A rolling stone

After a day of strenuous social activities, Lady Kesters was enjoying a well-earned rest, reposing at full length on a luxurious Chesterfield, with cushions of old brocade piled...

“I have very much seen him,” replied her brother, who had thrown himself into a chair; “I did a sprint across the park, because I know your ladyship cannot bear to be kept waiti...

Sir Richard Wynyard, aged fifty-six, was a little, grey, square-shouldered man, with a good heart and bad temper. His father, the notorious Sir Fulke, had put his two sons into...

As Lady Kesters motored home in her smart new Rolls-Royce, her expression was unusually grave; for once Uncle Dick had proved invulnerable, and she was overpowered with surprise...

“His nephew--his heir--a common chauffeur! Outrageous! Why not enlist, and be the King’s servant, if livery he _must_ wear?” Then, in a tone of angry sarcasm, “I see--I see his...

The train which bore Wynyard to his situation was slow, and lingered affectionately at every station; nevertheless he enjoyed the leisurely journey. He was glad to be in England...

Miss Susan preceded Owen, and as he stalked along the great flagged passage, he noted her trim, light figure, quantity of well-dressed, grizzled hair, and brisk, tripping walk,...

Wynyard strolled out into the little front garden along the red brick path to the wooden gate; as he closed this, he observed that it bore in large characters the enticing name...

As the new arrival wandered up the street, and inspected the village, he had been under the impression that the place was deserted--he scarcely saw a soul; but this was the way...

The chauffeur was informed that there were no orders for the car the following morning, as “Miss Parrett was suffering from neuralgia in her face,” and also--though this was not...

She appeared in a long fur cloak and gigantic sable stole--a shapeless bundle, resembling a well-to-do bear, with a cross human face. Susan, who, after all, was but fifty, looke...

The morning succeeding the motor’s first trip proved depressingly wet; thick mists of cold spring rain shrouded the outlook from the Manor, beat down upon the pleasure ground, a...

Mrs. Hogben had lost no time in giving her lodger explicit instructions as to what was expected of him in Ottinge! Her lecture assumed a negative form. He was not to take out an...

It was an undeniable fact that the chauffeur spent much more time in the Manor grounds than driving the car. The car was rarely used, and anything was better than loafing about...

Miss Parrett felt slightly embarrassed and uncomfortable when people remarked how seldom her motor was seen! “Was it not satisfactory?” they inquired. The old lady also recognis...

By the middle of June Miss Susan had departed to visit friends in the south of England, escorting her niece as far as London, where she was to spend some weeks with General and...

“Why, man alive, you and I were at school together! Don’t you remember your poky little room over the churchyard, and how we fagged for Toler, and played hard rackets?”

Whilst Ottinge had been dozing through lovely summer days, Aurea Morven was enjoying a certain amount of the gay London season. General and Mrs. Morven had no family--Aurea was...

Undoubtedly it was hard on Wynyard that, at a time when his own love-affair was absorbing his soul and thoughts, he should be burthened with the anxieties of another--in fact, w...

There had been an outbreak of festivities in the neighbourhood of lethargic Ottinge; the climax of these was a grand ball given by Mrs. Woolcock at Westmere, to celebrate her yo...

A long time had elapsed since a tragedy or an inquest had taken place in Ottinge; the last had occurred twenty years previously, when Joe Watkins (a village name), being jealous...

But Aurea had no intention of “telling her aunts”; on the contrary, she crossed the old bowling-green in order to avoid the Manor, and returned home across the meadows that led...

The white flowers had been gathered on Saturday in the Manor garden, and it was now Monday. Miss Parrett had adventured a drive to Westmere, returning home by four o’clock, and...

It was not the horse, but the horse’s rider that was of consequence. Where was she? What had happened? Spurred by an agony of apprehension, Wynyard ran in the direction from whi...

Jane Norris, who had been Aurea’s nurse, was now her maid and housekeeper, a most efficient individual in both capacities. Jane was a woman of fifty, with a round, fat face, a c...

Lady Kesters had removed her cap and motor coat, and was seated at the table in a careless attitude, leaning her head on her hand and smoking a cigarette. The door was exactly o...

Before Aurea had departed--and her departure was, as we know, in the nature of a flight--she had paid the necessary visit of ceremony to her Aunt Bella, who imagined herself to...

The venerable green motor, whose value by an expert had been so brutally assessed, was not considered worth repair, yet Miss Bella Parrett could not endure to part with a posses...

Miss Tottie Toye’s Renault was a beauty, and, after the old rickety green car, it afforded Wynyard a real pleasure to handle it. He took it for a trial turn to Bushey, in order...

Ten minutes later, he appeared accompanied by a clean-shaven, bullet-headed little man--with a brick-coloured complexion, sleek black hair, a pair of small, piercing grey eyes,...

Early in January Wynyard found himself on the Continent, roaming hither and thither as dictated by the caprice of his employer. First they went to Paris, then, leaving behind th...

Mrs. Ramsay’s trip to the Sunny South was accounted for by the fact that she had recently come into possession of a comfortable fortune, left to her by her godfather “in recogni...

It was evident that some kind of armistice or _pourparlers_ had been arranged between Mrs. Ramsay and her misguided young companion, for, when the General, the Rector, and Mrs....

Sir Richard Wynyard was passing through Edinburgh on his way to London; he had been shooting up in Perthshire, and found, as he drove up to Waverley Station, that he had missed...

It was dinner time in one of the larger hotels at Lossiemouth--a soft September evening, the windows stood wide, admitting the warm salt air, and above the clattering of plates...

As it was a lovely evening, many other couples were on the links or the shore, lured abroad by the beauty of the scene, the clear radiance of the northern sky, and the brillianc...