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

gentlemen from their wine. Her stepmother⁠—mapping out a new antiquarian excursion for the next day, and finding Blanche’s ears closed to her occasional remarks on baronial Scotland five hundred years since⁠—lamented, with satirical emphasis, the absence of an intelligent companion of her own sex; and stretched her majestic figure on the sofa to wait until an audience worthy of her flowed in from the dining-room. Before very long⁠—so soothing is the influence of an after-dinner view of feudal antiquities, taken through the medium of an approving conscience⁠—Lady Lundie’s eyes closed; and from Lady Lundie’s nose there poured, at intervals, a sound, deep like her ladyship’s learning; regular, like her ladyship’s habits⁠—a sound associated with nightcaps and bedrooms, evoked alike by Nature, the leveler, from high and low⁠—the sound (oh, Truth, what enormities find publicity in thy name!)⁠—the sound of a snore.

Free to do as she pleased, Blanche left the echoes of the drawing-room in undisturbed enjoyment of Lady Lundie’s audible repose.

She went into the library, and turned over the novels. Went out again, and looked across the hall at the dining-room door. Would the men never have done talking their politics and drinking their wine? She went up to her own room, and changed her earrings, and scolded her maid. Descended once more⁠—and made an alarming discovery in a dark corner of the hall.

Two men were standing there, hat in hand whispering to the butler. The butler, leaving them, went into the dining-room⁠—came out again with Sir Patrick⁠—and said to the two men, “Step this way, please.” The two men came out into the light. Murdoch, the stationmaster; and Duncan, the valet! News of Anne!

“Oh, uncle, let me stay!” pleaded Blanche.

Sir Patrick hesitated. It was impossible to say⁠—as matters stood at that moment⁠—what distressing intelligence the two men might not have brought of the missing woman. Duncan’s return, accompanied by the stationmaster, looked serious. Blanche instantly penetrated the secret of her uncle’s hesitation. She turned pale, and caught him by the arm. “Don’t send me away,” she whispered. “I can bear anything but suspense.”

“Out with it!” said Sir Patrick, holding his niece’s hand. “Is she found or not?”

“She’s gone by the up-train,” said the stationmaster. “And we know where.”

Sir Patrick breathed freely; Blanche’s color came back. In different ways, the relief to both of them was equally great.

“You had my orders to follow her,” said Sir Patrick to Duncan. “Why have you come back?”

“Your man is not to blame, Sir,” interposed the stationmaster. “The lady took the train at Kirkandrew.”

Sir Patrick started and looked at the stationmaster. “Ay? ay? The next station⁠—the market-town. Inexcusably stupid of me. I never thought of that.”

“I took the liberty of telegraphing your description of the lady to Kirkandrew, Sir Patrick, in case of accidents.”

“I stand corrected, Mr. Murdoch. Your head, in this matter, has been the sharper head of the two. Well?”

“There’s the answer, Sir.”

Sir Patrick and Blanche read the telegram together.

“Kirkandrew. Up train. 7:40 p.m. Lady as described. No luggage. Bag in her hand. Traveling alone. Ticket⁠—second-class. Place⁠—Edinburgh.”

“Edinburgh!” repeated Blanche. “Oh, uncle! we shall lose her in a great place like that!”

“We shall find her, my dear; and you shall see how. Duncan, get me pen, ink, and paper. Mr. Murdoch, you are going back to the station, I suppose?”

“Yes, Sir Patrick.”

“I will give you a telegram, to be sent at once to Edinburgh.”

He wrote a carefully-worded telegraphic message, and addressed it to The Sheriff of Mid-Lothian.

“The Sheriff is an old friend of mine,” he explained to his niece. “And he is now in Edinburgh. Long before the train gets to the terminus he will receive this personal description of Miss Silvester, with my request to have all her movements carefully watched till further notice. The police are entirely at his disposal; and the best men will be selected for the purpose. I have asked for an answer by telegraph. Keep a special messenger ready for it at the station, Mr. Murdoch. Thank you; good evening. Duncan, get your supper, and make yourself comfortable. Blanche, my dear, go back to the drawing-room, and expect us in to tea immediately. You will know where your friend is before you go to bed tonight.”

With those comforting words he returned to the gentlemen. In ten minutes more they all appeared in the drawing-room; and Lady Lundie (firmly persuaded that she had never closed her eyes) was back again in baronial Scotland five hundred years since.

Blanche, watching her opportunity, caught her uncle alone.

“Now for your promise,” she said. “You have made some important discoveries at Craig Fernie. What are they?”

Sir Patrick’s eye turned toward Geoffrey, dozing in an armchair in a corner of the room. He showed a certain disposition to trifle with the curiosity of his niece.

“After the discovery we have already made,” he said, “can’t you wait, my dear, till we get the telegram from Edinburgh?”

“That is just what it’s impossible for me to do! The telegram won’t come for hours yet. I want something to go on with in the meantime.”

She seated herself on a sofa in the corner opposite Geoffrey, and pointed to the vacant place by her side.

Sir Patrick had promised⁠—Sir Patrick had no choice but to keep his word. After another look at Geoffrey, he took the vacant place by his niece.

XXIV Backward

“Well?” whispered Blanche, taking her uncle confidentially by the arm.

“Well,” said Sir Patrick, with a spark of his satirical humor flashing out at his niece, “I am going to do a very rash thing. I am going to place a serious trust in the hands of a girl of eighteen.”

“The girl’s hands will keep it, uncle⁠—though she is only eighteen.”

“I must run the risk, my dear; your intimate knowledge of Miss Silvester may be of the greatest assistance to me in the next step I take. You shall know all that I can tell you, but I must warn you first. I can only admit you into my confidence by startling you with a great surprise. Do you