The Woman in White
course can I possibly take except the course of asserting them? My
hands are bound—don’t you see, my dear sir?—my hands are bound.”
“You maintain your note on the clause, then, to the letter?” I said.
“Yes—deuce take it! I have no other alternative.” He walked to the
fireplace and warmed himself, humming the fag end of a tune in a rich
convivial bass voice. “What does your side say?” he went on; “now pray
tell me—what does your side say?”
I was ashamed to tell him. I attempted to gain time—nay, I did worse.
My legal instincts got the better of me, and I even tried to bargain.
“Twenty thousand pounds is rather a large sum to be given up by the
lady’s friends at two days’ notice,” I said.
“Very true,” replied Mr. Merriman, looking down thoughtfully at his
boots. “Properly put, sir—most properly put!”
“A compromise, recognising the interests of the lady’s family as well
as the interests of the husband, might not perhaps have frightened
my client quite so much,” I went on. “Come, come! this contingency
resolves itself into a matter of bargaining after all. What is the
least you will take?”
“The least we will take,” said Mr. Merriman, “is nineteen-thousand-
nine-hundred-and-ninety-nine-pounds-nineteen-shillings-and-elevenpence-
three-farthings. Ha! ha! ha! Excuse me, Mr. Gilmore. I must have my
little joke.”
“Little enough,” I remarked. “The joke is just worth the odd farthing
it was made for.”
Mr. Merriman was delighted. He laughed over my retort till the room
rang again. I was not half so good-humoured on my side; I came back to
business, and closed the interview.
“This is Friday,” I said. “Give us till Tuesday next for our final
answer.”
“By all means,” replied Mr. Merriman. “Longer, my dear sir, if you
like.” He took up his hat to go, and then addressed me again. “By the
way,” he said, “your clients in Cumberland have not heard anything more
of the woman who wrote the anonymous letter, have they?”
“Nothing more,” I answered. “Have you found no trace of her?”
“Not yet,” said my legal friend. “But we don’t despair. Sir Percival
has his suspicions that Somebody is keeping her in hiding, and we are
having that Somebody watched.”
“You mean the old woman who was with her in Cumberland,” I said.
“Quite another party, sir,” answered Mr. Merriman. “We don’t happen to
have laid hands on the old woman yet. Our Somebody is a man. We have
got him close under our eye here in London, and we strongly suspect
he had something to do with helping her in the first instance to
escape from the Asylum. Sir Percival wanted to question him at once,
but I said, ‘No. Questioning him will only put him on his guard—watch
him, and wait.’ We shall see what happens. A dangerous woman to be
at large, Mr. Gilmore; nobody knows what she may do next. I wish you
good-morning, sir. On Tuesday next I shall hope for the pleasure of
hearing from you.” He smiled amiably and went out.
My mind had been rather absent during the latter part of the
conversation with my legal friend. I was so anxious about the matter
of the settlement that I had little attention to give to any other
subject, and the moment I was left alone again I began to think over
what my next proceeding ought to be.
In the case of any other client I should have acted on my instructions,
however personally distasteful to me, and have given up the point
about the twenty thousand pounds on the spot. But I could not act with
this business-like indifference towards Miss Fairlie. I had an honest
feeling of affection and admiration for her—I remembered gratefully
that her father had been the kindest patron and friend to me that ever
man had—I had felt towards her while I was drawing the settlement as I
might have felt, if I had not been an old bachelor, towards a daughter
of my own, and I was determined to spare no personal sacrifice in her
service and where her interests were concerned. Writing a second time
to Mr. Fairlie was not to be thought of—it would only be giving him
a second opportunity of slipping through my fingers. Seeing him and
personally remonstrating with him might possibly be of more use. The
next day was Saturday. I determined to take a return ticket and jolt my
old bones down to Cumberland, on the chance of persuading him to adopt
the just, the independent, and the honourable course. It was a poor
chance enough, no doubt, but when I had tried it my conscience would be
at ease. I should then have done all that a man in my position could do
to serve the interests of my old friend’s only child.
The weather on Saturday was beautiful, a west wind and a bright sun.
Having felt latterly a return of that fulness and oppression of the
head, against which my doctor warned me so seriously more than two
years since, I resolved to take the opportunity of getting a little
extra exercise by sending my bag on before me and walking to the
terminus in Euston Square. As I came out into Holborn a gentleman
walking by rapidly stopped and spoke to me. It was Mr. Walter Hartright.
If he had not been the first to greet me I should certainly have
passed him. He was so changed that I hardly knew him again. His face
looked pale and haggard—his manner was hurried and uncertain—and his
dress, which I remembered as neat and gentlemanlike when I saw him at
Limmeridge, was so slovenly now that I should really have been ashamed
of the appearance of it on one of my own clerks.
“Have you been long back from Cumberland?” he asked. “I heard from Miss
Halcombe lately. I am aware that Sir Percival Glyde’s explanation has
been considered satisfactory. Will the marriage take place soon? Do you
happen to know, Mr. Gilmore?”
