The Moonstone

the spring of the year eighteen hundred and forty-nine I was
wandering in the East, and had then recently altered the travelling
plans which I had laid out some months before, and which I had
communicated to my lawyer and my banker in London.

This change made it necessary for me to send one of my servants to
obtain my letters and remittances from the English consul in a certain
city, which was no longer included as one of my resting-places in my
new travelling scheme. The man was to join me again at an appointed
place and time. An accident, for which he was not responsible, delayed
him on his errand. For a week I and my people waited, encamped on the
borders of a desert. At the end of that time the missing man made his
appearance, with the money and the letters, at the entrance of my tent.

“I am afraid I bring you bad news, sir,” he said, and pointed to one of
the letters, which had a mourning border round it, and the address on
which was in the handwriting of Mr. Bruff.

I know nothing, in a case of this kind, so unendurable as suspense. The
letter with the mourning border was the letter that I opened first.

It informed me that my father was dead, and that I was heir to his
great fortune. The wealth which had thus fallen into my hands brought
its responsibilities with it, and Mr. Bruff entreated me to lose no
time in returning to England.

By daybreak the next morning, I was on my way back to my own country.

The picture presented of me, by my old friend Betteredge, at the time
of my departure from England, is (as I think) a little overdrawn. He
has, in his own quaint way, interpreted seriously one of his young
mistress’s many satirical references to my foreign education; and has
persuaded himself that he actually saw those French, German, and
Italian sides to my character, which my lively cousin only professed to
discover in jest, and which never had any real existence, except in our
good Betteredge’s own brain. But, barring this drawback, I am bound to
own that he has stated no more than the truth in representing me as
wounded to the heart by Rachel’s treatment, and as leaving England in
the first keenness of suffering caused by the bitterest disappointment
of my life.

I went abroad, resolved—if change and absence could help me—to forget
her. It is, I am persuaded, no true view of human nature which denies
that change and absence do help a man under these circumstances; they
force his attention away from the exclusive contemplation of his own
sorrow. I never forgot her; but the pang of remembrance lost its worst
bitterness, little by little, as time, distance, and novelty interposed
themselves more and more effectually between Rachel and me.

On the other hand, it is no less certain that, with the act of turning
homeward, the remedy which had gained its ground so steadily, began
now, just as steadily, to drop back. The nearer I drew to the country
which she inhabited, and to the prospect of seeing her again, the more
irresistibly her influence began to recover its hold on me. On leaving
England she was the last person in the world whose name I would have
suffered to pass my lips. On returning to England, she was the first
person I inquired after, when Mr. Bruff and I met again.

I was informed, of course, of all that had happened in my absence; in
other words, of all that has been related here in continuation of
Betteredge’s narrative—one circumstance only being excepted. Mr. Bruff
did not, at that time, feel himself at liberty to inform me of the
motives which had privately influenced Rachel and Godfrey Ablewhite in
recalling the marriage promise, on either side. I troubled him with no
embarrassing questions on this delicate subject. It was relief enough
to me, after the jealous disappointment caused by hearing that she had
ever contemplated being Godfrey’s wife, to know that reflection had
convinced her of acting rashly, and that she had effected her own
release from her marriage engagement.

Having heard the story of the past, my next inquiries (still inquiries
after Rachel!) advanced naturally to the present time. Under whose care
had she been placed after leaving Mr. Bruff’s house? and where was she
living now?

She was living under the care of a widowed sister of the late Sir John
Verinder—one Mrs. Merridew—whom her mother’s executors had requested to
act as guardian, and who had accepted the proposal. They were reported
to me as getting on together admirably well, and as being now
established, for the season, in Mrs. Merridew’s house in Portland
Place.

Half an hour after receiving this information, I was on my way to
Portland Place—without having had the courage to own it to Mr. Bruff!

The man who answered the door was not sure whether Miss Verinder was at
home or not. I sent him upstairs with my card, as the speediest way of
setting the question at rest. The man came down again with an
impenetrable face, and informed me that Miss Verinder was out.

I might have suspected other people of purposely denying themselves to
me. But it was impossible to suspect Rachel. I left word that I would
call again at six o’clock that evening.

At six o’clock I was informed for the second time that Miss Verinder
was not at home. Had any message been left for me. No message had been
left for me. Had Miss Verinder not received my card? The servant begged
my pardon—Miss Verinder had received it.

The inference was too plain to be resisted. Rachel declined to see me.

