Uncle Silas - J. Sheridan Le Fanu (best novels to read for students .TXT) 📗

at the Pension, in France; Madame de la Rougierre shall accompany you,” said my uncle, delivering his directions with the stern monotony and the measured pauses of a person dictating an important despatch to a secretary. “Old Mrs. Quince shall follow with me, or, if alone, in a week. You shall pass tonight in London; tomorrow night you proceed thence to Dover, and cross by the mail-packet. You shall now sit down and write a letter to your cousin Monica Knollys, which I will first read and then despatch. Tomorrow you shall write a note to Lady Knollys, from London, telling her how you have got over so much of your journey, and that you cannot write from Dover, as you must instantly start by the packet on reaching it; and that until my affairs are a little settled, you cannot write to her from France, as it is of high importance to my safety that no clue should exist as to our address. Intelligence, however, shall reach her through my attorneys, Archer and Sleigh, and I trust we shall soon return. You will, please, submit that latter note to Madame de la Rougierre, who has my directions to see that it contains no libels upon my character. Now, sit down.”

So, with those unpleasant words tingling in my ears, I obeyed.

“Write,” said he, when I was duly placed. “You shall convey the substance of what I say in your own language. The immiment danger this morning announced of an execution⁠—remember the word,” and he spelled it for me⁠—“being put into this house either this afternoon or tomorrow, compels me to anticipate my plans, and despatch you for France this day. That you are starting with an attendant.” Here an uneasy movement from Madame, whose dignity was perhaps excited. “An attendant,” he repeated, with a discordant emphasis; “and you can, if you please⁠—but I don’t solicit that justice⁠—say that you have been as kindly treated here as my unfortunate circumstances would permit. That is all. You have just fifteen minutes to write. Begin.”

I wrote accordingly. My hysterical state had made me far less combative than I might have proved some months since, for there was much that was insulting as well as formidable in his manner. I completed my letter, however, to his satisfaction in the prescribed time; and he said, as he laid it and its envelope on the table⁠—

“Please to remember that this lady is not your attendant only, but that she has authority to direct every detail respecting your journey, and will make all the necessary payments on the way. You will please, then, implicitly to comply with her directions. The carriage awaits you at the hall-door.”

Having thus spoken, with another grim bow, and “I wish you a safe and pleasant journey,” he receded a step or two, and I, with an undefinable kind of melancholy, though also with a sense of relief, withdrew.

My letter, I afterwards found, reached Lady Knollys, accompanied by one from Uncle Silas, who said⁠—“Dear Maud apprises me that she has written to tell you something of our movements. A sudden crisis in my miserable affairs compels a breakup as sudden here. Maud joins my daughter at the Pension, in France. I purposely omit the address, because I mean to reside in its vicinity until this storm shall have blown over; and as the consequences of some of my unhappy entanglements might pursue me even there, I must only for the present spare you the pain and trouble of keeping a secret. I am sure that for some little time you will excuse the girl’s silence; in the meantime you shall hear of them, and perhaps circuitously, from me. Our dear Maud started this morning en route for her destination, very sorry, as am I, that she could not enjoy first a flying visit to Elverston, but in high spirits, notwithstanding, at the new life and sights before her.”

At the door my beloved old friend, Mary Quince, awaited me.

“Am I going with you, Miss Maud?”

I burst into tears and clasped her in my arms.

“I’m not,” said Mary, very sorrowfully; “and I never was from you yet, Miss, since you wasn’t the length of my arm.”

And kind old Mary began to cry with me.

“Bote you are coming in a few days, Mary Quince,” expostulated Madame. “I wonder you are soche fool. What is two, three days? Bah! nonsense, girl.”

Another farewell to poor Mary Quince, quite bewildered at the suddenness of her bereavement. A serious and tremulous bow from our little old butler on the steps. Madame bawling through the open window to the driver to make good speed, and remember that we had but nineteen minutes to reach the station. Away we went. Old Crowle’s iron grille rolled back before us. I looked on the receding landscape, the giant trees⁠—the palatial, time-stained mansion. A strange conflict of feelings, sweet and bitter, rose and mingled in the reverie. Had I been too hard and suspicious with the inhabitants of that old house of my family? Was my uncle justly indignant? Was I ever again to know such pleasant rambles as some of those I had enjoyed with dear Millicent through the wild and beautiful woodlands I was leaving behind me? And there, with my latest glimpse of the front of Bartram-Haugh, I beheld dear old Mary Quince gazing after us. Again my tears flowed. I waved my handkerchief from the window; and now the park-wall hid all from view, and at a great pace, throught the steep wooded glen, with the rocky and precipitous character of a ravine, we glided; and when the road next emerged, Bartram-Haugh was a misty mass of forest and chimneys, slope and hollow, and we within a few minutes of the station.

XXV The Journey

Waiting for the train, as we stood upon the platform, I looked back again toward the wooded uplands of Bartram; and far behind, the fine range