5th, and Lady Glyde was not to arrive in London till the
26th!

I was stunned. Meditate on that. Fosco stunned!

It was too late to retrace our steps. Before my return the doctor had
officiously undertaken to save me all trouble by registering the death,
on the date when it happened, with his own hand. My grand scheme,
unassailable hitherto, had its weak place now--no efforts on my part
could alter the fatal event of the 25th. I turned manfully to the
future. Percival's interests and mine being still at stake, nothing
was left but to play the game through to the end. I recalled my
impenetrable calm--and played it.

On the morning of the 26th Percival's letter reached me, announcing his
wife's arrival by the midday train. Madame Rubelle also wrote to say
she would follow in the evening. I started in the fly, leaving the
false Lady Glyde dead in the house, to receive the true Lady Glyde on
her arrival by the railway at three o'clock. Hidden under the seat of
the carriage, I carried with me all the clothes Anne Catherick had worn
on coming into my house--they were destined to assist the resurrection
of the woman who was dead in the person of the woman who was living.
What a situation! I suggest it to the rising romance writers of
England. I offer it, as totally new, to the worn-out dramatists of
France.

Lady Glyde was at the station. There was great crowding and confusion,
and more delay than I liked (in case any of her friends had happened to
be on the spot), in reclaiming her luggage. Her first questions, as we
drove off, implored me to tell her news of her sister. I invented news
of the most pacifying kind, assuring her that she was about to see her
sister at my house. My house, on this occasion only, was in the
neighbourhood of Leicester Square, and was in the occupation of
Monsieur Rubelle, who received us in the hall.

I took my visitor upstairs into a back room, the two medical gentlemen
being there in waiting on the floor beneath to see the patient, and to
give me their certificates. After quieting Lady Glyde by the necessary
assurances about her sister, I introduced my friends separately to her
presence. They performed the formalities of the occasion briefly,
intelligently, conscientiously. I entered the room again as soon as
they had left it, and at once precipitated events by a reference of the
alarming kind to "Miss Halcombe's" state of health.

Results followed as I had anticipated.