Second Period First Narrative - Chapter VII
is left to me but to pass over Lady Verinder's death with the simple
announcement of the fact which ends my fifth chapter.
Keeping myself for the future strictly within the limits of my own
personal experience, I have next to relate that a month elapsed from the
time of my aunt's decease before Rachel Verinder and I met again. That
meeting was the occasion of my spending a few days under the same roof
with her. In the course of my visit, something happened, relative to
her marriage-engagement with Mr. Godfrey Ablewhite, which is important
enough to require special notice in these pages. When this last of
many painful family circumstances has been disclosed, my task will be
completed; for I shall then have told all that I know, as an actual (and
most unwilling) witness of events.
My aunt's remains were removed from London, and were buried in the
little cemetery attached to the church in her own park. I was invited to
the funeral with the rest of the family. But it was impossible (with my
religious views) to rouse myself in a few days only from the shock which
this death had caused me. I was informed, moreover, that the rector of
Frizinghall was to read the service. Having myself in past times seen
this clerical castaway making one of the players at Lady Verinder's
whist-table, I doubt, even if I had been fit to travel, whether I should
have felt justified in attending the ceremony.
