Serial Installments of The Woman in White (1859-1860)
(No. 9) – 21 January 1860
GILMORE’S NARRATIVE CONCLUDED.
III.
A WEEK passed, after my return to London, without the receipt of any communication from Miss Halcombe.
On the eighth day, a letter in her handwriting was placed among the other letters on my desk.[1]
It announced that Sir Percival Glyde had been definitely accepted, and that the marriage was to take place, as he had originally desired, before the end of the year. In all probability the ceremony would be performed during the last fortnight in December. Miss Fairlie’s twenty-first birthday was late in March. She would, therefore, by this arrangement, become Sir Percival’s wife about three months before she was of age.
I ought not to have been surprised, I ought not to have been sorry; but I was surprised and sorry, nevertheless. Some little disappointment, caused by the unsatisfactory shortness of Miss Halcombe’s letter, mingled itself with these feelings, and contributed its share towards upsetting my serenity for the day. In six lines my correspondent announced the proposed marriage; in three more, she told me that Sir Percival had left Cumberland to return to his house in Hampshire; and in two concluding sentences she informed me, first, that Laura was sadly in want of change and cheerful society; secondly, that she had resolved to try the effect of some such change forthwith, by taking her sister away with her on a visit to certain old friends in Yorkshire. There the letter ended, without a word to explain what the circumstances were which had decided Miss Fairlie to accept Sir Percival Glyde in one short week from the time when I had last seen her.
At a later period, the cause of this sudden determination was fully explained to me. It is not my business to relate it imperfectly, on hearsay evidence. The circumstances came within the personal experience of Miss Halcombe; and, when her narrative succeeds mine, she will describe them in every particular, exactly as they happened. In the mean time, the plain duty for me to perform — before I, in my turn, lay down my pen and withdraw from the story —is to relate the one remaining event connected with Miss Fairlie’s proposed marriage in which I was concerned, namely, the drawing of the settlement.
It is impossible to refer intelligibly to this document, without first entering into certain particulars, in relation to the bride’s pecuniary affairs. I will try to make my explanation briefly and plainly, and to keep it free from professional obscurities and technicalities. The matter is of the utmost importance. I warn all readers of these lines that Miss Fairlie’s inheritance is a very serious part of Miss Fairlie’s story; and that Mr. Gilmore’s experience, in this particular, must be their experience also, if they wish to understand the narratives which are yet to come.
Miss Fairlie’s expectations, then, were of a twofold kind; comprising her possible inheritance of real property, or land, when her uncle died, and her absolute inheritance of personal property, or money, when she came of age.
Let us take the land first.
In the time of Miss Fairlie’s paternal grandfather (whom we will call Mr. Fairlie, the elder) the entailed succession to the Limmeridge estate stood thus:
Mr. Fairlie, the elder, died and left three sons, Philip, Frederick, and Arthur. As eldest son, Philip succeeded to the estate. If he died without leaving a son, the property went to the second brother, Frederick. And if Frederick died also without leaving a son, the property went to the third brother, Arthur.
As events turned out, Mr. Philip Fairlie died leaving an only daughter, the Laura of this story; and the estate, in consequence, went, in course of law, to the second brother, Frederick, a single man. The third brother, Arthur, had died many years before the decease of Philip, leaving a son and a daughter. The son, at the age of eighteen, was drowned at Oxford. His death left Laura, the daughter of Mr. Philip Fairlie, presumptive heiress to the estate; with every chance of succeeding to it, in the ordinary course of nature, on her uncle Frederick’s death, if the said Frederick died without leaving male issue.
