The Law and the Lady

by Wilkie Collins

  CHAPTER V. THE LANDLADY'S DISCOVERY.

  I SAT down, and tried to compose my spirits. Now or never was the timeto decide what it was my duty to my husband and my duty to myself to donext.

  The effort was beyond me. Worn out in mind and body alike, I wasperfectly incapable of pursuing any regular train of thought. I vaguelyfelt--if I left things as they were--that I could never hope to removethe shadow which now rested on the married life that had begun sobrightly. We might live together, so as to save appearances. But toforget what had happened, or to feel satisfied with my position, wasbeyond the power of my will. My tranquillity as a woman--perhaps mydearest interests as a wife--depended absolutely on penetrating themystery of my mother-in-law's conduct, and on discovering the truemeaning of the wild words of penitence and self-reproach which myhusband had addressed to me on our way home.

  So far I could advance toward realizing my position--and no further.When I asked myself what was to be done next, hopeless confusion,maddening doubt, filled my mind, and transformed me into the mostlistless and helpless of living women.

  I gave up the struggle. In dull, stupid, obstinate despair, I threwmyself on my bed, and fell from sheer fatigue into a broken, uneasysleep.

  I was awakened by a knock at the door of my room.

  Was it my husband? I started to my feet as the idea occurred to me. Wassome new trial of my patience and my fortitude at hand? Half nervously,half irritably, I asked who was there.

  The landlady's voice answered me.

  "Can I speak to you for a moment, if you please?"

  I opened the door. There is no disguising it--though I loved him sodearly, though I had left home and friends for his sake--it was a reliefto me, at that miserable time, to know that Eustace had not returned tothe house.

  The landlady came in, and took a seat, without waiting to be invited,close by my side. She was no longer satisfied with merely assertingherself as my equal. Ascending another step on the social ladder, shetook her stand on the platform of patronage, and charitably looked downon me as an object of pity.

  "I have just returned from Broadstairs," she began. "I hope you will dome the justice to believe that I sincerely regret what has happened."

  I bowed, and said nothing.

  "As a gentlewoman myself," proceeded the landlady--"reduced by familymisfortunes to let lodgings, but still a gentlewoman--I feel sinceresympathy with you. I will even go further than that. I will take it onmyself to say that I don't blame _you_. No, no. I noticed that you wereas much shocked and surprised at your mother-in-law's conduct as I was;and that is saying a great deal--a great deal indeed. However, I havea duty to perform. It is disagreeable, but it is not the less a dutyon that account. I am a single woman; not from want of opportunities ofchanging my condition--I beg you will understand that--but from choice.Situated as I am, I receive only the most respectable persons into myhouse. There must be no mystery about the positions of _my_ lodgers.Mystery in the position of a lodger carries with it--what shall I say? Idon't wish to offend you--I will say, a certain Taint. Very well. Now Iput it to your own common-sense. Can a person in my position be expectedto expose herself to--Taint? I make these remarks in a sisterly andChristian spirit. As a lady yourself--I will even go the length ofsaying a cruelly used lady--you will, I am sure, understand--"

  I could endure it no longer. I stopped her there.

  "I understand," I said, "that you wish to give us notice to quit yourlodgings. When do you want us to go?"

  The landlady held up a long, lean, red hand, in a sorrowful and sisterlyprotest.

  "No," she said. "Not that tone; not those looks. It's natural you shouldbe annoyed; it's natural you should be angry. But do--now do please tryand control yourself. I put it to your own common-sense (we will say aweek for the notice to quit)--why not treat me like a friend? You don'tknow what a sacrifice, what a cruel sacrifice, I have made--entirely foryour sake.

  "You?" I exclaimed. "What sacrifice?"

  "What sacrifice?" repeated the landlady. "I have degraded myself as agentlewoman. I have forfeited my own self-respect." She paused for amoment, and suddenly seized my hand in a perfect frenzy of friendship."Oh, my poor dear!" cried this intolerable person. "I have discoveredeverything. A villain has deceived you. You are no more married than Iam!"

  I snatched my hand out of hers, and rose angrily from my chair.

  "Are you mad?" I asked.

  The landlady raised her eyes to the ceiling with the air of a person whohad deserved martyrdom, and who submitted to it cheerfully.

  "Yes," she said. "I begin to think I _am_ mad--mad to have devotedmyself to an ungrateful woman, to a person who doesn't appreciate asisterly and Christian sacrifice of self. Well, I won't do it again.Heaven forgive me--I won't do it again!"

  "Do what again?" I asked.

  "Follow your mother-in-law," cried the landlady, suddenly dropping thecharacter of a martyr, and assuming the character of a vixen in itsplace. "I blush when I think of it. I followed that most respectableperson every step of the way to her own door."

  Thus far my pride had held me up. It sustained me no longer. I droppedback again into my chair, in undisguised dread of what was coming next.

  "I gave you a look when I left you on the beach," pursued the landlady,growing louder and louder and redder and redder as she went on. "Agrateful woman would have understood that look. Never mind! I won'tdo it again I overtook your mother-in-law at the gap in the cliff. Ifollowed her--oh, how I feel the disgrace of it _now!_--I followed herto the station at Broadstairs. She went back by train to Ramsgate. _I_went back by train to Ramsgate. She walked to her lodgings. _I_ walkedto her lodgings. Behind her. Like a dog. Oh, the disgrace of it!Providentially, as I then thought--I don't know what to think of itnow--the landlord of the house happened to be a friend of mine, andhappened to be at home. We have no secrets from each other wherelodgers are concerned. I am in a position to tell you, madam, what yourmother-in-law's name really is. She knows nothing about any such personas Mrs. Woodville, for an excellent reason. Her name is _not_ Woodville.Her name (and consequently her son's name) is Macallan--Mrs. Macallan,widow of the late General Macallan. Yes! your husband is _not_ yourhusband. You are neither maid, wife, nor widow. You are worse thannothing, madam, and you leave my house!"

  I stopped her as she opened the door to go out. She had roused _my_temper by this time. The doubt that she had cast on my marriage was morethan mortal resignation could endure.

  "Give me Mrs. Macallan's address," I said.

  The landlady's anger receded into the background, and the landlady'sastonishment appeared in its place.

  "You don't mean to tell me you are going to the old lady herself?" shesaid.

  "Nobody but the old lady can tell me what I want to know," I answered."Your discovery (as you call it) may be enough for _you_; it is notenough for _me_. How do we know that Mrs. Macallan may not have beentwice married? and that her first husband's name may not have beenWoodville?"

  The landlady's astonishment subsided in its turn, and the landlady'scuriosity succeeded as the ruling influence of the moment.Substantially, as I have already said of her, she was a good-naturedwoman. Her fits of temper (as is usual with good-natured people) were ofthe hot and the short-lived sort, easily roused and easily appeased.

  "I never thought of that," she said. "Look here! if I give you theaddress, will you promise to tell me all about it when you come back?"

  I gave the required promise, and received the address in return.

  "No malice," said the landlady, suddenly resuming all her oldfamiliarity with me.

  "No malice," I answered, with all possible cordiality on my side.

  In ten minutes more I was at my mother-in-law's lodgings.