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Faith Moore
Hello and welcome to Storytime for Grown Ups. I'm Faith Moore and this season we're reading the Woman in White by Wilkie Collins. Each episode I'll read a few chapters from the book, pausing from time to time to give brief explanations so it's easier to follow along. It's like an audiobook with built in notes. So brew a pot of tea, find a cozy chair, settle in, it's story time. Hi, welcome back and welcome to Real Time. To those of you who have just found yourself having to wait for episodes to drop on Mondays and Thursdays. I got a lot of emails this week from people saying that they finally caught up and they're joining us now in Real time. So I just wanted to say officially welcome to all of you who find yourself in this situation. I always say I know it's bittersweet to catch up when you've been able to binge, but I do think this is the best way to listen. So I'm glad to have you here and I'm glad to have all of you here whether you're listening in real time or whether you're listening to this at some point in the future and we've moved on to some other thing, but you're still here. And so please, please know that I'm just so thrilled that you're here whatever time it is that you are listening to this. Thank you for being here. Okay, so please subscribe to the show, tap the five stars if you're enjoying the show. Leave a positive review in your podcast player and tell a friend. Just tell everyone that you can think of, shout it from the rooftops, tell people that you're passing on the street, whatever it is, or buy the merch. Scroll down, click on that link to the merch store, buy some merch and just proudly wear it. And maybe someone will ask you, hey, what's story time for grownups? That that works too. And thank you to all of you who have been doing that are doing that, people who are giving on buy me a coffee, people buying me a tea, signing up for memberships, all of those things. Thank you for being a part of this show in whatever way you are a part of it, even if it's just listening. Thank you for listening, thanks for being here and I of course always love your emails. So that's faith k.moore.com click on contact or just scroll down into the show notes. Browse the other links while you're there and click on the link to contact me. Okay, let's get into this episode so last time we read Heart Rights Narrative chapter seven. Today we're going to read Heart Rights Narrative chapter eight. I have one question that I think will be very helpful for us to talk about a little bit. We're going to do that and then we'll get into the chapters. But first, here is the recap. All right, so where we left off was Walter is still with Mrs. Clements, and he thinks that maybe he can figure out the secret by learning more about Anne's mother, Mrs. Catherick. So he starts asking Mrs. Clements what she knows. And essentially what he learns is that Mrs. Catherick is a hard and sort of haughty woman who only married Mr. Catherick, as it turned out, because she'd had an affair with someone and was pregnant and needed to make it seem like the child was legitimate. Mrs. Clements and her husband lived in the same town as Mr. And Mrs. Catherick, a town called Old Welmingham, which is now basically gone except for the church. Eventually, Mr. Catherick found jewels and things that had been given to his wife by Sir Percival Glyde, who had recently come to town. People also saw the Two of them, Mrs. Catherick and Sir Percival together, whispering to each other and seeming to be on very close terms. So Mr. Catherick and everyone else assumed that Mrs. Catherick was having an affair with Sir Percival and that her child Anne, was actually his. Because of this, her husband left her and everyone in the town shunned her. But she refused to leave town and she always maintained that there had been a mistake, that they hadn't had an affair. Walter feels that this affair isn't the secret, since noblemen often had affairs with poor women, and even though it would have been really bad for the woman, it didn't actually mean that much for the man. So Walter thinks there actually is some hidden thing going on between Mrs. Catherick and Sir Percival, but not an affair. Sir Percival left town after this, but he provides Mrs. Catherick with money. And Walter thinks that Sir Percival pays Mrs. Catherick to actually stay in Welmingham, which is the new town that grew up when the old one became too run down. So there's old Wilmingham and now Welmingham. He pays her to stay there because everyone there thinks that Mrs. Catherick is a disgrace and they wouldn't believe her if she tried to tell anyone whatever the real secret is. Mrs. Clements also tells Walter that Mrs. Catherick didn't really seem to care that much about anne, and that Mrs. Clements mostly took care of her, but Mrs. Catherick wouldn't let Mrs. Clements adopt her. Both Mrs. Clements and Walter think that Anne never actually knew Sir Percival's secret. She only picked up from her mother that there was a secret and talked about it as if she knew what it was, which made Sir Percival think that she did know it, which is what made him lock her away. This seems to be all that Mrs. Catherick can tell him. So Walter asks for Mrs. Catherick's address and tells Mrs. Clements that he'll come back and tell her everything about Anne when it's safe. And Mrs. Clements warns Walter to be careful if he intends to go to Welmingham. Okay, so today's question comes to us from John. John writes, so Anne isn't Sir Percival's daughter. This whole time I thought I was so clever for, quote, figuring out the secret. I was sure that