The Woman in White

Chapter 1

[1] The passages omitted, here and elsewhere, in Miss Halcombe's

Diary are only those which bear no reference to Miss Fairlie or to

any of the persons with whom she is associated in these pages.

His interview with Laura had evidently grieved and surprised him

more than he liked to confess. I felt afraid, from his look and

manner when we parted, that she might have inadvertently betrayed

to him the real secret of her depression and my anxiety. This

doubt grew on me so, after he had gone, that I declined riding out

with Sir Percival, and went up to Laura's room instead.

I have been sadly distrustful of myself, in this difficult and

lamentable matter, ever since I found out my own ignorance of the

strength of Laura's unhappy attachment. I ought to have known

that the delicacy and forbearance and sense of honour which drew

me to poor Hartright, and made me so sincerely admire and respect

him, were just the qualities to appeal most irresistibly to

Laura's natural sensitiveness and natural generosity of nature.

And yet, until she opened her heart to me of her own accord, I had

no suspicion that this new feeling had taken root so deeply. I

once thought time and care might remove it. I now fear that it

will remain with her and alter her for life. The discovery that I

have committed such an error in judgment as this makes me hesitate

about everything else. I hesitate about Sir Percival, in the face

of the plainest proofs. I hesitate even in speaking to Laura. On

this very morning I doubted, with my hand on the door, whether I

should ask her the questions I had come to put, or not.

When I went into her room I found her walking up and down in great

impatience. She looked flushed and excited, and she came forward

at once, and spoke to me before I could open my lips.

"I wanted you," she said. "Come and sit down on the sofa with me.

Marian! I can bear this no longer--I must and will end it."

There was too much colour in her cheeks, too much energy in her

manner, too much firmness in her voice. The little book of

Hartright's drawings--the fatal book that she will dream over

whenever she is alone--was in one of her hands. I began by gently

and firmly taking it from her, and putting it out of sight on a

side-table.

She shook her head. "No, not in what I am thinking of now. He

was very kind and good to me, Marian, and I am ashamed to say I

distressed him by crying. I am miserably helpless--I can't

control myself. For my own sake, and for all our sakes, I must

have courage enough to end it."

She put her arms round my neck, and rested her head quietly on my

bosom. On the opposite wall hung the miniature portrait of her

father. I bent over her, and saw that she was looking at it while

her head lay on my breast.

"I can never claim my release from my engagement," she went on.

"Whatever way it ends it must end wretchedly for me. All I can

do, Marian, is not to add the remembrance that I have broken my

promise and forgotten my father's dying words, to make that

wretchedness worse."

"To tell Sir Percival Glyde the truth with my own lips," she

answered, "and to let him release me, if he will, not because I

ask him, but because he knows all."

"What do you mean, Laura, by 'all'? Sir Percival will know enough

(he has told me so himself) if he knows that the engagement is

opposed to your own wishes."

"Can I tell him that, when the engagement was made for me by my

father, with my own consent? I should have kept my promise, not

happily, I am afraid, but still contentedly--" she stopped, turned

her face to me, and laid her cheek close against mine--"I should

have kept my engagement, Marian, if another love had not grown up

in my heart, which was not there when I first promised to be Sir

Percival's wife."

"Wrong, Marian, wrong! I ought to deceive no one--least of all the

man to whom my father gave me, and to whom I gave myself." She put

her lips to mine, and kissed me. "My own love," she said softly,

"you are so much too fond of me, and so much too proud of me, that

you forget, in my case, what you would remember in your own.

Better that Sir Percival should doubt my motives, and misjudge my

conduct if he will, than that I should be first false to him in

thought, and then mean enough to serve my own interests by hiding

the falsehood."

I held her away from me in astonishment. For the first time in

our lives we had changed places--the resolution was all on her

side, the hesitation all on mine. I looked into the pale, quiet,

resigned young face--I saw the pure, innocent heart, in the loving

eyes that looked back at me--and the poor worldly cautions and

objections that rose to my lips dwindled and died away in their

own emptiness. I hung my head in silence. In her place the

despicably small pride which makes so many women deceitful would

have been my pride, and would have made me deceitful too.

