Doctor Grimshawe's Secret Part 23

_Note 3. Author's note_.--"Describe, in rich poetry, all shapes of deadly things."

CHAPTER XII.

_Note 1. Author's note_.--"Conferred their best qualities": an alternative phrase for "done their utmost."

_Note 2. Author's note_.--"Let the old man have a beard as part of the costume."

CHAPTER XIII.

_Note 1. Author's note_.--"Describe him as delirious, and the scene as adopted into his delirium."

_Note 2. Author's note_.--"Make the whole scene very dreamlike and feverish."

_Note 3. Author's note_.--"There should be a slight wildness in the patient's remark to the surgeon, which he cannot prevent, though he is conscious of it."

_Note 4. Author's note_.--"Notice the peculiar depth and intelligence of his eyes, on account of his pain and sickness."

_Note 5. Author's note_.--"Perhaps the recognition of the pensioner should not be so decided. Redclyffe thinks it is he, but thinks it as in a dream, without wonder or inquiry; and the pensioner does not quite acknowledge it."

_Note 6._ The following dialogue is marked to be omitted or modified in the original MS.; but it is retained here, in order that the thread of the narrative may not be broken.

_Note 7. Author's note_.--"The patient, as he gets better, listens to the feet of old people moving in corridors; to the ringing of a bell at stated periods; to old, tremulous voices talking in the quadrangle; etc., etc."

_Note 8._ At this point the modification indicated in Note 5 seems to have been made operative: and the recognition takes place in another way.

CHAPTER XIV.

_Note 1._ This paragraph is left incomplete in the original MS.

_Note 2._ The words "Rich old bindings" are interlined here, indicating, perhaps, a purpose to give a more detailed description of the library and its contents.

CHAPTER XV.

_Note 1. Author's note_.--"I think it shall be built of stone, however."

_Note 2._ This probably refers to some incident which the author intended to incorporate in the former portion of the romance, on a final revision.

CHAPTER XVI.

_Note 1._ Several pa.s.sages, which are essentially reproductions of what had been previously treated, are omitted from this chapter. It belongs to an earlier version of the romance.

CHAPTER XVII.

_Note 1. Author's note_.--"Redclyffe shows how to find, under the surface of the village green, an old cross."

_Note 2. Author's note_.--"A circular seat around the tree."

_Note 3._ The reader now hears for the first time what Redclyffe recollected.

CHAPTER XVIII.

_Note 1. Author's note_.--"The dinner is given to the pensioners, as well as to the gentry, I think."

_Note 2. Author's note_.--"For example, a story of three brothers, who had a deadly quarrel among them more than two hundred years ago for the affections of a young lady, their cousin, who gave her reciprocal love to one of them, who immediately became the object of the deadly hatred of the two others. There seemed to be madness in their love; perhaps madness in the love of all three; for the result had been a plot to kidnap this unfortunate young man and convey him to America, where he was sold for a servant."

CHAPTER XIX.

_Note 1._ The following pa.s.sage, though it seems to fit in here chronologically, is concerned with a side issue which was not followed up. The author was experimenting for a character to act as the accomplice of Lord Braithwaite at the Hall; and he makes trial of the present personage, Mountford; of an Italian priest, Father Angelo; and finally of the steward, Omskirk, who is adopted. It will be noticed that Mountford is here endowed (for the moment) with the birthright of good Doctor Hammond, the Warden. He is represented as having made the journey to America in search of the grave. This alteration being inconsistent with the true thread of the story, and being, moreover, not continued, I have placed this pa.s.sage in the Appendix, instead of in the text.

Redclyffe often, in the dim weather, when the prophetic intimations of rain were too strong to allow an American to walk abroad with peace of mind, was in the habit of pacing this n.o.ble hall, and watching the process of renewal and adornment; or, which suited him still better, of enjoying its great, deep solitude when the workmen were away. Parties of visitors, curious tourists, sometimes peeped in, took a cursory glimpse at the old hall, and went away; these were the only ordinary disturbances. But, one day, a person entered, looked carelessly round the hall, as if its antiquity had no great charm to him; then he seemed to approach Redclyffe, who stood far and dim in the remote distance of the great room. The echoing of feet on the stone pavement of the hall had always an impressive sound, and turning his head towards the visitant Edward stood as if there were an expectance for him in this approach. It was a middle-aged man--rather, a man towards fifty, with an alert, capable air; a man evidently with something to do in life, and not in the habit of throwing away his moments in looking at old halls; a gentlemanly man enough, too. He approached Redclyffe without hesitation, and, lifting his hat, addressed him in a way that made Edward wonder whether he could be an Englishman. If so, he must have known that Edward was an American, and have been trying to adapt his manners to those of a democratic freedom.

"Mr. Redclyffe, I believe," said he.

Redclyffe bowed, with the stiff caution of an Englishman; for, with American mobility, he had learned to be stiff.

"I think I have had the pleasure of knowing--at least of meeting--you very long ago," said the gentleman. "But I see you do not recollect me."

Redclyffe confessed that the stranger had the advantage of him in his recollection of a previous acquaintance.

"No wonder," said the other, "for, as I have already hinted, it was many years ago."

"In my own country then, of course," said Redclyffe.

"In your own country certainly," said the stranger, "and when it would have required a penetrating eye to see the distinguished Mr. Redclyffe.

the representative of American democracy abroad, in the little pale-faced, intelligent boy, dwelling with an old humorist in the corner of a graveyard."

At these words Redclyffe sent back his recollections, and, though doubtfully, began to be aware that this must needs be the young Englishman who had come to his guardian on such a singular errand as to search an old grave. It must be he, for it could be n.o.body else; and, in truth, he had a sense of his ident.i.ty,--which, however, did not express itself by anything that he could confidently remember in his looks, manner, or voice,--yet, if anything, it was most in the voice. But the image which, on searching, he found in his mind of a fresh-colored young Englishman, with light hair and a frank, pleasant face, was terribly realized for the worse in this somewhat heavy figure, and coa.r.s.er face, and heavier eye. In fact, there is a terrible difference between the mature Englishman and the young man who is not yet quite out of his blossom. His hair, too, was getting streaked and sprinkled with gray; and, in short, there were evident marks of his having worked, and succeeded, and failed, and eaten and drunk, and being made largely of beef, ale, port, and sherry, and all the solidities of English life.

"I remember you now," said Redclyffe, extending his hand frankly; and yet Mountford took it in so cold a way that he was immediately sorry that he had done it, and called up an extra portion of reserve to freeze the rest of the interview. He continued, coolly enough, "I remember you, and something of your American errand,--which, indeed, has frequently been in my mind since. I hope you found the results of your voyage, in the way of discovery, sufficiently successful to justify so much trouble."

"You will remember," said Mountford, "that the grave proved quite unproductive. Yes, you will not have forgotten it; for I well recollect how eagerly you listened, with that queer little girl, to my talk with the old governor, and how disappointed you seemed when you found that the grave was not to be opened. And yet, it is very odd. I failed in that mission; and yet there are circ.u.mstances that have led me to think that I ought to have succeeded better,--that some other person has really succeeded better."

Redclyffe was silent; but he remembered the strange old silver key, and how he had kept it secret, and the doubts that had troubled his mind then and long afterwards, whether he ought not to have found means to convey it to the stranger, and ask whether that was what he sought. And now here was that same doubt and question coming up again, and he found himself quite as little able to solve it as he had been twenty years ago. Indeed, with the views that had come up since, it behooved him to be cautious, until he knew both the man and the circ.u.mstances.