Mrs. Craddock

Next day, after luncheon, Miss Ley retired to the drawing-room and unpacked the books which had just arrived from Mudie. She looked through them, and read a page here and there...

“Upon my word, I think that Providence is behaving scandalously. Am I not a harmless middle-aged woman who mind my own business; what have I done to deserve these shocks?”

But if the human soul, or the heart, or the mind--call it what you will--is an instrument upon which countless melodies may be played, it is capable of responding for very long...

With old and young great sorrow is followed by a sleepless night, and with the old great joy is as disturbing; but youth, I suppose, finds happiness more natural and its rest is...

Time passed slowly, slowly. Bertha wrapped her pride about her like a cloak, but sometimes it seemed too heavy to bear and she nearly fainted. The restraint which she imposed up...

Exactly one month after her twenty-first birthday, as Bertha had announced, the marriage took place; and the young couple started off to spend their honeymoon in London. Bertha,...

But in the winter of that very year Edward, while hunting, had an accident. For years he had made a practice of riding unmanageable horses, and he never heard of a vicious beast...

The Kentish coast is bleak and grey between Leanham and Blackstable; through the long winter months the winds of the North Sea sweep down upon it, bowing the trees before them;...

But the love which had taken such despotic possession of Bertha’s nature could not be overthrown by any sudden means. When she recovered her health and was able to resume her ha...

But the apathy with which for weeks Bertha had looked upon all terrestrial concerns was passing away before her increasing strength. It had been due only to an utter physical we...

The passion to analyse the casual fellow-creature was the most absorbing vice that Miss Ley possessed; and no ties of relationship or affection (the two go not invariably togeth...

Some days later, after the due preliminaries which Mrs. Branderton would on no account have neglected, the Craddocks received an invitation to dinner. Bertha silently passed it...

For days Bertha was overwhelmed with grief. She thought always of the dead child that had never lived, and her heart ached. But above all she was tormented by the idea that all...

“He was as quiet as a lamb,” he said. “I could ride him with my arms tied behind my back; and as to jumping--he takes a five-barred gate in his stride.”

_Dear Edward,--I think we were wise to part. We were too unsuited to one another, and our difficulties could only have increased. The knot of marriage between two persons of dif...

Bertha and Miss Ley passed a troubled night, while Edward, of course, after much exercise and a hearty dinner, slept the sleep of the just and of the pure at heart. Bertha was n...

If the gods, who scatter wit in sundry unexpected places, so that it is sometimes found beneath the bishop’s mitre and, once in a thousand years, beneath a king’s crown, had giv...

At last Gerald had but one day more. A long-standing engagement of Bertha and Miss Ley forced him to take leave of them early, for he started from London at seven in the morning.

But Edward was certainly not an ardent lover. Bertha could not tell when first she had noticed his irresponsiveness; at the beginning she had known only that she loved her husba...

Bertha still felt on her hands Gerald’s passionate kisses, like little patches of fire; and on her lips was still the touch of his boyish mouth. What magic current had passed fr...

Bertha surrendered herself completely to the enjoyment of her love. Her sanguine temperament never allowed her to do anything half-heartedly, and she took no care now to conceal...

They stood for a while on a terrace overlooking the river by the side of the hospital. Immediately below, a crowd of boys were bathing, animated and noisy, chasing and ducking o...

But after Easter Miss Ley proposed that they should travel slowly back to England. Bertha had dreaded the suggestion, not only because she regretted to leave Rome, but still mor...

Bertha went home, fuming, knowing perfectly well that Edward had really given the orders which she had countermanded, but glad of the chance to have a final settlement of rights...

Bertha’s imagination seldom permitted her to see things in anything but a false light; sometimes they were pranked out in the glamour of the ideal, while at others the process w...

With the summer Edward began to teach Bertha lawn-tennis; and in the long evenings, when he had finished his work and changed into the flannels which suited him so well, they pl...

The nurse arrived, bringing new apprehension. She was an old woman who, for twenty years, had helped the neighbouring gentry into the world; and she had a copious store of ghast...

Bertha’s relief was unmistakable when she landed on English soil; at last she was near Edward, and she had been extremely sea-sick. Though it was less than thirty miles from Dov...

This book might be called also _The Triumph of Love_. Bertha was looking out of window, at the bleakness of the day. The sky was sombre and the clouds heavy and low; the neglect...

With swinging step Bertha returned to the house, and like a swarm of birds a hundred amorets flew about her head; Cupid leapt from tree to tree and shot his arrows into her will...

The youth’s outspoken admiration could not fail to increase her liking; and she was amused by the stare of his green eyes, which, with a woman’s peculiar sense, she felt even wh...

And so the Craddocks began their journey along the great road nowhither which is called the Road of Holy Matrimony. The spring came, and with it a hundred new delights; Bertha w...

Bertha threw off her troubled looks and the vexation which the argument had caused her. She blushed charmingly as the door opened, and with the entrance of the fairy prince her...

Alone in her room once more, memories of the past crowded upon her. The last years fled from her mind and Bertha saw vividly again the first days of her love, the visit to Edwar...

Edward Craddock was a strong man, also unimaginative. Driving through the night to Tercanbury he did not give way to distressing thoughts, but easily kept his anxiety within pro...

When Lord Roseberry makes a speech, even the journals of his own party report him in the first person and at full length; and this is said to be the politician’s supreme ambitio...