1. _From Mrs. Oldershaw (Diana Street, Pimlico) to Miss Gwilt (West
Place, Old Brompton)_.
“Ladies’ Toilet Repository, June 20th,
“Eight in the Evening.
“MY DEAR LYDIA--About three hours have passed, as well as I can
remember, since I pushed you unceremoniously inside my house in West
Place, and, merely telling you to wait till you saw me again, banged
the door to between us, and left you alone in the hall. I know your
sensitive nature, my dear, and I am afraid you have made up your mind
by this time that never yet was a guest treated so abominably by her
hostess as I have treated you.
“The delay that has prevented me from explaining my strange conduct
is, believe me, a delay for which I am not to blame. One of the many
delicate little difficulties which beset so essentially confidential
a business as mine occurred here (as I have since discovered) while
we were taking the air this afternoon in Kensington Gardens. I see no
chance of being able to get back to you for some hours to come, and I
have a word of very urgent caution for your private ear, which has been
too long delayed already. So I must use the spare minutes as they come,
and write.
“Here is caution the first. On no account venture outside the door again
this evening, and be very careful, while the daylight lasts, not to
show yourself at any of the front windows. I have reason to fear that
a certain charming person now staying with me may possibly be watched.
Don’t be alarmed, and don’t be impatient; you shall know why.
“I can only explain myself by going back to our unlucky meeting in the
Gardens with that reverend gentleman who was so obliging as to follow us
both back to my house.
“It crossed my mind, just as we were close to the door, that there
might be a motive for the parson’s anxiety to trace us home, far less
creditable to his taste, and far more dangerous to both of us, than
the motive you supposed him to have. In plainer words, Lydia, I rather
doubted whether you had met with another admirer; and I strongly
suspected that you had encountered another enemy instead. There was
no time to tell you this. There was only time to see you safe into the
house, and to make sure of the parson (in case my suspicions were right)
by treating him as he had treated us; I mean, by following him in his
turn.
“I kept some little distance behind him at first, to turn the thing over
in my mind, and to be satisfied that my doubts were not misleading me.
We have no concealments from each other; and you shall know what my
doubts were.
“I was not surprised at _your_ recognizing _him_; he is not at all
a common-looking old man; and you had seen him twice in
Somersetshire--once when you asked your way of him to Mrs. Armadale’s
house, and once when you saw him again on your way back to the railroad.
But I was a little puzzled (considering that you had your veil down
on both those occasions, and your veil down also when we were in the
Gardens) at his recognizing _you_. I doubted his remembering your figure
in a summer dress after he had only seen it in a winter dress; and
though we were talking when he met us, and your voice is one among your
many charms, I doubted his remembering your voice, either. And yet
I felt persuaded that he knew you. ‘How?’ you will ask. My dear, as
ill-luck would have it, we were speaking at the time of young Armadale.
I firmly believe that the name was the first thing that struck him; and
when he heard _that_, your voice certainly and your figure perhaps,
came back to his memory. ‘And what if it did?’ you may say. Think again,
Lydia, and tell me whether the parson of the place where Mrs. Armadale
lived was not likely to be Mrs. Armadale’s friend? If he _was_ her
friend, the very first person to whom she would apply for advice
after the manner in which you frightened her, and after what you most
injudiciously said on the subject of appealing to her son, would be the
clergyman of the parish--and the magistrate, too, as the landlord at the
inn himself told you.
“You will now understand why I left you in that extremely uncivil
manner, and I may go on to what happened next.
“I followed the old gentleman till he turned into a quiet street,
and then accosted him, with respect for the Church written (I flatter
myself) in every line of my face.
“‘Will you excuse me,’ I said, ‘if I venture to inquire, sir, whether
you recognized the lady who was walking with me when you happened to
pass us in the Gardens?’
“‘Will you excuse my asking, ma’am, why you put that question?’ was all
the answer I got.
“‘I will endeavor to tell you, sir,’ I said. ‘If my friend is not an
absolute stranger to you, I should wish to request your attention to a
very delicate subject, connected with a lady deceased, and with her son
who survives her.’
“He was staggered; I could see that. But he was sly enough at the same
time to hold his tongue and wait till I said something more.
“‘If I am wrong, sir, in thinking that you recognized my friend,’ I went
on, ‘I beg to apologize. But I could hardly suppose it possible that a
gentleman in your profession would follow a lady home who was a total
stranger to him.’
“There I had him. He colored up (fancy that, at his age!), and owned the
truth, in defense of his own precious character.
