Armadale

by Wilkie Collins

  ‘But,’ you may say, ‘supposing all this, here I am, at my very best, a good sixteen years older than he is;2 and that is against me at starting.’ Is it? Just think again. Surely, your own experience must have shown you that the commonest of all common weaknesses, in young fellows of this Armadale’s age, is to fall in love with women older than themselves? Who are the men who really appreciate us in the bloom of our youth (I’m sure I have cause to speak well of the bloom of youth; I made fifty guineas to-day by putting it on the spotted shoulders of a woman old enough to be your mother), – who are the men, I say, who are ready to worship us when we are mere babies of seventeen? The gay young gentlemen in the bloom of their own youth? No! The cunning old wretches who are on the wrong side of forty.

  And what is the moral of this, as the story-books say? The moral is that the chances, with such a head as you have got on your shoulders, are all in your favour. If you feel your present forlorn position, as I believe you do; if you know what a charming woman (in the men’s eyes) you can still be, when you please; and if all your old resolution has really come back, after that shocking outbreak of desperation on board the steamer (natural enough, I own, under the dreadful provocation laid on you), you will want no further persuasion from me to try this experiment. Only to think of how things turn out! If the other young booby had not jumped into the river after you, this young booby would never have had the estate. It really looks as if fate had determined that you were to be Mrs Armadale, of Thorpe-Ambrose – and who can control his fate, as the poet says?

  Send me one line to say Yes or No; and believe me

  Your attached old friend

  MARIA OLDERSHAW.

  3. – From Miss Gwilt to Mrs Oldershaw

  Richmond, Thursday.

  YOU OLD WRETCH, – I won’t say Yes or No till I have had a long, long look at my glass first. If you had any real regard for anybody but your wicked old self, you would know that the bare idea of marrying again (after what I have gone through) is an idea that makes my flesh creep.

  But there can be no harm in your sending me a little more information, while I am making up my mind. You have got twenty pounds of mine still left out of those things you sold for me: send ten pounds here for my expenses, in a post-office order, and use the other ten for making private inquiries at Thorpe-Ambrose. I want to know when the two Blanchard women go away, and when young Armadale stirs up the dead ashes in the family fireplace. Are you quite sure he will turn out as easy to manage as you think? If he takes after his hypocrite of a mother, I can tell you this – Judas Iscariot has come to life again.

  I am very comfortable in this lodging. There are lovely flowers in the garden, and the birds wake me in the morning delightfully. I have hired a reasonably good piano. The only man I care two straws about – don’t be alarmed; he was laid in his grave many a long year ago, under the name of BEETHOVEN – keeps me company in my lonely hours. The landlady would keep me company, too, if I would only let her. I hate women. The new curate paid a visit to the other lodger yesterday, and passed me on the lawn as he came out. My eyes have lost nothing yet, at any rate, though I am five-and-thirty; the poor man actually blushed when I looked at him! What sort of colour do you think he would have turned, if one of the little birds in the garden had whispered in his ear, and told him the true story of the charming Miss Gwilt?

  Good-by, Mother Oldershaw. I rather doubt whether I am yours, or anybody’s, affectionately; but we all tell lies at the bottoms of our letters, don’t we? If you are my attached old friend, I must of course be

  Yours affectionately,

  LYDIA GWILT.

  P. S. – Keep your odious powders3 and paints and washes for the spotted shoulders of your customers; not one of them shall touch my skin, I promise you. If you really want to be useful, try and find out some quieting draught to keep me from grinding my teeth in my sleep. I shall break them one of these nights; and then what will become of my beauty, I wonder?

  4. – From Mrs Oldershaw to Miss Gwilt

  Ladies’ Toilette Repository, Tuesday.

  MY DEAR LYDIA, – It is a thousand pities your letter was not addressed to Mr Armadale; your graceful audacity would have charmed him. It doesn’t affect me; I am so well used to it, you know. Why waste your sparkling wit, my love, on your own impenetrable Oldershaw? – it only splutters and goes out. Will you try and be serious, this next time? I have news for you from Thorpe-Ambrose, which is beyond a joke, and which must not be trifled with.

  An hour after I got your letter, I set the inquiries on foot. Not knowing what consequences they might lead to, I thought it safest to begin in the dark. Instead of employing any of the people whom I have at my own disposal (who know you and know me), I went to the Private Inquiry Office in Shadyside Place, and put the matter in the inspector’s hands, in the character of a perfect stranger, and without mentioning you at all. This was not the cheapest way of going to work, I own; but it was the safest way, which is of much greater consequence.

  The inspector and I understood each other in ten minutes; and the right person for the purpose – the most harmless-looking young man you ever saw in your life – was produced immediately. He left for Thorpe-Ambrose an hour after I saw him. I arranged to call at the office on the afternoons of Saturday, Monday, and to-day, for news. There was no news till to-day – and there I found our Confidential Agent just returned to town, and waiting to favour me with a full account of his trip to Norfolk.