I only answered by drawing her close to me again. I was afraid of

crying if I spoke. My tears do not flow so easily as they ought--

they come almost like men's tears, with sobs that seem to tear me

in pieces, and that frighten every one about me.

"I have thought of this, love, for many days," she went on,

twining and twisting my hair with that childish restlessness in

her fingers, which poor Mrs. Vesey still tries so patiently and so

vainly to cure her of--"I have thought of it very seriously, and I

can be sure of my courage when my own conscience tells me I am

right. Let me speak to him to-morrow--in your presence, Marian.

I will say nothing that is wrong, nothing that you or I need be

ashamed of--but, oh, it will ease my heart so to end this

miserable concealment! Only let me know and feel that I have no

deception to answer for on my side, and then, when he has heard

what I have to say, let him act towards me as he will."

She sighed, and put her head back in its old position on my bosom.

Sad misgivings about what the end would be weighed upon my mind,

but still distrusting myself, I told her that I would do as she

wished. She thanked me, and we passed gradually into talking of

other things.

At dinner she joined us again, and was more easy and more herself

with Sir Percival than I have seen her yet. In the evening she

went to the piano, choosing new music of the dexterous, tuneless,

florid kind. The lovely old melodies of Mozart, which poor

Hartright was so fond of, she has never played since he left. The

book is no longer in the music-stand. She took the volume away

herself, so that nobody might find it out and ask her to play from

it.

I had no opportunity of discovering whether her purpose of the

morning had changed or not, until she wished Sir Percival good-

night--and then her own words informed me that it was unaltered.

She said, very quietly, that she wished to speak to him after

breakfast, and that he would find her in her sitting-room with me.

He changed colour at those words, and I felt his hand trembling a

little when it came to my turn to take it. The event of the next

morning would decide his future life, and he evidently knew it.

I went in, as usual, through the door between our two bed-rooms,

to bid Laura good-night before she went to sleep. In stooping

over her to kiss her I saw the little book of Hartright's drawings

half hidden under her pillow, just in the place where she used to

hide her favourite toys when she was a child. I could not find it

in my heart to say anything, but I pointed to the book and shook

my head. She reached both hands up to my cheeks, and drew my face

down to hers till our lips met.

9th.--The first event of the morning was not of a kind to raise my

spirits--a letter arrived for me from poor Walter Hartright. It

is the answer to mine describing the manner in which Sir Percival

cleared himself of the suspicions raised by Anne Catherick's

letter. He writes shortly and bitterly about Sir Percival's

explanations, only saying that he has no right to offer an opinion

on the conduct of those who are above him. This is sad, but his

occasional references to himself grieve me still more. He says

that the effort to return to his old habits and pursuits grows

harder instead of easier to him every day and he implores me, if I

have any interest, to exert it to get him employment that will

necessitate his absence from England, and take him among new

scenes and new people. I have been made all the readier to comply

with this request by a passage at the end of his letter, which has

almost alarmed me.

After mentioning that he has neither seen nor heard anything of

Anne Catherick, he suddenly breaks off, and hints in the most

abrupt, mysterious manner, that he has been perpetually watched

and followed by strange men ever since he returned to London. He

acknowledges that he cannot prove this extraordinary suspicion by

fixing on any particular persons, but he declares that the

suspicion itself is present to him night and day. This has

frightened me, because it looks as if his one fixed idea about

Laura was becoming too much for his mind. I will write

immediately to some of my mother's influential old friends in

London, and press his claims on their notice. Change of scene and

change of occupation may really be the salvation of him at this

crisis in his life.

Greatly to my relief, Sir Percival sent an apology for not joining

us at breakfast. He had taken an early cup of coffee in his own

room, and he was still engaged there in writing letters. At

eleven o'clock, if that hour was convenient, he would do himself

the honour of waiting on Miss Fairlie and Miss Halcombe.

My eyes were on Laura's face while the message was being

delivered. I had found her unaccountably quiet and composed on

going into her room in the morning, and so she remained all

through breakfast. Even when we were sitting together on the sofa

in her room, waiting for Sir Percival, she still preserved her

self-control.

"Don't be afraid of me, Marian," was all she said; "I may forget

myself with an old friend like Mr. Gilmore, or with a dear sister

like you, but I will not forget myself with Sir Percival Glyde."

