Wilkie Collins

The Black Robe Wilkie Collins

"What brings you to London at this time of year?" I asked. "The fatality that pursues me," he answered grimly. "I am one of the unluckiest men living." He was thirty years old; he was not married; he was the enviable possessor of the fine old country seat, called Vange Abbey; he had no poor relations; and he was one of the handsomest men in England. When I add that I am, myself, a retired army officer, with a wretched income, a disagreeable wife, four ugly children, and a burden of fifty years on my back, no one will be surprised to hear that I answered Romayne, with bitter sincerity, in these words: "I wish to heaven I could change places with you!" "I wish to heaven you could!" he burst out, with equal sincerity on his side. "Read that." He handed me a letter addressed to him by the traveling medical attendant of Lady Berrick;