Complete Works of Wilkie Collins (2075 page)

Rachel
(
rousing herself
). Godfrey, do you mind inquiring if the carriage is at the door?

Godfrey
(
eagerly
). With the greatest pleasure! (
He hurries out at the back.
MISS CLACK
looks after him as if he had a little disappointed her.
)

Miss Clack
(
to herself
). Politeness is certainly a virtue. Mr. Godfrey is perhaps a little
too
polite. (
She looks at
RACHEL.) Dearest Rachel, how unhappy you look!

Rachel.
I look what I am. Do you know what it is to reproach yourself when reproach comes too late?

Miss Clack
(
aside
). At last she feels the want of Me! (
Looking about her.
) Where is my bag? (
She discovers the bag where she had placed it on entering the room, takes it, and returns to
RACHEL,
holding up the bag.
) Here, dearest, is the remedy for all your sorrows!

Rachel.
I daresay you mean well, Drusilla, but your idea of consolation is not mine. Forgive me, I shall be better if I keep quiet till the carriage comes. (
She retires to a sofa at the back, and reclines on it with her face turned away on the cushion.
)

Miss Clack
(
in confidence to herself
). In all my experience, I never met with a more promising case for tracts! The one question is how to direct her attention to the inestimable blessings in this bag? She must go back to her room to put on her bonnet when the carriage comes. I know what I’ll do! When she leaves that sofa, she shall find one of my precious tracts waiting for her in every part of the hall! (MISS CLACK
trips softly to and fro, depositing tracts on the different articles of furniture as she names them.
) A tract on her favourite chair, if she happens to look that way! Another on her work-table! Another at the fireplace! Another among the roses! And one more pinned to the curtain, to catch her eye if she goes out by the garden. (
While
MISS CLACK
is pinning her tract on the outer side of the window curtain, so that she is hidden by it from the observation of anyone entering the room,
GODFREY
returns from his errand.
)

Godfrey
(
advancing
). I have been to the stables, Rachel. (
He looks round him, and continues, aside.
) We are alone again!

Rachel
(
raising herself to a sitting position
). Is the carriage ready?

Godfrey.
It will be ready in ten minutes. (RACHEL
rises, and advances a few steps as if to return to her room to get ready.
GODFREY
follows, and stops her.
) Dearest Rachel! (MISS CLACK,
hearing him, suddenly checks herself on the point of returning to the room.
)

Miss Clack
(
aside
). “Dearest Rachel”?

Rachel
(
looking at
GODFREY
in surprise
). What do you want?

Godfrey.
One word with you. There is nobody to hear us. We are relieved of the everlasting presence of Miss Clack.

Miss Clack
(
to herself
). My everlasting presence!

Godfrey
(
continuing
). May I speak? (RACHEL
understands him. Her head droops on her bosom.
GODFREY
leads her to her chair. She sees the tract in it, and checks herself.
)

Rachel.
What is that in the chair?

Godfrey
(
taking it up
). A book of yours? (
He reads the title.
) “Man the Deceiver, by the author of Woman the Dupe!”

Miss Clack
(
to herself
). How perfectly appropriate!

Godfrey
(
throwing the tract aside
). Miss Clack and her ridiculous tracts!

Miss Clack
(
to herself
). My ridiculous tracts!

Godfrey.
Be seated, dear Rachel. Your charming kindness since I have been here has once more emboldened me to hope. Am I mad to dream of some future day when your heart may soften to me? (
He places his hand on the table while he speaks, and knocks off the tract which
MISS CLACK
has put there. It falls on
RACHEL’S
lap. She takes it up.
)

Rachel.
Another book that doesn’t belong to me? (
She reads.
) “Soft Soap. By a Converted Laundress.”

Miss Clack
(
to herself
). Mr. Godfrey’s own language, exactly described!

Godfrey
(
continuing
). I have lost every interest in life, Rachel, but my interest in you. My charitable business has become an unendurable nuisance to me. When I see a ladies’ committee, I wish them all at the uttermost ends of the earth!

Miss Clack
(
to herself
). The “Mothers’-Small-Clothes” a nuisance! He wishes us all at the uttermost ends of the earth! (
She shakes her fist at
GODFREY.) Apostate! (
In her anger she has spoken the last word just loud enough for
RACHEL
to hear her voice, while
GODFREY
is still pleading with her.
)

Rachel
(
starting
). Is there somebody at the window? (GODFREY
turns towards the window.
MISS CLACK
sees him, and instantly feigns to be entering the room, after a walk in the garden.
)

Miss Clack
(
innocently
). You can’t imagine how delightful the air is in the garden! (
She looks round her.
) Oh, dear! Have I come in again at the wrong time? I’ll go back to the garden directly!