was it, that Percival was actually Anne's father through some sort of illicit situation with Mrs. Catherick. But then when that came up last time, Walter completely dismissed it. So, Anne, is he her father and there's more to it, or is he not her father at all? Right. Okay. So John is not alone. Okay. Lots of you have been writing in lately, over the last few weeks or so to say that you think that Sir Percival's secret is that he's actually Anne's father. And of course, when you write to me, I say, oh, that's an interesting theory. I can't reveal anything. That's what I say anytime if you're right. If you're wrong, I just say, that's a great theory. I love it, because I do. I love your theories. And I never reveal anything at all. And I don't read them on the show because I don't want to put ideas into your head, right or wrong. Right. I want you to just experience the story and not be influenced by other people's ideas, because those are their ideas and not yours. But now I can reveal, because it has now come up in the story, that many, many of you have felt that perhaps the answer to what is the secret is, as John is saying, that Anne's father is actually Sir Percival. Right. And this was a good guess because even before we learned all this weird stuff about Sir Percival giving Mrs. Catherick gifts and whispering with her in the church vestry and everything, the fact that Sir Percival knew Mrs. Catherick at all seemed sort of weird. And it could have been explained by the fact that they had had an affair. Right. And the fact that Sir Percival wanted Anne out of the way also seemed like it could be explained by the fact that she was his illegitimate daughter and he didn't want anyone to know. And it's still possible. Right. We haven't learned definitively at this point that Sir Percival isn't Anne's father. And everyone in the town of Welmingham, apparently, according to Mrs. Clements. Right. Everyone there does think that Sir Percival is Anne's father. As did Mr. Catherick, Mrs. Catherick's husband, who thought it so definitively that he left Mrs. Catherick never to return. Basically. But Walter, Detective Walter, right, Is pretty sure that Sir Percival is actually not Anne's father and that the secret is actually something else entirely. Why? Well, a man from the aristocracy having an illegitimate child with a lowborn woman was actually not that big of a deal. I said this in the recap, right? It would have been a big deal for the woman. Okay. We see that in the way that Mrs. Catherick is treated. Once her husband and the town believed that her child wasn't Mr. Catherick's. Right. For Mrs. Catherick, having a child out of wedlock was essentially the end of her reputation. And by the way, Anne clearly was born out of wedlock. She clearly isn't Mr. Catherick's child. Okay. Here's what Walter says about that. He says it had been positively ascertained by calculations of time and place into which I need not enter, particularly that the daughter who bore her husband's name was not her husband's child. So Mrs. Catherick did have an affair out of wedlock with someone, but not, Walter thinks, with Sir Percival. So it's really bad for Mrs. Catherick that she had a child out of wedlock. That's why she agreed to marry Mr. Catherick all of a sudden. So it could seem like the child was his. But it actually wasn't that bad for a man like Sir Percival. Right. The truth was that men of the upper classes did have affairs and they sire children. And because no one could prove whose child it was, the mother was blamed and the man usually just went on with his life. If you were with us for Jane Eyre, you may remember that we talked about this a little bit because we were talking about why it was so important for women to get married to someone before sleeping with him. So if it came out that Sir Percival had an illegitimate child, it would be like semi scandalous, maybe, but not for long. And certainly not scandalous enough for him to feel that he had to lock Anne up rather than let that secret come out. So it seems pretty clear that Sir Percival is not Anne's father, even though Mr. Catherick is also not Anne's father. And it seems pretty clear that there is a different secret that does somehow involve Mrs. Catherick about Sir Percival that is so shameful that it actually would completely ruin Sir Percival's reputation if it came to light. And writers, just a side note again for writers, for just a minute. Writers, take note. This is great mystery writing. You want your readers absolutely convinced that they've cracked the case, right? They've guessed it. They're smarter than you. You were too obvious. You left way too many breadcrumbs. You want them thinking that about a very specific thing. And then right when they become convinced that that thing is true, you have your characters bring up that exact thing and totally trash it and reveal that it couldn't possibly be that. That's how you do this, ladies and gentlemen. But anyway, so not only has Sir Percival locked Anne up so as to protect his secret, he has also fueled the rumor that he and Mrs. Catherick had an affair. Which, by the way, also speaks to this idea of it not really being that bad for a man like Sir Percival to have had an affair with a woman like Mrs. Catherick. If the secret actually was that Anne was Sir Percival's child, then Sir Percival would have had to lock up the entire town of Welmingham because they all think that Sir Percival is Anne's father. So it's clearly not that. But he's allowing everyone to think it's that. And then forcing Mrs. Catherick to stay at Wilmingham. At least this is what Walter's theory is at this point. Here's