I looked at her, and listened to her in silent surprise. Through

all the years of our close intimacy this passive force in her

character had been hidden from me--hidden even from herself, till

love found it, and suffering called it forth.

As the clock on the mantelpiece struck eleven Sir Percival knocked

at the door and came in. There was suppressed anxiety and

agitation in every line of his face. The dry, sharp cough, which

teases him at most times, seemed to be troubling him more

incessantly than ever. He sat down opposite to us at the table,

and Laura remained by me. I looked attentively at them both, and

he was the palest of the two.

He said a few unimportant words, with a visible effort to preserve

his customary ease of manner. But his voice was not to be

steadied, and the restless uneasiness in his eyes was not to be

concealed. He must have felt this himself, for he stopped in the

middle of a sentence, and gave up even the attempt to hide his

embarrassment any longer.

"I wish to speak to you, Sir Percival," she said, "on a subject

that is very important to us both. My sister is here, because her

presence helps me and gives me confidence. She has not suggested

one word of what I am going to say--I speak from my own thoughts,

not from hers. I am sure you will be kind enough to understand

that before I go any farther?"

Sir Percival bowed. She had proceeded thus far, with perfect

outward tranquillity and perfect propriety of manner. She looked

at him, and he looked at her. They seemed, at the outset, at

least, resolved to understand one another plainly.

"I have heard from Marian," she went on, "that I have only to

claim my release from our engagement to obtain that release from

you. It was forbearing and generous on your part, Sir Percival,

to send me such a message. It is only doing you justice to say

that I am grateful for the offer, and I hope and believe that it

is only doing myself justice to tell you that I decline to accept

it."

His attentive face relaxed a little. But I saw one of his feet,

softly, quietly, incessantly beating on the carpet under the

table, and I felt that he was secretly as anxious as ever.

"I have not forgotten," she said, "that you asked my father's

permission before you honoured me with a proposal of marriage.

Perhaps you have not forgotten either what I said when I consented

to our engagement? I ventured to tell you that my father's

influence and advice had mainly decided me to give you my promise.

I was guided by my father, because I had always found him the

truest of all advisers, the best and fondest of all protectors and

friends. I have lost him now--I have only his memory to love, but

my faith in that dear dead friend has never been shaken. I

believe at this moment, as truly as I ever believed, that he knew

what was best, and that his hopes and wishes ought to be my hopes

and wishes too."

Her voice trembled for the first time. Her restless fingers stole

their way into my lap, and held fast by one of my hands. There

was another moment of silence, and then Sir Percival spoke.

"May I ask," he said, "if I have ever proved myself unworthy of

the trust which it has been hitherto my greatest honour and

greatest happiness to possess?"

"I have found nothing in your conduct to blame," she answered.

"You have always treated me with the same delicacy and the same

forbearance. You have deserved my trust, and, what is of far more

importance in my estimation, you have deserved my father's trust,

out of which mine grew. You have given me no excuse, even if I

had wanted to find one, for asking to be released from my pledge.

What I have said so far has been spoken with the wish to

acknowledge my whole obligation to you. My regard for that

obligation, my regard for my father's memory, and my regard for my

own promise, all forbid me to set the example, on my side, of

withdrawing from our present position. The breaking of our

engagement must be entirely your wish and your act, Sir Percival--

not mine."

I heard her breath quickening--I felt her hand growing cold. In

spite of what she had said to me when we were alone, I began to be

afraid of her. I was wrong.

"A reason that it is very hard to tell you," she answered. "There

is a change in me, Sir Percival--a change which is serious enough

to justify you, to yourself and to me, in breaking off our

engagement."

His face turned so pale again that even his lips lost their

colour. He raised the arm which lay on the table, turned a little

away in his chair, and supported his head on his hand, so that his

profile only was presented to us.

She sighed heavily, and leaned towards me a little, so as to rest

her shoulder against mine. I felt her trembling, and tried to

spare her by speaking myself. She stopped me by a warning

pressure of her hand, and then addressed Sir Percival one more,

but this time without looking at him.

"I have heard," she said, "and I believe it, that the fondest and

truest of all affections is the affection which a woman ought to

bear to her husband. When our engagement began that affection was

mine to give, if I could, and yours to win, if you could. Will

you pardon me, and spare me, Sir Percival, if I acknowledge that

it is not so any longer?"

