Blind Love

"You must return by way of Paris, though it is longer than by Basle and

Laon. Mr. Mountjoy, I know, will send you the money you want. He has

told me as much. 'I have done with Lady Harry,' he said. 'Her movements

no longer concern me, though I can never want interest in what she

does. But since the girl is right to stick to her mistress, I will send

her the money--not as a loan to be paid back by Iris, but as a gift

from myself.' "Therefore, my dear Fanny, stop in Paris for one night at least, and

learn what has been done if you can. Find out the nurse, and ask her

what really happened. With the knowledge that you already possess, it

will be hard, indeed, if we cannot arrive at the truth. There must be

people who supplied things to the cottage--the restaurant, the

pharmacien, the laundress. See them all--you know them already, and

we will put the facts together. As for finding her ladyship, that will

depend entirely upon herself. I shall expect you back in about a week.

If anything happens here I shall be able to tell you when you arrive.

"Yours affectionately, L. Vimpany."

This letter exactly coincided with Fanny's own views. The doctor was

now gone. She was pretty certain that he was not going to remain alone

in the cottage; and the suburb of Passy, though charming in many ways,

is not exactly the place for a man of Dr. Vimpany's temperament. She

would stay a day, or even two days or more, if necessary, at Passy. She

would make those inquiries.

The second letter, which reached her the same day, was from Mr.

Mountjoy. He told her what he had told Mrs. Vimpany: he would give her

the money, because he recognised the spirit of fidelity which caused

Fanny to go first to Paris and then to Berne.

But he could not pretend to any right to interference in the affairs of

Lord and Lady Harry Norland. He enclosed a mandat postal for a

hundred and twenty-five francs, which he hoped would be sufficient for

her immediate wants.

She started on her return-journey on the same day--namely, Saturday. On

Sunday evening she was in a pension at Passy, ready to make those

inquiries. The first person whom she sought out was the rentier--the

landlord of the cottage. He was a retired tradesman--one who had made

his modest fortune in a charcuterie and had invested it in house

property. Fanny told him that she had been lady's-maid to Lady Harry

Norland, in the recent occupancy of the cottage, and that she was

anxious to know her present address.