what he. It seemed, to my mind, more natural and more probable to assume that she was not so completely a free agent in this matter as she had herself asserted in that case, who was the likeliest person to possess the power of compelling her to remain at Welmingham? The person, unquestionably from whom she derived the means of living. Okay, so Mrs. Catherick's husband left her, so she has no one to support her. And Walter's theory is that Sir Percival supports her under the condition that she never move away from Welmingham because this ensures that she'll stay in a place where everyone thinks she's a loose woman, essentially, and so no one would believe her if she actually did reveal the real secret, whatever that is. Okay, so Sir Percival is not Anne's Father. Even though we were all set up to think he was. That's not the secret. But there is a secret, and Mrs. Catherick knows it. And, and this is just tragic, I think, right, we learned last time that Anne actually didn't know the secret. At least that's what Mrs. Clements thinks. Okay, here's what Mrs. Clements said to Walter. But she never could say what it was when I asked her. So what the secret was when I asked her, all she could tell me was that her mother might be the ruin and destruction of Sir Percival if she chose. Mrs. Catherick may have let out just as much as that and no more. I'm next to certain I should have heard the whole truth from Anne if she had really known it, as she pretended to do, and as she very likely felt fancied she did, poor soul. Okay, so Anne knew that there was a secret and she thought she knew what it was in her kind of confused mental state, but she may not actually have known it, which is consistent with her talking about it all the time, but never actually revealing it. I know some of you were kind of annoyed, right? You thought it was sort of unfair of Wilkie Collins that he was sort of keeping us in suspense unnecessarily, since Anne was right there in the boathouse with Laura and could have just blurted the secret out, but didn't. But in fact, she couldn't have done that because she didn't actually know it. She just thought she knew it. Which is really sad, I think, because it means that Anne was locked up and then made the victim of this whole plot which ended in her death over something that she couldn't have even revealed if she'd wanted to. Okay? And there's one last thing I just want to point out, which is that this whole story about ser Percival paying Mrs. Catherick to stay in a place where her bad reputation made it so that she couldn't reveal his secret and be believed. This whole, whole scenario tells us, I think, that Sir Percival isn't really a killer, right? If he were a cold blooded killer, he would have just murdered Anne, murdered Mrs. Catherick and gone on with his life. Similarly, he would have just murdered Laura when he realized that she didn't love him and he needed her money. Or if not then, then later when he felt that she knew his secret, he would have just killed her. But he didn't kill any of them. So he is a bad guy. Okay? He allowed the switch to happen. He allowed his wife to be placed in a madhouse he allowed Anne to die, but he's not a cold blooded killer, which tells us that when he needs to do something shady like keep this secret, for example, he's gonna go to great lengths to do all sorts of complicated things because he doesn't actually seem like he wants to kill anyone. And his behavior at Blackwater park, right, when he was drinking too much and cursing and then ultimately kind of running away into the night, never to be seen again, all of this reveals his guilt and his ambivalence about this plan that was going to result in Anne's death. Okay, so now Walder is off to Welmingham to visit Mrs. Catherick. And we got that lovely foreshadowing from Mrs. Clements, right? She really didn't want Walder to go there for some reason, and she warned him to be careful if he did. Okay, so we can expect some danger ahead and hopefully eventually the revelation of the real secret, whatever it is. So let's get back to it. Let's keep reading. And of course, don't forget to write to me. Faith K. Moore.com Click on Contact and send me all your reactions, all your questions, all your thoughts. I can't wait to hear them. All right, let's get started with Heart Wright's narrative, Chapter eight of the Woman in White by Wilkie Collins. It's story time. 8. When I reached home again after my interview with Mrs. Clements, I was struck by the appearance of a change in Laura. The unvarying gentleness and patience which long misfortune had tried so cruelly and had never conquered, yet seemed now to have suddenly failed her. Insensible to all Marian's attempts to soothe and amuse her, she sat with her neglected drawing pushed away on the table, her eyes resolutely cast down, her fingers twining and untwining themselves restlessly in her lap. Marion rose when I came in with a silent distress in her face, waited for a moment to see if Laura would look up at my approach, whispered to me, try if you can, rouse her, and left the room. I sat down in the vacant chair, gently unclasped the poor, worn, restless fingers, and took both her hands in mine. What are you thinking of, Laura? Tell me, my darling. Try and tell me what it is. She struggled with herself and raised her eyes to mine. I can't feel happy, she said. I can't help thinking. She stopped, bent forward a little, and laid her head on my shoulder with a terrible mute helplessness that struck me to the heart. Try to tell me, I repeated gently, try to tell me why you are not happy. I am so useless. I am such a burden on both of you, she