Complete Works of Wilkie Collins (913 page)

“I have hardly the heart to go on. If I studied my own wishes, I should feel inclined to stop here.

“Let me, at least, hasten to the end. In two or three days’ time I received my first intelligence of the patient and his nurse. Lady Janet informed me that he had recognised her. When I heard this I felt prepared for what was to come. The next report announced that he was gaining strength, and the next that he was out of danger. Upon this Lady Janet returned to Mablethorpe House. I called there a week ago — and heard that he had been removed to the sea-side. I called yesterday — and received the latest information from her ladyship’s own lips. My pen almost refuses to write it. Mercy Merrick has consented to marry him!

“An outrage on Society — that is how my mother and my sisters view it; that is how
you
will view it too. My mother has herself struck Julian’s name off her invitation-list. The servants have their orders, if he presumes to call: ‘Not at home.’

“I am unhappily only too certain that I am correct in writing to you of this disgraceful marriage as of a settled thing. Lady Janet went the length of showing me the letters — one from Julian, the other from the woman herself. Fancy Mercy Merrick in correspondence with Lady Janet Roy! addressing her as ‘My dear Lady Janet,’ and signing, ‘Yours affectionately!’

“I had not the patience to read either of the letters through. Julian’s tone is the tone of a Socialist; in my opinion his bishop ought to be informed of it. As for
her
she plays her part just as cleverly with her pen as she played it with her tongue. ‘I cannot disguise from myself that I am wrong in yielding.... Sad forebodings fill my mind when I think of the future.... I feel as if the first contemptuous look that is cast at my husband will destroy
my
happiness, though it may not disturb
him
.... As long as I was parted from him I could control my own weakness, I could accept my hard lot. But how can I resist him after having watched for weeks at his bedside; after having seen his first smile, and heard his first grateful words t o me while I was slowly helping him back to life?’

“There is the tone which she takes through four closely written pages of nauseous humility and clap-trap sentiment! It is enough to make one despise women. Thank God, there is the contrast at hand to remind me of what is due to the better few among the sex. I feel that my mother and my sisters are doubly precious to me now. May I add, on the side of consolation, that I prize with hardly inferior gratitude the privilege of corresponding with
you?

“Farewell for the present. I am too rudely shaken in my most cherished convictions, I am too depressed and disheartened, to write more. All good wishes go with you, dear Miss Roseberry, until we meet.

“Most truly yours,

“HORACE HOLMCROFT.”

IV.

Extracts from the DIARY of THE REVEREND JULIAN GRAY.

FIRST EXTRACT.

....”A month to-day since we were married! I have only one thing to say: I would cheerfully go through all that I have suffered to live this one month over again. I never knew what happiness was until now. And better still, I have persuaded Mercy that it is all her doing. I have scattered her misgivings to the winds; she is obliged to submit to evidence, and to own that she can make the happiness of my life.

“We go back to London to-morrow. She regrets leaving the tranquil retirement of this remote sea-side place — she dreads change. I care nothing for it. It is all one to me where I go, so long as my wife is with me.”

SECOND EXTRACT.

“The first cloud has risen. I entered the room unexpectedly just now, and found her in tears.

“With considerable difficulty I persuaded her to tell me what had happened. Are there any limits to the mischief that can be done by the tongue of a foolish woman? The landlady at my lodgings is the woman, in this case. Having no decided plans for the future as yet, we returned (most unfortunately, as the event has proved) to the rooms in London which I inhabited in my bachelor days. They are still mine for six weeks to come, and Mercy was unwilling to let me incur the expense of taking her to a hotel. At breakfast this morning I rashly congratulated myself (in my wife’s hearing) on finding that a much smaller collection than usual of letters and cards had accumulated in my absence. Breakfast over, I was obliged to go out. Painfully sensitive, poor thing, to any change in my experience of the little world around me which it is possible to connect with the event of my marriage, Mercy questioned the landlady, in my absence, about the diminished number of my visitors and my correspondents. The woman seized the opportunity of gossiping about me and my affairs, and my wife’s quick perception drew the right conclusion unerringly. My marriage has decided certain wise heads of families on discontinuing their social relations with me. The facts, unfortunately, speak for themselves. People who in former years habitually called upon me and invited me — or who, in the event of my absence, habitually wrote to me at this season — have abstained with a remarkable unanimity from calling, inviting, or writing now.

“It would have been sheer waste of time — to say nothing of its also implying a want of confidence in my wife — if I had attempted to set things right by disputing Mercy’s conclusion. I could only satisfy her that not so much as the shadow of disappointment or mortification rested on my mind. In this way I have, to some extent, succeeded in composing my poor darling. But the wound has been inflicted, and the wound is felt. There is no disguising that result. I must face it boldly.

“Trifling as this incident is in my estimation, it has decided me on one point already. In shaping my future course I am now resolved to act on my own convictions — in preference to taking the well-meant advice of such friends as are still left to me.

“All my little success in life has been gained in the pulpit. I am what is termed a popular preacher — but I have never, in my secret self, felt any exultation in my own notoriety, or any extraordinary respect for the means by which it has been won. In the first place, I have a very low idea of the importance of oratory as an intellectual accomplishment. There is no other art in which the conditions of success are so easy of attainment; there is no other art in the practice of which so much that is purely superficial passes itself off habitually for something that claims to be profound. Then, again, how poor it is in the results which it achieves! Take my own case. How often (for example) have I thundered with all my heart and soul against the wicked extravagance of dress among women — against their filthy false hair and their nauseous powders and paints! How often (to take another example) have I denounced the mercenary and material spirit of the age — the habitual corruptions and dishonesties of commerce, in high places and in low! What good have I done? I have delighted the very people whom it was my object to rebuke. ‘What a charming sermon!’ ‘More eloquent than ever!’ ‘I used to dread the sermon at the other church — do you know, I quite look forward to it now.’ That is the effect I produce on Sunday. On Monday the women are off to the milliners to spend more money than ever; the city men are off to business to make more money than ever — while my grocer, loud in my praises in his Sunday coat, turns up his week-day sleeves and adulterates his favorite preacher’s sugar as cheerfully as usual!