  First of all, let me quiet your mind about those two questions of yours; I have got answers to both the one and the other. The Blanchard women go away to foreign parts on the thirteenth; and young Armadale is at this moment cruising somewhere at sea in his yacht. There is talk at Thorpe-Ambrose of giving him a public reception, and of calling a meeting of the local grandees to settle it all. The speechifying and fuss on these occasions generally wastes plenty of time; and the public reception is not thought likely to meet the new Squire much before the end of the month.

  If our messenger had done no more for us than this, I think he would have earned his money. But the harmless young man is a regular Jesuit at a private inquiry – with this great advantage over all the Popish priests I have ever seen, that he has not got his slyness written in his face. Having to get his information through the female servants, in the usual way, he addressed himself, with admirable discretion, to the ugliest woman in the house. ‘When they are nice-looking, and can pick and choose,’ as he neatly expressed it to me, ‘they waste a great deal of valuable time in deciding on a sweetheart. When they are ugly, and haven’t got the ghost of a chance of choosing, they snap at a sweetheart, if he comes their way, like a starved dog at a bone.’ Acting on these excellent principles, our Confidential Agent succeeded, after certain unavoidable delays, in addressing himself to the upper housemaid at Thorpe-Ambrose, and took full possession of her confidence at the first interview. Bearing his instructions carefully in mind, he encouraged the woman to chatter, and was favoured, of course, with all the gossip of the servants’ hall. The greater part of it (as repeated to me) was of no earthly importance. But I listened patiently, and was rewarded by a valuable discovery at last. Here it is.

  It seems there is an ornamental cottage in the grounds at Thorpe-Ambrose. For some reason unknown, young Armadale has chosen to let it; and a tenant has come in already. He is a poor half-pay major in the army, named Milroy – a meek sort of man, by all accounts, with a turn for occupying himself in mechanical pursuits, and with a domestic incumbrance in the shape of a bedridden wife, who has not been seen by anybody. Well, and what of all this? you will ask, with that sparkling impatience which becomes you so well. My dear Lydia, don’t sparkle! The man’s family affairs seriously concern us both – for, as ill-luck will have it, the man has got a daughter!

  You may imagine how I questioned our agent, and how our agent ransacked his memory, when I stumbled, in due course, on such a discovery as this. If heaven is responsible for women’s chattering tongues, heaven be
praised! From Miss Blanchard to Miss Blanchard’s maid; from Miss Blanchard’s maid to Miss Blanchard’s aunt’s maid; from Miss Blanchard’s aunt’s maid, to the ugly housemaid; from the ugly housemaid to the harmless-looking young man – so the stream of gossip trickled into the right reservoir at last, and thirsty Mother Oldershaw has drunk it all up. In plain English, my dear, this is how it stands. The major’s daughter is a minx just turned sixteen; lively and nice-looking (hateful little wretch!), dowdy in her dress (thank heaven!), and deficient in her manners (thank heaven, again!). She has been brought up at home. The governess who last had charge of her, left before her father moved to Thorpe-Ambrose. Her education stands wofully in want of a finishing touch, and the major doesn’t quite know what to do next. None of his friends can recommend him a new governess, and he doesn’t like the notion of sending the girl to school. So matters rest at present, on the major’s own showing – for so the major expressed himself at a morning call which the father and daughter paid to the ladies at the great house.

  You have now got my promised news, and you will have little difficulty, I think, in agreeing with me, that the Armadale business must be settled at once, one way or the other. If – with your hopeless prospects, and with what I may call your family claim on this young fellow – you decide on giving him up, I shall have the pleasure of sending you the balance of your account with me (seven-and-twenty shillings), and shall then be free to devote myself entirely to my own proper business. If, on the contrary, you decide to try your luck at Thorpe-Ambrose, then (there being no kind of doubt that the major’s minx will set her cap at the young squire) I should be glad to hear how you mean to meet the double difficulty of inflaming Mr Armadale and extinguishing Miss Milroy.

  Affectionately yours,

  MARIA OLDERSHAW.

  5. – From Miss Gwilt to Mrs Oldershaw (First Answer)

  Richmond, Wednesday Morning.

  MRS OLDERSHAW, – Send me my seven-and-twenty shillings, and devote yourself to your own proper business.

  Yours,

  L. G.

  6. – From Miss Gwilt to Mrs Oldershaw (Second Answer)

  Richmond, Wednesday Night.

  DEAR OLD LOVE, – Keep the seven-and-twenty shillings, and burn my other letter. I have changed my mind.

  I wrote the first time, after a horrible night. I write, this time, after a ride on horseback, a tumbler of claret, and the breast of a chicken. Is that explanation enough? Please say Yes – for I want to go back to my piano.

  No; I can’t go back yet – I must answer your question first. But are you really so very simple as to suppose that I don’t see straight through you and your letter? You know that the major’s difficulty is our opportunity as well as I do – but you want me to take the responsibility of making the first proposal; don’t you? Suppose I take it in your own roundabout way? Suppose I say – ‘Pray don’t ask me how I propose inflaming Mr Armadale and extinguishing Miss Milroy; the question is so shockingly abrupt I really can’t answer it. Ask me instead, if it is the modest ambition of my life to become Miss Milroy’s governess?’ Yes, if you please, Mrs Oldershaw – and if you will assist me by becoming my reference.

