At a quarter to eight o’clock that night Mr. Bashwood took up his post of observation, as usual, on the platform of the terminus at London Bridge. He was in the highest good spirits; he smiled and smirked in irrepressible exultation. The sense that he held in reserve a means of influence over Miss Gwilt, in virtue of his knowledge of her past career, had had no share in effecting the transformation that now appeared in him. It had upheld his courage in his forlorn life at Thorpe Ambrose, and it had given him that increased confidence of manner which Miss Gwilt herself had noticed; but, from the moment when he had regained his old place in her favor, it had vanished as a motive power in him, annihilated by the electric shock of her touch and her look. His vanity—the vanity which in men at his age is only despair in disguise—had now lifted him to the seventh heaven of fatuous happiness once more. He believed in her again as he believed in the smart new winter overcoat that he wore—as he believed in the dainty little cane (appropriate to the dawning dandyism of lads in their teens) that he flourished in his hand. He hummed! The worn-out old creature, who had not sung since his childhood, hummed, as he paced the platform, the few fragments he could remember of a worn-out old song.
The train was due as early as eight o’clock that night. At five minutes past the hour the whistle sounded. In less than five minutes more the passengers were getting out on the platform.
Following the instructions that had been given to him, Mr. Bashwood made his way, as well as the crowd would let him, along the line of carriages, and, discovering no familiar face on that first investigation, joined the passengers for a second search among them in the custom-house waiting-room next.
He had looked round the room, and had satisfied himself that the persons occupying it were all strangers, when he heard a voice behind him, exclaiming: “Can that be Mr. Bashwood!” He turned in eager expectation, and found himself face to face with the last man under heaven whom he had expected to see.
The man was MIDWINTER.
II. IN THE HOUSE.
Noticing Mr. Bashwood’s confusion (after a moment’s glance at the change in his personal appearance), Midwinter spoke first.
“I see I have surprised you,” he said. “You are looking, I suppose, for somebody else? Have you heard from Allan? Is he on his way home again already?”
The inquiry about Allan, though it would naturally have suggested itself to any one in Midwinter’s position at that moment, added to Mr. Bashwood’s confusion. Not knowing how else to extricate himself from the critical position in which he was placed, he took refuge in simple denial.
“I know nothing about Mr. Armadale—oh dear, no, sir, I know nothing about Mr. Armadale,” he answered, with needless eagerness and hurry. “Welcome back to England, sir,” he went on, changing the subject in his nervously talkative manner. “I didn’t know you had been abroad. It’s so long since we have had the pleasure—since I have had the pleasure. Have you enjoyed yourself, sir, in foreign parts? Such different manners from ours—yes, yes, yes—such different manners from ours! Do you make a long stay in England, now you have come back?”