Armadale

by Wilkie Collins

  These conditions are, that for the next six months to come, all communication is to be broken off, both personally and by writing, between Armadale and Miss Milroy. That space of time is to be occupied by the young gentleman as he himself thinks best, and by the young lady in completing her education at school. If, when the six months have passed, they are both still of the same mind, and if Armadale’s conduct in the interval has been such as to improve the major’s opinion of him, he will be allowed to present himself in the character of Miss Milroy’s suitor – and, in six months more, if all goes well, the marriage may take place.

  I declare I could kiss the dear old major, if I was only within reach of him! If I had been at his elbow, and had dictated the conditions myself, I could have asked for nothing better than this. Six months of total separation between Armadale and Miss Milroy! In half that time – with all communication cut off between the two – it must go hard with me indeed if I don’t find myself dressed in the necessary mourning, and publicly recognized as Armadale’s widow.

  But I am forgetting the girl’s letter. She gives her father’s reasons for making his conditions, in her father’s own words. The major seems to have spoken so sensibly and so feelingly that he left his daughter no decent alternative – and he leaves Armadale no decent alternative – but to submit. As well as I can remember it, he seems to have expressed himself to Miss Neelie in these, or nearly in these terms:

  ‘Don’t think I am behaving cruelly to you, my dear – I am merely asking you to put Mr Armadale to the proof. It is not only right, it is absolutely necessary, that you should hold no communication with him for some time to come; and I will show you why. In the first place, if you go to school, the necessary rules in such places – necessary for the sake of the other girls – would not permit you to see Mr Armadale, or to receive letters from him; and, if you are to become mistress of Thorpe-Ambrose, to school you must go, for you would be ashamed, and I should be ashamed, if you occupied the position of a lady of station, without having the accomplishments which all ladies of station are expected to possess. In the second place, I want to see whether Mr Armadale will continue to think of you as he thinks now, without being encouraged in his attachment by seeing you, or reminded of it by hearing from you. If I am wrong in thinking him flighty and unreliable; and if your opinion of him is the right one, this is not putting the young man to an unfair test – true love survives much longer separations than a separation of six months. And when that time is over, and well over; and when I have had him under my own eye for another six months, and have learnt to think as highly of him as you do – even then, my dear, after all that terrible delay, you will still be a married woman before you are eighteen. Think of this, Neelie; and show that you love me and trust me, by accepting my proposal. I will hold no communication with Mr Armadale myself. I will leave it to you to write and tell him what has been decided on. He may write back one letter, and one only, to acquaint you with his decision. After that, for the sake of your reputation, nothing more is to be said, and nothing more is to be done, and the matter is to be kept strictly private until the six months’ interval is at an end.’

  To this effect the major spoke. His behaviour to that little slut of a girl has produced a stronger impression on me than anything else in the letter. It has set me thinking (me, of all the people in the world!) of what they call ‘a moral difficulty’. We are perpetually told that there can be no possible connection between virtue and vice. Can there not? Here is Major Milroy doing exactly what an excellent father, at once kind and prudent, affectionate and firm, would do under the circumstances – and by that very course of conduct, he has now smoothed the way for me, as completely as if he had been the chosen accomplice of that abominable creature, Miss Gwilt. Only think of my reasoning in this way! But I am in such good spirits, I can do anything to-day. I have not looked so bright and so young as I look now, for months past!

  To return to the letter, for the last time – it is so excessively dull and stupid that I really can’t help wandering away from it into reflections of my own, as a mere relief.

  After solemnly announcing4 that she meant to sacrifice herself to her beloved father’s wishes (the brazen assurance of her setting up for a martyr after what has happened, exceeds anything I ever heard or read of!), Miss Neelie next mentioned that the major proposed taking her to the seaside for change of air, during the few days that were still to elapse before she went to school. Armadale was to send his answer by return of post, and to address her, under cover to her father, at Lowestoft. With this, and with a last outburst of tender protestation, crammed crookedly into a corner of the page, the letter ended. (N.B. – The major’s object in taking her to the seaside is plain enough. He still privately distrusts Armadale, and he is wisely determined to prevent any more clandestine meetings in the park, before the girl is safely disposed of at school.)

