when the last bit of proof was fast in his possession mr. tulkinghorn, pluming himself on the cleverness with which he had wormed his way into lady dedlock's secret, went to her at her london home and informed her of all he had discovered, delighting in the fear and dread which she could not help showing. she knew now that this cruel man would always hold his knowledge over her head, torturing her with the threat of making it known to her husband.
some hours after he had gone home, she followed him there to beg him not to tell her husband what he had discovered. but all was dark in[pg 406] the lawyer's house. she rang the private bell twice, but there was no answer, and she returned in despair.
by a coincidence some one else had been seen to call at mr. tulkinghorn's that same night. this was mr. george, of the shooting-gallery, who came to get back the letter he had loaned to the lawyer.
when morning came it was found that a dreadful deed had been done that night. mr. tulkinghorn was found lying dead on the floor of his private apartment, shot through the heart. all the secrets he had so cunningly discovered and gloated over with such delight had not been able to save his life there in that room.
mr. tulkinghorn was so well-known that the murder made a great sensation. the police went at once to the shooting-gallery to arrest mr. george and he was put into jail.
he was able later to prove his innocence, however, and, all in all, his arrest turned out to be a fortunate thing. for by means of it old mrs. rouncewell, lady dedlock's housekeeper, discovered that he was her own son george, who had gone off to be a soldier so many years before. he had made up his mind not to return till he was prospering. but somehow this time had never come; bad fortune had followed him and he had been ashamed to go back.
but though he had acted so wrongly he had never lost his love for his mother, and was glad to give[pg 407] up the shooting-gallery and go with mrs. rouncewell to become sir leicester's personal attendant.
at first, after the death of mr. tulkinghorn, lady dedlock had hoped that her dread and fear were now ended, but she soon found that this was not to be. the telltale bundle of letters was in the possession of a detective whom the cruel lawyer had long ago called to his aid, and the detective, thinking lady dedlock herself might have had something to do with the murder, thought it his duty to tell all that his dead employer had discovered to sir leicester.
it was a fearful shock to the haughty baronet to find so many tongues had been busy with the name his wife had borne so proudly. when the detective finished, sir leicester fell unconscious, and when he came to his senses had lost the power to speak.
they laid him on his bed, sent for doctors and went to tell lady dedlock, but she had disappeared.
almost at one and the same moment the unhappy woman had learned not only that the detective had told his story to sir leicester, but that she herself was suspected of the murder. these two blows were more than she could bear. she put on a cloak and veil and, leaving all her money and jewels behind her, with a note for her husband, went out into the shrill, frosty wind. the note read:
"if i am sought for or accused of his murder, believe[pg 408] i am wholly innocent. i have no home left, i will trouble you no more. may you forget me and forgive me."
they gave sir leicester this note, and great agony came to the stricken man's heart. he had always loved and honored her, and he loved her no less now for what had been told him. nor did he believe for a moment that she could be guilty of the murder. he wrote on a slate the words, "forgive—find," and the detective started at once to overtake the fleeing woman.
he went first to esther, to whom he told the sad outcome, and together they began the search. for two days they labored, tracing lady dedlock's movements step by step, through the pelting snow and wind, across the frozen wastes outside of london, where brick-kilns burned and where she had exchanged clothes with a poor laboring woman, the better to elude pursuit—then back to london again, where at last they found her.
but it was too late. she was lying frozen in the snow, at the gate of the cemetery where captain hawdon, the copyist whom she had once loved, lay buried.
so lady dedlock's secret was hidden at last by death. only the detective, whose business was silence, sir leicester her husband, and esther her daughter, knew what her misery had been or the strange circumstances of her flight, for the police soon succeeded in tracing the murder of mr. tulkinghorn[pg 409] to hortense, the revengeful french maid whom he had threatened to put in prison.
one other shadow fell on esther's life before the clouds cleared away for ever.
grandfather smallweed, rummaging among the papers in krook's shop, found an old will, and this proved to be a last will made by the original jarndyce, whose affairs the court of chancery had been all these years trying to settle. this will bequeathed the greater part of the fortune to richard carstone, and its discovery, of course, would have put a stop to the famous suit.
but the suit stopped of its own accord, for it was found now that there was no longer any fortune left to go to law about or to be willed to anybody. all the money had been eaten up by the costs.
after all the years of hope and strain, this disappointment was too much for richard, and he died that night, at the very hour when poor crazed little miss flite (as she had said she would do when the famous suit ended) gave all her caged birds their liberty.
the time came at length, after the widowed ada and her baby boy had come to make their home with mr. jarndyce, when esther felt that she should fulfil her promise and become the mistress of bleak house. so she told her guardian she was ready to marry him when he wished. he appointed a day, and she began to prepare her wedding-clothes.[pg 410]
but mr. jarndyce, true-hearted and generous as he had always been, had an idea very different from this in his mind. he had found, on allan woodcourt's return from his voyage, that the young surgeon still loved esther. his keen eye had seen that she loved him in return, and he well knew that if she married him, jarndyce, it would be because of her promise and because her grateful heart could not find it possible to refuse him. so, wishing most of all her happiness, he determined to give up his own love for her sake.
he bought a house in the town in which woodcourt had decided to practise medicine, remodeled it and named it "bleak house," after his own. when it was finished in the way he knew esther liked best, he took her to see it, telling her it was to be a present from him to the surgeon to repay him for his kindness to little joe.
then, when she had seen it all, he told her that he had guessed her love for woodcourt, and that, though she married the surgeon and not himself, she would still be carrying out her promise and would still become the mistress of "bleak house."
when she lifted her tearful face from his shoulder she saw that woodcourt was standing near them.
"this is 'bleak house,'" said jarndyce. "this day i give this house its little mistress, and, before god, it is the brightest day of my life!"
