Man and Wife, Wilkie Collins [best ebook reader android .TXT] 📗

say, when I was so rude as to interrupt you. What was it?”

“Only this,” said Julius. “I don’t find it easy to understand Sir Patrick Lundie’s conduct in permitting Mr. Brinkworth to commit bigamy with his niece.”

“Wait a minute! The marriage of that horrible woman to Mr. Brinkworth was a private marriage. Of course, Sir Patrick knew nothing about it!”

Julius owned that this might be possible, and made a second attempt to lead the angry lady back to the piano. Useless, once more! Though she shrank from confessing it to herself, Mrs. Glenarm’s belief in the genuineness of her lover’s defense had been shaken. The tone taken by Julius⁠—moderate as it was⁠—revived the first startling suspicion of the credibility of Geoffrey’s statement which Anne’s language and conduct had forced on Mrs. Glenarm. She dropped into the nearest chair, and put her handkerchief to her eyes. “You always hated poor Geoffrey,” she said, with a burst of tears. “And now you’re defaming him to me!”

Julius managed her admirably. On the point of answering her seriously, he checked himself. “I always hated poor Geoffrey,” he repeated, with a smile. “You ought to be the last person to say that, Mrs. Glenarm! I brought him all the way from London expressly to introduce him to you.”

“Then I wish you had left him in London!” retorted Mrs. Glenarm, shifting suddenly from tears to temper. “I was a happy woman before I met your brother. I can’t give him up!” she burst out, shifting back again from temper to tears. “I don’t care if he has deceived me. I won’t let another woman have him! I will be his wife!” She threw herself theatrically on her knees before Julius. “Oh, do help me to find out the truth!” she said. “Oh, Julius, pity me! I am so fond of him!”

There was genuine distress in her face, there was true feeling in her voice. Who would have believed that there were reserves of merciless insolence and heartless cruelty in this woman⁠—and that they had been lavishly poured out on a fallen sister not five minutes since?

“I will do all I can,” said Julius, raising her. “Let us talk of it when you are more composed. Try a little music,” he repeated, “just to quiet your nerves.”

“Would you like me to play?” asked Mrs. Glenarm, becoming a model of feminine docility at a moment’s notice.

Julius opened the Sonatas of Mozart, and shouldered his violin.

“Let’s try the Fifteenth,” he said, placing Mrs. Glenarm at the piano. “We will begin with the Adagio. If ever there was divine music written by mortal man, there it is!”

They began. At the third bar Mrs. Glenarm dropped a note⁠—and the bow of Julius paused shuddering on the strings.

“I can’t play!” she said. “I am so agitated; I am so anxious. How am I to find out whether that wretch is really married or not? Who can I ask? I can’t go to Geoffrey in London⁠—the trainers won’t let me see him. I can’t appeal to Mr. Brinkworth himself⁠—I am not even acquainted with him. Who else is there? Do think, and tell me!”

There was but one chance of making her return to the Adagio⁠—the chance of hitting on a suggestion which would satisfy and quiet her. Julius laid his violin on the piano, and considered the question before him carefully.

“There are the witnesses,” he said. “If Geoffrey’s story is to be depended on, the landlady and the waiter at the inn can speak to the facts.”

“Low people!” objected Mrs. Glenarm. “People I don’t know. People who might take advantage of my situation, and be insolent to me.”

Julius considered once more; and made another suggestion. With the fatal ingenuity of innocence, he hit on the idea of referring Mrs. Glenarm to no less a person than Lady Lundie herself!

“There is our good friend at Windygates,” he said. “Some whisper of the matter may have reached Lady Lundie’s ears. It may be a little awkward to call on her (if she has heard anything) at the time of a serious family disaster. You are the best judge of that, however. All I can do is to throw out the notion. Windygates isn’t very far off⁠—and something might come of it. What do you think?”

Something might come of it! Let it be remembered that Lady Lundie had been left entirely in the dark⁠—that she had written to Sir Patrick in a tone which plainly showed that her self-esteem was wounded and her suspicion roused⁠—and that her first intimation of the serious dilemma in which Arnold Brinkworth stood was now likely, thanks to Julius Delamayn, to reach her from the lips of a mere acquaintance. Let this be remembered; and then let the estimate be formed of what might come of it⁠—not at Windygates only, but also at Ham Farm!

“What do you think?” asked Julius.

Mrs. Glenarm was enchanted. “The very person to go to!” she said. “If I am not let in I can easily write⁠—and explain my object as an apology. Lady Lundie is so right-minded, so sympathetic. If she sees no one else⁠—I have only to confide my anxieties to her, and I am sure she will see me. You will lend me a carriage, won’t you? I’ll go to Windygates tomorrow.”

Julius took his violin off the piano.

“Don’t think me very troublesome,” he said coaxingly. “Between this and tomorrow we have nothing to do. And it is such music, if you once get into the swing of it! Would you mind trying again?”

Mrs. Glenarm was willing to do anything to prove her gratitude, after the invaluable hint which she had just received. At the second trial the fair pianist’s eye and hand were in perfect harmony. The lovely melody which the Adagio of Mozart’s Fifteenth Sonata has given to violin and piano flowed smoothly at last⁠—and Julius Delamayn soared to the seventh heaven of musical delight.

The next day Mrs. Glenarm and Mrs. Delamayn went together to Windygates House.

Tenth Scene The Bedroom XLI Lady Lundie Does Her Duty

The scene opens on a bedroom⁠—and discloses, in