Armadale by Wilkie Collins
It has struck one. I can hear Midwinter still, pacing to and fro in his room.
He is thinking, I suppose? Well! I can think too. What am I to do next? I shall wait and see. Events take odd turns, sometimes – and events may justify the fatalism of the amiable man in the next room, who curses the day when he first saw my face. He may live to curse it for other reasons than he has now. If I am the Woman pointed at in the Dream, there will be another temptation put in my way before long – and there will be no brandy in Armadale’s lemonade if I mix it for him a second time.
October 24th – Barely twelve hours have passed since I wrote my yesterday’s entry – and that other temptation has come, tried, and conquered me already!
This time there was no alternative. Instant exposure and ruin stared me in the face – I had no choice but to yield in my own defence. In plainer words still, it was no accidental resemblance that startled me at the theatre last night. The chorus-singer at the opera was Manuel himself!
Not ten minutes after Midwinter had left the sitting-room for his study, the woman of the house came in with a dirty little three-cornered note in her hand. One look at the writing on the address was enough. He had recognized me in the box; and the ballet between the acts of the opera had given him time to trace me home. I drew that plain conclusion in the moment that elapsed before I opened the letter. It informed me, in two lines, that he was waiting in a by-street, leading to the beach; and that, if I failed to make my appearance in ten minutes, he should interpret my absence as an invitation to him to call at the house.
What I went through yesterday, must have hardened me, I suppose. At any rate, after reading the letter, I felt more like the woman I once was than I have felt for months past. I put on my bonnet, and went downstairs, and left the house as if nothing had happened.
He was waiting for me at the entrance to the street.
In the instant when we stood face to face, all my wretched life with him came back to me. I thought of my trust that he had betrayed; I thought of the cruel mockery of a marriage that he had practised on me, when he knew that he had a wife living; I thought of the time when I had felt despair enough at his desertion of me to attempt my own life. When I recalled all this, and when the comparison between Midwinter and the mean, miserable villain whom I had once believed in, forced itself into my mind, I knew, for the first time, what a woman feels when every atom of respect for herself has left her. If he had personally insulted me, at that moment, I believe I should have submitted to it.
But he had no idea of insulting me, in the more brutal meaning of the word. He had me at his mercy, and his way of making me feel it was to behave with an elaborate mockery of penitence and respect. I let him speak as he pleased, without interrupting him, without looking at him a second time, without even allowing my dress to touch him, as we walked together towards the quieter part of the beach. I had noticed the wretched state of his clothes, and the greedy glitter in his eyes, in my first look at him. And I knew it would end – as it did end – in a demand on me for money.
Yes! After taking from me the last farthing I possessed of my own, and the last farthing I could extort for him from my old mistress, he turned on me as we stood by the margin of the sea, and asked if I could reconcile it to my conscience to let him be wearing such a coat as he then had on his back, and earning his miserable living as a chorus-singer at the opera!
My disgust, rather than my indignation, roused me into speaking to him at last.
‘You want money,’ I said. ‘suppose I am too poor to give it to you?’
‘In that case,’ he replied, ‘I shall be forced to remember that you are a treasure in yourself. And I shall be under the painful necessity of pressing my claim to you on the attention of one of those two gentlemen whom I saw with you at the opera – the gentleman, of course, who is now honoured by your preference, and who lives provisionally in the light of your smiles.’
I made him no answer – for I had no answer to give. Disputing his right to claim me from anybody, would have been a mere waste of words. He knew as well as I did that he had not the shadow of a claim on me. But the mere attempt to raise it would, as he was well aware, lead necessarily to the exposure of my whole past life.
Still keeping silence, I looked out over the sea. I don’t know why – except that I instinctively looked anywhere rather than look at him.
A little sailing boat was approaching the shore. The man steering was hidden from me by the sail; but the boat was so near that I thought I recognized the flag on the mast. I looked at my watch. Yes! It was Armadale coming over from Santa Lucia, at his usual time, to visit us in his usual way.
Before I had put my watch back in my belt, the means of extricating myself from the frightful position I was placed in showed themselves to me as plainly as I see them now.
I turned and led the way to the higher part of the beach, where some fishing-boats were drawn up which completely screened us from the view of any one landing on the shore below. Seeing probably that I had a purpose of some kind, Manuel followed me without uttering a word. As soon as we were safely under the shelter of the boats, I forced myself, in my own defence, to look at him again.
‘What should you say,’ I asked, ‘if I was rich, instead of poor? What should you say if I could afford to give you a hundred pounds?’
He started. I saw plainly that he had not expected so much as half the sum I had mentioned. It is needless to add that his tongue lied, while his face spoke the truth; and that when he replied to me, the answer was, ‘Nothing like enough.’
