A Tale of a Lonely Parish

The squire had grown used to the position in which he found himself after Mary Goddard had told him her story. He continued his visits as formerly, and it could hardly be said t...

"You have done more towards beautifying the cottage than I could have hoped to do," said Mr. Juxon, leaning back in his chair and resting one hand on Stamboul's great head.

John Short had almost finished his hard work at college. For two years and a half he had laboured on acquiring for himself reputation and a certain amount of more solid advantag...

Mr. Juxon received the vicar in the library as he had received him on the previous day; but on the present occasion Mr. Ambrose had not been sent for and the squire's face wore...

Mrs. Goddard did not mean to walk home with John; but on the other hand she did not mean to walk with the squire. She revolved the matter in her mind as she sat in the library t...

In the month of October of that year, a short time after John had taken up his abode in Trinity College, an event occurred which shook Billingsfield to its foundations; no less...

The squire had remarked that John Short seemed to have a peculiar temper, and Mrs. Goddard had observed the same thing. What has gone before sufficiently explains the change in...

In the warm June weather young Angleside went up to pass his examination for entrance at Trinity. There is nothing particularly interesting or worthy of note in that simple proc...

Mrs. Goddard's head ached "terrible bad" according to Martha, and when the vicar left her she went and lay down upon her bed, with a sensation that if the worst were not yet ove...

and tear-stained, while the beautiful waves of her brown hair had lost their habitual neatness and symmetry. The child noticed these things, with a child's quickness, but explai...

Mr. Juxon was relieved to hear that John Short had suddenly gone back to Cambridge. He had indeed meant to like him from the first and had behaved towards him with kindness and...

"Any news, my dear?" inquired Mrs. Ambrose with great suavity, as she rinsed her teacup in the bowl preparatory to repeating the dose. "Is not it time that we should hear from J...

Mrs. Goddard's heart stood still as she looked at the wretched man, and tried to discover her husband's face, even a resemblance to him, in the haggard features she saw close be...

The vicar's suspicions were more than realized and he passed an uncomfortable day after his interview with John, in debating what he ought to do, whether he ought to do anything...

John did not sleep so peacefully nor dream so happily that night as on the night before. The course of true love had not run smooth that afternoon. The squire had insisted upon...

It was late in the afternoon when Mr. Juxon walked down towards the cottage, accompanied by the vicar. In spite of their mutual anxiety to be of service to Mrs. Goddard, when th...

Doctor Longstreet was not the freethinking physician of Billingsfield. The latter was out when Mr. Juxon's groom went in search of him, and the man had driven on to the town, si...

The Reverend Augustin Ambrose would gladly have given up taking pupils. He was growing old and his sight was beginning to trouble him; he was very weary of Thucydides, of Homer,...

Events of such stirring interest as the establishment of Mrs. Goddard in Billingsfield rarely come alone; for it seems to be in the nature of great changes to bring other change...

John Short was in absolute ignorance of what was occurring. He attributed Mrs. Goddard's anxiety to her solicitude for Mr. Juxon, and if he had found time to give the matter ser...

Mrs. Ambrose kept her word and arrived with the vicar before nine o'clock, protesting her determination to take care of poor Goddard, so long as he needed any care. Mr. Juxon wa...

John's impression of Mrs. Goddard was strengthened by the scene at the vicarage at the moment of leaving. The extraordinary nervousness she betrayed, the anxiety for her welfare...

While Mr. and Mrs. Ambrose were together in the library downstairs, while John Short was waking from the short sleep he had enjoyed, and while the squire was listening in the st...

When Mr. Ambrose undertook to reason with the detective he went directly towards the study where John said the man was waiting. But Mr. Booley was beginning to suspect that the...