“He has left me, as he left me before, with an absorbing subject of interest to think of in his absence. I noticed a change in him the moment he entered the room. When he told me of the funeral, and of his parting with Armadale on board the yacht, though he spoke with feelings deeply moved, he spoke with a mastery over himself which is new to me in my experience of him. It was the same when our talk turned next on our own hopes and prospects. He was plainly disappointed when he found that my family embarrassments would prevent our meeting to-morrow, and plainly uneasy at the prospect of leaving me to find my way by myself on Monday to the church. But there was a certain hopefulness and composure of manner underlying it all, which produced so strong an impression on me that I was obliged to notice it.
“‘You know what odd fancies take possession of me sometimes,’ I said. ‘Shall I tell you the fancy that has taken possession of me now? I can’t help thinking that something has happened since we last saw each other which you have not told me yet.
“‘Something has happened,’ he answered. ‘And it is something which you ought to know.’
“With those words he took out his pocket-book, and produced two written papers from it. One he looked at and put back. The other he placed on the table.
“‘Before I tell you what this is, and how it came into my possession,’ he said, ‘I must own something that I have concealed from you. It is no more serious confession than the confession of my own weakness.’
“He then acknowledged to me that the renewal of his friendship with Armadale had been clouded, through the whole period of their intercourse in London, by his own superstitious misgivings. He had obeyed the summons which called him to the rector’s bedside, with the firm intention of confiding his previsions of coming trouble to Mr. Brock; and he had been doubly confirmed in his superstition when he found that Death had entered the house before him, and had parted them, in this world, forever. More than this, he had traveled back to be present at the funeral, with a secret sense of relief at the prospect of being parted from Armadale, and with a secret resolution to make the after-meeting agreed on between us three at Naples a meeting that should never take place. With that purpose in his heart, he had gone up alone to the room prepared for him on his arrival at the rectory, and had opened a letter which he found waiting for him on the table. The letter had only that day been discovered—dropped and lost—under the bed on which Mr. Brock had died. It was in the rector’s handwriting throughout; and the person to whom it was addressed was Midwinter himself.
“Having told me this, nearly in the words in which I have written it, he gave me the written paper that lay on the table between us.
“‘Read it,’ he said; ‘and you will not need to be told that my mind is at peace again, and that I took Allan’s hand at parting with a heart that was worthier of Allan’s love.’
“I read the letter. There was no superstition to be conquered in my mind; there were no old feelings of gratitude toward Armadale to be roused in my heart; and yet, the effect which the letter had had on Midwinter was, I firmly believe, more than matched by the effect that the letter now produced on me.
“It was vain to ask him to leave it, and to let me read it again (as I wished) when I was left by myself. He is determined to keep it side by side with that other paper which I had seen him take out of his pocket-book, and which contains the written narrative of Armadale’s Dream. All I could do was to ask his leave to copy it; and this he granted readily. I wrote the copy in his presence; and I now place it here in my diary, to mark a day which is one of the memorable days in my life.