  When I had done with the letter – I had requested permission to read parts of it which I particularly admired, for the second and third time! – we all consulted together in a friendly way about what Armadale was to do.

  He was fool enough, at the outset, to protest against submitting to Major Milroy’s conditions. He declared, with his odious red face looking the picture of brute health, that he should never survive a six months’ separation from his beloved Neelie. Midwinter (as may easily be imagined) seemed a little ashamed of him, and joined me in bringing him to his senses. We showed him what would have been plain enough to anybody but a booby, that there was no honourable, or even decent, alternative left but to follow the example of submission set by the young lady. ‘Wait – and you will have her for your wife,’ was what I said. ‘Wait – and you will force the major to alter his unjust opinion of you,’ was what Midwinter added. With two clever people hammering common sense into his head at that rate, it is needless to say that his head gave way, and he submitted.

  Having decided him to accept the major’s conditions (I was careful to warn him, before he wrote to Miss Milroy, that my engagement to Midwinter was to be kept as strictly secret from her as from everybody else), the next question we had to settle related to his future proceedings. I was ready with the necessary arguments to stop him, if he had proposed returning to Thorpe-Ambrose. But he proposed nothing of the sort. On the contrary, he declared, of his own accord, that nothing would induce him to go back. The place and the people were associated with everything that was hateful to him. There would be no Miss Milroy now to meet him in the park, and no Midwinter to keep him company in the solitary house. ‘I’d rather break stones on the road,’ was the sensible and cheerful way in which he put it, ‘than go back to Thorpe-Ambrose.’

  The first suggestion after this came from Midwinter. The sly old clergyman who gave Mrs Oldershaw and me so much trouble, has it seems been ill; but has been latterly reported better. ‘Why not go to Somersetshire,’ said Midwinter; ‘and see your good friend, and my good friend, Mr Brock?’

  Armadale caught at the proposal readily enough. He longed, in the first place, to see ‘dear old Brock’, and he longed, in the second place, to see his yacht. After staying a few days more in London with Midwinter, he would gladly go to Somersetshire. But what after that?

  Seeing my opportunity, I came to the rescue this time. ‘You have got a yacht, Mr Armadale,’ I said; ‘and you know that Midwinter is going to Italy. When you are tired of Somersetshire, why not make a voyage to the Mediterranean, and meet your friend, and your friend’s wife, at Naples?’

  I made the allusion to ‘his friend’s wife’, with the most becoming modesty and confusion. Armadale was enchanted. I had hit on the best of all ways of occupying the weary time. He started up, and wrung my hand in quite an ecstasy of gratitude. How I do hate people who can only express their feelings by hurting other people’s hands!

  Midwinter was as pleased with my proposal as Armadale; but he saw difficulties in the way of carrying it out. He considered the yacht too small for a cruise to the Mediterranean, and he th
ought it desirable to hire a larger vessel. His friend thought otherwise. I left them arguing the question. It was quite enough for me to have made sure, in the first place, that Armadale will not return to Thorpe-Ambrose; and to have decided him, in the second place, on going abroad. He may go how he likes. I should prefer the small yacht myself – for there seems to be a chance that the small yacht might do me the inestimable service of drowning him…

  Five o’clock. – The excitement of feeling that I had got Armadale’s future movements completely under my own control, made me so restless, when I returned to my lodgings, that I was obliged to go out again, and do something. A new interest to occupy me being what I wanted, I went to Pimlico to have it out with Mother Oldershaw.

