`Count!' she said. `Your foreign forms of politeness are not understood by Englishwomen.'
`Pardon me, my angel! The best and dearest Englishwoman in the world understands them.' With those words he dropped my hand and quietly raised his wife's hand to his lips in place of it.
I ran back up the stairs to take refuge in my own room. If there had been time to think, my thoughts, when I was alone again, would have caused me bitter suffering. But there was no time to think. Happily for the preservation of my calmness and my courage there was time for nothing but action.
The letters to the lawyer and to Mr Fairlie were still to be written, and I sat down at once without a moment's hesitation to devote myself to them.
There was no multitude of resources to perplex me -- there was absolutely no one to depend on, in the first instance, but myself. Sir Percival had neither friends nor relatives in the neighbourhood whose intercession I could attempt to employ. He was on the coldest terms -- in some cases on the worst terms with the families of his own rank and station who lived near him. We two women had neither father nor brother to come to the house and take our parts. There was no choice but to write those two doubtful letters, or to put Laura in the wrong and myself in the wrong, and to make all peaceable negotiation in the future impossible by secretly escaping from Blackwater Park. Nothing but the most imminent personal peril could justify our taking that second course. The letters must be tried first, and I wrote them.
I said nothing to the lawyer about Anne Catherick, because (as I had already hinted to Laura) that topic was connected with a mystery which we could not yet explain, and which it would therefore be useless to write about to a professional man. I left my correspondent to attribute Sir Percival's disgraceful conduct, if he pleased, to fresh disputes about money matters, and sun ply consulted him on the possibility of taking legal proceedings for Laura's protection in the event of her husband's refusal to allow her to leave Blackwater Park for a time and return with me to Limmeridge. I referred him to Mr Fairlie for the details of this last arrangement -- I assured him that I wrote with Laura's authority -- and I ended by entreating him to act in her name to the utmost extent of his power and with the least possible loss of time.
The letter to Mr Fairlie occupied me next. I appealed to him on the terms which I had mentioned to Laura as the most likely to make him bestir himself; I enclosed a copy of my letter to the lawyer to show him how serious the case was, and I represented our removal to Limmeridge as the only compromise which would prevent the danger and distress of Laura's present position from inevitably affecting her uncle as well as herself at no very distant time.
When I had done, and had sealed and directed the two envelopes, I went back with the letters to Laura's room, to show her that they were written.
`Has anybody disturbed you?' I asked, when she opened the door to me.
`Nobody has knocked,' she replied. `But I heard some one in the outer room.'
`Was it a man or a woman?'
`A woman. I heard the rustling of her gown.'
`A rustling like silk?'
`Yes, like silk.'
Madame Fosco had evidently been watching outside. The mischief she might do by herself was little to be feared. But the mischief she might do, as a willing instrument in her husband's hands, was too formidable to be overlooked.
`What became of the rustling of the gown when you no longer heard it in the ante-room?' I inquired. `Did you hear it go past your wall, along the passage?'
`Yes. I kept still and listened, and just heard it.'
`Which way did it go?'
`Towards your room.'
I considered again. The sound had not caught my ears. But I was then deeply absorbed in my letters, and I write with a heavy hand and a quill pen, scraping and scratching noisily over the paper. It was more likely that Madame Fosco would hear the scraping of my pen than that I should hear the rustling of her dress. Another reason (if I had wanted one) for not trusting my letters to the post-bag in the hall.
Laura saw me thinking. `More difficulties!' she said wearily; `more difficulties and more dangers!'
`No dangers,' I replied. `Some little difficulty, perhaps. I am thinking of the safest way of putting my two letters into Fanny's hands.'
`You have really written them, then? Oh, Marian, run no risks -- pray, pray, run no risks!'
`No, no -- no fear. Let me see -- what o'clock is it now?'
It was a quarter to six. There would be time for me to get to the village inn, and to come back again before dinner. If I waited till the evening I might find no second opportunity of safely leaving the house.