‘Suppose,’ I went on, without taking any notice of what he had said, ‘that I could show you a way of helping yourself to twice as much –three times as much – five times as much as a hundred pounds, are you bold enough to put out your hand, and take it?’
The greedy glitter came into his eyes once more. His voice dropped low, in breathless expectation of my next words.
‘Who is the person?’ he asked. ‘And what is the risk?’
I answered him at once, in the plainest terms. I threw Armadale to him, as I might have thrown a piece of meat to a wild beast who was pursuing me.
‘The person is a rich young Englishman,’ I said. ‘He has just hired the yacht called the Dorothea, in the harbour here; and he stands in need of a sailing-master and a crew. You were once an officer in the Spanish navy – you speak English and Italian perfectly – you are thoroughly well acquainted with Naples and all that belongs to it. The rich young Englishman is ignorant of the language; and the interpreter who assists him, knows nothing of the sea. He is at his wits’ end for want of useful help in this strange place; he has no more knowledge of the world than that child who is digging holes there with a stick in the sand; and he carries all his money with him in circular notes. So much for the person. As for the risk, estimate it for yourself.’
The greedy glitter in his eyes grew brighter and brighter with every word I said. He was plainly ready to face the risk, before I had done speaking.
‘When can I see the Englishman?’ he asked eagerly.
I moved to the seaward end of the fishing-boat, and saw that Armadale was at that moment disembarking on the shore.
‘You can see him now,’ I answered, and pointed to the place.
After a long look at Armadale walking carelessly up the slope of the beach, Manuel drew back again under the shelter of the boat. He waited a moment, considering something carefully with himself, and put another question to me – in a whisper this time.
‘When the vessel is manned,’ he said, ‘and the Englishman sails from Naples, how many friends sail with him?’
‘He has but two friends here,’ I replied – ‘that other gentleman whom you saw with me at the opera, and myself. He will invite us both to sail with him – and when the time comes, we shall both refuse.’
‘Do you answer for that?’
‘I answer for it positively.’
He walked a few steps away, and stood with his face hidd
There was a change in him when he came back. His face had turned to a livid yellow, and his eyes looked at me with a hideous distrust.
‘One last question,’ he said, and suddenly came closer to me, suddenly spoke with a marked emphasis on his next words. ‘What is your interest in this?’
I started back from him. The question reminded me that I had an interest in the matter, which was entirely unconnected with the interest of keeping Manuel and Midwinter apart. Thus far, I had only remembered that Midwinter’s fatalism had smoothed the way for me, by abandoning Armadale beforehand to any stranger who might come forward to help him. Thus far, the sole object I had kept in view was to protect myself, by the sacrifice of Armadale, from the exposure that threatened me. I tell no lies to my Diary. I don’t affect to have felt a moment’s consideration for the interests of Armadale’s purse, or the safety of Armadale’s life. I hated him too savagely to care what pitfalls my tongue might be the means of opening under his feet. But I certainly did not see (until that last question was put to me) that, in serving his own designs, Manuel might – if he dared go all lengths for the money – be serving my designs too. The one overpowering anxiety to protect myself from exposure before Midwinter, had (I suppose) filled all my mind, to the exclusion of everything else.
Finding that I made no reply for the moment, Manuel reiterated his question, putting it in a new form.
‘You have cast your Englishman at me,’ he said, ‘like the sop to Cerberus. Would you have been quite so ready to do that, if you had not had a motive of your own? I repeat my question. You have an interest in this – what is it?’
‘I have two interests,’ I answered. ‘The interest of forcing you to respect my position here; and the interest of ridding myself of the sight of you, at once and for ever!’ I spoke with a boldness he had not yet heard from me. The sense that I was making the villain an instrument in my hands, and forcing him to help my purpose blindly, while he was helping his own, roused my spirits, and made me feel like myself again.
He laughed. ‘Strong language, on certain occasions, is a lady’s privilege,’ he said. ‘You may, or may not, rid yourself of the sight of me, at once and for ever. We will leave that question to be settled in the future. But your other interest in this matter puzzles me. You have told all I need know about the Englishman and his yacht, and you have made no conditions before you opened your lips. Pray, how are you to force me, as you say, to respect your position here?’
‘I will tell you how,’ I rejoined. ‘You shall hear my conditions first. I insist on your leaving me in five minutes more. I insist on your never again coming near the house where I live; and I forbid your attempting to communicate in any way, either with me, or with that other gentleman whom you saw with me at the theatre—’
‘And suppose I say no?’ he interposed. ‘In that case, what will you do?’
‘In that case,’ I answered, ‘I shall say two words in private to the rich young Englishman – and you will find yourself back again among the chorus at the opera.’
‘You are a bold woman to take it for granted that I have my designs on the Englishman already, and that I am certain to succeed in them. How do you know—?’