“‘I have met with the lady once before, and I acknowledge that I
recognized her in the Gardens,’ he said. ‘You will excuse me if I
decline entering into the question of whether I did or did not purposely
follow her home. If you wish to be assured that your friend is not an
absolute stranger to me, you now have that assurance; and if you have
anything particular to say to me, I leave you to decide whether the time
has come to say it.’
“He waited, and looked about. I waited, and looked about. He said the
street was hardly a fit place to speak of a delicate subject in. I said
the street was hardly a fit place to speak of a delicate subject in. He
didn’t offer to take me to where he lived. I didn’t offer to take him
to where I lived. Have you ever seen two strange cats, my dear, nose to
nose on the tiles? If you have, you have seen the parson and me done to
the life.
“‘Well, ma’am,’ he said, at last, ‘shall we go on with our conversation
in spite of circumstances?’
“‘Yes, sir,’ I said; ‘we are both of us, fortunately, of an age to set
circumstances at defiance’ (I had seen the old wretch looking at my gray
hair, and satisfying himself that his character was safe if he _was_
seen with me).
“After all this snapping and snarling, we came to the point at last. I
began by telling him that I feared his interest in you was not of the
friendly sort. He admitted that much--of course, in defense of his own
character once more. I next repeated to him everything you had told me
about your proceedings in Somersetshire, when we first found that he was
following us home. Don’t be alarmed my dear--I was acting on principle.
If you want to make a dish of lies digestible, always give it a garnish
of truth. Well, having appealed to the reverend gentleman’s confidence
in this matter, I next declared that you had become an altered woman
since he had seen you last. I revived that dead wretch, your husband
(without mentioning names, of course), established him (the first place
I thought of) in business at the Brazils, and described a letter which
he had written, offering to forgive his erring wife, if she would repent
and go back to him. I assured the parson that your husband’s noble
conduct had softened your obdurate nature; and then, thinking I had
produced the right impression, I came boldly to close quarters with him.
I said, ‘At the very time when you met us, sir, my unhappy friend was
speaking in terms of touching, self-reproach of her conduct to the late
Mrs. Armadale. She confided to me her anxiety to make some atonement,
if possible, to Mrs. Armadale’s son; and it is at her entreaty (for she
cannot prevail on herself to face you) that I now beg to inquire whether
Mr. Armadale is still in Somersetshire, and whether he would consent
to take back in small installments the sum of money which my friend
acknowledges that she received by practicing on Mrs. Armadale’s fears.’
Those were my very words. A neater story (accounting so nicely for
everything) was never told; it was a story to melt a stone. But this
Somersetshire parson is harder than stone itself. I blush for _him_,
my dear, when I assure you that he was evidently insensible enough to
disbelieve every word I said about your reformed character, your husband
in the Brazils, and your penitent anxiety to pay the money back. It is
really a disgrace that such a man should be in the Church; such
cunning as his is in the last degree unbecoming in a member of a sacred
profession.
“‘Does your friend propose to join her husband by the next steamer?’ was
all he condescended to say, when I had done.
“I acknowledge I was angry. I snapped at him. I said, ‘Yes, she does.’
“‘How am I to communicate with her?’ he asked.
“I snapped at him again. ‘By letter--through me.’
“‘At what address, ma’am?’
“There, I had him once more. ‘You have found my address out for
yourself, sir,’ I said. ‘The directory will tell you my name, if you
wish to find that out for yourself also; otherwise, you are welcome to
my card.’
“‘Many thanks, ma’am. If your friend wishes to communicate with Mr.
Armadale, I will give you _my_ card in return.’
“‘Thank you, sir.’
“‘Thank you, ma’am.’
“‘Good-afternoon, sir.’
“‘Good-afternoon, ma’am.’
“So we parted. I went my way to an appointment at my place of business,
and he went his in a hurry; which is of itself suspicious. What I can’t
get over is his heartlessness. Heaven help the people who send for _him_
to comfort them on their death-beds!
“The next consideration is, What are we to do? If we don’t find out the
right way to keep this old wretch in the dark, he may be the ruin of us
at Thorpe Ambrose just as we are within easy reach of our end in view.
Wait up till I come to you, with my mind free, I hope, from the other
difficulty which is worrying me here. Was there ever such ill luck as
ours? Only think of that man deserting his congregation, and coming
to London just at the very time when we have answered Major Milroy’s
advertisement, and may expect the inquiries to be made next week! I have
no patience with him; his bishop ought to interfere.
“Affectionately yours,
“MARIA OLDERSHAW.”