`Keep the key turned in the lock, Laura,' I said, `and don't be afraid about me. If you hear any inquiries made, call through the door, and say that I am gone out for a walk.'
`When shall you be back?'
`Before dinner, without fail. Courage, my love. By this time tomorrow you will have a clear-headed, trustworthy man acting for your good. Mr Gilmore's partner is our next best friend to Mr Gilmore himself.'
A moment's reflection, as soon as I was alone, convinced me that I had better not appear in my walking-dress until I had first discovered what was going on in the lower part of the house. I had not ascertained yet whether Sir Percival was indoors or out.
The singing of the canaries in the library, and the smell of tobacco-smoke that came through the door, which was not closed, told me at once where the Count was. I looked over my shoulder as I passed the doorway, and saw to my surprise that he was exhibiting the docility of the birds in his most engagingly polite manner to the housekeeper. He must have specially invited her to see them -- for she would never have thought of going into the library of her own accord. The man's slightest actions had a purpose of some kind at the bottom of every one of them. What could be his purpose here?
It was no time then to inquire into his motives. I looked about for Madame Fosco next, and found her following her favourite circle round and round the fish-pond.
I was a little doubtful how she would meet me, after the outbreak of jealousy of which I had been the cause so short a time since. But her husband had tamed her in the interval, and she now spoke to me with the same civility as usual. My only object in addressing myself to her was to ascertain if she knew what had become of Sir Percival. I contrived to refer to him indirectly, and after a little fencing on either side she at last mentioned that he had gone out.
`Which of the horses has he taken?' I asked carelessly.
`None of them,' she replied. `He went away two hours since on foot. As I understood it, his object was to make fresh inquiries about the woman named Anne Catherick. He appears to be unreasonably anxious about tracing her. Do you happen to know if she is dangerously mad, Miss Halcombe?'
`I do not, Countess.'
`Are you going in?'
`Yes, I think so. I suppose it will soon be time to dress for dinner.'
We entered the house together. Madame Fosco strolled into the library, and dosed the door. I went at once to fetch my hat and shawl. Every moment was of importance, if I was to get to Fanny at the inn and he back before dinner.
When I crossed the hall again no one was there, and the singing of the birds in the library had ceased. I could not stop to make any fresh investigations. I could only assure myself that the way was clear, and then leave the house with the two letters safe in my pocket.
On my way to the village I prepared myself for the possibility of meeting Sir Percival. As long as I had him to deal with alone I felt certain of not losing my presence of mind. Any woman who is sure of her own wits is a match at any time for a man who is not sure of his own temper. I had no such fear of Sir Percival as I had of the Count. Instead of fluttering, it had composed me, to hear of the errand on which he had gone out. While the tracing of Anne Catherick was the great anxiety that occupied him, Laura and I might hope for some cessation of any active persecution at his hands. For our sakes now, as well as for Anne's, I hoped and prayed fervently that she might still escape him.
I walked on as briskly as the heat would let me till I reached the cross-road which led to the village, looking back from time to time to make sure that I was not followed by any one.
Nothing was behind me all the way but an empty country waggon. The noise made by the lumbering wheels annoyed me, and when I found that the waggon took the road to the village, as well as myself, I stopped to let it go by and pass out of hearing. As I looked toward it, more attentively than before, I thought l detected at intervals the feet of a man walking close behind it, the carter being in front, by the side of his horses. The part of the cross-road which I had just passed over was so narrow that the waggon coming after me brushed the trees and thickets on either side, and I had to wait until it went by before I could test the correctness of my impression. Apparently that impression was wrong, for when the waggon had passed me the road behind it was quite clear.
I reached the inn without meeting Sir Percival, and without noticing anything more, and was glad to find that the landlady had received Fanny with all possible kindness. The girl had a little parlour to sit in, away from the noise of the taproom, and a clean bedchamber at the top of the house. She began crying again at the sight of me, and said, poor soul, truly enough, that it was dreadful to feel herself turned out into the world as if she had committed some unpardonable fault, when no blame could be laid at her door by anybody -- not even by her master, who had sent her away.
