Complete Works of Wilkie Collins (2010 page)

Mrs. C.
I am trying to find out your motive in coming here.

Sir P.
My motive is no business of yours. I have offered you —

Mrs. C.
You have offered me fifty pounds to get you access privately to the church registers. My husband is answerable for the registers to the rector, and the rector is answerable to the law. If I put the registers into your hands, what are your hands going to do with them? Answer me that.

Sir P.
I decline to answer you. I expect you to help me blindfold — and I pay you handsomely for doing it.

Mrs. C.
That’s your side of the question. Now look at mine. It’s a risk to let you in here, in my husband’s absence.

Sir P.
Fifty pounds!

Mrs. C.
It’s a risk to steal the key.

Sir P.
Fifty pounds!

Mrs. C.
It’s a risk to leave you here, with the registers at your mercy.

Sir P.
Fifty pounds!

Mrs. C.
Have you no more to say to me than that?

Sir P.
Not a word more.
(He takes a bank-note from his pocket-book.)
This, in exchange for the key of the press — without questions. Take it, or leave it, which you please.

Mrs. C. (holding out her hand).
I take it.

Sir P. (withholding it).
In exchange for the key!

Mrs. C.
Give me a quarter of an hour — and you shall have the key.

Sir P. (putting back the note).
I’ll smoke a cigar in the lane, and come back.
(Aside.)
If she gives me the key, she becomes my accomplice. Penal servitude for her, if she betrays me after that!

(He puts the key into the lock of the door leading into the churchyard.)

Mrs. C. (aside).
There is a private copy of the registers in the rector’s possession. If the fool had trusted me, I would have told him of it!
(To
SIR PERCIVAL.) Not that way! There are strangers in the lane — two gentlemen with knapsacks on their backs; artists, or such like.

Sir P. (turning towards the other door).
This way?
(He
notices the arched opening above the door.)
What’s that for?

Mrs. C.
It’s a make-shift to let light and air into the vestry — it opens out from the organ-gallery. Stand back, and let me see if the coast’s clear.
(She opens the door into the church, looks in, and listens.)
It’s all safe. Come out this way. Smoke your cigar in the copse — and meet me again in a quarter of an hour at the church porch.

(She crosses the threshold and stops.)

Sir P.
What’s wrong now?

Mrs. C.
Nothing. One word of warning while I think of it. You have mortally offended that crazy daughter of mine. She’s revengeful and cunning. Mind she doesn’t follow you, on your way back to the church!

(She leads the way out.
SIR PERCIVAL
follows her, and closes the door.
ANNE CATHERICK
shows herself at the arched opening above the door.)

Anne (in triumph).
My clever mother never thought of looking for me in the organ-loft! Crazy as I am, I have heard him already. When he comes back again, I can see him from here.

(She disappears from the opening. At the same moment,
WALTER HARTRIGHT
and
PROFESSOR PESCA,
both equipped for a walking tour, appear in the churchyard.)

Wal.
Give me ten minutes, Pesca. I want to take a rough sketch of this picturesque old church.

(He produces his sketch-book and pencils.)

Pesca (despondently).
Right — all-right, Walter! Take your sketch.

(He unbuckles his knapsack, and seats himself.
WALTER,
still standing, looks at him in surprise.)

Wal.
I don’t annoy you, by stopping here — do I?

Pesca (vehemently remonstrating).
My soul-bless-my-soul! he asks if he annoys me! (WALTER
smiles, and begins his sketch, while
PESCA
goes on speaking, more and more excitedly.)
Here am I — Pesca — Italian exile, and professor of languages. I am broken down with nothing but teach, teach, teach, morning, noon, and night. The doctors say, deuce-what-the-deuce! too many pupils for this one little man! Give him a holiday; put a knapsack on his back, and a stick in his hand; make him walk, walk, walk, in the fine fresh air, till he has changed the vertigoes in his head for blisters on his feet. In a month he will be well again. There is the sentence pronounced on me! After teach, teach, teach, I am to walk, walk, walk — all by myself. Who says, “No! Pesca shall have a companion to take care of him?” Who sacrifices his work, aches under his knapsack, blisters his feet, for Pesca’s sake? The same Walter Hartright who turns on me now, and asks if he annoys me! I call heaven and earth to witness — have I deserved this?