answered with a weary, hopeless sigh. You work and get money, Walter, and Marion helps you. Why is there nothing I can do? You will end in liking Marion better than you like me. You will. Because I am so helpless. Oh, don't, don't. Don't treat me like a child. I raised her head and smoothed away the tangled hair that fell over her face and kissed her. My poor, faded flower, my lost, afflicted sister. You shall help us, Laura, I said. You shall begin, my darling, today. She looked at me with a feverish eagerness, with a breathless interest that made me tremble for the new life of hope which I had called into being by those few words. I rose and set her drawing materials in order and placed them near her again. You know that I work and get money by drawing, I said. Now you have taken such pains. Now you are so much improved, you shall begin to work and get money, too. Try to finish this little sketch as nicely and prettily as you can. When it is done, I will take it away with me, and the same person will buy it who buys all that? I do. You shall keep your own earnings in your own purse, and Marian shall come to you to help us as often as she comes to me. Think how useful you are going to make yourself to both of us. And you will soon be as happy, Laura, as the day is long. Her face drew eager and brightened into a smile. In the moment while it lasted, in the moment when she again took up the pencils that had been laid aside, she almost looked like the Laura of past days. I had rightly interpreted the first signs of a new growth and strength in her mind, unconsciously expressing themselves in the notice she had taken of the occupations which filled her sister's life and mine. Marian, when I told her what had passed, saw as I saw that she was longing to assume her own little position of importance, to raise herself in her own estimation and in ours. And from that day we tenderly helped the new ambition which gave promise of the hopeful, happier future that might now not be far off. Her drawings, as she finished them or tried to finish them, were placed in my hands. Marian took them from me and hid them carefully, and I set aside a little weekly tribute from my earnings to be offered to her as the price paid by strangers for the poor, faint, valueless sketches of which I was the only purchaser. It was hard sometimes to maintain our innocent deception when she proudly brought out her purse to contribute her share towards the expenses, and wondered with serious interest whether I or she had earned the most that week. I have all those hidden drawings in my possession. Still they are my treasures beyond price, the dear remembrances that I love to keep alive, the friends in past adversity that my heart will never part from my tenderness, never forget. Am I trifling here with the necessities of my task? Am I looking forward to the happier time which my narrative has not yet reached? Yes, back again, back to the days of doubt and dread when the spirit within me struggled hard for its life in the icy stillness of perpetual suspense. I have paused and rested for a while on my forward course. It is not, perhaps time wasted if the friends who read these pages have paused and rested too. I took the first opportunity I could find of speaking to Marian in private and of communicating to her the result of the inquiries which I had made that morning. She seemed to share the opinion on the subject of my proposed journey to welmingham, which Mrs. Clements had already expressed to me. Surely, Walter, she said, you hardly know enough yet to give you any hope of claiming Mrs. Catherick's confidence. Is it wise to proceed to these extremities before you have really exhausted all safer and simpler means of attaining your object? When you told me that Sir Percival and the Count were the only two people in existence who knew the exact date of Laura's journey, you forgot, and I forgot that there was a third person who must surely know it. I mean Mrs. Rubelle. Would it not be far easier and far less dangerous to insist on a confession from her than to force it from Sir Percival? It might be easier, I replied, but we are not aware of the full extent of Mrs. Rubell's connivance and interest in the conspiracy. Meaning they don't know if Mrs. Rubell was totally in on the plan or not, and we are therefore not certain that the date has been impressed on her mind, as it has been assuredly impressed on the minds of Sir Percival and the Count. It is too late now to waste time on Mrs. Rubell, which may be all important to the discovery of the one assailable point in Sir Percival's life. Are you thinking a little too seriously, Marian, of the risk I may run in returning to Hampshire? Are you beginning to doubt whether Sir Percival Glyde may not, in the end be more than a match for me? He will not be more than your match, she replied decidedly, because he will not be helped in resisting you by the impenetrable wickedness of the Count. Meaning without the Count, Sir Percival is nothing. What has led you to that conclusion? I replied in some surprise. My own knowledge of Sir Percival's obstinacy and impatience of the count's control, she answered. I believe he will insist on meeting you single handed, just as he insisted at first on acting for himself at Blackwater Park. The time for suspecting the count's interference will be the time when you have Sir Percival at your mercy. His own interest will then be directly threatened and he will act, Walter, to terrible purpose in his own defence. We may deprive him of his weapons beforehand, I said. Some of the particulars I have heard from Mrs. Clements may yet be turned to account against