“I deeply regret that I have been the means of bringing misfortune and unhappiness and sorrow upon you, but I have been the tool of another. In shame and deepest humiliation I leave you, and if you will grant one favour to an unhappy and penitent woman, you will never seek to discover my whereabouts. It would be quite useless. To-night I leave you in secret, never to meet you again. Accept my deepest regret, and do not let my action trouble you. I am not worthy of your love. Good-bye. Your unhappy—Sylvia.”
I stood staring at the uneven scribbled lines, blurred as they were by the tears of the writer.
What had happened? Why had she so purposely left me? Why had she made that signal from the theatre-box to her accomplice?
She admitted having grossly deceived me, and that she was unworthy. What did she mean? In what manner had she deceived me?
Had she a secret lover?
That idea struck me suddenly, and staggered me. In some of her recent actions I read secrecy and suspicion. On several occasions lately she had been out shopping alone, and one afternoon, about a week before, she had not returned to dress for dinner until nearly eight o’clock. Her excuse had been a thin one, but, unsuspicious, I had passed it by.
Had I really been a fool to marry her, after all? I knew Marlowe’s opinion of our marriage, though he had never expressed it. That she had been associated with a shady lot had all along been apparent. The terrors of that silent house in Porchester Terrace remained only too fresh within my memory.
That night I spent in a wild fever of excitement. No sleep came to my eyes, and I think Browning—to whom I said nothing—believed that I had taken leave of my senses. The faithful old servant did not retire, for at five in the morning I found him seated dozing in a chair outside in the hall, tired out by the watchful vigil he had kept over me.
I tried in vain to decide what to do. I wanted to find Sylvia, to induce her to reveal the truth to me, and to allay her fear of my reproaches.