Wal. (laughing).
There! There! I withdraw the question. But — come, Pesca! you can’t deny you’re out of spirits?

Pesca.
I don’t deny it. My spirits are down in the bottoms of my boots.

Wal.
You received two letters this morning. Any bad news?

Pesca.
Yes, Walter. Bad news from my native country.

Wal.
News from your family?

Pesca.
No.

Wal.
From your friends?

Pesca.
From my republican friends.

Wal. (pausing in his sketching).
Again? Another letter from the Secret Society to which you belonged when you were in Italy? Why did you ever join it? Why don’t you leave it now?

Pesca (gravely).
Once a member of that Brotherhood, Walter, always a member. I joined them years ago, my friend — under provocation which would have made you join, if you had been me. Say no more. Go on with your sketch.

Wal.
I fancy there is a better point of view yonder. Shall we move up a little?

Pesca.
Yes, yes; I will come after you. (WALTER
withdraws up the stage, and resumes his sketch.
PESCA
opens a letter.)
I dare not tell him what is written here!
I,
who ask nothing better, in my exile, than to forget the past, and end my days in peace —
I
am singled out, by my chief in Italy, to decide the dreadful question of a man’s life or death!

Wal. (calling).
Come here, Pesca! The view is much prettier on this side.

Pesca.
In a minute.
(He reads in a low voice to himself.)
“We have certain information of a member who has betrayed the Brotherhood. He was received among us, twenty years since, by you. He will be in England in three months’ time. Contrive to see him without letting him see you, and then communicate privately with the two brethren whose names and addresses are enclosed. The man will die, if you identify him, by their hands.”
(He pauses, shuddering.)
Horrible! If I say the word, he is doomed; no human laws can save him!
(He reads once more.)
“Personal description of the traitor. A man of sixty years old — immensely stout — bears in his face a striking resemblance to the great Napoleon — gaudy in his dress, smooth in his manners, singularly fond of pet animals, such as canary birds and white mice. He is the friend of an English baronet — Sir Percival Glyde. Set a watch on Sir Percival’s town house. He will be found there on his arrival in London. Shortly afterwards, he will accompany Sir Percival to Cumberland. The name under which he travels is Count Fosco.” (PESCA
closes the letter, and speaks.)
“Fosco?” I know nobody named “Fosco.” “Immensely stout?” “fond of pet animals?” I do not recognise the description. Heaven grant — when I see him — I may not recognise the man!

(He puts the letter into his pocket.)

Wal.
Pesca! what are you about? Still reading your correspondence?

Pesca (rising).
My correspondence?
(Suddenly remembering.)
Ha! the other one of my two letters! I had quite forgotten it.

Wal.
Perhaps there may be better news in that?

Pesca.
I shall see.
(He produces the second letter, opens it, runs his eye over it, and passes instantly from the extreme of depression to the extreme of joy.)
Hurray! hurray! Right-right-right-all-right! — Walter, if you were not an Englishman, I should kiss you!

Wal.
Thank you, Pesca. I’ll take the will for the deed. What is it now?

Pesca (joining
WALTER). What is it? What did you tell me you wanted when we set out on this journey?

Wal.
I wanted employment as a drawing-master.

Pesca.
Good! I have got you the employment.

Wal.
You?

Pesca.
I. I have written right and left among my pupils whom I teach. A circular letter, my friend: “Do you know anybody who wants a drawing-master? The best drawing-master in England is at my disposal. Write-write-write!” A pupil has written — the employment is found. My soul-bless-my-soul, and such an employment too! To begin next week — to live in a fine country house — to teach a young lady to sketch from nature — and all these guineas a week offered you for the whole summer. Go, my son! Your fortune is made. You teach the young lady — you fall in love with the young lady — you marry the young lady — and I, Pesca, am at the bottom of it all. Right-right-right-all-right. Hurray!

Wal.
Have you done prophesying, my good friend?

Pesca.
No; there is one thing I have forgotten. I am to be godfather to your first child. Now I have done.

Wal.
Now you have done, may I know the young lady’s name?

Pesca (referring to the letter).
Miss Fairlie. Ah, what a pretty name!

Wal.
Very pretty. Any other members of the family?

Pesca (as before).
Miss Fairlie’s uncle, who is an invalid, confined to his room. (Good! The uncle will not be in the way!) And Miss Fairlie’s relative and companion, Miss Halcombe. And that is all.