‘I know you,’ I said. ‘And that is enough.’
There was a moment’s silence between us. He looked at me – and I looked at him. We understood each other.
He was the first to speak. The villainous smile died out of his face, and his voice dropped again distrustfully to its lowest tones.
‘I accept your terms,’ he said. ‘As long as your lips are closed, my lips shall be closed too – except in the event of my finding that you have deceived me; in which case the bargain is at an end, and you will see me again. I shall present myself to the Englishman to-morrow, with the necessary credentials to establish me in his confidence. Tell me his name?’
I told it.
‘Give me his address?’
I gave it – and turned to leave him. Before I had stepped out of the shelter of the boats, I heard him behind me again.
‘One last word,’ he said. ‘Accidents sometimes happen at sea. Have you interest enough in the Englishman – if an accident happens in his case – to wish to know what has become of him?’
I stopped, and considered on my side. I had plainly failed to persuade him that I had no secret interest to serve, in placing Armadale’s money, and (as a probable consequence) Armadale’s life, at his mercy. And it was now equally clear that he was cunningly attempting to associate himself with my private objects (whatever they might be), by opening a means of communication between us in the future. There could be no hesitation about how to answer him, under such circumstances as these. If the ‘accident’ at which he hinted did really happen to Armadale, I stood in no need of Manuel’s intervention to give me the intelligence of it. An easy search through the obituary columns of the English papers would tell me the news – with the great additional advantage that the papers might be relied on, in such a matter as this, to tell the truth. I formally thanked Manuel, and declined to accept his proposal. ‘Having no interest in the Englishman,’ I said, ‘I have no wish whatever to know what becomes of him.’
He looked at me for a moment with steady attention, and with an interest in me which he had not shown yet.
‘What the game you are playing may be,’ he rejoined, speaking slowly and significantly, ‘I don’t pretend to know. But I venture on a prophecy neverthelesss – you will win it! If we ever meet again, remember I said that.’ He took off his hat, and bowed to me gravely. ‘Go your way, madam. And leave me to go mine!’
With those words, he released me from the sight of him. I waited a minute alone, to recover myself in the air – and then returned to the house.
The first object that met my eyes on entering the sitting-room, was – Armadale himself!
He was waiting on the chance of seeing me, to beg that I would exert my influence with his friend. I made the needful inquiry as to what he meant, and found that Midwinter had spoken as he had warned me he would speak when he and Armadale next met. He had announced that he was unable to finish his work for the newspaper as soon as he had hoped; and he had advised Armadale to find a crew for the yacht without waiting for any assistance on his part.
All that it was necessary for me to do, on hearing this, was to perform the promise I had made to Midwinter, when he gave me my directions how to act in the matter. Armadale’s vexation on finding me resolved not to interfere, expressed itself in the form of all others that is most personally offensive to me. He declined to believe my reiterated assurances that I possessed no influence to exert in his favour. ‘If I was married to Neelie,’ he said, ’she could do anything she liked with me; and I am sure, when you choose, you can do anything you like with Midwinter.’ If the infatuated fool had actually tried to stifle the last faint struggles of remorse and pity left stirring in my heart, he could have said nothing more fatally to the purpose than this! I gave him a look which effectually silenced him so far as I was concerned. He went out of the room grumbling and growling to himself. ‘It’s all very well to talk about manning the yacht. I don’t speak a word of their gibberish here – and the interpreter thinks a fisherman and a sailor mean the same thing. Hang me if I know what to do with the vessel, now I have got her!’
He will probably know by to-morrow. And if he only comes here as usual, I shall know too!
October 25th, Ten at night – Manuel has got him!
He has just left us, after staying here more than an hour, and talking the whole time of nothing but his own wonderful luck in finding the very help he wanted, at the time when he needed it most.
At noon to-day, he was on the Mole,5 it seems, with his interpreter, trying vainly to make himself understood by the vagabond population of the water-side. J
I watched Midwinter anxiously, while Armadale was telling us these particulars; and afterwards, when he produced the new sailing-master’s testimonials, which he had brought with him for his friend to see.
For the moment, Midwinter’s superstitious misgivings seemed to be all lost in his natural anxiety for his friend. He examined the stranger’s papers – after having told me that the sooner Armadale was in the hands of strangers the better! – with the closest scrutiny and the most business-like distrust. It is needless to say that the credentials were as perfectly regular and satisfactory as credentials could be. When Midwinter handed them back, his colour rose: he seemed to feel the inconsistency of his conduct, and to observe for the first time that I was present noticing it. ‘There is nothing to object to in the testimonials, Allan: I am glad you have got the help you want at last.’ That was all he said, at parting. As soon as Armadale’s back was turned, I saw no more of him. He has locked himself up again for the night, in his own room.