Except in the event, then, of Mr. Frederick Fairlie’s marrying and leaving an heir (the two very last things in the world that he was likely to do), his niece, Laura, would have the property on his death; possessing, it must be remembered, nothing more than a life-interest in it. If she died single, or died childless, the estate would revert to her cousin Magdalen, the daughter of Mr. Arthur Fairlie. If she married, with a proper settlement — or, in other words, with the settlement I meant to make for her — the income from the estate (a good three thousand a year) would, during her lifetime, be at her own disposal. If she died before her husband, he would naturally expect to be left in the enjoyment of the income, for his lifetime. If she had a son, that son would be the heir, to the exclusion of her cousin Magdalen. Thus, Sir Percival’s prospects in marrying Miss Fairlie (so far as his wife’s expectations from real property were concerned) promised him these two advantages, on Mr. Frederick Fairlie’s death: First, the use of three thousand a year (by his wife’s permission, while she lived, and, in his own right, on her death, if he survived her); and, secondly, the inheritance of Limmeridge for his son, if he had one.
So much for the landed property, and for the disposal of the income from it, on the occasion of Miss Fairlie’s marriage. Thus far, no difficulty or difference of opinion on the lady’s settlement was at all likely to arise between Sir Percival’s lawyer and myself.
The personal estate, or, in other words, the money to which Miss Fairlie would become entitled on reaching the age of twenty-one years, is the next point to consider.
This part of her inheritance was, in itself, a comfortable little fortune. It was derived under her father’s will, and it amounted to the sum of twenty thousand pounds. Besides this, she had a life-interest in ten thousand pounds more; which latter amount was to go, on her decease, to her aunt Eleanor, her father’s only sister. It will greatly assist in setting the family affairs before the reader in the clearest possible light, if I stop here for a moment, to explain why the aunt had been kept waiting for her legacy until the death of the niece.
Mr. Philip Fairlie had lived on excellent terms with his sister Eleanor, as long as she remained a single woman. But when her marriage took place, somewhat late in life, and when that marriage united her to an Italian gentleman, named Fosco — or, rather, to an Italian nobleman, seeing that he rejoiced in the title of Count — Mr. Fairlie disapproved of her conduct so strongly that he ceased to hold any communication with her, and even went the length of striking her name out of his will. The other members of the family all thought this serious manifestation of resentment at his sister’s marriage more or less unreasonable. Count Fosco, though not a rich man, was not a penniless adventurer either. He had a small, but sufficient income of his own; he had lived many years in England; and he held an excellent position in society. These recommendations, however, availed nothing with Mr. Fairlie. In many of his opinions he was an Englishman of the old school; and he hated a foreigner, simply and solely because he was a foreigner. The utmost that he could be prevailed on to do, in after years, mainly at Miss Fairlie’s intercession, was to restore his sister’s name to its former place in his will, but to keep her waiting for her legacy by giving the income of the money to his daughter for life, and the money itself, if her aunt died before her, to her cousin Magdalen. Considering the relative ages of the two ladies, the aunt’s chance, in the ordinary course of nature, of receiving the ten thousand pounds, was thus rendered doubtful in the extreme; and Madame Fosco resented her brother’s treatment of her, as unjustly as usual in such cases, by refusing to see her niece, and declining to believe that Miss Fairlie’s intercession had ever been exerted to restore her name to Mr. Fairlie’s will.
Such was the history of the ten thousand pounds. Here again no difficulty could arise with Sir Percival’s legal adviser. The income would be at the wife’s disposal, and the principal would go to her aunt, or her cousin, on her death.
All preliminary explanations being now cleared out of the way, I come, at last, to the real knot of the case — to the twenty thousand pounds.
This sum was absolutely Miss Fairlie’s own, on her completing her twenty-first year; and the whole future disposition of it depended, in the first instance, on the conditions I could obtain for her in her marriage-settlement. The other clauses contained in that document were of a formal kind, and need not be recited here. But the clause relating to the money is too important to be passed over. A few lines will be sufficient to give the necessary abstract of it.
