Several times in reading this letter the tears stood in David's eyes. So much trust and kindness made him momentarily sorry at the double life he was leading. If it were possible to establish the death of the wastrel he was personating he would perhaps allow his "father" to live on in this new-found happiness; but if the real D.V.W. were alive some effort must be made to help him out of the slough—perhaps to bring him back. He would try to find out through Frank Gardner.
Some time before Vivie Warren had taken her departure, she had left behind in Honoria Fraser's temporary care a Power of Attorney duly executed in favour of David Vavasour Williams; and reciprocally D.V.W. had executed another in favour of Vivien Warren. Both these documents lay securely in the little safe that David had had fitted into the wall of his sitting-room in Fig Tree Court. Also David had opened an account in his own name after he got back from Wales, at the Temple Bar Branch of the C. &. C. Bank. Into this he now paid the cheque for twenty-five pounds which his father had sent as pocket money.
A few days afterwards, Vivie Warren reappeared—in spirit—and indited a letter to Frank Gardner's agents in Cape Town. She was careful to give no address at the head of the letter and to post it at Victoria Station. In it she said she was starting on a tour abroad, but asked him to do what he could to trace the boy who had lain so grievously ill in the hospital at Colesberg. Had he recovered after the Boers had taken Colesberg? As a rumour had reached her that he had, and had even returned to England. She wanted to know, and if they ever met again would tell him why. Meanwhile if he got any news would he address it to her, care of Honoria Fraser, Queen Anne's Mansions, St. James's Park; as her own address would be quite uncertain for the present. Or it would do quite as well if he wrote to Praddy; but not to his father, which might only needlessly agitate the old clergyman down in Wales, whom Vivie by an unexpected chance had come to know.
The first result of this letter a year later was a statement of Frank's belief, almost certainty, that his acquaintance of the hospital had died and been buried while the Boers held possession of Colesberg; and that indeed was the utmost that was ever learnt about the end of the ill-fated son of Howel Vaughan Williams and Mary his wife, who were wedded in sunshine and with fair prospects of happiness in the early summer of 1874.
The new-born David Vavasour Williams having by November settled all these details, having arranged to pay the very modest rent of fifty-five pounds for his three rooms at Fig Tree Court, and twenty-five pounds a year to the housekeeper who was to "do" for him and another gentleman on the same floor—a gentleman who was most anxious to be chummy with the new tenant of the opposite chambers but whose advances were firmly though civilly kept at bay—having likewise passed his preliminary examination (since he could not avow that inside his clothes he was a third wrangler), having satisfied his two "godfathers" of the Bar that he was a fit person to recommend to the Benchers; having arranged to read with a barrister in chambers, and settled all other preliminaries of importance: decided that he would pay an afternoon call on the Rossiters in Portland Place and see how the land lay there.
Already a strange exhilaration was spreading over David's mind. Life was not twice but ten times more interesting than it had appeared to the prejudiced eyes of Vivien Warren. It was as though she—he—had passed through some magic door, gone through the looking-glass and was contemplating the same world as the one Vivie had known for—shall we say fifteen?—years, but a world which viewed from a different standpoint was quite changed in proportions, in colour, in the conjunction of events. It was a world in which everything was made smooth and easy before the semblance of manhood. What a joy to be rid of skirts and petticoats! To be able to run after and leap on to an omnibus, to wear the same hat day after day just stuck on top of her curly head. Not, perhaps, to change her clothes, between her uprising and her retirement to bed, unless she were going out to dine. No simpering. No need to ask favours. No compliments. It is true she felt awkward in the presence of women, not quite the same, even with Honoria. But with men. What a difference! She felt she had never really known men before. At first the frank speech, the expletives, the smoking-room stories made her a little uncomfortable and occasionally called forth an irrepressible blush. But this was not to her disadvantage. It made her seem younger, and created a good impression on her tutors and acquaintances. "A nice modest boy, fresh from the country—pity to lead him astray—won't preserve his innocence long—" was the vaguely defined impression, contact with her—him, I mean—made on most decent male minds. Many a lad comes up from the country to commence his career in London who knew far less than the unfortunate Vivie had been compelled to know of the shady side of life; who is compelled to lead a somewhat retired life by straitness of means; whose determination towards probity and regularity of life is respected by the men of law among whom he finds himself.
But David having decided—he did not quite know why—to pursue his acquaintance with Professor Rossiter; having written to ask if he might do so (as a matter of fact he frequently saw Rossiter walking across the gardens of New Square to go to the museum of the Royal College of Surgeons: he recollected him immediately but Rossiter did not reciprocate, being absent-minded); and having received a card from "Linda Rossiter" to say they would be at home throughout the winter on Thursdays, between 4 and 6: went on one of those Thursdays and made definite progress with the great friendship of his life.