The Moonstone - Wilkie Collins (ebook reader screen TXT) 📗

The objection struck me, all the more forcibly that it reflected an objection which I had felt myself.

“As to this,” pursued the lawyer taking up Rosanna Spearman’s confession, “I can understand that the letter is a distressing one to you. I can understand that you may hesitate to analyse it from a purely impartial point of view. But I am not in your position. I can bring my professional experience to bear on this document, just as I should bring it to bear on any other. Without alluding to the woman’s career as a thief, I will merely remark that her letter proves her to have been an adept at deception, on her own showing; and I argue from that, that I am justified in suspecting her of not having told the whole truth. I won’t start any theory, at present, as to what she may or may not have done. I will only say that, if Rachel has suspected you on the evidence of the nightgown only, the chances are ninety-nine to a hundred that Rosanna Spearman was the person who showed it to her. In that case, there is the woman’s letter, confessing that she was jealous of Rachel, confessing that she changed the roses, confessing that she saw a glimpse of hope for herself, in the prospect of a quarrel between Rachel and you. I don’t stop to ask who took the Moonstone (as a means to her end, Rosanna Spearman would have taken fifty Moonstones)⁠—I only say that the disappearance of the jewel gave this reclaimed thief who was in love with you, an opportunity of setting you and Rachel at variance for the rest of your lives. She had not decided on destroying herself, then, remember; and, having the opportunity, I distinctly assert that it was in her character, and in her position at the time, to take it. What do you say to that?”

“Some such suspicion,” I answered, “crossed my own mind, as soon as I opened the letter.”

“Exactly! And when you had read the letter, you pitied the poor creature, and couldn’t find it in your heart to suspect her. Does you credit, my dear sir⁠—does you credit!”

“But suppose it turns out that I did wear the nightgown? What then?”

“I don’t see how the fact can be proved,” said Mr. Bruff. “But assuming the proof to be possible, the vindication of your innocence would be no easy matter. We won’t go into that, now. Let us wait and see whether Rachel hasn’t suspected you on the evidence of the nightgown only.”

“Good God, how coolly you talk of Rachel suspecting me!” I broke out. “What right has she to suspect me, on any evidence, of being a thief?”

“A very sensible question, my dear sir. Rather hotly put⁠—but well worth considering for all that. What puzzles you, puzzles me too. Search your memory, and tell me this. Did anything happen while you were staying at the house⁠—not, of course, to shake Rachel’s belief in your honour⁠—but, let us say, to shake her belief (no matter with how little reason) in your principles generally?”

I started, in ungovernable agitation, to my feet. The lawyer’s question reminded me, for the first time since I had left England, that something had happened.

In the eighth chapter of Betteredge’s Narrative, an allusion will be found to the arrival of a foreigner and a stranger at my aunt’s house, who came to see me on business. The nature of his business was this.

I had been foolish enough (being, as usual, straitened for money at the time) to accept a loan from the keeper of a small restaurant in Paris, to whom I was well known as a customer. A time was settled between us for paying the money back; and when the time came, I found it (as thousands of other honest men have found it) impossible to keep my engagement. I sent the man a bill. My name was unfortunately too well known on such documents: he failed to negotiate it. His affairs had fallen into disorder, in the interval since I had borrowed of him; bankruptcy stared him in the face; and a relative of his, a French lawyer, came to England to find me, and to insist upon the payment of my debt. He was a man of violent temper; and he took the wrong way with me. High words passed on both sides; and my aunt and Rachel were unfortunately in the next room, and heard us. Lady Verinder came in, and insisted on knowing what was the matter. The Frenchman produced his credentials, and declared me to be responsible for the ruin of a poor man, who had trusted in my honour. My aunt instantly paid him the money, and sent him off. She knew me better of course than to take the Frenchman’s view of the transaction. But she was shocked at my carelessness, and justly angry with me for placing myself in a position, which, but for her interference, might have become a very disgraceful one. Either her mother told her, or Rachel heard what passed⁠—I can’t say which. She took her own romantic, high-flown view of the matter. I was “heartless”; I was “dishonourable”; I had “no principle”; there was “no knowing what I might do next”⁠—in short, she said some of the severest things to me which I had ever heard from a young lady’s lips. The breach between us lasted for the whole of the next day. The day after, I succeeded in making my peace, and thought no more of it. Had Rachel reverted to this unlucky accident, at the critical moment when my place in her estimation was again, and far more seriously, assailed? Mr. Bruff, when I had mentioned the circumstances to him, answered the question at once in the affirmative.

“It would have its effect on her mind,” he said gravely. “And I wish, for your sake, the thing had not happened. However, we have discovered that