Aldyth's inheritance

MRS. BLAND'S house stood in the High Street of the little town of Woodham. It was an old-fashioned, sedate-looking house, with a bow-window projecting on each side of the front...

THE house in which Aldyth Lorraine lived with her aunt was scarcely ten minutes' walk from Mrs. Bland's. The High Street took a turn just above the Blands' door, and winding rou...

ALDYTH rose early the next morning, that her letter might be finished and posted ere the morning mail went out. The clock had not long struck seven, when she threw wide her case...

MISS LORRAINE succeeded in creating an interest in the literature lectures, and carried out her project with little difficulty, though not without encountering opposition. There...

ALDYTH and Hilda were very busy during the next few days. They were writing their essays on the "Characteristics of Eighteenth Century Poetry," and whenever they met, they discu...

ALDYTH came in fresh and bright from her ride, and her entrance seemed to bring a breath of new life into the dreary old house. She was delighted with the mare, and declared tha...

ALDYTH was feeling more out of temper than perhaps she had ever felt before. It was Thursday evening, and Miss Lorraine had gone to the lecture, leaving her alone. She had yield...

"MOTHER, is it true?" asked Charlie Bland, one afternoon in the following week, as he burst into the dining room, swinging a strapful of books. "Is it true that Mr. Glynne going...

JOHN GLYNNE would have been surprised could he have known how little Aldyth had enjoyed that ride with her cousin. She had been conscious of something unusual in Guy's manner to...

THE party given in honour of Hilda's coming of age was an evening party of the good old-fashioned sort. Mrs. Bland's guests began to arrive about seven, and they knew that they...

ONE of Aldyth's chief thoughts when she woke in the morning was that the morrow would be Christmas Day, and that she and her aunt were to dine, as usual, at Wyndham Hall. The pr...

IT was the last day of the year. A thaw had set in and disappointed the skaters, but now the ground was again hard with frost, and a cold, grey sky seemed to presage snow. Early...

ON the afternoon of New Year's Day, Aldyth, coming down the London Road, met Kitty Bland and Gwendolen, then at home for her holidays, on their way to the river, carrying their...

A FORTNIGHT later, on a raw, gloomy afternoon, Aldyth and her aunt stepped from a train on to the platform of Liverpool Street Station. A telegram received late on the previous...

"When we get into our own house, we shall have more time with each other, darling," her mother would say with a smile and caress, and then drive away with her husband and Gladys...

Gladys was always good-natured and bright; there was something very charming in her pretty, careless ways. It was impossible to help loving her, and yet after she had lived with...

THREE days had passed since Aldyth received Hilda's letter. Her aunt had sent her a full account of what had happened, and a few curt, but not unkind, words from her uncle had a...

CAPTAIN WALKER came to help to entertain the factory girls—not once only, but several times. He endured with a good grace hearing himself described as "the man with the fiddle,"...

Some hours had passed since the squire breathed his last, and she was with Mr. Ralph Greenwood in the old-fashioned library. The blinds were down, and even the outside venetians...

She had but just finished breakfast. Guy apparently had breakfasted earlier, for he stood before her, hat and stick in hand. And now Aldyth perceived that his dog-cart stood at...

ALDYTH did not remain at Wyndham for more than a week after her uncle's death. There was something oppressive in the quietness of the old house, where Guy's gay voice and whistl...

Hilda Bland was the speaker, and as she spoke, she turned her head on the pillow, so that her sister could see no more of her than a mass of loosened, disordered hair. Kitty sto...

IT was shocking and terrible news Mrs. Stanton had received by telegram from Melbourne earlier in that day. The firm of Stanton Bros. had come to utter bankruptcy, such as reduc...

THESE words were in Aldyth's mind as she sprang up the next morning. The new duty which had come to her, the duty of making a home for her mother and sisters, and doing all in h...

MRS. STANTON sat alone in the drawing room for an hour after the others had driven away. Aldyth had converted this into a very pretty room. Even Mrs. Stanton could find no fault...

ON the following morning Aldyth found her mother looking white and worn. And in response to her daughters anxious questioning, she confessed that she had hardly slept at all dur...

IT was not surprising that Mrs. Stanton should seem sorely depressed after the arrival of the mail from Australia. The news it brought was of the worst. The bankruptcy of the la...

THE stroke of calamity which had fallen on her home roused Hilda Bland to an awful sense of the realities of life. She had been living in selfish dreams, nursing a sickly sentim...

MRS. STANTON came home looking little better for her month's stay in town. Her face had still a worn and harassed look, and she responded in a fretful tone to Aldyth's loving gr...

The speaker was Mr. Ralph Greenwood, and he was alighting from a chaise at the entrance to Wyndham. Aldyth had just stepped into the road from a field to the left, and he chose...

"DEAR Guy,—Will you call to see me as early as possible to-morrow? A fact has come to my knowledge which is of importance to you, and you should know it without delay.

"ALDYTH, I want to have a talk with you," said Gladys, that night, following Aldyth into her room as they were about to retire to rest; "I hope you are not very sleepy."