A few tears gathered in her eyes, and dropped over her cheeks

slowly as she paused and waited for his answer. He did not utter

a word. At the beginning of her reply he had moved the hand on

which his head rested, so that it hid his face. I saw nothing but

the upper part of his figure at the table. Not a muscle of him

moved. The fingers of the hand which supported his head were

dented deep in his hair. They might have expressed hidden anger

or hidden grief--it was hard to say which--there was no

significant trembling in them. There was nothing, absolutely

nothing, to tell the secret of his thoughts at that moment--the

moment which was the crisis of his life and the crisis of hers.

"Sir Percival!" I interposed sharply, "have you nothing to say

when my sister has said so much? More, in my opinion," I added, my

unlucky temper getting the better of me, "than any man alive, in

your position, has a right to hear from her."

"Pardon me, Miss Halcombe," he said, still keeping his hand over

his face, "pardon me if I remind you that I have claimed no such

right."

The few plain words which would have brought him back to the point

from which he had wandered were just on my lips, when Laura

checked me by speaking again.

"I hope I have not made my painful acknowledgment in vain," she

continued. "I hope it has secured me your entire confidence in

what I have still to say?"

"Pray be assured of it." He made that brief reply warmly, dropping

his hand on the table while he spoke, and turning towards us

again. Whatever outward change had passed over him was gone now.

His face was eager and expectant--it expressed nothing but the

most intense anxiety to hear her next words.

"I wish you to understand that I have not spoken from any selfish

motive," she said. "If you leave me, Sir Percival, after what you

have just heard, you do not leave me to marry another man, you

only allow me to remain a single woman for the rest of my life.

My fault towards you has begun and ended in my own thoughts. It

can never go any farther. No word has passed--" She hesitated, in

doubt about the expression she should use next, hesitated in a

momentary confusion which it was very sad and very painful to see.

"No word has passed," she patiently and resolutely resumed,

"between myself and the person to whom I am now referring for the

first and last time in your presence of my feelings towards him,

or of his feelings towards me--no word ever can pass--neither he

nor I are likely, in this world, to meet again. I earnestly beg

you to spare me from saying any more, and to believe me, on my

word, in what I have just told you. It is the truth. Sir

Percival, the truth which I think my promised husband has a claim

to hear, at any sacrifice of my own feelings. I trust to his

generosity to pardon me, and to his honour to keep my secret."

"I have said all I wish to say," she added quietly--"I have said

more than enough to justify you in withdrawing from your

engagement."

"You have said more than enough," he answered, "to make it the

dearest object of my life to KEEP the engagement." With those

words he rose from his chair, and advanced a few steps towards the

place where she was sitting.

She started violently, and a faint cry of surprise escaped her.

Every word she had spoken had innocently betrayed her purity and

truth to a man who thoroughly understood the priceless value of a

pure and true woman. Her own noble conduct had been the hidden

enemy, throughout, of all the hopes she had trusted to it. I had

dreaded this from the first. I would have prevented it, if she

had allowed me the smallest chance of doing so. I even waited and

watched now, when the harm was done, for a word from Sir Percival

that would give me the opportunity of putting him in the wrong.

"You have left it to ME, Miss Fairlie, to resign you," he

continued. "I am not heartless enough to resign a woman who has

just shown herself to be the noblest of her sex."

He spoke with such warmth and feeling, with such passionate

enthusiasm, and yet with such perfect delicacy, that she raised

her head, flushed up a little, and looked at him with sudden

animation and spirit.

"No!" she said firmly. "The most wretched of her s*x, if she must

give herself in marriage when she cannot give her love."

"Never!" she answered. "If you still persist in maintaining our

engagement, I may be your true and faithful wife, Sir Percival--

your loving wife, if I know my own heart, never!"

She looked so irresistibly beautiful as she said those brave words

that no man alive could have steeled his heart against her. I

tried hard to feel that Sir Percival was to blame, and to say so,

but my womanhood would pity him, in spite of myself.

"I gratefully accept your faith and truth," he said. "The least

that you can offer is more to me than the utmost that I could hope

for from any other woman in the world."

