One word more, and my story is done.  Years after, Northmour was killed fighting under the colors of Garibaldi for the liberation of the Tyrol.

Wilkie Collins

The Dream Woman

A Mystery in Four Narratives

THE FIRST NARRATIVE

INTRODUCTORY STATEMENT OF THE FACTS BY PERCY FAIRBANK

I

“Hullo, there!  Hostler!  Hullo-o-o!”

“My dear! why don’t you look for the bell?”

“I have looked—­there is no bell.”

“And nobody in the yard.  How very extraordinary!  Call again, dear.”

“Hostler!  Hullo, there!  Hostler-r-r!”

My second call echoes through empty space, and rouses nobody—­produces, in short, no visible result.  I am at the end of my resources—­I don’t know what to say or what to do next.  Here I stand in the solitary inn yard of a strange town, with two horses to hold, and a lady to take care of.  By way of adding to my responsibilities, it so happens that one of the horses is dead lame, and that the lady is my wife.

Who am I?—­you will ask.

There is plenty of time to answer the question.  Nothing happens; and nobody appears to receive us.  Let me introduce myself and my wife.

I am Percy Fairbank—­English gentleman—­age (let us say) forty—­no profession—­moderate politics—­middle height—­fair complexion—­easy character—­plenty of money.

My wife is a French lady.  She was Mademoiselle Clotilde Delorge—­when I was first presented to her at her father’s house in France.  I fell in love with her—­I really don’t know why.  It might have been because I was perfectly idle, and had nothing else to do at the time.  Or it might have been because all my friends said she was the very last woman whom I ought to think of marrying.  On the surface, I must own, there is nothing in common between Mrs. Fairbank and me.  She is tall; she is dark; she is nervous, excitable, romantic; in all her opinions she proceeds to extremes.  What could such a woman see in me? what could I see in her?  I know no more than you do.  In some mysterious manner we exactly suit each other.  We have been man and wife for ten years, and our only regret is, that we have no children.  I don’t know what you may think; I call that—­upon the whole—­a happy marriage.

So much for ourselves.  The next question is—­what has brought us into the inn yard? and why am I obliged to turn groom, and hold the horses?

We live for the most part in France—­at the country house in which my wife and I first met.  Occasionally, by way of variety, we pay visits to my friends in England.  We are paying one of those visits now.  Our host is an old college friend of mine, possessed of a fine estate in Somersetshire; and we have arrived at his house—­called Farleigh Hall—­toward the close of the hunting season.