" 'You will find, among the law reports, a married woman charged with fraudulently representing herself to be the missing widow of an officer in the merchant service, who was supposed to have been drowned. The name of the prisoner's husband (living) and the name of the officer (a very common one, both as to Christian and surname) happened to be identically the same. There was money to be got by it (sorely wanted by the prisoner's husband, to whom she was devotedly attached), if the fraud had succeeded. The woman took it all on herself. Her husband was helpless and ill, and the bailiffs were after him. The circumstances, as you may read for yourself, were all in her favor, and were so well managed by her that the lawyers themselves acknowledged she might have succeeded, if the supposed drowned man had not turned up alive and well in the nick of time to confront her. The scene took place at the lawyer's office, and came out in the evidence at the police court. The woman was handsome, and the sailor was a good-natured man. He wanted, at first, if the lawyers would have allowed him, to let her off. He said to her, among other things:
"You didn't count on the drowned man coming back, alive and hearty, did you, ma'am?" "It's lucky for you," she said, "Ididn't count on it. You have escaped the sea, but you wouldn't have escaped _me._" "Why, what would you have done, if you _had_known I was coming back?" says the sailor. She looked him steadily in the face, and answered: "I would have killed you."There! Do you think such a woman as that would have written to tell me I was pressing her further than she had courage to go? Ahandsome woman, too, like yourself. You would drive some men in my position to wish they had her now in your place.'
"I read no further. When I had got on, line by line, to those words, it burst on me like a flash of lightning. In an instant Isaw it as plainly as I see it now. It is horrible, it is unheard of, it outdares all daring; but, if I can only nerve myself to face one terrible necessity, it is to be done. _I may personate the richly provided widow of Allan Armadale of Thorpe Ambrose, if I can count on Allan Armadale's death in a given time._"There, in plain words, is the frightful temptation under which Inow feel myself sinking. It is frightful in more ways than one;for it has come straight out of that other temptation to which Iyielded in the by-gone time.
"Yes; there the letter has been waiting for me in my box, to serve a purpose never thought of by the villain who wrote it.
There is the Case, as he called it--only quoted to taunt me;utterly unlike my own case at the time--there it has been, waiting and lurking for me through all the changes in my life, till it has come to be like _my_ case at last.
"It might startle any woman to see this, and even this is not the worst. The whole thing has been in my Diary, for days past, without my knowing it! Every idle fancy that escaped me has been tending secretly that one way! And I never saw, never suspected it, till the reading of the letter put my own thoughts before me in a new light--till I saw the shadow of my own circumstances suddenly reflected in one special circumstance of that other woman's case!
"It is to be done, if I can but look the necessity in the face.
It is to be done, _if I can count on Allan Armadale's death in a given time._"All but his death is easy. The whole series of events under which I have been blindly chafing and fretting for more than a week past have been, one and all--though I was too stupid to see it--events in my favor; events paving the way smoothly and more smoothly straight to the end.
"In three bold steps--only three!--that end might be reached. Let Midwinter marry me privately, under his real name--step the first! Let Armadale leave Thorpe Ambrose a single man, and die in some distant place among strangers--step the second!
"Why am I hesitating? Why not go on to step the third, and last?
"I _will_ go on. Step the third, and last, is my appearance, after the announcement of Armadale's death has reached this neighborhood, in the character of Armadale's widow, with my marriage certificate in my hand to prove my claim. It is as clear as the sun at noonday. Thanks to the exact similarity between the two names, and thanks to the careful manner in which the secret of that similarity has been kept, I may be the wife of the dark Allan Armadale, known as such to nobody but my husband and myself; and I may, out of that very position, claim the character of widow of the light Allan Armadale, with proof to support me (in the shape of my marriage certificate) which would be proof in the estimation of the most incredulous person living.
"To think of my having put all this in my Diary! To think of my having actually contemplated this very situation, and having seen nothing more in it, at the time, than a reason (if I married Midwinter) for consenting to appear in the world under my husband's assumed name!
"What is it daunts me? The dread of obstacles? The fear of discovery?
"Where are the obstacles? Where is the fear of discovery?
"I am actually suspected all over the neighborhood of intriguing to be mistress of Thorpe Ambrose. I am the only person who knows the real turn that Armadale's inclinations have taken. Not a creature but myself is as yet aware of his early morning meetings with Miss Milroy. If it is necessary to part them, I can do it at any moment by an anonymous line to the major. If it is necessary to remove Armadale from Thorpe Ambrose, I can get him away at three days' notice. His own lips informed me, when I last spoke to him, that he would go to the ends of the earth to be friends again with Midwinter, if Midwinter would let him. I have only to tell Midwinter to write from London, and ask to be reconciled;and Midwinter would obey me--and to London Armadale would go.
Every difficulty, at starting, is smoothed over ready to my hand.