  There it is for you! If some serious disaster happens (which is quite possible), what a comfort it will be to remember that it was all my fault!

  Now I have done this for you, will you do something for me? I want to dream away the little time I am likely to have left here, in my own way. Be a merciful Mother Oldershaw, and spare me the worry of looking at the Ins and Outs, and adding up the chances For and Against, in this new venture of mine. Think for me, in short, until I am obliged to think for myself.

  I had better not write any more, or I shall say something savage that you won’t like. I am in one of my tempers to-night. I want a husband to vex, or a child to beat, or something of that sort. Do you ever like to see the summer insects kill themselves in the candle? I do, sometimes. Good-night, Mrs Jezebel. The longer you can leave me here the better. The air agrees with me, and I am looking charmingly.

  L.G.

  7. – From Mrs Oldershaw to Miss Gwilt

  Thursday.

  MY DEAR LYDIA, – Some persons in my situation might be a little offended at the tone of your last letter. But I am so fondly attached to you! And when I love a person, it is so very hard, my dear, for that person to offend me! Don’t ride quite so far, and only drink half a tumblerful of claret next time. I say no more.

  Shall we leave off our fencing-match and come to serious matters now? How curiously hard it always seems to be for women to understand each other – especially when they have got their pens in their hands! But suppose we try.

  Well, then, to begin with – I gather from your letter that you have wisely decided to try the Thorpe-Ambrose experiment – and to secure, if you can, an excellent position at starting, by becoming a member of Major Milroy’s household. If the circumstances turn against you, and some other woman gets the governess’s place (about which I shall have something more to say presently), you will then have no choice but to make Mr Armadale’s acquaintance in some other character. In any case, you will want my assistance; and the first question therefore to set at rest between us, is the question of what I am willing to do, and what I can do, to help you.

  A woman, my dear Lydia, with your appearance, your manners, your abilities, and your education, can make almost any excursions into society that she pleases, if she only has money in her pocket and a respectable reference to appeal to in cases of emergency. As to the money, in the first place. I will engage to find it, on condition of your remembering my assistance with adequate pecuniary gratitude, if you win the Armadale prize. Your promise so to remember me, embodying the terms in plain figures, shall be drawn out on paper by my own lawyer; so that we can sign and settle at once when I see you in London.

  Next, as to the reference. Here, again, my services are at your disposal – on another condition. It is this: that you present yourself at Thorpe-Ambrose, under the name to which you have returned, ever since the dreadful business of your marriage – I mean your own maiden name of Gwilt. I have only one motive in insisting on this; I wish to run no needless risks. My experience, as confidential adviser of my customers, in various romantic cases of private embarrassment, has shown me that an assumed name is, nine times out of ten, a very unnecessary and a very dangerous form of deception. Nothing could justify your assuming a name but the fear of young Armadale’s detecting you – a fear from which we are fortunately relieved by his mother’s own conduct in keeping your early connection with her a profound secret from her son, and from everybody.

  The next, and last, perplexity to settle, relates, my dear, to the chances for and against your finding your way, in the capacity of governess, into Major Milroy’s house. Once inside the door, with your knowledge of music and languages, if you can keep your temper, you may be sure of keeping the place. The only doubt, as things are now, is whether you can get it.

  In the major’s present difficulty about his daughter’s education, the chances are, I think, in favour of his advertising for a governess. Say he does advertise, what address will he give for applicants to write to? There is the real pinch of the matter. If he gives an address in London, good-by to all chances in your favour at once; for this plain reason, that we shall not be able to pick out his advertisement from the advertisements of other people who want governesses, and who will give them addresses in London as well. If, on the other hand, our luck helps us, and he refers his correspondents to a shop, post-office, or what not, at Thorpe-Ambrose, there we have our advertiser as plainly picked out for us as we can wish. In this last case, I have little or no doubt – with me for your reference – of your finding your way into the major’s family circle. We have one great advantage over the other women who will answer the advertisement. Thanks to my inquiries on the spot, I know Major Milroy to be a poor man; and we will fix the salary you ask at a figure that is sure to tempt him. As for the style of the letter, if you
and I together can’t write a modest and interesting application for the vacant place, I should like to know who can?

  All this, however, is still in the future. For the present, my advice is – stay where you are, and dream to your heart’s content, till you hear from me again. I take in The Times regularly; and you may trust my wary eye not to miss the right advertisement. We can luckily give the major time, without doing any injury to our own interests; for there is no fear, just yet, of the girl’s getting the start of you. The public reception, as we know, won’t be ready till near the end of the month; and we may safely trust young Armadale’s vanity to keep him out of his new house until his flatterers are all assembled to welcome him. Let us wait another ten days at least before we give up the governess notion, and lay our heads together to try some other plan.

  It’s odd, isn’t it, to think how much depends on this half-pay officer’s decision? For my part, I shall wake every morning, now, with the same question in my mind. If the major’s advertisement appears, which will the major say – Thorpe-Ambrose, or London?