him, and other means of strengthening the case may be at our disposal. There are passages in Mrs. Mickelson's narrative which show that the count found it necessary to place himself in communication with Mr. Fairlie, and there may be circumstances which compromise him in that proceeding. While I am away, Marian, write to Mr. Fairlie and say that you want an answer describing exactly what passed between the Count and himself and informing you also of any particulars that may have come to his knowledge at the same time in connection with his niece. Tell him that the statement you request will sooner or later be insisted on. If he shows any reluctance to furnish you with it of his own accord. The letter shall be written, Walter. But you are really determined to go to Welmingham? Absolutely determined. I will devote the next two days to earning what we want for the week to come, and on the third day I go to Hampshire. When the third day came, I was ready for my journey. As it was possible that I might be absent for some little time, I arranged with Marian that we were to correspond every day, of course, addressing each other by assumed names for caution's sake. As long as I heard from her regularly, I should assume that nothing was wrong. But if the morning came and brought me no letter, my return to London would take place as a matter of course, by the first train. I contrived to reconcile Laura to my departure by telling her that I was going to the country to find new purchasers for her drawings and for mine. And I left her occupied and happy. Marion followed me downstairs to the street door. Remember what anxious hearts you leave here, she whispered as we stood together in the passage. Remember all the hopes that hang on your safe return if strange things happen to you on this journey, if you and Sir Percival meet. What makes you think we shall meet? I asked. I don't know. I have fears and fancies that I cannot account for. Laugh at them, Walter, if you like, but for God's sake, keep your temper. If you come into contact with that man, never fear, Marian. I answer for my self control. With those words we parted. I walked briskly to the station. There was a glow of hope in me. There was a growing conviction in my mind that my journey this time would not be taken in vain. It was a fine, clear, cold morning. My nerves were firmly strung and I felt all the strength of my resolution stirring in me vigorously from head to foot. As I crossed the railway platform and looked right and left among the people congregated on it to search for any faces among them that I knew. The doubt occurred to me whether it might not have been to my advantage if I had adopted a disguise before setting out for Hampshire. But there was something so repellent to me in the idea, something so meanly like the common herd of spies and informers in the mere act of adopting a disguise, that I dismissed the question from consideration almost as soon as it had risen in my mind. Even as a mere matter of expediency, the proceeding was doubtful in the extreme. If I tried the experiment at home, the landlord of the house would sooner or later discover me and would have his suspicions aroused immediately. If I tried it away from home, the same persons might see me by the commonest accident with the disguise and without it. And I should in that way be inviting the notice and distrust which it was my most pressing interest to avoid. In my own character I had acted thus far, and in my own character I was resolved to continue to the end. The train left me at Welmingham early in the afternoon. Is there any wilderness of sand in the deserts of Arabia? Is there any prospect of desolation among the ruins of Palestine which can rival the repelling effect on the eye and the depressing influence on the mind of an English country town in the first stage of its existence and in the transition state of its prosperity. I asked myself that question as I passed through the clean desolation, the neat ugliness, the prim torpor of the streets of Welmingham and the tradesmen who stared after me from their lonely shops. The trees that drooped helpless in their arid exile of unfinished crescents and squares. The dead house carcasses that waited in vain for the vivifying human element to animate them with the breath of life. Every creature that I saw, every object that I passed seemed to answer with one accord. The deserts of Arabia are innocent of our civilized desolation. The ruins of Palestine are incapable of our modern gloom. I inquired my way to the quarter of the town in which Mrs. Catherick lived, and on reaching it found myself in a square of small houses, one story high. There was a bare little plot of grass in the middle, protected by a cheap wire fence. An elderly nursemaid and two children were standing in a corner of the enclosure, looking at a lean goat tethered to the grass. Two foot passengers were talking together on one side of the pavement before the houses and an idle little boy was leading an idle little dog along by a string on the other. I heard the dull tinkling of a piano at a distance, accompanied by the intermittent knocking of a hammer near at hand. These were all the sights and sounds of life that encountered me when I entered the square. I walked at once to the door of number 13, the number of Mrs. Catherick's house, and knocked without waiting to consider beforehand how I might best present myself when I got in. The first necessity was to see Mrs. Catherick. I could then judge from my own observation of the safest and easiest manner of approaching the object of my visit. The door was opened by a melancholy middle aged woman