Here then at last, he was absolutely alone and free. Feeling perhaps how nearly it had lost him, or impressed by the sudden change in his position, the boarding-house revered this privacy of Rickman's as a sacred thing. Not even Mr. Soper would have dared to violate his virgin leisure. The charm of it was unbroken, it was even heightened by the inaudible presence of Miss Roots in her den on the same floor. Miss Roots indeed was the tie that bound him to Mrs. Downey's; otherwise the dream of his affluence would have been chambers in Westminster or the Temple. For his income, in its leap from zero to a fluctuating two hundred a year, appeared to him as boundless affluence. To be sure, Jewdwine had expressly stated that it would not be permanent, but this he had understood to be merely a delicate way of referring to his former imperfect record of sobriety. And he had become rich not only in money but in time. Rickman's had demanded an eight or even a ten hours' day; the office of The Museion claimed him but five hours of four days in the week. From five o'clock on Thursday evening till eleven on Monday morning, whatever work remained for him to do could be done in his own time and his own temper.
Much of the leisure time at his disposal he spent in endeavouring to follow the Harden library in its dispersion. He attended the great auctions in the hope of intercepting some treasure in its passage from Rickman's to the home of the collector. Once, in his father's absence, he bought a dozen volumes straight over the counter from his successor there. It was also about this time that Spinks and Soper appeared in the new character of book fanciers, buying according to Rickman's instructions and selling to him on commission, a transaction which filled these gentlemen with superb importance. Thus Rickman became possessed of about twenty or thirty volumes which he ranged behind a curtain, on a shelf apart. The collection, formed gradually, included nothing of any intrinsic value; such as it was he treasured it with a view to restoring it ultimately to Lucia Harden. He was considering whether with the means at his disposal he could procure a certain Aldine Dante of his memory, when the Harden library disappeared from the market as suddenly and mysteriously as it had come. No volume belonging to it could be bought for love or money; and none were displayed in the windows of Rickman's. Keith learnt nothing by his inquiries beyond the extent of his estrangement from his father. When he called at the shop his successor regretted that he was unable to give him any information. When he visited the suburban villa Isaac refused to see him. When he wrote Isaac never answered the letters. His stepmother in an unpleasant interview gave him to understand that the separation was final and complete.
He would have been more hurt by this rupture but for that other and abiding pain. The thought of Lucia Harden checked his enjoyment in the prospect of a now unimpeded career. Rickman was like some young athlete who walks on to the field stripped and strong for the race, but invisibly handicapped, having had the heart knocked out of him by some shameful incident outside the course. Apart from his own disgrace he was miserably anxious about Lucia herself, about her health, her happiness, her prospects; his misery being by no means lightened by his perception that these things were not exactly his concern.
He tried to picture her living as poor ladies live; he had seen them sometimes at Mrs. Downey's. He could not see her there, or rather, seeing her he could see nothing else; he perceived that surroundings and material accessories contributed nothing to his idea of her. Still, he knew nothing; and he had to accept his ignorance as part, and the worst part, of the separation that was his punishment. Many mixed feelings, shame and passion, delicacy and pride restrained him from asking Jewdwine any question. Even if Jewdwine had not told him as much, he would have known that his acquaintance with Jewdwine's affairs would not involve acquaintance with Jewdwine's family. He had absolutely nothing to hope for from that connection.
And yet he hoped. The probabilities were that if Lucia did not make her home with her cousins, she would at any rate stay with them the greater part of the year. He was always walking up to Hampstead Heath on the chance of some day seeing her there. Sometimes he would pass by the front of Jewdwine's beautiful old brown house, and glance quickly through the delicate iron gate and up at the windows. But she was never there. Sometimes he would sit for hours on one of the seats under the elm tree at the back. There was a high walk there overlooking the West Heath and shaded by the elms and by Jewdwine's garden wall. The wall had a door in it that might some day open and let out the thing he longed for. Only it never did. There was nothing to hope for from Jewdwine's house.
At last his longing became intolerable, and one day, in the office, he made up his mind to approach Jewdwine himself. He had been telling him about the apparent check in the career of the Harden library, when he saw his opportunity and took it.
"By the way, can you tell me where your cousin is now?"
"Miss Harden," said Jewdwine coldly, "is in Germany with Miss Palliser." He added, as if he evidently felt that some explanation was necessary (not on Rickman's account, but on his own), "She was to have come to us, but we were obliged to give her up to Miss Palliser, who is living alone."
"Alone?"
"Yes. Mrs. Palliser is dead."