s to tell you what you are burning to
know. So here I am at my desk, bent on telling it. If you don't bitterly
repent, when you are at the end of this letter, not having held to your
first resolution, and locked me up out of harm's way while you had the
chance, my name is not Lydia Gwilt.

"Where did my last letter end? I don't remember, and don't care. Make it
out as you can--I am not going back any further than this day week. That
is to say, Sunday last.

"There was a thunder-storm in the morning. It began to clear off toward
noon. I didn't go out: I waited to see Midwinter or to hear from him.
(Are you surprised at my not writing 'Mr.' before his name? We have got
so familiar, my dear, that 'Mr.' would be quite out of place.) He had
left me the evening before, under very interesting circumstances. I had
told him that his friend Armadale was persecuting me by means of a hired
spy. He had declined to believe it, and had gone straight to Thorpe
Ambrose to clear the thing up. I let him kiss my hand before he went. He
promised to come back the next day (the Sunday). I felt I had secured my
influence over him; and I believed he would keep his word.

"Well, the thunder passed away as I told you. The weather cleared up;
the people walked out in their best clothes; the dinners came in from
the bakers; I sat dreaming at my wretched little hired piano, nicely
dressed and looking my best--and still no Midwinter appeared. It was
late in the afternoon, and I was beginning to feel offended, when a
letter was brought to me. It had been left by a strange messenger
who went away again immediately. I looked at the letter. Midwinter at
last--in writing, instead of in person. I began to feel more offended
than ever; for, as I told you, I thought I had used my influence over
him to better purpose.

"The letter, when I read it, set my mind off in a new direction. It
surprised, it puzzled, it interested me. I thought, and thought, and
thought of him, all the rest of the day.

"He began by asking my pardon for having doubted what I told him. Mr.
Armadale's own lips had confirmed me. They had quarreled (as I had
anticipated they would); and he, and the man who had once been
his dearest friend on earth, had parted forever. So far, I was not
surprised. I was amused by his telling me in his extravagant way that he
and his friend were parted forever; and I rather wondered what he would
think when I carried out my plan, and found my way into