Mr Grey read it twice over, leaving the other letters unnoticed on the table by his tea-cup. He read it twice over, and the work of reading it was one to him of intense agony. Hitherto he had fed himself with hope. That Alice should have been brought to think of her engagement with him in a spirit of doubt and with a mind so troubled, that she had been inclined to attempt an escape from it, had been very grievous to him; but it had been in his mind a fantasy, a morbid fear of himself, which might be cured by time. He, at any rate, would give all his energies towards achieving such a cure. There had been one thing, however, which he most feared;—which he had chiefly feared, though he had forbidden himself to think that it could be probable, and this thing had now happened.
He had ever disliked and feared George Vavasor;—not from any effect which the man had upon himself, for as we know his acquaintance with Vavasor was of the slightest;—but he had feared and disliked his influence upon Alice. He had also feared the influence of her cousin Kate. To have cautioned Alice against her cousins would have been to him impossible. It was not his nature to express suspicion to one he loved. Is the tone of that letter remembered in which he had answered Alice when she informed him that her cousin George was to go with Kate and her to Switzerland? He had written, with a pleasant joke, words which Alice had been able to read with some little feeling of triumph to her two friends. He had not so written because he liked what he knew of the man. He disliked all that he knew of him. But it had not been possible for him to show that he distrusted the prudence of her, whom, as his future wife, he was prepared to trust in all things.
I have said that he read Alice’s letter with an agony of sorrow; as he sat with it in his hand he suffered as, probably, he had never suffered before. But there was nothing in his countenance to show that he was in pain. Seward had received some long epistle, crossed from end to end,—indicative, I should say, of a not far distant termination to that college tutorship,—and was reading it with placid contentment. It did not occur to him to look across at Grey, but had he done so, I doubt whether he would have seen anything to attract his attention. But Grey, though he was wounded, would not allow himself to be dismayed. There was less hope now than before, but there might still be hope;—hope for her, even though there might be none for him. Tidings had reached his ears also as to George Vavasor, which had taught him to believe that the man was needy, reckless, and on the brink of ruin. Such a marriage to Alice Vavasor would be altogether ruinous. Whatever might be his own ultimate fate he would still seek to save her from that. Her cousin, doubtless, wanted her money. Might it not be possible that he would be satisfied with her money, and that thus the woman might be saved?
“Seward,” he said at last, addressing his friend, who had not yet come to the end of the last crossed page.
“Is there anything wrong?” said Seward.
“Well;—yes; there is something a little wrong. I fear I must leave you, and go up to town to-day.”
“Nobody ill, I hope?”
“No;—nobody is ill. But I must go up to London. Mrs Bole will take care of you, and you must not be angry with me for leaving you.”
Seward assured him that he would not be in the least angry, and that he was thoroughly conversant with the capabilities and good intentions of Mrs Bole the housekeeper; but added, that as he was so near his own college, he would of course go back to Cambridge. He longed to say some word as to the purpose of Grey’s threatened journey; to make some inquiry as to this new trouble; but he knew that Grey was a man who did not well bear close inquiries, and he was silent.
“Why not stay here?” said Grey, after a minute’s pause. “I wish you would, old fellow; I do, indeed.” There was a tone of special affection in his voice which struck Seward at once. “If I can be of the slightest service or comfort to you, I will of course.”
Grey again sat silent for a little while. “I wish you would; I do, indeed.”
“Then I will.” And again there was a pause.
“I have got a letter here from—Miss Vavasor,” said Grey.
“May I hope that—”
“No;—it does not bring good news to me. I do not know that I can tell it you all. I would if I could, but the whole story is one not to be told in a hurry. I should leave false impressions. There are things which a man cannot tell.”
“Indeed there are,” said Seward.
“I wish with all my heart that you knew it all as I know it; but that is impossible. There are things which happen in a day which it would take a lifetime to explain.” Then there was another pause. “I have heard bad news this morning, and I must go up to London at once. I shall go into Ely so as to be there by twelve; and if you will, you shall drive me over. I may be back in a day; certainly in less than a week; but it will be a comfort to me to know that I shall find you here.”
The matter was so arranged, and at eleven they started. During the first two miles not a word was spoken between them. “Seward,” Grey said at last, “if I fail in what I am going to attempt, it is probable that you will never hear Alice Vavasor’s name mentioned by me again; but I want you always to bear this in mind;—that at no moment has my opinion of her ever been changed, nor must you in such case imagine from my silence that it has changed. Do you understand me?”
“I think I do.”
“To my thinking she is the finest of God’s creatures that I have known. It may be that in her future life she will be severed from me altogether; but I shall not, therefore, think the less well of her; and I wish that you, as my friend, should know that I so esteem her, even though her name should never be mentioned between us.” Seward, in some few words, assured him that it should be so, and then they finished their journey in silence.
From the station at Ely, Grey sent a message by the wires up to John Vavasor, saying that he would call on him that afternoon at his office in Chancery Lane. The chances were always much against finding Mr Vavasor at his office; but on this occasion the telegram did reach him there, and he remained till the unaccustomed hour of half past four to meet the man who was to have been his son-in-law.
“Have you heard from her?” he asked as soon as Grey entered the dingy little room, not in Chancery Lane, but in its neighbourhood, which was allocated to him for his signing purposes.
“Yes,”—said Grey; “she has written to me.”
“And told you about her cousin George. I tried to hinder her from writing, but she is very wilful.”
“Why should you have hindered her? If the thing was to be told, it is better that it should be done at once.”
“But I hoped that there might be an escape. I don’t know what you think of all this, Grey, but to me it is the bitterest misfortune that I have known. And I’ve had some bitter things, too,” he added,—thinking of that period of his life, when the work of which he was ashamed was first ordained as his future task.
“What is the escape that you hoped?” asked Grey.
“I hardly know. The whole thing seems to me to be so mad, that I partly trusted that she would see the madness of it. I am not sure whether you know anything of my nephew George?” asked Mr Vavasor.
“Very little,” said Grey.
“I believe him to be utterly an adventurer,—a