No Name - Wilkie Collins (free e books to read online .TXT) 📗

this morning. But for that last piece of intelligence, I should have been on my way back to Scotland before now. As it is, I cannot decide for myself what I ought to do next. My going back to Dumfries, after Mr. Vanstone has left it, seems like taking a journey for nothing⁠—and my staying in London appears to be almost equally useless.

“Will you kindly advise me in this difficulty? I will come to you at Lincoln’s Inn at any time this afternoon or tomorrow which you may appoint. My next few hours are engaged. As soon as this letter is dispatched, I am going to Kensington, with the object of ascertaining whether certain doubts I feel about the means by which Mrs. Lecount may have accomplished her discovery are well founded or not. If you will let me have your answer by return of post, I will not fail to get back to St. John’s Wood in time to receive it.

“Believe me, dear sir, yours sincerely,

“Magdalen Vanstone.”

II From Mr. Loscombe to Mrs. Noel Vanstone

“Lincoln’s Inn, November 5th.

“Dear Madam⁠—Your letter and its inclosure have caused me great concern and surprise. Pressure of business allows me no hope of being able to see you either today or tomorrow morning. But if three o’clock tomorrow afternoon will suit you, at that hour you will find me at your service.

“I cannot pretend to offer a positive opinion until I know more of the particulars connected with this extraordinary business than I find communicated either in your letter or in your maid’s. But with this reserve, I venture to suggest that your remaining in London until tomorrow may possibly lead to other results besides your consultation at my chambers. There is at least a chance that you or I may hear something further in this strange matter by the morning’s post.

“I remain, dear madam, faithfully yours,

“John Loscombe.”

III From Mrs. Noel Vanstone to Miss Garth

“November 5th, Two o’Clock.

“I have just returned from Westmoreland House⁠—after purposely leaving it in secret, and purposely avoiding you under your own roof. You shall know why I came, and why I went away. It is due to my remembrance of old times not to treat you like a stranger, although I can never again treat you like a friend.

“I set forth on the third from the North to London. My only object in taking this long journey was to see Norah. I had been suffering for many weary weeks past such remorse as only miserable women like me can feel. Perhaps the suffering weakened me; perhaps it roused some old forgotten tenderness⁠—God knows!⁠—I can’t explain it; I can only tell you that I began to think of Norah by day, and to dream of Norah by night, till I was almost heartbroken. I have no better reason than this to give for running all the risks which I ran, and coming to London to see her. I don’t wish to claim more for myself than I deserve; I don’t wish to tell you I was the reformed and repenting creature whom you might have approved. I had only one feeling in me that I know of. I wanted to put my arms round Norah’s neck, and cry my heart out on Norah’s bosom. Childish enough, I dare say. Something might have come of it; nothing might have come of it⁠—who knows?

“I had no means of finding Norah without your assistance. However you might disapprove of what I had done, I thought you would not refuse to help me to find my sister. When I lay down last night in my strange bed, I said to myself, ‘I will ask Miss Garth, for my father’s sake and my mother’s sake, to tell me.’ You don’t know what a comfort I felt in that thought. How should you? What do good women like you know of miserable sinners like me? All you know is that you pray for us at church.

“Well, I fell asleep happily that night⁠—for the first time since my marriage. When the morning came, I paid the penalty of daring to be happy only for one night. When the morning came, a letter came with it, which told me that my bitterest enemy on earth (you have meddled sufficiently with my affairs to know what enemy I mean) had revenged herself on me in my absence. In following the impulse which led me to my sister, I had gone to my ruin.

“The mischief was beyond all present remedy, when I received the news of it. Whatever had happened, whatever might happen, I made up my mind to persist in my resolution of seeing Norah before I did anything else. I suspected you of being concerned in the disaster which had overtaken me⁠—because I felt positively certain at Aldborough that you and Mrs. Lecount had written to each other. But I never suspected Norah. If I lay on my deathbed at this moment I could say with a safe conscience I never suspected Norah.

“So I went this morning to Westmoreland House to ask you for my sister’s address, and to acknowledge plainly that I suspected you of being again in correspondence with Mrs. Lecount.

“When I inquired for you at the door, they told me you had gone out, but that you were expected back before long. They asked me if I would see your sister, who was then in the schoolroom. I desired that your sister should on no account be disturbed: my business was not with her, but with you. I begged to be allowed to wait in a room by myself until you returned.

“They showed me into the double room on the ground-floor, divided by curtains⁠—as it was when I last remember it. There was a fire in the outer division of the room, but none in the inner; and for that reason, I suppose, the curtains were drawn. The servant was very civil