The Belton Estate

We will now follow the other message which was sent down into Norfolk, and which did not get into Belton's hands till the Monday morning. He was sitting with his sister at break...

"I know nothing about that. Of course I am very glad that he should be out of the running, as you call it. He is a bad sort of fellow, and I didn't want him to have the property...

Clara wrote her letter to the lawyer, returning the cheque, before she would allow herself a moment to dwell upon the news of her cousin's arrival. She felt that it was necessar...

Mrs. Amedroz, the wife of Bernard Amedroz, Esq., of Belton Castle, and mother of Charles and Clara Amedroz, died when those children were only eight and six years old, thereby s...

Mr. Belton came to the castle, and nothing further had been said at the cottage about his coming. Clara had seen Mrs. Askerton in the meantime frequently, but that lady had kept...

When the carriage was driven away, Sir Anthony and Captain Aylmer were left standing alone at the hall door of the house. The servants had slunk off, and the father and son, loo...

In course of post there came an answer from Lady Aylmer, naming a day for Clara's journey to Yorkshire, and also a letter from Captain Aylmer, in which he stated that he would m...

Clara began to doubt whether any possible arrangement of the circumstances of her life could be regarded as fortunate. She was very fond, in a different degree and after a diffe...

At the time of my story there was a certain Mr. Green, a worthy attorney, who held chambers in Stone Buildings, Lincoln's Inn, much to the profit of himself and family,--and to...

Captain Aylmer had never before this knelt to Clara Amedroz. Such kneeling on the part of lovers used to be the fashion because lovers in those days held in higher value than th...

Aylmer Park and the great house of the Aylmers together formed an important, and, as regarded in some minds, an imposing country residence. The park was large, including some th...

When Clara received the letter from Captain Aylmer on which so much is supposed to hang, she made up her mind to say nothing of it to any one,--not to think of it if she could a...

Clara felt herself to be a coward as the Aylmer Park carriage, which had been sent to meet her at the station, was drawn up at Sir Anthony Aylmer's door. She had made up her min...

Easter in this year fell about the middle of April, and it still wanted three weeks of that time when Captain Aylmer started for London. Clara was quite alive to the fact that t...

Clara, when she left her accepted lover in the drawing-room and went up to her own chamber, had two hours for consideration before she would see him again;--and she had two hour...

Clara was to start by a train leaving Perivale at eight on the following morning, and therefore there was not much time for conversation before she went. During the night she ha...

The next day was necessarily very sad. Clara had declared her determination to follow her aunt to the churchyard, and did so, together with Martha, the old servant. There were t...

Clara Amedroz had received her two letters together,--that, namely, from the attorney, and that from Captain Aylmer,--and the result of those letters is already known. She accep...

For a considerable time Belton stood under the porch of the house, thinking of what had happened to him, and endeavouring to steady himself under the blow which he had received....

It had been settled for some time past that Miss Amedroz was to go to Perivale for a few days in November. Indeed it seemed to be a recognised fact in her life that she was to m...

"Why don't you call him Will?" Clara said to her father. This question was asked on the evening of that Monday on which Mr. Amedroz had given his consent as to the marriage prop...

On the first evening of their visit Captain Aylmer was very attentive to his aunt. He was quite alive to the propriety of such attentions, and to their expediency; and Clara was...

At the door of the hotel of the Great Northern Railway Station they met Captain Aylmer. Rooms had been taken there because they were to start by an early train on that line in t...

Clara Amedroz had made one great mistake about her cousin, Will Belton, when she came to the conclusion that she might accept his proffered friendship without any apprehension t...

What had Captain Aylmer meant by telling her that they might be the dearest friends--by saying so much as that, and then saying no more? Of course Clara asked herself that quest...

It was about the middle of the pleasant month of May when Clara Amedroz again made that often repeated journey to Taunton, with the object of meeting Mary Belton. She had transf...

"I suppose now, my dear, it may be considered that everything is settled about that young lady," said Lady Aylmer to her son, on the same day that Miss Amedroz left Aylmer Park.

The death of the old man at Belton Castle had been very sudden. At three o'clock in the morning Clara had been called into his room, and at five o'clock she was alone in the wor...

It was on a Sunday morning that Clara's letter reached Aylmer Park, and Frederic Aylmer found it on his plate as he took his place at the breakfast-table. Domestic habits at Ayl...

About two months after the scene described in the last chapter, when the full summer had arrived, Clara received two letters from the two lovers, the history of whose loves have...

It was full summer at Belton, and the sweet scent of the new hay filled the porch of the old house with fragrance, as Clara sat there alone with her work. Immediately before the...

A dear cousin, and safe against love-making! This was Clara's verdict respecting Will Belton, as she lay thinking of him in bed that night. Why that warranty against love-making...