Her left hand still held mine, but her right hand hung listlessly

at her side. He raised it gently to his lips--touched it with

them, rather than kissed it--bowed to me--and then, with perfect

delicacy and discretion, silently quitted the room.

She neither moved nor said a word when he was gone--she sat by me,

cold and still, with her eyes fixed on the ground. I saw it was

hopeless and useless to speak, and I only put my arm round her,

and held her to me in silence. We remained together so for what

seemed a long and weary time--so long and so weary, that I grew

uneasy and spoke to her softly, in the hope of producing a change.

The sound of my voice seemed to startle her into consciousness.

She suddenly drew herself away from me and rose to her feet.

As she spoke she went to a side-table near the window, on which

her sketching materials were placed, gathered them together

carefully, and put them in a drawer of her cabinet. She locked

the drawer and brought the key to me.

"I must part from everything that reminds me of him," she said.

"Keep the key wherever you please--I shall never want it again."

Before I could say a word she had turned away to her book-case,

and had taken from it the album that contained Walter Hartright's

drawings. She hesitated for a moment, holding the little volume

fondly in her hands--then lifted it to her lips and kissed it.

"Oh, Laura! Laura!" I said, not angrily, not reprovingly--with

nothing but sorrow in my voice, and nothing but sorrow in my

heart.

She laid the book on the table and drew out the comb that fastened

her hair. It fell, in its matchless beauty, over her back and

shoulders, and dropped round her, far below her waist. She

separated one long, thin lock from the rest, cut it off, and

pinned it carefully, in the form of a circle, on the first blank

page of the album. The moment it was fastened she closed the

volume hurriedly, and placed it in my hands.

"You write to him and he writes to you," she said. "While I am

alive, if he asks after me always tell him I am well, and never

say I am unhappy. Don't distress him, Marian, for my sake, don't

distress him. If I die first, promise you will give him this

little book of his drawings, with my hair in it. There can be no

harm, when I am gone, in telling him that I put it there with my

own hands. And say--oh, Marian, say for me, then, what I can

never say for myself--say I loved him!"

She flung her arms round my neck, and whispered the last words in

my ear with a passionate delight in uttering them which it almost

broke my heart to hear. All the long restraint she had imposed on

herself gave way in that first last outburst of tenderness. She

broke from me with hysterical vehemence, and threw herself on the

sofa in a paroxysm of sobs and tears that shook her from head to

foot.

I tried vainly to soothe her and reason with her--she was past

being soothed, and past being reasoned with. It was the sad,

sudden end for us two of this memorable day. When the fit had

worn itself out she was too exhausted to speak. She slumbered

towards the afternoon, and I put away the book of drawings so that

she might not see it when she woke. My face was calm, whatever my

heart might be, when she opened her eyes again and looked at me.

We said no more to each other about the distressing interview of

the morning. Sir Percival's name was not mentioned. Walter

Hartright was not alluded to again by either of us for the

remainder of the day.

10th.--Finding that she was composed and like herself this

morning, I returned to the painful subject of yesterday, for the

sole purpose of imploring her to let me speak to Sir Percival and

Mr. Fairlie, more plainly and strongly than she could speak to

either of them herself, about this lamentable marriage. She

interposed, gently but firmly, in the middle of my remonstrances.

Sir Percival spoke to me this afternoon about what had passed in

Laura's room. He assured me that the unparalleled trust she had

placed in him had awakened such an answering conviction of her

innocence and integrity in his mind, that he was guiltless of

having felt even a moment's unworthy jealousy, either at the time

when he was in her presence, or afterwards when he had withdrawn

from it. Deeply as he lamented the unfortunate attachment which

had hindered the progress he might otherwise have made in her

esteem and regard, he firmly believed that it had remained

unacknowledged in the past, and that it would remain, under all

changes of circumstance which it was possible to contemplate,

unacknowledged in the future. This was his absolute conviction;

and the strongest proof he could give of it was the assurance,

which he now offered, that he felt no curiosity to know whether

the attachment was of recent date or not, or who had been the

object of it. His implicit confidence in Miss Fairlie made him

satisfied with what she had thought fit to say to him, and he was

honestly innocent of the slightest feeling of anxiety to hear

more.