servant. I gave her my card and asked if I could see Mrs. Catherick. The card was taken into the front parlor and the servant returned with a message requesting me to mention what my business was. Say if you please, that my business relates to Mrs. Catherick's daughter. I replied this was the best pretext I could think of. On the spur of the moment to account for my visit, the servant again retired to the parlor, again returned, and this time begged me with a look of gloomy amazement to walk in. I entered a little room with a flaring paper of the largest pattern on the walls, meaning the wallpaper is bright and garish. Chairs, tables, chefonniere and sofa all gleamed with the glutinous brightness of cheap upholstery. On the largest table in the middle of the room stood a smart bible placed exactly in the center on a red and yellow woolen mat. And at the side of the table nearest to the window, with a little knitting basket on her lap and a wheezing blear eyed old spaniel crouched at her feet. There sat an elderly woman wearing a black net cap and a black silk gown and having slate colored mittens on her hands. Her iron gray hair hung in heavy bands on either side of her face. Her dark eyes looked straight forward with a hard, defiant, implacable stare. She had full square cheeks, a long firm chin and thick sensual Colorless lips. Her figure was stout and sturdy and her manner aggressively self possessed. This was Mrs. Catherick. You have come to speak to me about my daughter, she said before I could utter a word on my side. Be so good as to mention what you have to say. The tone of her voice was as hard, as defiant, as implacable as the expression of her eyes. She pointed to a chair and looked me all over attentively, from head to foot. As I sat down in it, I saw that my only chance with this woman was to speak to her in her own tone and to meet her at the outset of our interview on her own ground. You are aware, I said, that your daughter has been lost? I am perfectly aware of it. Have you ever felt any apprehension that the misfortune of her loss might be followed by the misfortune of her death? Yes. Have you come here to tell me she is dead? I have. Why? She put that extraordinary question without the slightest change in her voice, her face or her manner. She could not have appeared more perfectly unconcerned if I had told her of the death of the goat in the enclosure outside. Why? I repeated. Do you ask why I come here to tell you of your daughter's death? Yes. What interest have you in me or in her? How do you come to know anything about my daughter in this way? I met her on the night when she escaped from the asylum and I assisted her in reaching a place of safety. You did very wrong. I am sorry to hear her mother say so. Her mother does say so. How do you know she is dead? I am not at liberty to say how I know it, but I do know it. Are you at liberty to say how you found out my address? Certainly. I got your address from Mrs. Clements. Mrs. Clements is a foolish woman. Did she tell you to come here? She did not. Then I ask you again, why did you come? As she was determined to have her answer, I gave it to her in the plainest possible form. I came, I said, because I thought Anne Catherick's mother might have some natural interest in knowing whether she was alive or dead. Just so, said Mrs. Catherick. With additional self possession. Had you no other motive? I hesitated. The right answer to that question was not easy to find at a moment's notice. If you have no other motive, she went on deliberately taking off her slate coloured mittens and rolling them up. I have only to thank you for your visit and to say that I will not detain you here any longer. Your information would be more satisfactory if you were Willing to explain how you became possessed of it. However, it justifies me, I suppose, in going into mourning, there is not much alteration necessary in my dress. As you see. When I have changed my mittens, I shall be all in black. She searched in the pocket of her gown, drew out a pair of black lace mittens, put them on with the stoniest and steadiest composure, and then quietly crossed her hands in her lap. I wish you good morning, she said. The cool contempt of her manner irritated me into directly avowing that the purpose of my visit had not been answered yet. I have another motive in coming here, I said. Ah, I thought so, remarked Mrs. Catherick. Your daughter's death. What did she die of? Of disease. Of the heart. Yes, Go on. Your daughter's death has been made the pretext for inflicting serious injury on a person who is very dear to me. Two men have been concerned, to my certain knowledge, in doing that wrong. One of them is Ser Percival Glyde. Indeed. I looked attentively to see if she flinched at the sudden mention of that name. Not a muscle of her stirred. The hard, defiant, implacable stare in her eyes never wavered for an instant. You may wonder, I went on, how the event of your daughter's death can have been made the means of inflicting injury on another person. No, said Mrs. Catherick, I don't wonder at all. This appears to be your affair. You are interested in my affairs. I am not interested in yours. You may ask, then, I persisted, why I mention the matter in your presence. Yes, I do ask that I mention it because I am determined to bring Sir Percival Glyde to account for the wickedness he has committed. What have I to do with your determination? You shall hear. There are certain events in Sir Percival's past life which it is necessary for my purpose to be fully acquainted with. You know them, and for that reason I come to you. What events do you mean? Events that occurred