My stipulation, in regard to the twenty thousand pounds, was simply this: The whole amount was to be settled so as to give the income to the lady for her life; afterwards to Sir Percival for his life; and the principal to the children of the marriage. In default of issue, the principal was to be disposed of as the lady might by her will direct, for which purpose I reserved to her the right of making a will. The effect of these conditions may be thus summed up. If Lady Glyde died without leaving children, her half-sister, Miss Halcombe, and any other relatives or friends whom she might be anxious to benefit, would, on her husband’s death, divide among them such shares of her money as she desired them to have. If, on the other hand, she died, leaving children, then their interest, naturally and necessarily, superseded all other interests whatsoever. This was the clause; and no one who reads it, can fail, I think, to agree with me that it meted out equal justice to all parties.
We shall see how my proposals were met on the husband’s side.
At the time when Miss Halcombe’s letter reached me, I was even more busily occupied than usual. But I contrived to make leisure for the settlement. I had drawn it, and had sent it for approval to Sir Percival’s solicitor, in less than a week from the time when Miss Halcombe had informed me of the proposed marriage. After a lapse of two days, the document was returned to me, with the notes and remarks of the baronet’s lawyer. His objections, in general, proved to be of the most trifling and technical kind, until he came to the clause relating to the twenty thousand pounds. Against this, there were double lines drawn in red ink, and the following note was appended to them:
“Not admissible. The principal to go to Sir Percival Glyde, in the event of his surviving Lady Glyde, and there being no issue.”
That is to say, not one farthing of the twenty thousand pounds was to go to Miss Halcombe, or to any other relative or friend of Lady Glyde’s. The whole sum, if she left no children, was to slip into the pockets of her husband.
The answer I wrote to this audacious proposal was as short and sharp as I could make it. “My dear sir. I maintain clause number so- and-so, exactly as it stands. Yours truly.”[2] The rejoinder came back in a quarter of an hour. “My dear sir. I maintain, the note in red ink exactly as it stands. Yours truly.”[3] In the detestable slang of the day, we were now both “at a dead-lock,” and nothing was left for it but to refer to our clients on either side.
As matters stood, my client — Miss Fairlie not having yet completed her twenty-first year — was her guardian, Mr. Frederick Fairlie. I wrote by that day’s post, and put the case before him exactly as it stood; not only urging every argument I could think of to induce him to maintain the clause as I had drawn it, but stating to him plainly the mercenary motive which was at the bottom of the opposition to my settlement of the twenty thousand pounds. The knowledge of Sir Percival’s affairs which I necessarily gained when the provisions of the deed on his side were submitted in due course to my examination, had but too plainly informed me that the debts on his estate were enormous, and that his income, though nominally a large one, was, virtually, for a man in his position, next to nothing.[4] The want of ready money was the practical necessity of Sir Percival’s existence; and his lawyer’s note on the clause in the settlement was nothing but the frankly selfish expression of it.
Mr. Fairlie’s answer reached me by return of post, and proved to be wandering and irrelevant in the extreme. Turned into plain English, it practically expressed itself to this effect: “Would dear Gilmore be so very obliging as not to worry his friend and client about such a trifle as a remote contingency? Was it likely that a young woman of twenty-one would die before a man of forty-five, and die without children? On the other hand, in such a miserable world as this, was it possible to over-estimate the value of peace and quietness? If those two heavenly blessings were offered in exchange for such an earthly trifle as a remote chance of twenty thousand pounds, was it not a fair bargain? Surely, yes. Then why not make it?”
I threw the letter away from me in disgust.[5] Just as it had fluttered to the ground, there was a knock at my door; and Sir Percival’s solicitor, Mr. Merriman, was shown in. There are many varieties of sharp practitioners in this world, but, I think, the hardest of all to deal with are the men who overreach you under the disguise of inveterate good humour. A fat, well-fed, smiling, friendly man of business is of all parties to a bargain the most hopeless to deal with. Mr. Merriman was one of this class.[6]
“And how is good Mr. Gilmore?” he began, all in a glow with the warmth of his own amiability. “Glad to see you, sir, in such excellent health. I was passing your door; and I thought I would look in, in case you might have something to say to me. Do— now pray do let us settle this little diiference of ours by word of mouth, if we can! Have you heard from your client yet?”
“Yes. Have you heard from yours?”