He waited after saying those words and looked at me. I was so

conscious of my unreasonable prejudice against him--so conscious

of an unworthy suspicion that he might be speculating on my

impulsively answering the very questions which he had just

described himself as resolved not to ask--that I evaded all

reference to this part of the subject with something like a

feeling of confusion on my own part. At the same time I was

resolved not to lose even the smallest opportunity of trying to

plead Laura's cause, and I told him boldly that I regretted his

generosity had not carried him one step farther, and induced him

to withdraw from the engagement altogether.

Here, again, he disarmed me by not attempting to defend himself.

He would merely beg me to remember the difference there was

between his allowing Miss Fairlie to give him up, which was a

matter of submission only, and his forcing himself to give up Miss

Fairlie, which was, in other words, asking him to be the suicide

of his own hopes. Her conduct of the day before had so

strengthened the unchangeable love and admiration of two long

years, that all active contention against those feelings, on his

part, was henceforth entirely out of his power. I must think him

weak, selfish, unfeeling towards the very woman whom he idolised,

and he must bow to my opinion as resignedly as he could--only

putting it to me, at the same time, whether her future as a single

woman, pining under an unhappily placed attachment which she could

never acknowledge, could be said to promise her a much brighter

prospect than her future as the wife of a man who worshipped the

very ground she walked on? In the last case there was hope from

time, however slight it might be--in the first case, on her own

showing, there was no hope at all.

I answered him--more because my tongue is a woman's, and must

answer, than because I had anything convincing to say. It was

only too plain that the course Laura had adopted the day before

had offered him the advantage if he chose to take it--and that he

HAD chosen to take it. I felt this at the time, and I feel it

just as strongly now, while I write these lines, in my own room.

The one hope left is that his motives really spring, as he says

they do, from the irresistible strength of his attachment to

Laura.

Before I close my diary for to-night I must record that I wrote

to-day, in poor Hartright's interest, to two of my mother's old

friends in London--both men of influence and position. If they

can do anything for him, I am quite sure they will. Except Laura,

I never was more anxious about any one than I am now about Walter.

All that has happened since he left us has only increased my

strong regard and sympathy for him. I hope I am doing right in

trying to help him to employment abroad--I hope, most earnestly

and anxiously, that it will end well.

I found Mr. Fairlie greatly relieved at the prospect of the

"family worry" (as he was pleased to describe his niece's

marriage) being settled at last. So far, I did not feel called on

to say anything to him about my own opinion, but when he

proceeded, in his most aggravatingly languid manner, to suggest

that the time for the marriage had better be settled next, in

accordance with Sir Percival's wishes, I enjoyed the satisfaction

of assailing Mr. Fairlie's nerves with as strong a protest against

hurrying Laura's decision as I could put into words. Sir Percival

immediately assured me that he felt the force of my objection, and

begged me to believe that the proposal had not been made in

consequence of any interference on his part. Mr. Fairlie leaned

back in his chair, closed his eyes, said we both of us did honour

to human nature, and then repeated his suggestion as coolly as if

neither Sir Percival nor I had said a word in opposition to it.

It ended in my flatly declining to mention the subject to Laura,

unless she first approached it of her own accord. I left the room

at once after making that declaration. Sir Percival looked

seriously embarrassed and distressed, Mr. Fairlie stretched out

his lazy legs on his velvet footstool, and said, "Dear Marian! how

I envy you your robust nervous system! Don't bang the door!"

On going to Laura's room I found that she had asked for me, and

that Mrs. Vesey had informed her that I was with Mr. Fairlie. She

inquired at once what I had been wanted for, and I told her all

that had passed, without attempting to conceal the vexation and

annoyance that I really felt. Her answer surprised and distressed

me inexpressibly--it was the very last reply that I should have

expected her to make.

"My uncle is right," she said. "I have caused trouble and anxiety

enough to you, and to all about me. Let me cause no more, Marian--

let Sir Percival decide."

"I am held to my engagement," she replied; "I have broken with my

old life. The evil day will not come the less surely because I

put it off. No, Marian! once again my uncle is right. I have

caused trouble enough and anxiety enough, and I will cause no

more."

She used to be pliability itself, but she was now inflexibly

passive in her resignation--I might almost say in her despair.

Dearly as I love her, I should have been less pained if she had

been violently agitated--it was so shockingly unlike her natural

character to see her as cold and insensible as I saw her now.

