Complete Works of Wilkie Collins (735 page)

On her way back to the house she met Arnold, dispatched by Lady Lundie in search of her.

The plan of occupation for the afternoon had been settled during Blanche’s absence. Some demon had whispered to Lady Lundie to cultivate a taste for feudal antiquities, and to insist on spreading that taste among her guests. She had proposed an excursion to an old baronial castle among the hills — far to the westward (fortunately for Sir Patrick’s chance of escaping discovery) of the hills at Craig Fernie. Some of the guests were to ride, and some to accompany their hostess in the open carriage. Looking right and left for proselytes, Lady Lundie had necessarily remarked the disappearance of certain members of her circle. Mr. Delamayn had vanished, nobody knew where. Sir Patrick and Blanche had followed his example. Her ladyship had observed, upon this, with some asperity, that if they were all to treat each other in that unceremonious manner, the sooner Windygates was turned into a Penitentiary, on the silent system, the fitter the house would be for the people who inhabited it. Under these circumstances, Arnold suggested that Blanche would do well to make her excuses as soon as possible at head-quarters, and accept the seat in the carriage which her step-mother wished her to take. “We are in for the feudal antiquities, Blanche; and we must help each other through as well as we can. If you will go in the carriage, I’ll go too.”

Blanche shook her head.

“There are serious reasons for
my
keeping up appearances,” she said. “I shall go in the carriage. You mustn’t go at all.”

Arnold naturally looked a little surprised, and asked to be favored with an explanation.

Blanche took his arm and hugged it close. Now that Anne was lost, Arnold was more precious to her than ever. She literally hungered to hear at that moment, from his own lips, how fond he was of her. It mattered nothing that she was already perfectly satisfied on this point. It was so nice (after he had said it five hundred times already) to make him say it once more!

“Suppose I had no explanation to give?” she said. “Would you stay behind by yourself to please me?”

“I would do any thing to please you!”

“Do you really love me as much as that?”

They were still in the yard; and the only witnesses present were the dogs. Arnold answered in the language without words — which is nevertheless the most expressive language in use, between men and women, all over the world.

“This is not doing my duty,” said Blanche, penitently. “But, oh Arnold, I am so anxious and so miserable! And it
is
such a consolation to know that
you
won’t turn your back on me too!”

With that preface she told him what had happened in the library. Even Blanche’s estimate of her lover’s capacity for sympathising with her was more than realized by the effect which her narrative produced on Arnold. He was not merely surprised and sorry for her. His face showed plainly that he felt genuine concern and distress. He had never stood higher in Blanche’s opinion than he stood at that moment.

“What is to be done?” he asked. “How does Sir Patrick propose to find her?”

Blanche repeated Sir Patrick’s instructions relating to the crossroads, and also to the serious necessity of pursuing the investigation in the strictest privacy. Arnold (relieved from all fear of being sent back to Craig Fernie) undertook to do every thing that was asked of him, and promised to keep the secret from every body.

They went back to the house, and met with an icy welcome from Lady Lundie. Her ladyship repeated her remark on the subject of turning Windygates into a Penitentiary for Blanche’s benefit. She received Arnold’s petition to be excused from going to see the castle with the barest civility. “Oh, take your walk by all means! You may meet your friend, Mr. Delamayn — who appears to have such a passion for walking that he can’t even wait till luncheon is over. As for Sir Patrick — Oh! Sir Patrick has borrowed the pony-carriage? and gone out driving by himself? — I’m sure I never meant to offend my brother-in-law when I offered him a slice of my poor little cake. Don’t let me offend any body else. Dispose of your afternoon, Blanche, without the slightest reference to me. Nobody seems inclined to visit the ruins — the most interesting relic of feudal times in Perthshire, Mr. Brinkworth. It doesn’t matter — oh, dear me, it doesn’t matter! I can’t force my guests to feel an intelligent curiosity on the subject of Scottish Antiquities. No! no! my dear Blanche! — it won’t be the first time, or the last, that I have driven out alone. I don’t at all object to being alone. ‘My mind to me a kingdom is,’ as the poet says.” So Lady Lundie’s outraged self-importance asserted its violated claims on human respect, until her distinguished medical guest came to the rescue and smoothed his hostess’s ruffled plumes. The surgeon (he privately detested ruins) begged to go. Blanche begged to go. Smith and Jones (profoundly interested in feudal antiquities) said they would sit behind, in the “rumble” — rather than miss this unexpected treat. One, Two, and Three caught the infection, and volunteered to be the escort on horseback. Lady Lundie’s celebrated “smile” (warranted to remain unaltered on her face for hours together) made its appearance once more. She issued her orders with the most charming amiability. “We’ll take the guidebook,” said her ladyship, with the eye to mean economy, which is only to be met with in very rich people, “and save a shilling to the man who shows the ruins.” With that she went up stairs to array herself for the drive, and looked in the glass; and saw a perfectly virtuous, fascinating, and accomplished woman, facing her irresistibly in a new French bonnet!

At a private signal from Blanche, Arnold slipped out and repaired to his post, where the roads crossed the road that led to the railway.

There was a space of open heath on one side of him, and the stonewall and gates of a farmhouse inclosure on the other. Arnold sat down on the soft heather — and lit a cigar — and tried to see his way through the double mystery of Anne’s appearance and Anne’s flight.