“My dear, good sir! I wish I had heard from him to any purpose—I wish, with all my heart, the responsibility was off my shoulders; but he won’t take it off.’[7] Merriman, I leave details to you. Do what you think right for my interests; and consider me as having personally withdrawn from the business until it is all over.’ Those were Sir Percival’s words a fortnight ago; and all I can get him to do now is to repeat them. I am not a hard man, Mr. Gilmore, as you know. Personally and privately, I do assure you, I should like to sponge out that note of mine at this very moment. But if Sir Percival won’t go into the matter, if Sir Percival will blindly leave all his interests in my sole care, what course can I possibly take except the course of asserting them? My hands are bound— don’t you see, my dear sir? — my hands are bound.”
“You maintain your note on the clause, then, to the letter?” I said.
“Yes — deuce take it! I have no other alternative.” He walked to the fireplace, and warmed himself, humming the fag end of a tune in a rich, convivial bass voice. “What does your side say?” he went on; “now pray tell me what does your side say?”
I was ashamed to tell him. I attempted to gain time — nay, I did worse. My legal instincts got the better of me; and I even tried to bargain.
“Twenty thousand pounds is rather a large sum to be given up by the lady’s friends at two days’ notice,” I said.
“Very true,” replied Mr. Merriman, looking down thoughtfully at his boots. “Properly put, sir — most properly put!”
“A compromise, recognising the interests of the lady’s family as well as the interests of the husband might not, perhaps, have frightened my client quite so much,” I went on. “Come! come! this contingency resolves itself into a matter of bargaining after all. What is the least you will take?”
“The least we will take,” said Mr. Merriman, “is nineteen-thousand-nine-hundred-and-ninety- nine-pounds-nineteen-shillings-and-eleven- pence-three-farthings. Ha! ha! ha! Excuse me, Mr. Gilmore. I must have my little joke.”
“Little enough!” I remarked. “The joke is just worth the odd farthing it was made for.”
Mr. Merriman was delighted. He laughed over my retort till the room rang again. I was not half so good-humoured, on my side: I came back to business, and closed the interview.
“This is Friday,” I said. “Give us till Tuesday next for our final answer.”
“By all means,” replied Mr. Merriman. “Longer, my dear sir, if you like.” He took up his hat to go; and then addressed me again. “By the way,” he said, “your clients in Cumberland have not heard anything more of the woman who wrote the anonymous letter, have they?”
“Nothing more,” I answered. “Have you found no trace of her?”
“Not yet,” said my legal friend. “But we don’t despair. Sir Percival has his suspicions that Somebody is keeping her in hiding; and we are having that Somebody watched.”
”You mean the old woman who was with her in Cumberland?” I said.
“Quite another party, sir,” answered Mr. Merriman. “We don’t happen to have laid hands on the old woman yet. Our Somebody is a man. We have got him close under our eye here in London; and we strongly suspect he had something to do with helping her in the first instance to escape from the Asylum. Sir Percival wanted to question him, at once; but I said, ‘No. Questioning him will only put him on his guard: watch him, and wait.’ We shall see what happens. A dangerous woman to be at large, Mr. Gilmore; nobody knows what she may do next. I wish you good morning, sir. On Tuesday next I shall hope for the pleasure of hearing from you.” He smiled amiably, and went out.
My mind had been rather absent during the latter part of the conversation with my legal friend. I was so anxious about the matter of the settlement, that I had little attention to give to any other subject; and, the moment I was left alone again, I began to think over what my next proceeding ought to be.