  I walked – and made up my mind, on the way, that I would begin by quarrelling with her. One of my notes-of-hand being paid already, and Midwinter being willing to pay the other two when they fall due, my present position with the old wretch is as independent a one as I could desire. I always get the better of her when it comes to a downright battle between us, and find her wonderfully civil and obliging the moment I have made her feel that mine is the strongest will of the two. In my present situation, she might be of use to me in various ways, if I could secure her assistance, without trusting her with secrets which I am now more than ever determined to keep to myself. That was my idea as I walked to Pimlico. Upsetting Mother Oldershaw’s nerves, in the first place, and then twisting her round my little finger, in the second, promised me, as I thought, an interesting occupation for the rest of the afternoon.

  When I got to Pimlico, a surprise was in store for me. The house was shut up – not only on Mrs Oldershaw’s side, but on Doctor Downward’s as well. A padlock was on the shop-door; and a man was hanging about on the watch, who might have been an ordinary idler certainly, but who looked, to my mind, like a policeman in disguise.

  Knowing the risks the doctor runs in his particular form of practice, I suspected at once that something serious had happened, and that even cunning Mrs Oldershaw was compromised this time. Without stopping, or making any inquiry, therefore, I called the first cab that passed me, and drove to the post-office to which I had desired my letters to be forwarded if any came for me after I left my Thorpe-Ambrose lodging.

  On inquiry a letter was produced for ‘Miss Gwilt’. It was in Mother Oldershaw’s handwriting, and it told me (as I had supposed) that the doctor had got into a serious difficulty – that she was herself most unfortunately mixed up in the matter – and that they were both in hiding for the present. The letter ended with some sufficiently venomous sentences about my conduct at Thorpe-Ambrose, and with a warning that I have not heard the last of Mrs Oldershaw yet. It relieved me to find her writing in this way – for she would have been civil and cringing if she had had any suspicion of what I have really got in view. I burnt the letter as soon as the candles came up. And there, for the present, is an end of the connection between Mother Jezebel and me. I must do all my own dirty work now – and I shall be all the safer, perhaps, for trusting nobody’s hands to do it but my own.

  July 31st. – More useful information for me. I met Midwinter again in the Park (on the pretext that my reputation might suffer, if he called too often at my lodgings); and heard the last news of Armadale, since I left the hotel yesterday.

  After he had written to Miss Milroy, Midwinter took the opportunity of speaking to him about the necessary business arrangements during his absence from the great house. It was decided that the servants should be put on board wages, and that Mr Bashwood should be left in charge. (Somehow, I don’t like this reappearance of Mr Bashwood in connection with my present interests, but there is no help for it.) The next question – the question of money – was settled at once by Armadale himself. All his available ready-money (a large sum) is to be lodged by Mr Bashwood in Coutts’s Bank, and to be there deposited in Armadale’s name. This, he said, would save him the worry of any further letter-writing to his steward, and would enable him to get what he wanted, when he went abroad, at a moment’s notice. The plan thus proposed being certainly the simplest and the safest, was adopted with Midwinter’s full concurrence; and here the business discussion would have ended, if the everlasting Mr Bashwood had not turned up again in the conversation, and prolonged it in an entirely new direction.

  On reflection, it seems to have struck Midwinter that the whole responsibility at Thorpe-Ambrose ought not to rest on Mr Bashwood’s shoulders. Without in the least distrusting him, Midwinter felt, nevertheless, that he ought to have somebody set over him, to apply to, in case of emergency. Armadale made no objection to this; he only asked, in his helpless way, who the person was to be?

