You dined at the table immediately on the left, if you remember. It is boxed off. I was in the inside seat of the partition next to it, the back of which is surmounted by a rail from which hangs a curtain. I give these details to show that although you could not see me, I was, in fact, literally only a few inches from you.
I was ill or I should not have stayed. As it was, I had no alternative but to overhear. Directly I was well enough to move, I went.
Marsden told you about my first book, Two Lives and a Destiny, and some of the facts of my life till I was twenty-one. Also, he made certain statements about me. The only ones of any penetration were quotations from Wrayburn. But I do not want to discuss Marsden. It is you who interest me.
You told him that a book of mine had impressed you because you felt that its author understood loneliness. You insisted on that, in spite of Marsden’s stupid protests. That interested me, but, above all, I liked you. I liked a quality that came from you.
Later, I heard how you had come here. You came to inquire about me, then—finding there was a room vacant—you took it and have remained here for weeks.
I know you have met Rosalie, Vera, and—Wrayburn. I know, therefore, that you have heard much of me. I know, too, that soon you are joining Rosalie in Italy.
But there is another, and a deeper, reason why I am writing this to you. You are mysteriously associated with the supreme event of my life—mysteriously, not intimately. You had interested me just before that event occurred—and you were the first person I heard about after I recovered consciousness.
What that event was you will learn—if you read the manuscript on which you found this letter. Do what you like with that manuscript. I am indifferent. I wrote it to save myself—and to make one thing clear. Destroy it, keep it, or send it to my publisher. But I hope that you—a stranger—will read it. That seems right somehow.
I have written this letter at lightning speed. I am leaving here in a few hours. I have not time even to read through what I have written. The manuscript, too, was written at great speed.
I do not believe that you and I will meet. I don’t know why I feel that, but I do feel it.
And yet, if you read this manuscript, we shall meet more intimately than if we took each other’s hand and looked into each other’s eyes. I am grateful to you.
Sincerely,
Ivor Trent.Rendell read this letter three times.
Then he took the manuscript and sat down by the fire.
He stared in front of him for some minutes, then started to read.
