position, I felt a kind of grim relief that I had been brought up by another, and that I would never now have to discover whether I loved my true mother as I had loved her friend.
As I was helping Mr Tredgold up the steps into the house, he asked me whether I was still in love with Miss Carteret.
‘Yes,’ I smiled, ‘and likely to be for all eternity.’ And then I told him of our walk in Hyde-park, and how we had each declared our love for one another.
‘And have you told her the truth about yourself? Ah, I see by your hesitation that you have not. How, then, can you be sure that she loves you, when she is ignorant even of your real name?’
‘She loves me for myself,’ I replied, ‘not for my real name, or for what I may become if I succeed in my task, because she is ignorant of both; and that is why I am now prepared to tell her everything.’
‘I do not know the lady well,’ said Mr Tredgold as we entered the house, ‘but that she is beautiful and clever is undeniable. And if she loves you as you love her, then she will be a prize indeed. Yet I would counsel you to take care before placing the truth in another’s hands. Forgive me. I am a lawyer, and cannot help myself from picturing the worst. Caution comes naturally to me.’
He was smiling broadly, but his eyes were serious.
‘I am sensible, sir, that you only have my best interests at heart. But recklessness, as you well know, is not in my nature; I only proceed on a matter when I am completely sure of the outcome.’
‘And you are sure of Miss Carteret’s love, and that you trust her absolutely?’
‘I am.’
‘Well, I have done my lawyer’s duty. You will not be turned from the course you are set upon, that is clear; and I have no arguments powerful enough to persuade a man in love to be prudent – God knows I have committed follies enough myself in love’s name. So there it is. You will write as soon as you can, I’m sure. Go, then, with my blessing, and may you bring back the truth, for it has been hidden for too long.’
I left him at the foot of the stair-case in the gloomy hall, grasping the banister with one hand as he weakly waved me good-bye with the other. I never saw him again.
My darling girl had promised to write from Evenwood, once she had settled herself in her new apartments; but a week went by, and then another, and still no word came. At last, I could stand it no longer and sent off a brief note, enquiring whether all was well, and suggesting that I might travel up to Northamptonshire the following week. I was sure that a reply would come by return, but was again disappointed. Finally, almost a week after sending my note, I received a communication.MY LOVE, —Bless you for your sweet note, which has been sent on to me here in Shrewsbury.How horrid you must have thought me! But, dearest, I wrote to you, two weeks since, to tell you that I have been travelling with Lord and Lady Tansor in Wales whilst work is being carried out at Evenwood – his Lordship has taken it into his head to have hot-water pipes installed, with consequences that you may easily imagine to one’s peace and comfort. The dust and noise are not to be spoken of. Where my letter has gone, telling you all this, I cannot imagine, but the ways are wild hereabouts, and so I suppose it was simply lost or dropped somewhere. We shall be away for some time – the work will not be completed for another month at least, and after we leave here we shall be going to some dreary place in Yorkshire, belonging to Lady Tansor’s brother. How I wish I could escape! But I am a captive, and must go where my master bids, seeing that I am now entirely dependent on him for the provision of a roof over my head; and then, you know, he really seems to take pleasure in my company (Lady T is so dreadfully tiresome – never says a word, or smiles), and so I really have no choice, and must do what I can to master my feelings.
A month at least! But it could be borne. I kissed the words she had written: ‘
How I passed the interminable weeks, I need not recount in detail. I resumed some of my former studies – reacquainting myself with some of the more abstruse Greek philosophers, continuing my study of hermeticism, and pursuing my bibliographical passions. From Mr Nutt’s shop in the Strand,* I had purchased a copy of Dr Daunt’s catalogue, the
A letter from my dear girl arrived in the first week of August, and then another a few weeks later from Lincolnshire, whither the Tansors had decamped at the invitation of the Earl of Newark. She was all sweetness, full of anguished regret that circumstances had sundered her from the man she loved above all others; and my heart overflowed to know that she was mine. ‘If I had wings,’ she wrote in her second letter, ‘I would fly with the speed of angels to be with my dearest love, if only for the briefest moment.’
At last the great house at Evenwood was ready to receive its noble owner once more, and in the second week of September I received a note to say that Miss Carteret would be pleased to see me in Northamptonshire at any time that I might care to propose.
On my arrival, I was shown up to the first floor and entered a long, low apartment above the Library, the chief feature of which was a series of four ancient arched windows that looked down on the terrace below. I stood for a moment, gripped by the thought that my mother, Lady Tansor, had once occupied these very rooms. At the far end, a door stood ajar, allowing a partial view of an elaborately carved bed – that same bed in which my poor misguided parent had been laid, mad with grief and remorse, by John Brine’s father, and from which she never again rose. Through this door my dearest girl now swept, ran towards me, and threw her arms around me in a passionate embrace. Many tender words were exchanged, after which we sat together on a seat in one of the arched windows, from where we could see the Park stretching out beyond the formal gardens to the Temple of the Winds, the Lake, and the distant woods.
‘Three long months! How I have missed you!’ I cried, kissing her hand feverishly.
‘To be parted from the one you love is the greatest of torments,’ she said. ‘I never thought I would suffer so. But there is an end to all suffering. My love is here with me once more, and I am the happiest woman alive. Dearest, will you excuse me for a moment?’ Whereupon she returned to the adjoining bedchamber and closed the door. I waited, feeling a little foolish and embarrassed, for several minutes until she returned, her face a little flushed, with a book in her hand.
