DEAR LORD BEARWARDEN,
"They won't fight! All sorts of difficulties have
been made, and even if we can obtain a meeting at last, it
must be after considerable delay. In the meantime I have
business of my own which forces me to leave town for
four-and-twenty hours at least. If possible, I will look
you up before I start. If not, send a line to the office.
I shall find it on my return: these matters complicate
themselves as they go on, but I still venture to hope you
may leave the conduct of the present affair with perfect
safety in my hands, and I remain, with much sympathy,"
Your lordship's obedient servant,
THOMAS RYFE.
The second, though a very short production, took longer time, both in composition and penmanship. It was written purposely on a scrap of paper from which the stationer's name and the water-mark had been carefully torn off. It consisted but of these lines--
"A cruel mystery has deprived you of your husband.
You have courage. Walk out to-night at eight, fifty yards
from your own door. Turn to the right--I will meet you
and explain all."
"My reputation is at stake. I trust you as one woman
trusts another. Seek to learn no more."
"That will bring her," thought Tom, "for she fears nothing!" and he sealed the letter with a dab of black wax flattened by the impression of the woman's thimble, who kept the shop.
There was a Court Guide on the counter. Tom Ryfe knew Lady Bearwarden's address as well as his own, yet from a methodical and lawyer-like habit of accuracy, seeing that it lay open at the letter B, he glanced his eye, and ran his finger down the page to stop at the very bottom, and thus verify, as it were, his own recollection of his lordship's number, ere he paid for the paper and walked away to post his letters in company with Jim, who waited outside.
The stationer, fitting shelves in his back shop, was a man of observation and some eccentricity.
"Poll," said he to his wife, "it's an uncertain business, is the book-trade. A Court Guide hasn't been asked for over that counter, no, not for six months, and here's two parties come in and look at it in a morning. There's nothing goes off, to depend on, but hymns. Both of 'em wanted the same address, I do believe, for I took notice each stopped in the same column at the very foot. Nothing escapes me, lass! However, that isn't no business of yours nor mine."
The wife, a woman of few words and abrupt demeanour, made a pounce at the Court Guide to put it back in its place, but her "master," as she somewhat inconsequently called him, interposed.
"Let it be, lass!" said he. "There's luck in odd numbers, they say. Who knows but we mayn't have a third party come in on the same errand? Let it be, and go make the toast. It's getting on for tea-time, and the fire in the back parlour's nearly out."