In the case of any other client, I should have acted on my instructions, however personally distasteful to me, and have given up the point about the twenty thousand pounds on the spot. But I could not act with this business-like indifference towards Miss Fairlie. I had an honest feeling of affection and admiration for her; I remembered gratefully that her father had been the kindest patron and friend to me that ever man had; I had felt towards her, while I was drawing the settlement, as I might have felt, if I had not been an old bachelor, towards a daughter of my own; and I was determined to spare no personal sacrifice in her service and where her interests were concerned. Writing a second time to Mr. Fairlie was not to be thought of; it would only be giving him a second opportunity of slipping through my fingers. Seeing him and personally remonstrating with him, might possibly be of more use. The next day was Saturday. I determined to take a return ticket, and jolt my old bones down to Cumberland, on the chance of persuading him to adopt the just, the independent, and the honourable course. It was a poor chance enough, no doubt; but, when I had tried it, my conscience would be at ease. I should then have done all that a man in my position could do to serve the interests of my old friend’s only child.
The weather on Saturday was beautiful, a west wind and a bright sun. Having felt latterly a return of that fulness and oppression of the head, against which my doctor warned me so seriously more than two years since, I resolved to take the opportunity of getting a little extra exercise, by sending my bag on before me, and walking to the terminus in Euston- square. As I came out into Holborn, a gentleman, walking by rapidly, stopped and spoke to me. It was Mr. Walter Hartright.
If he had not been the first to greet me, I should certainly have passed him. He was so changed that I hardly knew him again. His face looked pale and haggard — his manner was hurried and uncertain — and his dress, which I remembered as neat and gentlemanlike when I saw him at Limmeridge, was so slovenly, now, that I should really have been ashamed of the appearance of it on one of my own clerks.
“Have you been long back from Cumberland?” he asked. “I heard from Miss Halcombe lately. I am aware that Sir Percival Glyde’s explanation has been considered satisfactory. Will the marriage take place soon? Do you happen to know, Mr. Gilmore?”
He spoke so fast, and crowded his questions together so strangely and confusedly, that I could hardly follow him. However accidentally intimate he might have been with the family at Limmeridge, I could not see that he had any right to expect information on their private affairs; and I determined to drop him, as easily as might be, on the subject of Miss Fairlie’s marriage.
“Time will show, Mr. Hartright,” I said— “time will show. I dare say if we look out for the marriage in the papers we shall not be far wrong. Excuse my noticing it — but I am sorry to see you not looking so well as you were when we last met.”
A momentary nervous contraction quivered about his lips and eyes, and made me half reproach myself for having answered him in such a significantly guarded manner.
“l had no right to ask about her marriage,” he said, bitterly. “I must wait to see it in the newspapers like other people. Yes,” he went on, before I could make any apologies, “I have not been well lately. I want a change of scene and occupation. You have a large circle of acquaintance, Mr. Gilmore. If you should hear of any expedition abroad which may be in want of a draughtsman, and if you have no friend of your own who can take advantage of the opportunity, I should feel greatly obliged by your letting me know of it. I can answer for my testimonials being satisfactory; and I don’t care where I go, what the climate is, or how long I am away.”[8]He looked about him, while he said this, at the throng of strangers passing us by on either side, in a strange, suspicious, manner, as if he thought that some of them might be watching us.
“If I hear of anything of the kind I will not fail to mention it,” I said;[9] and then added, so as not to keep him altogether at arm’s length on the subject of the Fairlies, “I am going down to Limmeridge, to-day, on business. Miss Halcombe and Miss Fairlie are away, just now, on a visit to some friends in Yorkshire.”
His eyes brightened, and he seemed about to say something in answer; but the same momentary nervous spasm crossed his face again. He took my hand, pressed it hard, and disappeared among the crowd, without saying another word. Though he was little more than a stranger to me, I waited for a moment, looking after him almost with a feeling of regret. I had gained, in my profession, sufficient experience of young men, to know what the outward signs and tokens were of their beginning to go wrong; and, when I resumed my walk to the railway, I am sorry to say I felt more than doubtful about Mr. Hartright’s future.
IV.
