ALL AT KNOWL was indicative of the break-up that was so near at hand. Doctor Bryerly arrived according to promise. He was in a whirl of business all the time. He and Mr. Danvers conferred about the management of the estate. It was agreed that the grounds and gardens should be let, but not the house, of which Mrs. Rusk was to take the care. The gamekeeper remained in office, and some out-door servants. But the rest were to go, except Mary Quince, who was to accompany me to Bartram–Haugh as my maid.

“Don’t part with Quince,” said Lady Knollys, peremptorily; “they’ll want you, but don’t.”

She kept harping on this point, and recurred to it half a dozen times every day.

“They’ll say, you know, that she is not fit for a lady’s maid, as she certainly is not, if it in the least signified in such a wilderness as Bartram–Haugh; but she is attached, trustworthy, and honest; and those are qualities valuable everywhere, especially in a solitude. Don’t allow them to get you a wicked young French milliner in her stead.”

Sometimes she said things that jarred unpleasantly on my nerves, and left an undefined sense of danger. Such as:—

“I know she’s true to you, and a good creature; but is she shrewd enough?”

Or, with an anxious look:—

“I hope Mary Quince is not easily frightened.”

Or, suddenly:—

“Can Mary Quince write, in case you were ill?”

Or,

“Can she take a message exactly?”

Or,

“Is she a person of any enterprise and resource, and cool in an emergency?”

Now, these questions did not come all in a string, as I write them down here, but at long intervals, and were followed quickly by ordinary talk; but they generally escaped from my companion after silence and gloomy thought; and though I could extract nothing more defined than these questions, yet they seemed to me to point at some possible danger contemplated in my good cousin’s dismal ruminations.

Another topic that occupied my cousin’s mind a good deal was obviously the larceny of my pearl cross. She made a note of the description furnished by the recollection, respectively, of Mary Quince, Mrs. Rusk, and myself. I had fancied her little vision of the police was no more than the result of a momentary impulse; but really, to judge by her methodical examinations of us, I should have fancied that she had taken it up in downright earnest.

Having learned that my departure from Knowl was to be so very soon, she resolved not to leave me before the day of my journey to Bartram–Haugh; and as day after day passed by, and the hour of our leave-taking approached, she became more and more kind and affectionate. A feverish and sorrowful interval it was to me.

Of Doctor Bryerly, though staying in the house, we saw almost nothing except for an hour or so at tea-time. He breakfasted very early, and dined solitarily, and at uncertain hours, as business permitted.

The second evening of his visit, Cousin Monica took occasion to introduce the subject of his visit to Bartram–Haugh.

“You saw him, of course?” said Lady Knollys.

“Yes, he saw me; he was not well. On hearing who I as, he asked me to go to his room, where he sat in a silk dressing-gown and slippers.”

“About business principally,” said Cousin Monica, laconically.

“That was despatched in very few words; for he was quite resolved, and placed his refusal upon ground which it was difficult to dispute. But difficult or not, mind you, he intimated that he would hear nothing more on the subject — so that was closed.”

“Well; and what is his religion now?” inquired she, irreverently.

“We had some interesting conversation on the subject. He leans much to what we call the doctrine of correspondents. He is read rather deeply in the writings of Swedenborg, and seemed anxious to discuss some points with one who professes to be his follower. To say truth, I did not expect to find him either so well read or so deeply interested in the subject.”

“Was he angry when it was proposed that he should vacate his guardianship.”

“Not at all. Contrariwise, he said he had at first been so minded himself. His years, his habits, and something of the unfitness of the situation, the remoteness of Bartram–Haugh from good teachers, and all that, had struck him, and nearly determined him against accepting the office. But then came the views which I stated in my letter, and they governed him; and nothing could shake them, he said, or induce him to re-open the question in his own mind.”

All the time Doctor Bryerly was relating his conference with the head of the family at Bartram–Haugh my cousin commented on the narrative with a variety of little “pishes” and sneers, which I thought showed more of vexation than contempt.

I was glad to hear all that Doctor Bryerly related. It gave me a kind of confidence; and I experienced a momentary reaction. After all, could Bartram–Haugh be more lonely than I had found Knowl? Was I not sure of the society of my Cousin Millicent, who was about my own age? Was it not quite possible that my sojourn in Derbyshire might turn out a happy though very quiet remembrance through all my after-life? Why should it not? What time or place would be happy if we gave ourselves over to dismal imaginations?

So the summons reached me from Uncle Silas. The hours at Knowl were numbered.

The evening before I departed I visited the full-length portrait of Uncle Silas, and studied it for the last time carefully, with deep interest, for many minutes; but with results vaguer than ever.

With a brother so generous and so wealthy, always ready to help him forward; with his talents; with his lithe and gorgeous beauty, the shadow of which hung on that canvas — what might he not have accomplished? whom might he not have captivated? And yet where and what was he? A poor and shunned old man, occupying a lonely house and place that did not belong to him, married to degradation, with a few years of suspected and solitary life before him, and then swift oblivion his best portion.

I gazed on the picture, to fix it well and vividly in my remembrance. I might still trace some of its outlines and tints in its living original, whom I was next day to see for the first time in my life.

So the morning came — my last for many a day at Knowl — a day of partings, a day of novelty and regrets. The travelling carriage and post horses were at the door. Cousin Monica’s carriage had just carried her away to the railway. We had embraced with tears; and her kind face was still before me, and her words of comfort and promise in my ears. The early sharpness of morning was still in the air; the frosty dew still glistened on the window-panes. We had made a hasty breakfast, my share of which was a single cup of tea. The aspect of the house how strange! Uncarpeted, uninhabited, doors for the most part locked, all the servants but Mrs. Rusk and Branston departed. The drawing-room door stood open, and a charwoman was washing the bare floor. I was looking my last — for who could say how long? — on the old house, and lingered. The luggage was all up. I made Mary Quince get in first, for every delay was precious; and now he moment was come. ............