On my side, I declined to be treated in this way, without making an
attempt, at least, to discover a reason for it. I sent up my name to
Mrs. Merridew, and requested her to favour me with a personal interview
at any hour which it might be most convenient to her to name.

Mrs. Merridew made no difficulty about receiving me at once. I was
shown into a comfortable little sitting-room, and found myself in the
presence of a comfortable little elderly lady. She was so good as to
feel great regret and much surprise, entirely on my account. She was at
the same time, however, not in a position to offer me any explanation,
or to press Rachel on a matter which appeared to relate to a question
of private feeling alone. This was said over and over again, with a
polite patience that nothing could tire; and this was all I gained by
applying to Mrs. Merridew.

My last chance was to write to Rachel. My servant took a letter to her
the next day, with strict instructions to wait for an answer.

The answer came back, literally in one sentence.

“Miss Verinder begs to decline entering into any correspondence with
Mr. Franklin Blake.”

Fond as I was of her, I felt indignantly the insult offered to me in
that reply. Mr. Bruff came in to speak to me on business, before I had
recovered possession of myself. I dismissed the business on the spot,
and laid the whole case before him. He proved to be as incapable of
enlightening me as Mrs. Merridew herself. I asked him if any slander
had been spoken of me in Rachel’s hearing. Mr. Bruff was not aware of
any slander of which I was the object. Had she referred to me in any
way while she was staying under Mr. Bruff’s roof? Never. Had she not so
much as asked, during all my long absence, whether I was living or
dead? No such question had ever passed her lips. I took out of my
pocket-book the letter which poor Lady Verinder had written to me from
Frizinghall, on the day when I left her house in Yorkshire. And I
pointed Mr. Bruff’s attention to these two sentences in it:

“The valuable assistance which you rendered to the inquiry after the
lost jewel is still an unpardoned offence, in the present dreadful
state of Rachel’s mind. Moving blindfold in this matter, you have added
to the burden of anxiety which she has had to bear, by innocently
threatening her secret with discovery through your exertions.”

“Is it possible,” I asked, “that the feeling towards me which is there
described, is as bitter as ever against me now?”

Mr. Bruff looked unaffectedly distressed.

“If you insist on an answer,” he said, “I own I can place no other
interpretation on her conduct than that.”

I rang the bell, and directed my servant to pack my portmanteau, and to
send out for a railway guide. Mr. Bruff asked, in astonishment, what I
was going to do.

“I am going to Yorkshire,” I answered, “by the next train.”

“May I ask for what purpose?”

“Mr. Bruff, the assistance I innocently rendered to the inquiry after
the Diamond was an unpardoned offence, in Rachel’s mind, nearly a year
since; and it remains an unpardoned offence still. I won’t accept that
position! I am determined to find out the secret of her silence towards
her mother, and her enmity towards me. If time, pains, and money can
do it, I will lay my hand on the thief who took the Moonstone!”

The worthy old gentleman attempted to remonstrate—to induce me to
listen to reason—to do his duty towards me, in short. I was deaf to
everything that he could urge. No earthly consideration would, at that
moment, have shaken the resolution that was in me.

“I shall take up the inquiry again,” I went on, “at the point where I
dropped it; and I shall follow it onwards, step by step, till I come to
the present time. There are missing links in the evidence, as I left
it, which Gabriel Betteredge can supply, and to Gabriel Betteredge I
go!”

Towards sunset that evening I stood again on the well-remembered
terrace, and looked once more at the peaceful old country house. The
gardener was the first person whom I saw in the deserted grounds. He
had left Betteredge, an hour since, sunning himself in the customary
corner of the back yard. I knew it well; and I said I would go and seek
him myself.

I walked round by the familiar paths and passages, and looked in at the
open gate of the yard.

There he was—the dear old friend of the happy days that were never to
come again—there he was in the old corner, on the old beehive chair,
with his pipe in his mouth, and his Robinson Crusoe on his lap, and
his two friends, the dogs, dozing on either side of him! In the
position in which I stood, my shadow was projected in front of me by
the last slanting rays of the sun. Either the dogs saw it, or their
keen scent informed them of my approach; they started up with a growl.
Starting in his turn, the old man quieted them by a word, and then
shaded his failing eyes with his hand, and looked inquiringly at the
figure at the gate.

My own eyes were full of tears. I was obliged to wait a moment before I
could trust myself to speak to him.