LEAVING by an early train, I got to Limmeridge in time for dinner. The house was oppressively empty and dull. I had expected that good Mrs. Vesey would have been company for me in the absence of the young ladies; but she was confined to her room by a cold. The servants were so surprised at seeing me that they hurried and bustled absurdly, and made all sorts of annoying mistakes. Even the butler, who was old enough to have known better, brought me a bottle of port that was chilled. The reports of Mr. Fairlie’s health were just as usual; and when I sent up a message to announce my arrival, I was told that he would be delighted to see me the next morning, but that the sudden news of my appearance had prostrated him with palpitations for the rest of the evening. The wind howled dismally, all night, and strange cracking and groaning noises sounded here, there, and everywhere in the empty house. I slept as wretchedly as possible; and got up, in a mighty bad humour, to breakfast by myself the next morning.
At ten o’clock I was conducted to Mr. Fairlie’s apartments. He was in his usual room, his usual chair, and his usual aggravating state of mind and body. When I went in, his valet was standing before him, holding up for inspection a heavy volume of etchings, as long and as broad as my office writing-desk. The miserable foreigner grinned in the most abject manner, and looked ready to drop with fatigue, while his master composedly turned over the etchings, and brought their hidden beauties to light with the help of a magnifying glass.
“You very best of good old friends,” said Mr. Fairlie, leaning back lazily before he could look at me, “are you quite well? How nice of you to come here and see me in my solitude. Dear Gilmore!”
I had expected that the valet would be dismissed when I appeared; but nothing of the sort happened. There he stood, in front of his master’s chair, trembling under the weight of the etchings; and there Mr. Fairlie sat, serenely twirling the magnifying glass between his white fingers and thumbs.
“I have come to speak to you on a very important matter,” I said; “and you will therefore excuse me, if I suggest that we had better be alone.”
The unfortunate valet looked at me gratefully. Mr. Fairlie faintly repeated my last three words, “better be alone,” with every appearance of the utmost possible astonishment.
I was in no humour for trifling; and I resolved to make him understand what I meant.
“Oblige me by giving that man permission to withdraw,” I said, pointing to the valet.
Mr. Fairlie arched his eyebrows, and pursed up his lips, in sarcastic surprise.
“Man?” he repeated. “You provoking old Gilmore, what can you possibly mean by calling him a man? He’s nothing of the sort. He might have been a man half an hour ago, before I wanted my etchings; and he may be a man half an hour hence, when I don’t want them any longer. At present, he is simply a portfolio stand. Why object, Gilmore, to a portfolio stand?”
“I do object. For the third time, Mr. Fairlie, I beg that we may be alone.”
My tone and manner left him no alternative but to comply with my request. He looked at the servant, and pointed peevishly to a chair at his side.
“Put down the etchings and go away,” he said. “Don’t upset me by losing my place. Have you, or have you not, lost my place? Are you sure you have not? And have you put my hand-bell quite within my reach! Yes? Then, why the devil don’t you go?”
The valet went out. Mr. Fairlie twisted himself round in his chair, polished the magnifying glass with his delicate cambric handkerchief, and indulged himself in a sidelong inspection of the open volume of etchings. It was not easy to keep my temper, under these circumstances; but I did keep it.
“I have come here at great personal inconvenience,” I said, “to serve the interests of your niece and your family; and I think I have established some slight claim to be favoured with your attention, in return.”
“Don’t bully me!” exclaimed Mr. Fairlie, falling back helplessly in the chair, and closing his eyes. “Please don’t bully me. I’m not strong enough.”
I was determined not to let him provoke me, for Laura Fairlie’s sake.
“My object,” I went on, “is to entreat you to reconsider your letter, and not to force me to abandon the just rights of your niece, and of all who belong to her. Let me state the case to you once more, and for the last time.”
Mr. Fairlie shook his head, and sighed piteously.
“This is heartless of you, Gilmore — very heartless,” he said. “Never mind; go on.”
I put all the points to him carefully; I set the matter before him in every conceivable light. He lay back in the chair, the whole time I was speaking, with his eyes closed. When I had done, he opened them indolently, took his silver smelling-bottle from the table, and sniffed at it with an air of gentle relish.
“Good Gilmore!” he said, between the sniffs, “how very nice this is of you! How you reconcile one to human nature!”