He had interpreted his friend’s absence exactly as his friend had anticipated: he could only assume that Geoffrey had gone to keep a private appointment with Anne. Miss Silvester’s appearance at Windygates alone, and Miss Silvester’s anxiety to hear the names of the gentlemen who were staying in the house, seemed, under these circumstances, to point to the plain conclusion that the two had, in some way, unfortunately missed each other. But what could be the motive of her flight? Whether she knew of some other place in which she might meet Geoffrey? or whether she had gone back to the inn? or whether she had acted under some sudden impulse of despair? — were questions which Arnold was necessarily quite incompetent to solve. There was no choice but to wait until an opportunity offered of reporting what had happened to Geoffrey himself.

After the lapse of half an hour, the sound of some approaching vehicle — the first sound of the sort that he had heard — attracted Arnold’s attention. He started up, and saw the pony-chaise approaching him along the road from the station. Sir Patrick, this time, was compelled to drive himself — Duncan was not with him. On discovering Arnold, he stopped the pony.

“So! so!” said the old gentleman. “You have heard all about it, I see? You understand that this is to be a secret from every body, till further notice? Very good, Has any thing happened since you have been here?”

“Nothing. Have you made any discoveries, Sir Patrick?”

“None. I got to the station before the train. No signs of Miss Silvester any where. I have left Duncan on the watch — with orders not to stir till the last train has passed to-night.”

“I don’t think she will turn up at the station,” said Arnold. “I fancy she has gone back to Craig Fernie.”

“Quite possible. I am now on my way to Craig Fernie, to make inquiries about her. I don’t know how long I may be detained, or what it may lead to. If you see Blanche before I do tell her I have instructed the station-master to let me know (if Miss Silvester does take the railway) what place she books for. Thanks to that arrangement, we sha’n’t have to wait for news till Duncan can telegraph that he has seen her to her journey’s end. In the mean time, you understand what you are wanted to do here?”

“Blanche has explained every thing to me.”

“Stick to your post, and make good use of your eyes. You were accustomed to that, you know, when you were at sea. It’s no great hardship to pass a few hours in this delicious summer air. I see you have contracted the vile modern habit of smoking — that will be occupation enough to amuse you, no doubt! Keep the roads in view; and, if she does come your way, don’t attempt to stop her — you can’t do that. Speak to her (quite innocently, mind!), by way of getting time enough to notice the face of the man who is driving her, and the name (if there is one) on his cart. Do that, and you will do enough. Pah! how that cigar poisons the air! What will have become of your stomach when you get to my age?”

“I sha’n’t complain, Sir Patrick, if I can eat as good a dinner as you do.”

“That reminds me! I met somebody I knew at the station. Hester Dethridge has left her place, and gone to London by the train. We may feed at Windygates — we have done with dining now. It has been a final quarrel this time between the mistress and the cook. I have given Hester my address in London, and told her to let me know before she decides on another place. A woman who
can’t
talk, and a woman who
can
cook, is simply a woman who has arrived at absolute perfection. Such a treasure shall not go out of the family, if I can help it. Did you notice the Bechamel sauce at lunch? Pooh! a young man who smokes cigars doesn’t know the difference between Bechamel sauce and melted butter. Good afternoon! good afternoon!”

He slackened the reins, and away he went to Craig Fernie. Counting by years, the pony was twenty, and the pony’s driver was seventy. Counting by vivacity and spirit, two of the most youthful characters in Scotland had got together that afternoon in the same chaise.

An hour more wore itself slowly out; and nothing had passed Arnold on the cross-roads but a few stray foot-passengers, a heavy wagon, and a gig with an old woman in it. He rose again from the heather, weary of inaction, and resolved to walk backward and forward, within view of his post, for a change. At the second turn, when his face happened to be set toward the open heath, he noticed another foot-passenger — apparently a man — far away in the empty distance. Was the person coming toward him?

He advanced a little. The stranger was doubtless advancing too, so rapidly did his figure now reveal itself, beyond all doubt, as the figure of a man. A few minutes more and Arnold fancied he recognised it. Yet a little longer, and he was quite sure. There was no mistaking the lithe strength and grace of
that
man, and the smooth easy swiftness with which he covered his ground. It was the hero of the coming foot-race. It was Geoffrey on his way back to Windygates House.

Arnold hurried forward to meet him. Geoffrey stood still, poising himself on his stick, and let the other come up.

“Have you heard what has happened at the house?” asked Arnold.

He instinctively checked the next question as it rose to his lips. There was a settled defiance in the expression of Geoffrey’s face, which Arnold was quite at a loss to understand. He looked like a man who had made up his mind to confront any thing that could happen, and to contradict any body who spoke to him.

“Something seems to have annoyed you?” said Arnold.

“What’s up at the house?” returned Geoffrey, with his loudest voice and his hardest look.

“Miss Silvester has been at the house.”

“Who saw her?”

“Nobody but Blanche.”

“Well?”

“Well, she was miserably weak and ill, so ill that she fainted, poor thing, in the library. Blanche brought her to.”

“And what then?”

“We were all at lunch at the time. Blanche left the library, to speak privately to her uncle. When she went back Miss Silvester was gone, and nothing has been seen of her since.”

“A row at the house?”

“Nobody knows of it at the house, except Blanche — ”

“And you? And how many besides?”

“And Sir Patrick. Nobody else.”

“Nobody else? Any thing more?”

Arnold remembered his promise to keep the investigation then on foot a secret from every body. Geoffrey’s manner made him — unconsciously to himself — readier than he might otherwise have been to consider Geoffrey as included in the general prohibition.