Mattie:—A Stray (Vol 3 of 3)

Linger not, O novel-writer, at the helm when the ship sails into the harbour, or your readers will escape you. When the end is known, and the facts and fancies pieced together,...

Maurice Hinchford had been told by Mattie to wait in the shop until she returned; and, obedient to her mandate, he had taken his seat on a very tall, uncomfortable stool, on whi...

There are epochs in some lives when the heart cracks or hardens. When humanity, wrung to its utmost, gives way, or ossifies. Both are dangerous crises, and require more than ord...

She had settled down! Life had taken its sombre side with her; the force of circumstances had set her apart from those for whom her heart yearned; she became bound more to this...

Mr. Gray, though he had not remarked any change that was prejudicial to his daughter Mattie, was quick enough to detect the new difference in her manner. He knew then that she h...

Mattie reached Chesterfield Terrace as the clock was striking nine. Ann Packet almost shouted with alarm at the sight of the new visitor, and then looked intently over Mattie's...

Whether Sidney Hinchford gave much ulterior thought to his proposal, is a matter of some doubt. He had made up his mind before his conversation with Mr. Gray and daughter, and h...

Sidney's departure made a difference in the house; it was scarcely home without him now. Mattie and Mr. Gray took their usual places after the day's business was over, and looke...

Sidney Hinchford rose the next morning in better spirits, and Mattie in worse. Half the night in his own room Sidney had reflected on his vexatious sullenness of the preceding d...

Sidney Hinchford knew that he should miss Mattie, and accordingly made up his mind, as he thought, to the loss. But there is no making up one's mind entirely to the absence of t...

Mattie, as we are already aware, had found Mr. Wesden the sole occupant of that house in Camberwell, whither the stationer had retired from the stirring business of life. He was...

Had Harriet Wesden been less disturbed by all the trials of that day, she might have wondered more at Mattie's manner, and have guessed more shrewdly at the truth. But she had s...

It had come at last, that day of explanation. Mattie would not give way therein; she had long prepared for it, prayed for strength to sever all past ties, and leave him ignorant...

Nearly a year had passed away since the firm of Hinchford and Gray started in business and astonished the suburbs. In search of that rising firm, a young man, fresh from foreign...

Mattie dispatched her letter to Harriet that same evening; in her epistle she expressed surprise that they had not seen each other since the meeting at Dr. Bario's--should she v...

Yes, there he was, the old lover! The man whom she had once believed she should marry and make happy--whom she had valued at his just worth when he cast her off as unworthy of t...

The house wherein Sidney was waiting for the best or worst, was situated in Bayswater. A house that had been taken at Maurice's expense, and by Dr. Bario's suggestion. The Itali...

Mr. Gray and his daughter Mattie re-commenced housekeeping together on a different principle. Mattie's flitting had impressed Mr. Gray with the consciousness of his daughter pos...

Sidney Hinchford heard the door open, and knew that the end was come. In a few minutes was to be decided the tenor of his after-life. He did not move, but remained with his hand...

Harriet Wesden was strangely afraid of the old lover--what he would say to her in the first moments of meeting, whether he would speak of the past in which she had been misjudge...

Maurice Hinchford passed away from this story's scene of action. Suddenly and completely he disappeared once more, and they in the humble ranks of life knew nothing of his where...