“Give me a plain answer to a plain question, Mr. Fairlie. I tell you again, Sir Percival Glyde has no shadow of a claim to expect more than the income of the money. The money itself, if your niece has no children, ought to be under her control, and to return to her family. If you stand firm, Sir Percival must give way— he must give way, I tell you, or he exposes himself to the base imputation of marrying Miss Fairlie entirely from mercenary motives.”
Mr. Fairlie shook the silver smelling-bottle at me playfully.
“You dear old Gilmore; how you do hate rank and family, don’t you? How you detest Glyde, because he happens to be a baronet. What a Radical you are oh, dear me, what a Radical you are!”
A Radical!!! I could put up with a great deal of provocation, but, after holding the soundest Conservative principles all my life, I could not put up with being called a Radical.[10] My blood boiled at it—I started out of my chair — I was speechless with indignation.
“Don’t shake the room!” cried Mr. Fairlie— “for Heaven’s sake, don’t shake the room! Worthiest of all possible Gilmores, I meant no offence. My own views are so extremely liberal that I think I am a Radical myself. Yes. We are a pair of Radicals. Please don’t be angry. I can’t quarrel—I haven’t stamina enough. Shall we drop the subject? Yes. Come and look at these sweet etchings. Do let me teach you to understand the heavenly pearliness of these lines. Do, now, there’s a good Gilmore!”
While he was maundering on in this way, I was, fortunately for my own self-respect, returning to my senses. When I spoke again, I was composed enough to treat his impertinence with the silent contempt that it deserved.
“You are entirely wrong, sir,” I said, “in supposing that I speak from any prejudice against Sir Percival Glyde. I may regret that he has so unreservedly resigned himself, in this matter, to his lawyer’s direction, as to make any appeal to himself impossible; but I am not prejudiced against him. What I have said would equally apply to any other man, in his situation, high or low. The principle I maintain is a recognised principle among lawyers.[11] If you were to apply, at the nearest town here, to the first respectable practitioner you could find, he would tell you, as a stranger, what I tell you, as a friend.[12] He would inform you that it is against all rule to abandon the lady’s money entirely to the man she marries. He would decline, on grounds of common legal caution, to give the husband, under any circumstances whatever, an interest of twenty thousand pounds in the event of the wife’s death.”[13]
“Would he really, Gilmore?” said Mr. Fairlie. “If he said anything half so horrid I do assure you I should tinkle my bell for Louis, and have him sent out of the house immediately.”
“You shall not irritate me, Mr. Fairlie — for your niece’s sake and for her father’s sake, you shall not irritate me. You shall take the whole responsibility of this discreditable settlement on your own shoulders, before I leave the room.”
“Don’t!—now please don’t!” said Mr. Fairlie. “Think how precious your time is, Gilmore; and don’t throw it away. I would dispute with you, if I could, but I can’t — I haven’t stamina enough. You want to upset me, to upset yourself, to upset Glyde, and to upset Laura; and — oh, dear me — all for the sake of the very last thing in the world that is likely to happen. No, dear friend — for the sake of peace and quietness, positively No!”
“I am to understand, then, that you hold by the determination expressed in your letter?”
“Yes, please. So glad we understand each other at last. Sit down again — do!”
I walked at once to the door; and Mr. Fairlie resignedly “tinkled” his hand-bell. Before I left the room, I turned round, and addressed him, for the last time.
“Whatever happens in the future, sir,” I said, “remember that my plain duty of warning you has been performed. As the faithful friend and servant of your family, I tell you, at parting, that no daughter of mine should be married to any man alive under such a settlement as you are forcing me to make for Miss Fairlie.”
The door opened behind me, and the valet stood waiting on the threshold.
“Louis,” said Mr. Fairlie, “show Mr. Gilmore out, and then come back and hold up my etchings for me again. Make them give you a good lunch down stairs — do, Gilmore, make my idle beasts of servants give you a good lunch.”
