A gentleman of fortune

second visit. So, I believe, she seized upon the suspicions of the apothecary, determined to make as much trouble as she might.

Of course, she has known all along that publication of the engagement would convince the whole world of his guilt and by hurrying on Miss Bevan’s departure she hoped that he would be forced to make it public in order to save her. But Miss Bevan would not allow him to reveal the secret. She would rather go away to Yorkshire than permit him to endanger himself by acknowledging the engagement. You will notice, Eliza, that it was only after she had shown herself determined to go away – when she had actually bespoken her place in the coach – that Mrs Midgely decided to act by spreading the rumour herself.

This explains a great many little things. It explains, for example, why Miss Bevan has lately avoided her guardian’s company – preferring to sit with Miss Prentice instead…

But, now that I see the picture for what it truly is, I find that there is one very important new question to be answered. Why should Mrs Midgely suddenly turn against a girl she has known for nearly twenty years?

And the dislike was certainly sudden. Flora is sure that this plan to send Miss Bevan away was never mentioned until last November. In which month, of course, according to Miss Merryweather’s account, Mrs Midgely lost not only her taste for love stories but also her soul…

What can have happened last November?

It is made all the more puzzling by Flora’s information that Miss Bevan was not even at home at this time. For in November of last year Mary was in Ramsgate – and forming her attachment to Mr Lansdale.

And this, Eliza, leads me to suppose that this hatred – and I am sorry to use so strong a word, but such I think it must be called – this hatred arose, not from anything Miss Bevan did, but rather something which Mrs Midgely learnt about her.

You will, I trust, be very distressed to hear that it is now past two o’clock in the morning and I am endangering my health by passing another sleepless night. For I cannot cease to puzzle over this conundrum. What was it that Mrs Midgely learnt during Miss Bevan’s absence which rendered her soulless – and determined to be rid of her ward…

I find that there are two things which I keep remembering: there is the desk in Miss Prentice’s room – and the portrait hanging above the fire in Mrs Midgely’s parlour. And together these two memories point to such an answer… But I will not write it until I am certain.

Tomorrow I must visit the house and look again at these things to be sure that I am remembering correctly. And if I am… Well, then, I think I had better consult with Miss Bevan.

Of course Mr Lomax had almost persuaded me that I should leave these matters alone… But if I go about things very quietly then perhaps he need not know what I have done… And besides, now that I have come so close, I cannot leave this part of the mystery in uncertainty. I simply cannot. It is a great deal too much to ask of me.

Next morning Dido found Mary Bevan in the little garden at the side of Mrs Midgely’s house – a dark, sunless place of severely clipped grass, grey gravel and stunted yew hedges. She was seated upon a narrow bench, looking paler than ever, with great shadows beneath her eyes; but she greeted Dido warmly and immediately said, ‘I am very glad to see you, Miss Kent, for there is something I have been wanting to tell you about.’

‘Oh yes? And what is that?’

‘The extract in your mysterious letter – have you succeeded yet in finding its origin?’

‘Oh!’ said Dido with some surprise. ‘Yes, I have. It comes from Romeo and Juliet.’

‘Does it? I did not know.’

‘Why do you ask me about it?’

‘Because…’ Mary stopped, looking a little confused. ‘Well, it is nothing. But I happened to read it yesterday – quoted by Doctor Johnson in The Rambler – it is in number one hundred and seven. I thought it might be of use to you to know… But if you have already found the original…’ She shrugged up her shoulders and smiled.

‘Thank you,’ said Dido. ‘Thank you very much – that might prove very useful indeed.’

‘So,’ said Mary with a curious look, ‘you are still pursuing your enquiries?’

‘Oh yes.’ She looked sidelong at her companion. ‘In fact,’ she said, ‘I have been about them this morning.’

‘Oh? And what have you been investigating?’

She hesitated again, but decided to be frank; there was something about Miss Bevan’s own open manner which seemed to demand a return in the same kind. She would be honest – though she doubted very much that her companion would like what she had to say. ‘I have been investigating Colonel Midgely’s old desk,’ she replied quietly. ‘And the portrait hanging in your parlour.’

‘Indeed? Have you?’ cried Mary in surprise. And then they sat in silence for a little while. A blackbird sang high up on the roof of the house and, out on the street, carriage wheels rumbled by. At last Mary turned and looked her full in the face. ‘And what have you learnt from the desk and the portrait?’ she asked with a tolerable pretence at calm.

Dido took so deep a breath she might have been about to plunge into a cold bath. ‘I believe I have learnt the cause of Mrs Midgely’s…resentment against you,’ she said.

A little colour rose into Mary’s pale cheeks, but she showed no other sign of distress – or surprise. ‘I think,’ she said at last, ‘that you had better explain exactly what you mean, Miss Kent.’

‘Well,’ began Dido, turning her eyes down upon the gravel at her feet, ‘at first, you know, I could not determine why Mrs Midgely should change towards you during the short time that you were absent in Ramsgate.’

‘I see.’ Mary thought for a moment. ‘It would, I suppose, be of no use to attempt to convince you that such a change did not take place?’

‘No, I do not think you would succeed in convincing me.’

‘Very well, I shall, as the saying goes, save my breath to cool my porridge.’ Mary folded her hands tightly in her lap and waited calmly; it seemed she would let Dido reveal what she knew, rather than risk any disclosure of her own.

‘You see,’ Dido said, ‘I set myself to think of what might have taken place during those two months to produce so strange a revolution in feeling.’

‘Yes?’

‘And the only thing I could think of was that, during that time, Colonel Midgely’s book room had been emptied of its papers. You see I remembered that Mrs Midgely had told Flora that that must be accomplished before Miss Prentice could take possession of the room.’

Mary put up her hand to check a little spasm in her throat, but said nothing.

‘And then you see,’ continued Dido, still very intent in her study of the gravel, ‘then I recalled the broken lock upon the desk. Which made me think – for I have a mind which is always seeking answers and explanations – which made me think that there must have been something locked within. Something which was only got at with violence. And then…’

‘Yes? What did this remarkable mind of yours turn to next?’ asked Miss Bevan, attempting to speak lightly, but with her hands all the while knotting themselves together in a way which showed her far from indifferent to what was being said.

‘Well,’ said Dido, ‘I am afraid my mind turned next to the portrait in the parlour.’

‘It is,’ said Mary quickly, ‘a picture of Mrs Midgely’s father.’

‘Yes. And a very grim old fellow he seems to have been!’

‘I beg your pardon, but I cannot understand what interest he can have held for you.’

‘Oh, none at all…except that he is old and ugly.’

Mary unclenched her hands and instead crossed her arms across her breast as if, all at once, she was cold. ‘What were you expecting to see, Miss Kent?’

‘Well, I hardly knew what to expect. You see, Flora – who has not been in the parlour since last summer – believed that it was the handsome Colonel Midgely who was hanging there; but yesterday it occurred to me that it was not a handsome man I had seen when I was in the parlour two weeks ago. I had quite a distinct memory of a