“But I will never humiliate myself to him. He has wronged me; and the consequences of that wrong must rest upon his own head.”
You see this young lady’s nature was as undisciplined as it had been in her girlhood, when she flung herself on her knees in the little Parisian chamber to take an oath of vengeance against her father’s destroyer. She had not yet learnt to submit. She had not yet learnt the most sublime lesson that the Gospel teaches, to suffer unmerited wrong, and take it patiently.
The letter she had written to Gilbert Monckton was very brief.
“Gilbert,” she wrote, “you have most cruelly wronged me, and I cannot doubt that the day will come in which you will know how baseless your suspicions have been. Every word that I uttered in Mr. de Crespigny’s house upon the night of his death was true. I am quite powerless to prove my truth, and I cannot be content to see Launcelot Darrell triumph. The mystery of the lost will is more than I can comprehend, but I declare that it was in my possession five minutes before I met you in the garden. If ever that will should be found, my justification will be found with it. I look to you to watch my interests in this matter, but I am quite incapable of remaining an inmate of your house while you think me the base creature I should be if my accusations against Launcelot Darrell were in the slightest degree false. I will never return to Tolldale until my truth has been proved. You need not fear that I will do anything to bring discredit upon your name. I go out into the world to get my own living, as I have done before.
“Eleanor Monckton.”
This letter expressed very little of the indignation which filled Eleanor’s breast. Her pride revolted against the outrage which her husband had inflicted upon her; and she suffered all the more acutely because beneath her apparent indifference there lurked, in the innermost recesses of her heart, a true and pure affection for this cruel Gilbert Monckton, whose causeless suspicions had so deeply wounded her.
In proportion to the strength of her love was the force of her indignation, and she went away from Tolldale with angry thoughts raging in her breast, and buoying her up with a most factitious courage.
This influence was still at work when she reached London. She had only a few pounds in her purse, and it was necessary therefore that she should begin to get her own living immediately. She had thought of this during her journey between Windsor and London, and had determined what to do. She took a cab, and drove to a quiet little hotel in the neighbourhood of the Strand, left her portmanteau and other packages there, and then walked to a certain institution for governesses in the neighbourhood of Cavendish Square. She had been there before, during her residence with the Signora, to make an inquiry about pupils for the pianoforte, but had never given her name to the principal.
“I must call myself by a new name,” she thought, “if I want to hide myself from Gilbert Monckton and from the Signora. I must write to her directly, by-the-bye, poor dear, and tell her that I am safe and well; or else she will be making herself unhappy about me, directly she hears I have left Tolldale.”
The principal of the Governess’ Institution was a stately maiden lady, with a rustling silk dress and glossy braids of gray hair under a cap of point lace. She received Eleanor with solemn graciousness, demanded her requirements and her qualifications, and then, with a gold pencil-case poised lightly between the tips of her taper fingers, deliberated for a few minutes.
Eleanor sat opposite to her, watching her face very anxiously. She wanted some home, some asylum, some hiding-place from a world that seemed altogether against her. She scarcely cared where or what the place of refuge might be. She wanted to get away from Gilbert Monckton, who had wronged and insulted her; and from Launcelot Darrell, whose treachery was always strong enough to triumph over the truth.
But of course she didn’t say this. She only said that she wanted a situation as musical governess, nursery governess, or companion, and that the amount of salary was of very little importance to her.
“I understand,” the lady principal replied, slowly, “I perfectly understand your feeling, Miss—Miss—”
“My name is Villars,” Eleanor answered quickly, looking down at her muff as she spoke.
The lady principal’s eyes followed hers, and looked at the muff too. It was a very handsome sable muff, which had cost five-and-twenty pounds, and had been given by Mr. Monckton to his wife at the beginning of the winter. It was not at all in accord with Eleanor’s plain merino dress and woollen shawl, or with her desire to go out as a governess without consideration of salary. Miss Barkham, the lady principal, began to look rather suspiciously at her visitor’s handsome face, and forgot to finish the sentence which she had only just commenced.
“You can command excellent references, Miss Villars, I suppose?” she said, coldly.
Eleanor flushed crimson. Here was an insurmountable difficulty at the very outset.
“References,” she stammered, “will references be necessary?”
“Most decidedly. We could not think of sending out any young lady from this establishment who could not command first-class references or testimonials. Some people are satisfied with written testimonials; for myself, I consider a personal reference indispensable, and I would not upon my own authority engage any lady without one.”
Eleanor looked very much distressed. She had no idea of diplomatising or prevaricating. She blurted out the truth all at once, unappalled by the stern glances of Miss Barkham.
“I can’t possibly give you a reference,” she said, “my friends do not know that I am in search of a situation, and they must not know it. I assure you that I belong to a very respectable family, and am quite competent to do what I profess to do.”
