A Perfect Fool: A Novel

Chris thought this incident very strange. She pondered it in her mind, and mentioned it to her mother in a manner which showed that she considered it a suspicious one.

And all the time that she was speaking and drying her tears, Mr. Richard, without showing any anger at his capture, kept his mild eyes fixed upon her. When she looked up at him,...

“My dear, the girl’s a perfect fool. What her poor mother is going to do with her I don’t know. As for teaching, I don’t believe she knows anything herself. And as for getting m...

The next two days were days such as Mrs. Graham-Shute loved, full of bustle and confusion, and needless noise. She herself went out early in the morning to call upon the Brownes...

When the ladies left the dining-room, a spirit very different from the kindly geniality, conventionally supposed to belong to the Christmas season, reigned over the revels there...

Although Mr. Bradfield kept close watch from the study window, and saw Gilbert Wryde’s son safely out of the grounds, he was no more a match than other astute middle-aged person...

A fair, colourless, middle-aged man, under the middle height, and inclined to be stout, he was the most inoffensive-looking person in the world, and, to judge by his demeanour a...

The evening of the day following was that of the ball. Chris was in the lowest of low spirits, and would have shut herself up in her room but for Mr. Bradfield, who had insisted...

By the luckiest chance in the world (so _she_ said) there was by this time a house to be let absolutely within sight of Wyngham House. It was an ugly brand-new dwelling, built o...

Poor Mrs. Abercarne tried to look as if she didn’t mind, but the attempt was a failure. It was with uneasy hearts and troubled countenances that both she and her daughter went t...

Stupefaction, terrible, absolute, fell for one moment upon Mr. Bradfield. He thought not of common thieves; it was borne in upon him at once, with irresistible force, that the t...

Encouraged by her condescension on his first arrival, Alfred Marrable looked forward to finding daily pleasure in the society of the beautiful Miss Abercarne. Great was his disa...

Chris, much against her will, was stationed, by Mr. Bradfield’s special request, to receive the visitors. Mrs. Abercarne tried to persuade him that he himself ought to meet such...

Chris went upstairs feeling uncomfortable and unhappy. Instead of opening a way out of the awkward position in which, as she had truly said, she found herself now that the Graha...

It was two days after the interview Chris had had with Mr. Bradfield in the drawing-room, and the new music had come. Mr. Bradfield, who had on several occasions during the past...

At the first moment of finding herself alone with the madman, Chris gave herself up for lost; for he carried in his hand a formidable weapon--the table leg with which he had pro...

To have a raving lunatic under the same roof with you is an experience which appeals differently to different minds. To the middle-aged it is a fact calculated to send a “cold s...

It is sad, in these days of strong-minded girls with nerves of iron, to have to relate of poor Chris Abercarne that she fainted. No sooner had she convinced herself that it was...

To have a personal attack made upon her by a lunatic is enough to alarm the most intrepid girl. And Chris, although not a coward, not even given to hysterical attacks over black...

The doctor was troubled by the slowness of the girl’s convalescence, and by her own lack of a strong desire to get well again. He recommended change for one thing, and cheerful...

To Mrs. Abercarne’s surprise and disappointment, but very much to the relief of Chris, the ladies saw but little of Mr. Bradfield in the first days of their sojourn at Wyngham H...

Chris Abercarne had had sweethearts at every period of her young life--little boys of eight and nine had presented her, when she was of a similar age, with bull’s-eyes, half-app...

Poor Mr. Marrable was very much frightened by the effect of his words upon Chris. He rushed to the door of the room, and summoned Mrs. Abercarne with frantic cries.

Chris had jumped up from her chair in an uncontrollable impulse of terror at the sound of Mr. Bradfield’s voice, although he spoke in tones which betrayed more amusement than an...

Even Mrs. Abercarne, at the other end of the table, could see that something had gone wrong: Mr. Bradfield’s voice as he loudly assented, had not the right ring: Mr. Graham-Shut...

Wyngham House being so near, Mrs. Abercarne and her daughter had returned on foot. They had not exchanged a single word on the way. It was not until they had reached the Chinese...

It was impossible for Chris not to be struck by the change in Mr. Bradfield’s face, impossible for her to avoid the supposition that this change was caused by the sight of the s...

There was a pause, and John turned away, as if feeling that he had satisfied his companion’s thirst for information. But presently Marrable spoke again, and his manner was somew...

As soon as the ladies were in the drawing-room, Mrs. Graham-Shute returned to her point. As her daughters, used to mamma’s ways of “getting up” entertainments, were unsympatheti...

Chris walked as long as she could be seen by Donald; but as soon as she was out of his sight, she ran. Into the house, up the stairs, never taking breath until she had shut hers...

A beautiful peace had descended upon Wyngham House on the departure of the Graham-Shutes. There were no more scurryings up and down stairs on unimportant errands; no more conver...

He had been troubled by no pangs of a guilty conscience, not even by fears of an imaginary pursuer. Accusations might be made against him certainly, some of which could be suppo...

Mr. Bradfield commanded rather than invited Chris to be seated, and planted himself in a rather menacing than lover-like attitude before her. He had just remembered, luckily for...

While John Bradfield still sat in his study, turning over the papers from a locked drawer in his desk, tearing up some, and carefully putting aside others, he heard again the cr...

Chris was busy with the “properties,” which had been collected from different parts of the house, without any formality of asking Mr. Bradfield’s permission to use them. Curtain...

The next morning Chris was awakened by a stream of bright light coming between the window-curtains and when she looked out of the window, she gave a scream of delight.