“I have often, in past years, felt the objections to pursuing my career which are here indicated. They were bitterly present to my mind when I resigned my curacy, and they strongly influence me now.

“I am weary of my cheaply won success in the pulpit. I am weary of society as I find it in my time. I felt some respect for myself, and some heart and hope in my works among the miserable wretches in Green Anchor Fields. But I can not, and must not, return among them: I have no right,
now
, to trifle with my health and my life. I must go back to my preaching, or I must leave England. Among a primitive people, away from the cities — in the far and fertile West of the great American continent — I might live happily with my wife, and do good among my neighbours, secure of providing for our wants out of the modest little income which is almost useless to me here. In the life which I thus picture to myself I see love, peace, health, and duties and occupations that are worthy of a Christian man. What prospect is before me if I take the advice of my friends and stay here? Work of which I am weary, because I have long since ceased to respect it; petty malice that strikes at me through my wife, and mortifies and humiliates her, turn where she may. If I had only myself to think of, I might defy the worst that malice can do. But I have Mercy to think of — Mercy, whom I love better than my own life! Women live, poor things, in the opinions of others. I have had one warning already of what my wife is likely to suffer at the hands of my ‘friends’ — Heaven forgive me for misusing the word! Shall I deliberately expose her to fresh mortifications? — and this for the sake of returning to a career the rewards of which I no longer prize? No! We will both be happy — we will both be free! God is merciful, Nature is kind, Love is true, in the New World as well as the Old. To the New World we will go!”

THIRD EXTRACT.

“I hardly know whether I have done right or wrong. I mentioned yesterday to Lady Janet the cold reception of me on my return to London, and the painful sense of it felt by my wife.

“My aunt looks at the matter from her own peculiar point of view, and makes light of it accordingly. ‘You never did, and never will, understand Society, Julian,’ said her ladyship. ‘These poor stupid people simply don’t know what to do. They are waiting to be told by a person of distinction whether they are, or are not, to recognise your marriage. In plain English, they are waiting to be led by Me. Consider it done. I will lead them.’

“I thought my aunt was joking. The event of to-day has shown me that she is terribly in earnest. Lady Janet has issued invitations for one of her grand balls at Mablethorpe House; and sh e has caused the report to be circulated everywhere that the object of the festival is ‘to celebrate the marriage of Mr. and Mrs. Julian Gray!’

“I at first refused to be present. To my amazement, however, Mercy sides with my aunt. She reminds me of all that we both owe to Lady Janet; and she has persuaded me to alter my mind. We are to go to the ball — at my wife express request!

“The meaning of this, as I interpret it, is that my poor love is still pursued in secret by the dread that my marriage has injured me in the general estimation. She will suffer anything, risk anything, believe anything, to be freed from that one haunting doubt. Lady Janet predicts a social triumph; and my wife’s despair — not my wife’s conviction — accepts the prophecy. As for me, I am prepared for the result. It will end in our going to the New World, and trying Society in its infancy, among the forests and the plains. I shall quietly prepare for our departure, and own what I have done at the right time — that is to say, when the ball is over.”

FOURTH EXTRACT.

“I have met with the man for my purpose — an old college friend of mine, now partner in a firm of ship-owners, largely concerned in emigration.

“One of their vessels sails for America, from the port of London, in a fortnight, touching at Plymouth. By a fortunate coincidence, Lady Janet’s ball takes place in a fortnight. I see my way.

“Helped by the kindness of my friend, I have arranged to have a cabin kept in reserve, on payment of a small deposit. If the ball ends (as I believe it will) in new mortifications for Mercy — do what they may, I defy them to mortify
me
— I have only to say the word by telegraph, and we shall catch the ship at Plymouth.

“I know the effect it will have when I break the news to her, but I am prepared with my remedy. The pages of my diary, written in past years, will show plainly enough that it is not
she
who is driving me away from England. She will see the longing in me for other work and other scenes expressing itself over and over again long before the time when we first met.”

FIFTH EXTRACT.

“Mercy’s ball dress — a present from kind Lady Janet — is finished. I was allowed to see the first trial, or preliminary rehearsal, of this work of art. I don’t in the least understand the merits of silk and lace; but one thing I know — my wife will be the most beautiful woman at the ball.

“The same day I called on Lady Janet to thank her, and encountered a new revelation of the wayward and original character of my dear old aunt.

“She was on the point of tearing up a letter when I went into her room. Seeing me, she suspended her purpose and handed me the letter. It was in Mercy’s handwriting. Lady Janet pointed to a passage on the last page. ‘Tell your wife, with my love,’ she said, ‘that I am the most obstinate woman of the two. I positively refuse to read her, as I positively refuse to listen to her, whenever she attempts to return to that one subject. Now give me the letter back.’ I gave it back, and saw it torn up before my face. The ‘one subject’ prohibited to Mercy as sternly as ever is still the subject of the personation of Grace Roseberry! Nothing could have been more naturally introduced, or more delicately managed, than my wife’s brief reference to the subject. No matter. The reading of the first line was enough. Lady Janet shut her eyes and destroyed the letter — Lady Janet is determined to live and die absolutely ignorant of the true story of ‘Mercy Merrick.’ What unanswerable riddles we are! Is it wonderful if we perpetually fail to understand one another?”