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Updated: June 17, 2025
He turned to his aunt. "You saw me start," he went on, "when you first mentioned Miss Roseberry's name in my hearing. Now you know why." He addressed himself once more to Horace. "You heard me say that you, as Miss Roseberry's future husband, had an interest in being present at my interview with Lady Janet. Now you know why." "The woman is plainly mad," said Lady Janet.
"Pardon me," he rejoined, "you forget that you and Lady Janet meet now for the first time. Try to put yourself in my aunt's place. How is she to know that you are the late Colonel Roseberry's daughter?" Grace's head sunk on her breast; she dropped into the nearest chair. The expression of her face changed instantly from anger to discouragement.
"Pray let us hear her," he said, in a tone of entreaty which had something of the imperative in it this time. He turned to Grace. "Have you any proof to produce," he added, in his gentler voice, "which will satisfy us that you are Colonel Roseberry's daughter?" Grace looked at him indignantly. "Proof!" she repeated. "Is my word not enough?" Julian kept his temper perfectly.
Either Miss Roseberry must have spoken of you and of her own affairs while she and the stranger were together in the French cottage, or the stranger must have obtained access privately to Miss Roseberry's papers. Do you agree so far?" Lady Janet began to feel interested for the first time. "Perfectly," she said.
The woman whose immovable composure had conquered Grace Roseberry's utmost insolence in the hour of her triumph the woman who, without once flinching, had faced every other consequence of her resolution to ignore Mercy's true position in the house quailed for the first time when she found herself face to face with the very person for who m she had suffered and sacrificed so much.
"One word, Lady Janet, before you turn your back on me," she said, firmly. "One word, and I will be content. Has Colonel Roseberry's letter found its way to this house or not? If it has, did a woman bring it to you?" Lady Janet looked as only a great lady can look, when a person of inferior rank has presumed to fail in respect toward her.
Miss Roseberry's clothes, marked with her name, were drying, at Mercy's disposal, in the next room. The way of escape from the unendurable humiliation of her present life lay open before her at last. What a prospect it was! A new identity, which she might own anywhere! a new name, which was beyond reproach! a new past life, into which all the world might search, and be welcome!
Impulsively, recklessly wickedly, if you like I seized the opportunity, and let you pass me through the German lines under Miss Roseberry's name. Arrived in England, having had time to reflect, I made my first and last effort to draw back before it was too late. I went to the Refuge, and stopped on the opposite side of the street, looking at it.
"Alone?" rejoined the other. "Without any one to protect you?" Grace's head sank on her bosom. "I have left my only protector my father in the English burial-ground at Rome," she answered simply. "My mother died, years since, in Canada." The shadowy figure of the nurse suddenly changed its position on the chest. She had started as the last word passed Miss Roseberry's lips.
During her delirium the idea of Miss Roseberry's identity ferments in her brain, and assumes its present perverted form. In that form it still remains. As a necessary consequence, she persists in reversing the two identities. She says she is Miss Roseberry, and declares Miss Roseberry to be Mercy Merrick. There is the doctor 's explanation. What do you think of it?" "Very ingenious, I dare say.
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