I was too much disgusted to reply; I turned on my heel, and left him in silence. There was an up train, at two o’clock in the afternoon; and by that train I returned to London.
On the Tuesday, I sent in the altered settlement, which practically disinherited the very persons whom Miss Fairlie’s own lips had informed me she was most anxious to benefit. I had no choice. Another lawyer would have drawn up the deed if I had refused to undertake it.
My task is done. My personal share in the events of the family story extends no farther than the point which I have just reached. Other pens than mine will describe the strange circumstances which are now shortly to follow. Seriously and sorrowfully, I close this brief record. Seriously and sorrowfully, I repeat here the parting words that I spoke at Limmeridge House: No daughter of mine should have been married to any man alive under such a settlement as I was compelled to make for Laura Fairlie.
Source:
Collins, Wilkie. “Gilmore’s Narrative Concluded,” The Woman in White, All The Year Round, Vol. 2, No. 39, 21 Jan 1860, pp. 285-291. Dickens Journals Online.
- In the 1860 volume edition, the letters sit on Gilmore's table rather than his desk (V. 1 p. 236). ↵
- In the 1860 volume publication of The Woman in White, this passage reads: "My dear sir. Miss Fairlie's settlement. I maintain the clause to which you object, exactly as it stands. Yours truly" (emphasis added) (V. 1 p. 244). ↵
- The volume update reads "My dear sir. Miss Fairlie's settlement. I maintain the red ink to which you object, exactly as it stands (V. 1 p. 244). ↵
- A small addition in the 1860 volume edition reads "The knowledge of Sir Percival's affairs which I had necessarily gained..."(V. 1 p. 244). ↵
- The 1860 volume edition omits the words "from me": "I threw the letter away in disgust" (V. 1 p. 245). ↵
- The September 8, 1860 London Review article about The Woman in White calls attention to these final two sentences as part of a series of excerpts used to illustrate Wilkie Collins's style and characterization. ↵
- The 1860 volume edition adds a section to this sentence: "but he is obstinate—or let me rather say, resolute—and he won't take it off" (V. 1 p. 246). ↵
- The 1860 volume edition makes no changes to this passage. However, in later versions of the novel, such as the Harper and Brothers edition published in New York and London in 1873, this passage instead reads: "I am going to another country to try a change of scene and occupation. Miss Halcombe has kindly assisted me with her influence, and my testimonials have been found satisfactory. It is a long distance off, but I don't care where I go, what the climate is, or how long I am away." (Collins, Wilkie. The Woman in White, Harper & Bros Publishers, 1873, p. 139. Also pub. in the Chatto & Windus 1907 edition, p. 62 and. int the J. M. Dent & Sons Ltd. edition, 1910, 1913, 1917, and 1919, p. 136. This is also the variant reflected in the undated Project Gutenberg version of this novel. ↵
- The 1873 volume edition changes Gilmore's comment to "I wish you well through it, and safe back again" (Harper & Bros. 1873 ed., p. 139). ↵
- The volume changes "great" to "good"--"I could put up with a good deal of provocation" (V. 1 p. 257). ↵
- In the 1860 volume edition of this novel, Wilkie Collins removed the phrase "among lawyers" from this sentence. Intriguingly, Collins assumes a defensive tone in the preface he attached to this later volume edition, noting that "Some doubts having been expressed, in certain captious quarters, about the correct presentation of the legal “points” incidental to the story, I may be permitted to mention that I spared no pains — in this instance, as in all others — to preserve myself from unintentionally misleading my readers." Collins continues on to insist that he had a professional lawyer proof the legal aspects of his text. It is possible that he removed the phrase "among lawyers" in the later edition to avoid a clamor of additional 'not all lawyers' naysayers (V. 1 p. 258). ↵
- The 1860 volume replaces "practitioner" with "solicitor" (V. 1 p. 258). ↵
- The 1860 volume edition reads "an interest of twenty thousand pounds in his wife's death," omitting the phrase "the event of" (V. 1 p. 258). ↵