What should she do with the terrible secret?
She ought to inform the police. But there were two objections. First,
the nurse may have been mistaken in supposing her patient to be dead.
She herself had no choice but to escape as she did. Next, the dreadful
thought occurred to her that she herself until the previous day had
been the man's nurse--his only nurse, day and night. What was to
prevent the doctor from fixing the guilt of poisoning upon herself?
Nay; it would be his most obvious line of action. The man was left
alone all the morning; the day before he had shown every sign of
returning strength; she would have to confess that she was in hiding.
How long had she been there? Why was she in hiding? Was it not after
she had poisoned the man and when she heard the doctor's footstep?
Naturally ignorant of poisons and their symptoms, it seemed to her as
if these facts so put together would be conclusive against her.
Therefore, she determined to keep quiet in Paris that day and to cross
over by the night boat from Dieppe in the evening. She would at first
disclose everything to Mrs. Vimpany and to Mountjoy. As to what she
would tell her mistress she would be guided by the advice of the
others.
She got to London in safety and drove straight to Mr. Mountjoy's hotel,
proposing first to communicate the whole business to him. But she found
in his sitting-room Mrs. Vimpany herself.
"We must not awake him," she said, "whatever news you bring. His
perfect recovery depends entirely on rest and quiet. There"--she
pointed to the chimneypiece--"is a letter in my lady's handwriting. I
am afraid I know only too well what it tells him."
"What does it tell?"
"This very morning," Mrs. Vimpany went on, "I called at her lodging.
She has gone away."
"Gone away? My lady gone away? Where is she gone?"
"Where do you think she is most likely to have gone?"
"Not?--oh!--not to her husband? Not to him!--oh! this is more
terrible--far more terrible--than you can imagine."
"You will tell me why it is now so much more terrible. Meantime, I find
that the cabman was told to drive to Victoria. That is all I know. I
have no doubt, however, but that she has gone back to her husband. She
has been in a disturbed, despondent condition ever since she arrived in
London. Mr. Mountjoy has been as kind as usual: but he has not been
able to chase away her sadness. Whether she was fretting after her
husband, or whether--but this I hardly think--she was comparing the man
she had lost with the man she had taken--but I do not know. All I do
know is that she has been uneasy ever since she came from France, and
what I believe is that she has been reproaching herself with leaving
her husband without good cause."