  The answer was not an easy one to arrive at. Either of the two solicitors at Thorpe-Ambrose might have been employed – but Armadale was on bad terms with both of them. Any reconciliation with such a bitter enemy as the elder lawyer, Mr Darch, was out of the question; and reinstating Mr Pedgift in his former position, implied a tacit sanction on Armadale’s part, of the lawyer’s abominable conduct towards me, which was scarcely consistent with the respect and regard that he felt for a lady who was soon to be his friend’s wife. After some further discussion, Midwinter hit on a new suggestion which appeared to meet the difficulty. He proposed that Armadale should write to a respectable solicitor at Norwich, stating his position in general terms, and requesting that gentleman to take charge of his affairs, and to act as Mr Bashwood’s adviser and superintendent when occasion required. Norwich being within an easy railway ride of Thorpe-Ambrose, Armadale saw no objection to the proposal, and promised to write to the Norwich lawyer. Fearing that he might make some mistake, if he wrote without assistance, Midwinter had drawn him out a draft of the necessary letter, and Armadale was now engaged in copying the draft, and also in writing to Mr Bashwood to lodge the money immediately in Coutts’s Bank.

  These details are so dry and uninteresting in themselves, that I hesitated at first about putting them down in my diary. But a little reflection has convinced me that they are too important to be passed over. Looked at from my point of view, they mean this – that Armadale’s own act is now cutting him off from all communication with Thorpe-Ambrose, even by letter. He is as good as dead, already, to everybody he leaves behind him. The causes which have led to such a result as that, are causes which certainly claim the best place I can give them in these pages.

  August 1st. – Nothing to record, but that I have had a long quiet, happy day with Midwinter. He hired a carriage, and we drove to Richmond, and dined there. After to-day’s experience, it is impossible to deceive myself any longer. Come what may of it, I love him.

  I have fallen into low spirits since he left me. A persuasion has taken possession of my mind, that the smooth and prosperous course of my affairs since I have been in London, is too smooth and prosperous to last. There is something oppressing me to-night, which is more than the oppression of the heavy London air.

  August 2nd. Three o’clock. – My presentiments, like other people’s, have deceived me often enough – but I am almost afraid that my presentiment of last night was really prophetic, for once in a way.

  I went after breakfast to a milliner’s in this neighbourhood to order a few cheap summer things, and thence to Midwinter’s hotel to arrange with him for another day in the country. I drove to the milliner’s and to the hotel, and part of the way back. Then, feeling disgusted with the horrid close smell of the cab (somebody had been smoking in it, I suppose), I got out to walk the rest of the way. Before I had been two minutes on my feet, I discovered that I was being followed by a strange man.

  This may mean nothing but that an idle fellow has been struck by my figure, and my appearance generally. My face could have made no impression on him – for it was hidden as usual by my veil. Whether he followed me (in a cab of course) from the milliner’s, or from the hotel, I cannot say. Nor am I quite certain whether he did or did not track me to this door. I only know that I lost sight of him before I got b
ack. There is no help for it but to wait till events enlighten me. If there is anything serious in what has happened, I shall soon discover it.

  Five o’clock. – It is serious. Ten minutes since, I was in my bed-room, which communicates with the sitting-room. I was just coming out, when I heard a strange voice on the landing outside – a woman’s voice. The next instant the sitting-room door was suddenly opened; the woman’s voice said, ‘Are these the apartments you have got to let?’ – and though the landlady, behind her, answered, ‘No! higher up, ma’am,’ the woman came on straight to my bed-room, as if she had not heard. I had just time to slam the door in her face before she saw me. The necessary explanations and apologies followed between the landlady and the stranger in the sitting-room – and then I was left alone again.

  ‘I have no time to write more. It is plain that somebody has an interest in trying to identify me, and that, but for my own quickness, the strange woman would have accomplished this object by taking me by surprise. She and the man who followed me in the street are, I suspect, in league together; and there is probably somebody in the background whose interests they are serving. Is Mother Oldershaw attacking me in the dark? or who else can it be? No matter who it is; my present situation is too critical to be trifled with. I must get away from this house to-night, and leave no trace behind me by which I can be followed to another place.

  August 3rd. – Gary Street, Tottenham Court Road – I got away last night (after writing an excuse to Midwinter, in which ‘my invalid mother’ figured as the all-sufficient cause of my disappearance); and I have found refuge here. It has cost me some money; but my object is attained! Nobody can possibly have traced me from All Saints’ Terrace to this address.