Page:The Woman in White.djvu/337

 spare you the horrors of public scandal. A temporary separation between husband and wife is the one peaceable solution of this difficulty. Part them for the present; and when all causes of irritation are removed, I, who have now the honour of addressing you&mdash;I will undertake to bring Sir Percival to reason. Lady Glyde is innocent, Lady Glyde is injured; but&mdash;follow my thought here!&mdash;she is, on that very account (I say it with shame), the cause of irritation while she remains under her husband's roof. No other house can receive her with propriety, but yours. I invite you to open it."

Cool. Here was a matrimonial hailstorm pouring in the South of England; and I was invited, by a man with fever in every fold of his coat, to come out from the North of England, and take my share of the pelting. I tried to put the point forcibly, just as I have put it here. The Count deliberately lowered one of his horrid fingers; kept the other up, and went on&mdash;rode over me, as it were, without even the common coachmanlike attention of crying "Hi!" before he knocked me down.

"Follow my thought once more, if you please," he resumed. "My first object you have heard. My second object in coming to this house is to do what Miss Halcombe's illness has prevented her from doing for herself.  My large experience is consulted on all difficult matters at Blackwater Park; and my friendly advice was requested on the interesting subject of your letter to Miss Halcombe.  I understood at once&mdash;for my sympathies are your sympathies&mdash;why you wished to see her here, before you pledged yourself to inviting Lady Glyde.  You are most right, sir, in hesitating to receive the wife, until you are quite certain that the husband will not exert his authority to reclaim her.  I agree to that.  I also agree that such delicate explanations as this difficulty involves, are not explanations which can be properly disposed of by writing only.  My presence here (to my own great inconvenience) is the proof that I speak sincerely.  As for the explanations themselves, I&mdash;Fosco&mdash;I who know Sir Percival much better than Miss Halcombe knows him, affirm to you, on my honour and my word, that he will not come near this house, or attempt to communicate with this house, while his wife is living in it. His affairs are embarrassed. Offer him his freedom, by means of the absence of Lady Glyde. I promise you he will take his freedom, and go back to the Continent, at the earliest moment when he can get away. Is this clear to you as crystal? Yes, it is. Have you questions to