I crumpled up the letter in my pocket, and forgot it the moment after,
in the all-absorbing interest of my coming interview with Rachel.
As the clock of Hampstead church struck three, I put Mr. Bruff's key
into the lock of the door in the wall. When I first stepped into the
garden, and while I was securing the door again on the inner side, I
own to having felt a certain guilty doubtfulness about what might
happen next. I looked furtively on either side of me; suspicious of
the presence of some unexpected witness in some unknown corner of the
garden. Nothing appeared, to justify my apprehensions. The walks
were, one and all, solitudes; and the birds and the bees were the only
witnesses.
I passed through the garden; entered the conservatory; and crossed the
small drawing-room. As I laid my hand on the door opposite, I heard a
few plaintive chords struck on the piano in the room within. She had
often idled over the instrument in this way, when I was staying at her
mother's house. I was obliged to wait a little, to steady myself. The
past and present rose side by side, at that supreme moment--and the
contrast shook me.
After the lapse of a minute, I roused my manhood, and opened the door.