money sent to New York, and it can be invested there—except your own fortune—in my new name. We shall want no outfit for a fortnight at sea. I have arranged it all beautifully. Child, look like your old self.' He took an unresisting hand. 'I want to see you smile and look happy again.'
'You never will.'
'Yes—when we have got ourselves out of this damnable, unwholesome way of life; when we are with our fellow-creatures again. You will forget this—this little business—which was, you know, after all, an unhappy necessity.'
'Oh! how can I ever forget?'
'New interests will arise; new friendships will be formed—'
'Harry, it is myself that I cannot forgive. Teach me to forgive myself, and I will forget everything.'
He pressed her no longer.
'Well, then,' he said, 'go to Brussels and get this information. If you will not try to conquer this absurd moral sensitiveness—which comes too late—you will at least enable me to place you in a healthier atmosphere.'
'I will go at once,' she said, 'I will go by the next train.'
'There is a train at a quarter to two. You can do all you have to do and catch the train at five. Iris'—the chance of a change made him impatient—'let us go to-morrow. Let us go by the night express. There will be English travellers, but they shall not recognise me. We shall be in Calais at one in the morning. We will go on by an early train before the English steamer comes in. Will you be ready?'
'Yes; there is nothing to delay me. I suppose we can leave the house by paying the rent? I will go and do what you want.'
'Let us go this very night.'
'If you please; I am always ready.'
'No: there will be no time; it will look like running away. We will go to-morrow night. Besides, you would be too tired after going to Brussels and back. Iris, we are going to be happy again—I am sure we are.' He, for one, looked as if there was nothing to prevent a return of happiness. He laughed and waved his hands. 'A new sky—-new scenes—new work—you will be happy again, Iris. You shall go, dear. Get me the things I want.'
She put on her thick veil and started on her short journey. The husband's sudden return to his former good spirits gave her a gleam of hope. The change would be welcome indeed if it permitted him to go about among other men, and to her if it gave her occupation. As to forgetting—how could she forget the past, so long as they were reaping the fruit of their wickedness in the shape of solid dividends? She easily found what she wanted. The steamer of the Compagnie Generale Transatlantique left Havre every eighth day. They would go by that line. The more she considered the plan the more it recommended itself. They would at any rate go out of prison. There would be a change in their life. Miserable condition! To have no other choice of life but that of banishment and concealment: no other prospect than that of continual fraud renewed by every post that brought them money.
When she had got all the information that was wanted she had still an hour or two before her. She thought she would spend the time wandering about the streets of Brussels. The animation and life of the cheerful city—where all the people except the market-women are young—pleased her. It was long since she had seen any of the cheerfulness that belongs to a busy street. She walked slowly along, up one street and down another, looking into the shops. She made two or three little purchases. She looked into a place filled with Tauchnitz Editions, and bought two or three books. She was beginning to think that she was tired and had better make her way back to the station, when suddenly she remembered the post-office and her instructions to Fanny Mere.
'I wonder,' she said, 'if Fanny has written to me.'
She asked the way to the post-office. There was time if she walked quickly.
At the Poste Restante there was a letter for her—more than a letter, a parcel, apparently a book.
She received it and hurried back to the station.
In the train she amused herself with looking through the leaves of her new books. Fanny Mere's letter she would read after dinner.
At dinner they actually talked. Lord Harry was excited with the prospect of going back to the world. He had enjoyed his hermitage, he said, quite long enough. Give him the society of his fellow-creatures. 'Put me among cannibals,' he said, 'and I should make friends with them. But to live alone—it is the devil! To-morrow we begin our new flight.'
After dinner he lit his cigar, and went on chattering about the future. Iris remembered the packet she had got at the post-office, and opened it. It contained a small manuscript book filled with writing and a brief letter. She read the letter, laid it down, and opened the book.
CHAPTER LXI
THE LAST DISCOVERY
'I SHALL like to turn farmer,' Lord Harry went on talking while Iris opened and began to read Fanny's manuscript. 'After all my adventures, to settle down in a quiet place and cultivate the soil. On market-day we will drive into town together'—he talked as if Kentucky were Warwickshire—'side by side in a spring cart. I shall have samples of grain in bags, and you will have a basket of butter and cream. It will be an ideal life. We shall dine at the ordinary, and, after dinner, over a pipe and a glass of grog, I shall discuss the weather and the crops. And while we live in this retreat of ours, over here the very name of Harry Norland will have been forgotten. Queer, that! We shall go on living long after we are dead and buried and forgotten. In the novels the man turns up after he is supposed to be cast away—wrecked—drowned—dead long ago. But he never turns up when he is forgotten—unless he is Rip Van Winkle. By Gad, Iris! when we are old people we will go home and see the old places together. It will be something to look forward to—something to live for—eh?'
'I feel quite happy this evening, Iris; happier than I have been for months. The fact is, this infernal place has hipped us both confoundedly. I didn't like to grumble, but I've felt the monotony more than a bit. And so have you. It's made you brood over things. Now, for my part, I like to look at the bright side. Here we are comfortably cut off from the past. That's all done with. Nothing in the world can revive the memory of disagreeable things if we are only true to ourselves and agree to forget them. What has been done can never be discovered. Not a soul knows except the doctor, and between him and ourselves we are going to put a few thousand—What's the matter, Iris? What the devil is the matter?'
