The moat house

"JOY, I wish you'd put down that stupid book, and talk! You can't think how curious I feel! And how you can sit there reading so quietly when mother's in the next room with that...

MRS. Wallis had told Mr. Tillotson she must have a week in which to consider her uncle's invitation, and during that time she wrote to several of her husband's relations asking...

THE bright May sunshine shone upon the Moat House with its ivy-clad walls, and peeped into the library where Sir Jasper Amery was seated, pen in hand, before his writing-table....

NOT more than five minutes' walk from the entrance to the grounds of the Moat House was a six-roomed, thatched cottage, called Home Vale, standing back from the high road, from...

The speaker was Sir Jasper Amery, who encountered Celia and Joy in the garden a few evenings after Miss Pring had commenced her duties at the Moat House. He leaned heavily upon...

"I AM expecting visitors this afternoon," Sir Jasper announced at the breakfast-table one Saturday morning. "Tillotson is coming to see me on business, and I have asked him to s...

THE Moat House was situated about half-a-mile from Crumleigh, a little village which consisted of one straggling street and one old church surrounded by a small bury-ground. The...

MRS. WALLIS was far from being desirous that Lulu Tillotson should become very friendly with her young daughters; but, when the lawyer, before bidding her farewell on Monday mor...

IN a corner of the rock garden at the Moat House was a rustic seat beneath an arbour, where Celia sat one warm, July evening, her fair head bent over a limp, paper-covered volum...

SIR JASPER had never taken as much notice of Joy as of Celia, though he had been pleased when the former had learnt his favourite piece of music, and had on several occasions ca...

IT was with deep concern that Mrs. Wallis I noted that Sir Jasper appeared to have taken a dislike to her younger daughter; and as she had not the faintest idea that he believed...

ERIC had not gone far beyond the grounds of the Moat House when he encountered Mr. Cole, the Vicar of Crumleigh, who drew up, and addressed him with a smiling: "Good evening."

THE Vicarage at Crumleigh was situated at one end of the straggling village street. It was a modern, red-brick building with bay windows in front; and had been built on the site...

MRS. Wallis and her children always breakfasted by themselves in the sitting-room in the east wing, for Sir Jasper did not, as a rule, rise till after ten o'clock. The meal was...

A WEEK had elapsed since Mrs. Wallis and Celia had driven into T— to make their purchases, and the latter had everything in readiness for her visit. To-morrow she was to say goo...

ALTHOUGH Eric now had his great chum within only half-a-mile of the Moat House, he did not, on that account, neglect his favourite sister, and managed so that she should be incl...

THE morning of the T— flower show dawned clear and bright, with the promise of a cloudless day. It would have been oppressively hot but for the breeze which sprang up about noon...

"THE weather is hopeless, there's no doubt about that," said Lulu Tillotson, as she lolled on a sofa in her bedroom, on the afternoon subsequent to the flower show. "What a good...

WHEN Celia first discovered her loss, she was too shocked to utter a sound. She dropped into a chair and covered her face with her hands whilst she tried to collect her thoughts...

"SO to-morrow your sister returns," remarked Miss Pring. She was nipping the dead roses from around the porch at Home Vale whilst she talked to Joy Wallis, who stood by watching...

JOY rose on the following morning with the exhilarating sensation that something very pleasant had happened. Sir Jasper's disbelief in her integrity had been the one cloud on th...

Sir Jasper, who was seated before his writing-table in the library, dropped his pen and looked up at the speaker—Mrs. Mallock—in sudden alarm, for she had burst into the room li...

ERIC was up betimes the morning following the carriage accident; and seven o'clock found him at the Vicarage hearing the latest news of the invalid, which was anything but reass...

"I AM sorry the holidays are so nearly at an end," Lawrence Puttenham remarked one evening, as he strolled back to the Moat House with Eric. He was to return to London on the fo...

It was twelve o'clock on the morning subsequent to the fire, and Sir Jasper, seated in his favourite easy chair in the library, had composed himself sufficiently to glance at th...

IT was Sunday evening; and all the members of the Vicarage household were at church with the exception of Mrs. Wallis and her little invalid daughter. Joy lay on a sofa in the d...

IT was a hot day towards the end of July; and a fast train from London was speeding westwards, bearing among its passengers three young people going home for the holidays—namely...