at Old Welmingham when your husband was parish clerk at that place and before the time when your daughter was born. I had reached the woman at last, through the barrier of impenetrable reserve that she had tried to set up between us. I saw her temper smouldering in her eyes as plainly as I saw her hands grow restless, then unclasp themselves and begin mechanically smoothing her dress over her knees. What do you know of those events? She asked. All that Mrs. Clements could tell me, I answered. There was a momentary flush on her firm, square face, a momentary stillness in her restless Hands which seemed to betoken a coming outburst of anger that might throw her off her guard. But no. She mastered the rising irritation, leaned back in her chair, crossed her arms on her broad bosom and with a smile of grim sarcasm on her thick lips, looked at me as steadily as ever. Ah, I begin to understand it all now, she said, her tamed and disciplined anger only expressing itself in the elaborate mockery of her tone and manner. You have a grudge of your own against Sir Percival, Glyde, and I must help you to wreak it. I must tell you this, that and the other about Sir Percival and myself. Must I? Yes indeed. You have been prying into my private affairs. You think you have found a lost woman to deal with who lives here on sufferance and who will do anything you ask for fear you may injure her in the opinions of the townspeople. I see through you and your precious speculation, I do, and it amuses me. Ha ha. She stopped for a moment. Her arms tightened over her bosom and she laughed to herself, a hard, harsh, angry laugh. You don't know how I have lived in this place and what I have done in this place. Mister. What's your name? She went on. I'll tell you before I ring the bell. And have you shown out I came here a wronged woman? I came here robbed of my character and determined to claim it back. I've been years and years about it and I have claimed it back. I have matched the respectable people fairly and openly on their own grounds. If they say anything against me now, they must say it in secret. They can't say it. They daren't say it openly. I stand high enough in this town to be out of your reach. The clergyman bows to me. Aha. You didn't bargain for that when you came here. Go to the church and inquire about me. You will find Mrs. Catherick has her sitting like the rest of them and pays the rent on the day it's due. Go down to the town hall. There's a petition lying there, a petition of the respectable inhabitants against allowing a circus to come and perform here and corrupt our morals. Yes, our morals. I signed that petition this morning. Go to the bookseller's shop. The clergyman's Wednesday evening lectures on Justification by Faith are publishing there by subscription. I'm down on the list. The doctor's wife only put a shilling in the plate at our last charity sermon. I put half a crown. Mr. Churchwarden sword held the plate and bowed to me. Ten years ago he told Pigram, the chemist. I ought to be whipped out of the town at the cart's tail. Is your mother alive? Has she got a better Bible on her table than I have got on mine? Does she stand better with her tradespeople than I do with mine? Has she always lived within her income? I have always lived within mine. Ah, there is. Is the clergyman coming along the square? Look, mister, what's your name? Look, if you please. So Mrs. Catherick is saying that she has spent all this time earning back her reputation and she feels that she's actually done it. She started up with the activity of a young woman, went to the window, waited till the clergyman passed and bowed to him solemnly. The clergyman ceremoniously raised his hat and walked on. Mrs. Catherick returned to her chair and looked at me with a grimmer sarcasm than ever. There, she said. What do you think of that for a woman with a lost character? How does your speculation look now? The singular manner in which she had chosen to assert herself, the extraordinary practical vindication of her position in the town which she had just offered, had so perplexed me that I listened to her in silent surprise. I was not the less resolved, however, to make another effort to throw her off her guard. If the woman's fierce temper once got beyond her control and once flamed out on me, she might yet say the words which would put the clue in my hands. How does your speculation look now? She repeated. Exactly as it looked when I first came in, I answered. I don't doubt the position you have gained in the town, and I don't wish to assail it, even if I could. I came here because Sir Percival Glyde is, to my certain knowledge, your enemy as well as mine. If I have a grudge against him, you have a grudge against him too. You may deny it if you like, you may distrust me as much as you please. You may be as angry as you will. But of all the women in England, you, if you have any sense of injury, are the woman who ought to help me to crush that man. Crush him for yourself, she said. Then come back here and see what I say to you. She spoke those words as she had not spoken yet. Quickly, fiercely, vindictively. I had stirred in its lair the serpent hatred of years, but only for a moment. Like a lurking reptile, it leaped up at me as she eagerly bent forward towards the place in which I was sitting. Like a lurking reptile, it dropped out of sight again as she instantly resumed her former position in the chair. You won't trust me, I said. No. You are afraid. Do I look as if I was? You are afraid of Ser Percival Glyde. Am I? Her color was rising and her hands were at work again smoothing her gown. I pressed the point farther and