12th.--Sir Percival put some questions to me at breakfast about

Laura, which left me no choice but to tell him what she had said.

While we were talking she herself came down and joined us. She

was just as unnaturally composed in Sir Percival's presence as she

had been in mine. When breakfast was over he had an opportunity

of saying a few words to her privately, in a recess of one of the

windows. They were not more than two or three minutes together,

and on their separating she left the room with Mrs. Vesey, while

Sir Percival came to me. He said he had entreated her to favour

him by maintaining her privilege of fixing the time for the

marriage at her own will and pleasure. In reply she had merely

expressed her acknowledgments, and had desired him to mention what

his wishes were to Miss Halcombe.

I have no patience to write more. In this instance, as in every

other, Sir Percival has carried his point with the utmost possible

credit to himself, in spite of everything that I can say or do.

His wishes are now, what they were, of course, when he first came

here; and Laura having resigned herself to the one inevitable

sacrifice of the marriage, remains as coldly hopeless and enduring

as ever. In parting with the little occupations and relics that

reminded her of Hartright, she seems to have parted with all her

tenderness and all her impressibility. It is only three o'clock

in the afternoon while I write these lines, and Sir Percival has

left us already, in the happy hurry of a bride-groom, to prepare

for the bride's reception at his house in Hampshire. Unless some

extraordinary event happens to prevent it they will be married

exactly at the time when he wished to be married--before the end

of the year. My very fingers burn as I write it!

13th.--A sleepless night, through uneasiness about Laura. Towards

the morning I came to a resolution to try what change of scene

would do to rouse her. She cannot surely remain in her present

torpor of insensibility, if I take her away from Limmeridge and

surround her with the pleasant faces of old friends? After some

consideration I decided on writing to the Arnolds, in Yorkshire.

They are simple, kind-hearted, hospitable people, and she has

known them from her childhood. When I had put the letter in the

post-bag I told her what I had done. It would have been a relief

to me if she had shown the spirit to resist and object. But no--

she only said, "I will go anywhere with you, Marian. I dare say

you are right--I dare say the change will do me good."

14th.--I wrote to Mr. Gilmore, informing him that there was really

a prospect of this miserable marriage taking place, and also

mentioning my idea of trying what change of scene would do for

Laura. I had no heart to go into particulars. Time enough for

them when we get nearer to the end of the year.

15th.--Three letters for me. The first, from the Arnolds, full of

delight at the prospect of seeing Laura and me. The second, from

one of the gentlemen to whom I wrote on Walter Hartright's behalf,

informing me that he has been fortunate enough to find an

opportunity of complying with my request. The third, from Walter

himself, thanking me, poor fellow, in the warmest terms, for

giving him an opportunity of leaving his home, his country, and

his friends. A private expedition to make excavations among the

ruined cities of Central America is, it seems, about to sail from

Liverpool. The draughtsman who had been already appointed to

accompany it has lost heart, and withdrawn at the eleventh hour,

and Walter is to fill his place. He is to be engaged for six

months certain, from the time of the landing in Honduras, and for

a year afterwards, if the excavations are successful, and if the

funds hold out. His letter ends with a promise to write me a

farewell line when they are all on board ship, and when the pilot

leaves them. I can only hope and pray earnestly that he and I are

both acting in this matter for the best. It seems such a serious

step for him to take, that the mere contemplation of it startles

me. And yet, in his unhappy position, how can I expect him or

wish him to remain at home?

23rd.--A week in these new scenes and among these kind-hearted

people has done her some good, though not so much as I had hoped.

I have resolved to prolong our stay for another week at least. It

is useless to go back to Limmeridge till there is an absolute

necessity for our return.

24th.--Sad news by this morning's post. The expedition to Central

America sailed on the twenty-first. We have parted with a true

man--we have lost a faithful friend. Water Hartright has left

England.

25th.--Sad news yesterday--ominous news to-day. Sir Percival

Glyde has written to Mr. Fairlie, and Mr. Fairlie has written to

Laura and me, to recall us to Limmeridge immediately.

In the 1600s, Balthasar Gracian, a jesuit priest wrote 300 aphorisms on living life called "The Art of Worldly Wisdom." Join our newsletter below and read them all, one at a time.