Godfrey
(
with formal politeness
). You will excuse me, I am sure, Miss Clack, if I own that I have something to say in confidence to Rachel.

Miss Clack
(
spitefully
). Ah, Mr. Godfrey, I can guess what it is! You good man! You are trying to interest Rachel in that charitable business which is the delight of your life. You are bent on persuading her to join those ladies’ committees to which you are so unselfishly and so devotedly attached. Forgive my innocent intrusion. Good-morning! (
She goes out again on the right, angrily tearing away the tract pinned to the curtain as she passes.
)

Godfrey
(
aside
). Has she been listening? (
He returns to
RACHEL,
who has remained absorbed in her own thoughts during the dialogue between
MISS CLACK
and
GODFREY.) Rachel, you are not annoyed by this trifling interruption? Will you recall what I have said to you? Will you favour me, dearest, with a word of reply?

Rachel
(
sadly
). You have made your confession, Godfrey. Would it cure you of your unhappy attachment to me if I made mine? I am the wretchedest woman living.

Godfrey.
Rachel! Rachel!

Rachel.
What greater wretchedness can there be than to live degraded in your own estimation? After what you have said, Godfrey, I owe it to you to speak as plainly as I can. Forget for a moment your favourable opinion of me. Suppose you were in love with some other woman?

Godfrey.
Yes?

Rachel.
Suppose you discovered the woman to be utterly unworthy of you — a false, shameless, degraded creature. And suppose your faithful heart still clung, in spite of you, to that first object of your love? Suppose — (
She stops, despairing of herself.
) Oh, how can I make a
man
understand that a feeling which horrifies me at myself can be a feeling which fascinates me at the same time? Godfrey, it’s the breath of my life, and it’s the poison that kills me — both in one! Don’t ask me any more. I will never see him again — let that be enough. Oh, my heart! my heart! I feel as if I was stifling for want of breath! (
She tries to speak lightly.
) Is there a form of hysterics, Godfrey, that bursts into words instead of tears? What does it matter? You will get over your love for me now. I have dropped to my right place in your estimation, haven’t I? (
The hysterical passion returns and overpowers her.
) Don’t notice me! don’t pity me! For God’s sake, go! (
She bursts into tears.
)

Godfrey
(
to himself
). Franklin Blake! — I see my way. (
He drops on one knee, and takes
RACHEL’S
hand.
) Rachel, you have spoken of your place in my estimation. Judge what that place is, when I implore you on my knees to let the cure of your poor wounded heart be my care!

Rachel
(
looking at him in amazement
). You can’t have listened to what I said to you.

Godfrey.
Not a word of it has been lost on me!

Rachel
(
sadly
). You are speaking under a generous impulse. I am generous enough, on my side, not to take advantage of it.

Godfrey.
I am speaking in the full possession of my reason. Rachel, it is your duty to yourself to forget this ill-placed attachment. At your age, and with your attractions, can you sentence yourself to a single life? Impossible! You may marry some other man some years hence. Or you may marry the man who now pleads with you, and who asks of heaven no purer joy than to make you his wife.

Rachel
(
struggling against herself
). Say no more! You are trying to reconcile me to reasons which have been in my mind already. When I have tried to find my way back to my own self-respect, I confess I have thought of another marriage. I confess I have remembered your expressions of attachment to me. (GODFREY
attempts to speak.
) Don’t tempt me, Godfrey! I am wretched enough and reckless enough, if you press me, to marry you on your own terms. Take the warning, and say no more!

Godfrey.
I won’t rise from my knees until you have said “Yes.”

Rachel
(
beginning to yield
).
You
will repent, and
I
shall repent, when it is too late.

Godfrey.
We shall both bless the day when I pressed and you yielded.

Rachel
(
still yielding
).You won’t hurry me, Godfrey?

Godfrey.
My time shall be yours.

Rachel.
You won’t ask me for more than I can give.

Godfrey.
My angel! I only ask you to give me yourself.

Rachel
(
faintly
). Take me! (
Her head drops.
GODFREY
puts his arm round her. She submits for a moment, then draws back with a start.
) Leave me for a little while. I am dreadfully agitated. Let me compose myself.