He spoke so fast, and crowded his questions together so strangely
and confusedly, that I could hardly follow him. However accidentally
intimate he might have been with the family at Limmeridge, I could
not see that he had any right to expect information on their private
affairs, and I determined to drop him, as easily as might be, on the
subject of Miss Fairlie’s marriage.
“Time will show, Mr. Hartright,” I said—“time will show. I dare say if
we look out for the marriage in the papers we shall not be far wrong.
Excuse my noticing it, but I am sorry to see you not looking so well as
you were when we last met.”
A momentary nervous contraction quivered about his lips and eyes,
and made me half reproach myself for having answered him in such a
significantly guarded manner.
“I had no right to ask about her marriage,” he said bitterly. “I must
wait to see it in the newspapers like other people. Yes,”—he went on
before I could make any apologies—“I have not been well lately. I am
going to another country to try a change of scene and occupation. Miss
Halcombe has kindly assisted me with her influence, and my testimonials
have been found satisfactory. It is a long distance off, but I don’t
care where I go, what the climate is, or how long I am away.” He looked
about him while he said this at the throng of strangers passing us by
on either side, in a strange, suspicious manner, as if he thought that
some of them might be watching us.
“I wish you well through it, and safe back again,” I said, and then
added, so as not to keep him altogether at arm’s length on the subject
of the Fairlies, “I am going down to Limmeridge to-day on business.
Miss Halcombe and Miss Fairlie are away just now on a visit to some
friends in Yorkshire.”
His eyes brightened, and he seemed about to say something in answer,
but the same momentary nervous spasm crossed his face again. He took my
hand, pressed it hard, and disappeared among the crowd without saying
another word. Though he was little more than a stranger to me, I waited
for a moment, looking after him almost with a feeling of regret. I had
gained in my profession sufficient experience of young men to know what
the outward signs and tokens were of their beginning to go wrong, and
when I resumed my walk to the railway I am sorry to say I felt more
than doubtful about Mr. Hartright’s future.
IV
Leaving by an early train, I got to Limmeridge in time for dinner.
The house was oppressively empty and dull. I had expected that good
Mrs. Vesey would have been company for me in the absence of the young
ladies, but she was confined to her room by a cold. The servants were
so surprised at seeing me that they hurried and bustled absurdly, and
made all sorts of annoying mistakes. Even the butler, who was old
enough to have known better, brought me a bottle of port that was
chilled. The reports of Mr. Fairlie’s health were just as usual, and
when I sent up a message to announce my arrival, I was told that he
would be delighted to see me the next morning but that the sudden news
of my appearance had prostrated him with palpitations for the rest of
the evening. The wind howled dismally all night, and strange cracking
and groaning noises sounded here, there, and everywhere in the empty
house. I slept as wretchedly as possible, and got up in a mighty bad
humour to breakfast by myself the next morning.
At ten o’clock I was conducted to Mr. Fairlie’s apartments. He was
in his usual room, his usual chair, and his usual aggravating state
of mind and body. When I went in, his valet was standing before him,
holding up for inspection a heavy volume of etchings, as long and as
broad as my office writing-desk. The miserable foreigner grinned in the
most abject manner, and looked ready to drop with fatigue, while his
master composedly turned over the etchings, and brought their hidden
beauties to light with the help of a magnifying glass.
“You very best of good old friends,” said Mr. Fairlie, leaning back
lazily before he could look at me, “are you QUITE well? How nice of you
to come here and see me in my solitude. Dear Gilmore!”
I had expected that the valet would be dismissed when I appeared, but
nothing of the sort happened. There he stood, in front of his master’s
chair, trembling under the weight of the etchings, and there Mr.
Fairlie sat, serenely twirling the magnifying glass between his white
fingers and thumbs.
“I have come to speak to you on a very important matter,” I said, “and
you will therefore excuse me, if I suggest that we had better be alone.”
The unfortunate valet looked at me gratefully. Mr. Fairlie faintly
repeated my last three words, “better be alone,” with every appearance
of the utmost possible astonishment.
I was in no humour for trifling, and I resolved to make him understand
what I meant.
“Oblige me by giving that man permission to withdraw,” I said, pointing
to the valet.
Mr. Fairlie arched his eyebrows and pursed up his lips in sarcastic
surprise.
“Man?” he repeated. “You provoking old Gilmore, what can you possibly
mean by calling him a man? He’s nothing of the sort. He might have been
a man half an hour ago, before I wanted my etchings, and he may be a
man half an hour hence, when I don’t want them any longer. At present
he is simply a portfolio stand. Why object, Gilmore, to a portfolio
stand?”
“I DO object. For the third time, Mr. Fairlie, I beg that we may be
alone.”
My tone and manner left him no alternative but to comply with my
request. He looked at the servant, and pointed peevishly to a chair at
his side.
“Put down the etchings and go away,” he said. “Don’t upset me by losing
my place. Have you, or have you not, lost my place? Are you sure you
have not? And have you put my hand-bell quite within my reach? Yes?
Then why the devil don’t you go?”
The valet went out. Mr. Fairlie twisted himself round in his chair,
polished the magnifying glass with his delicate cambric handkerchief,
and indulged himself with a sidelong inspection of the open volume of
etchings. It was not easy to keep my temper under these circumstances,
but I did keep it.