farther. Home, I went on without allowing her a moment of delay. Sir Percival has a high position in the world, I said. It would be no wonder if you were afraid of him. Sir Percival is a powerful man, a baronet, the possessor of a fine estate, the descendant of a great family. She amazed me beyond expression by suddenly bursting out laughing. Yes, she repeated in tones of the bitterest, steadiest contempt. A baronet, the possessor of a fine estate. The descendant of a great family. Yes, indeed, a great family. Especially by the mother's side. There was no time to reflect on the words that had just escaped her. There was only time to feel that they were well worth thinking over the moment I left the house. I am not here to dispute with you about family questions, I said. I know nothing of Sir Percival's mother. And you know little of Sir Percival himself, she interposed sharply. I advise you not to be too sure of that, I rejoined. I know some things about him, and I suspect many more. What do you suspect? I'll tell you what I don't suspect. I don't suspect him of being Anne's father. She started to her feet and came close up to me with a look of fury. How dare you talk to me about Anne's father. How dare you say who was her father, who wasn't? She broke out, her face quivering, her voice trembling with passion. The secret between you and Sir Percival is not that secret, I persisted. The mystery which darkens Sir Percival's life was not born with your daughter's birth and has not died with your daughter's death. She drew back a step. Go, she said, and pointed sternly to the door. There was no thought of the child in your heart or in his. I went on, determined to press her back to her last defences. There was no bond of guilty love between you and him. When you held those stolen meetings, when your husband found you whispering together under the vestry of the church, her pointing hand instantly dropped to her side and the deep flush of anger faded from her face. While I spoke, I saw the change pass over her. I saw that hard, firm, fearless, self possessed woman quail under a terror which her utmost resolution was not strong enough to resist. When I said those five last words, the vestry of the church For a minute or more we stood looking at each other in silence I spoke first. Do you still refuse to trust me? I asked. She could not call the color that had left it back to her face, but she had steadied her voice. She had recovered the defiant self possession of her manner when she answered me. I do refuse, she said. Do you still tell me to go? Yes, go and never come back. I walked to the door, waited a moment before I opened it, and turned round to look at her again. I may have news to bring you of Sir Percival which you don't expect, I said. And in that case I shall come back. There is no news of Sir Percival that I don't expect. Except. She stopped. Her pale face darkened and she stole back with a quiet, stealthy cat like step to her chair. Accept the news of his death, she said, sitting down again with the mockery of a smile just hovering on her cruel lips and the furtive light of hatred lurking deep in her steady eyes. As I opened the door of the room to go out, she looked round at me quickly. The cruel smile slowly widened her lips. She eyed me with a strange stealthy interest from head to foot. An unutterable expectation showed itself wickedly all over her face. Was she speculating in the secrecy of her own heart on my youth and strength, on the force of my sense of injury and the limits of my self control? And was she considering the lengths to which they might carry me if Sir Percival and I ever chanced to meet? The bare doubt that it might be so drove me from her presence and silenced even the common forms of farewell on my lips. Without a word more on my side or on hers, I left the room. As I opened the outer door I saw the same clergyman who had already passed the house once, about to pass it again on his way back through the square. I waited on the doorstep to let him go by, and looked round as I did so at the parlour window. Mrs. Catherick had heard his footsteps approaching in the silence of that lonely place, and she was on her feet at the window again, waiting for him. Not all the strength of all the terrible passions I had roused in that woman's heart could loosen her desperate hold on the one fragment of social consideration which years of resolute effort had just dragged within her grasp. There she was again, not a minute after I had left her, placed purposely in a position which made it a matter of common courtesy on the part of the clergyman to bow to her for a second time. He raised his hat once more. I saw the hard, ghastly face behind the window softening and light up with gratified pride. I saw the head with the grim black cap bend ceremoniously in return. The clergyman had bowed to her and in my presence, twice in one day. Thank you so much for listening. I'd love to know what you thought of the chapters. Is there anything you'd like me to clarify? Did something particularly interest you? Please go to my website faithkmoore.com click on contact and send me your questions and thoughts. Or you can click on the link in the Show Notes to contact me. I'll feature one or two of your entries at the start of the next episode. Speaking of links, don't forget to take a look at the other links in the Show Notes. You can learn more about me, check out our merch store, or pick up one of my books. Before I go, I'd like to ask a quick favor. This is an independent podcast. It's produced, recorded and marketed by me, so I need your help. 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