`Try to make the best of it, Fanny,' I said. `Your mistress and I will stand your friends, and will take care that your character shall not suffer. Now, listen to me. I have very little time to spare, and I am going to put a great trust in your hands. I wish you to take care of these two letters. The one with the stamp on it you are to put into the post when you reach London tomorrow. The other, directed to Mr Fairlie, you are to deliver to him yourself as soon as you get home. Keep both the letters about you and give them up to no one. They are of the last importance to your mistress's interests.'
Fanny put the letters into the bosom of her dress. `There they shall stop, miss,' she said, `till I have done what you tell me.'
`Mind you are at the station in good time tomorrow morning,' I continued. `And when you see the housekeeper at Limmeridge give her my compliments, and say that you are in my service until Lady Glyde is able to take you back. We may meet again sooner than you think. So keep a good heart, and don't miss the seven o'clock train.'
`Thank you, miss -- thank you kindly. It gives one courage to hear your voice again. Please to offer my duty to my lady, and say I left all the things as tidy as I could in the time. Oh, dear! dear! who will dress her for dinner today? It really breaks my heart, miss, to think of it.'
When I got back to the house I had only a quarter of an hour to spare to put myself in order for dinner, and to say two words to Laura before I went downstairs.
`The letters are in Fanny's hands,' I whispered to her at the door. `Do you mean to join us at dinner?'
`Oh, no, no -- not for the world.'
`Has anything happened? Has any one disturbed you?'
`Yes -- just now -- Sir Percival --'
`Did he come in?'
`No, he frightened me by a thump on the door outside. I said, ``Who's there?'' ``You know,'' he answered. ``Will you alter your mind, and tell me the rest? You shall! Sooner or later I'll wring it out of you. You know where Anne Catherick is at this moment.'' ``Indeed, indeed,'' I said, ``I don't.'' ``You do!'' he called back. ``I'll crush your obstinacy -- mind that! -- I'll wring it out of you!'' He went away with those words -- went away, Marian, hardly five minutes ago.' had not found her yet.
`You are going downstairs, Marian? Come up again in the evening.'
`Yes, yes. Don't be uneasy if I am a little late -- I must be careful not to give offence by leaving them too soon.'
The dinner-bell rang and I hastened away.
Sir Percival took Madame Fosco into the dining-room, and the Count gave me his ann. He was hot and flushed, and was not dressed with his customary care and completeness. Had he, too, been out before dinner, and been late in getting back? or was he only suffering from the heat a little more severely than usual?
However this might be, he was unquestionably troubled by some secret annoyance or anxiety, which, with all his powers of deception, he was not able entirely to conceal. Through the whole of dinner he was almost as silent as Sir Percival himself, and he, every now and then, looked at his wife with an expression of furtive uneasiness which was quite new in my experience of him. The one social obligation which he seemed to be self-possessed enough to perform as carefully as ever was the obligation of being persistently civil and attentive to me. What vile object he has in view I cannot still discover, but be the design what it may, invariable politeness towards myself, invariable humility towards Laura, and invariable suppression (at any cost) of Sir Percival's clumsy violence, have been the means he has resolutely and impenetrably used to get to his end ever since he set foot in this house. I suspected it when he first interfered in our favour, on the day when the deed was produced in the library, and I feel certain of it now.
When Madame Fosco and I rose to leave the table, the Count rose also to accompany us back to the drawing-room.
`What are you going away for?' asked Sir Percival -- `I mean you, Fosco.'
`I am going away because I have had dinner enough, and wine enough,' answered the Count. `Be so kind, Percival, as to make allowances for my foreign habit of going out with the ladies, as well as coming in with them.'
`Nonsense! Another glass of claret won't hurt you. Sit down again like an Englishman. I want half an hour's quiet talk with you over our wine.'
`A quiet talk, Percival, with all my heart, but not now, and not over the wine. Later in the evening, if you please -- later in the evening.'
`Civil!' said Sir Percival savagely. `Civil behaviour, upon my soul, to a man in his own house!'
