It had seemed to him so easy! He had felt as sure a trust in his mother's marriage as he felt in Heaven. It was only to find out where they had stayed that fortnight in London, and search the parish church register; for there, and only there, Robert Carr argued, the marriage had taken place. But there, it was now evident, that it had not taken place, and he was all at sea.
He began with the other churches; he knew not what else to do. In Holland they could not have been married, from the want of legal papers, and other matters, necessary to foreigners united abroad. He searched the churches nearest to St. Clement Danes first, and then went on to others, and others, and others. He would go up after breakfast from his kind friend, who was nursing him like a mother, and begin his daily task; out of one church into another, as she had phrased it, in all weathers—rain, hail, storm—and go back at night again utterly wearied out.
Mrs. Dundyke stood at the window watching the rain. She fancied it was beginning to grow dusk; but it was not time just yet, and the afternoon was a dark one. He would not be home yet awhile, she was thinking. He stopped in those cold churches as long as there was a ray of light to see by. Mrs. Dundyke was turning from the window, when she saw an omnibus stop, and Robert Carr get out of it. He seemed worse than usual; weaker in strength, more tottering in frame; and as he looked up at her with a faint, sad smile, a conviction came over her that she should not be able to save the life of this poor young man; that all her care, all her comforts, all her ample income would not benefit him. And how very ample her income would for the future be, she had not known until that day. She was a rich lady for this world; she might ride in her carriage, if she chose, and be grand for all time.
"Oh! Robert!" she exclaimed, meeting him on the stairs—and she had taken to call him by the familiar name, as she might a son—"I fear you have got very wet! I am so glad you came home early!"
He walked unsteadily to the easy chair by the fire, and sunk in it. Mrs. Dundyke, with him daily, saw not the change that every hour was surely making in him; but she did notice how wan and ill he looked this evening.
"Have you not been well to-day, Robert?"
"Not very. I have been spitting so much of that blood again. And I felt so weary too; so sick of it all."
"There's no success, then, again!"
"None. Altogether, I thought I'd leave it for the day, and come back and take a rest."