"Haven't you seen it?"
"No, Miss."
"What time did you get up?"
"At seven, Miss."
At seven I was still writing in my Journal, and the mist was still over
everything in the room. Persons in the lower ranks of life are curiously
unobservant of the aspects of Nature. I never (in the days of my
blindness) got any information from servants or laborers about the views
round Dimchurch. They seemed to have no eyes for anything beyond the
range of the kitchen, or the ploughed field. I got out of bed, and took
the maid myself to the window, and opened it.
"There!" I said. "It is not quite so thick as it was some hours since.
But there is the mist as plain as can be!"
The girl looked backwards and forwards in a state of bewilderment between
me and the view.
"Mist?" she repeated. "Begging your pardon, Miss, it's a beautiful clear
morning--as I see it."
"Clear?" I repeated on my side.
"Yes, Miss!"
"Do you mean to tell me it's clear over the sea?"
"The sea is a beautiful blue, Miss. Far and near, you can see the ships."
"Where are the ships?"
She pointed, out of the window, to a certain spot.
"There are two of them, Miss. A big ship, with three masts. And a little
ship just behind, with one."
I looked along her finger, and strained my eyes to see. All I could make
out was a dim greyish mist, with something like a little spot or blur on
it, at the place which the maid's finger indicated as the position
occupied by the two ships.
The idea struck me for the first time that the dimness which I had
attributed to the mist, was, in plain truth, the dimness in my own eyes.
For the moment I was a little startled. I left the window, and made the
best excuse that I could to the girl. As soon as it was possible to
dismiss her, I sent her away, and bathed my eyes with one of Grosse's
lotions, and then tried them again in writing this entry. To my relief, I
can see to write better than I did earlier in the morning. Still, I have
had a warning to pay a little more attention to Grosse's directions than
I have hitherto done. Is it possible that he saw something in the state
of my eyes which he was afraid to tell me of? Nonsense! Grosse is not the
sort of man who shrinks from speaking out. I have fatigued my eyes--that
is all. Let me shut up my book, and go down-stairs to breakfast.
_Ten o'clock._--For a moment, I open my Journal again.
Something has happened which I must positively set down in the history of
my life. I am so vexed and so angry! The maid, (wretched chattering
fool!) has told my aunt what passed between us this morning at my window.
Miss Batchford has taken the alarm, and has insisted on writing, not only
to Grosse, but to my father. In the present embittered state of my
father's feelings against my aunt, he will either leave her letter
unanswered, or he will offend her by an angry reply. In either case, I
shall be the sufferer: my aunt's sense of injury--which cannot address
itself to my father--will find a convenient object to assail in me. I
shall never hear the last of it. Being already nervous and dispirited,
the prospect of finding myself involved in a new family quarrel quite
daunts me. I feel ungratefully inclined to run away from Miss Batchford,
when I think of it!
No signs of Oscar; and no news of Oscar--yet.
_Twelve o'clock._--But one trial more was wanted to make my life here
quite unendurable. The trial has come.
A letter from Oscar (sent by a messenger from his hotel) has just been
placed in my hands. It informs me that he has decided on leaving Ramsgate
by the next train. The next train starts in forty minutes. Good God! what
am I to do?
My eyes are burning. I know it does them harm to cry. How can I help
crying? It is all over between us, if I let Oscar go away alone--his
letter as good as tells me so. Oh, why have I behaved so coldly to him? I
ought to make any sacrifice of my own feelings to atone for it. And yet,
there is an obstinate something in me that shrinks--What am I to do? what
am I to do?
I must drop the pen, and try if I can think. My eyes completely fail me.
I can write no more.
[Note.--I copy the letter to which Lucilla refers.
Nugent's own assertion is, that he wrote it in a moment of remorse, to
give her an opportunity of breaking the engagement by which she
innocently supposed herself to be held to him. He declares that he
honestly believed the letter would offend her, when he wrote it. The
other interpretation of the document is, that finding himself obliged to
leave Ramsgate--under penalty (if he remained) of being exposed by Grosse
as an impostor, when the surgeon visited his patient on the next
day--Nugent seized the opportunity of making his absence the means of
working on Lucilla's feelings, so as to persuade her to accompany him to
London. Don't ask me which of these two conclusions I favor. For reasons
which you will understand when you have come to the end of my narrative,
I would rather not express my opinion, either one way or the other.
Read the letter--and determine for yourselves:
"MY DARLING,--After a sleepless night, I have decided on leaving
Ramsgate, by the next train that starts after you receive these lines.
Last night's experience has satisfied me that my presence here (after
what I said to you on the pier) only distresses you. Some influence that
is too strong for you to resist has changed your heart towards me. When
the time comes for you to determine whether you will be my wife on the
conditions that I have proposed, I see but too plainly that you will say
No. Let me make it less hard for you, my love, to do that, by leaving you
to write the word--instead of saying it to me. If you wish for your
freedom, cost me what it may, I will absolve you from your engagement. I
love you too dearly to blame you. My address in London is on the other
leaf. Farewell!
"OSCAR."
The address given on the blank leaf is at an hotel.
A few lines more in the Journal follow the lines last quoted in this
place. Except a word or two, here and there, it is impossible any longer
to decipher the writing. The mischief done to her eyes by her reckless
use of them, by her fits of crying, by her disturbed nights, by the
long-continued strain on her of agitation and suspense, has evidently
justified the worst of those unacknowledged forebodings which Grosse felt
when he saw her. The last lines of the Journal are, as writing, actually
inferior to her worst penmanship when she was blind.
However, the course which she ended in taking on receipt of the letter
which you have just read, is sufficiently indicated by a note of Nugent's
writing, left at Miss Batchford's residence at Ramsgate by a porter from
the railway. After-events make it necessary to preserve this note also.
It runs thus:--
"MADAM,--I write, by Lucilla's wish, to beg that you will not be anxious
on discovering that your niece has left Ramsgate. She accompanies me, at
my express request, to the house of a married lady who is a relative of
mine, and under whose care she will remain, until the time arrives for
our marriage. The reasons which have led to her taking this step, and
which oblige her to keep her new place of residence concealed for the
present, will be frankly stated to you and to her father on the day when
we are man and wife. In the meantime, Lucilla begs that you will excuse
her abrupt departure, and that you will be so good as to send this letter
on to her father. Both you and he will, I hope, remember that she is of
an age to act for herself, and that she is only hastening her marriage
with a man to whom she has been long engaged, with the sanction and
approval of her family--Believe me, Madam, your faithful Servant,
"OSCAR DUBOURG."
This letter was delivered at luncheon-time--almost at the moment when the
servant had announced to her mistress that Miss Finch was nowhere to be
found, and that her traveling-bag had disappeared from her room. The
London train had then started. Miss Batchford, having no right to
interfere, decided--after consultation with a friend--on at once
traveling to Dimchurch, and placing the matter in Mr. Finch's hands.--P.]