Wives and Daughters

At the present time there are few people at a public ball besides the dancers and their chaperones, or relations in some degree interested in them. But in the days when Molly an...

Roger had a great deal to think of as he turned away from looking after the carriage as long as it could be seen. The day before, he had believed that Molly had come to view all...

Mrs. Kirkpatrick had been reading aloud till Lady Cumnor fell asleep, the book rested on her knee, just kept from falling by her hold. She was looking out of the window, not see...

At ten o'clock on the eventful Thursday the Towers' carriage began its work. Molly was ready long before it made its first appearance, although it had been settled that she and...

Mr. Gibson believed that Cynthia Kirkpatrick was to return to England to be present at her mother's wedding; but Mrs. Kirkpatrick had no such intention. She was not what is comm...

The honour and glory of having a lover of her own was soon to fall to Molly's share; though, to be sure, it was a little deduction from the honour that the man who came with the...

Of course the news of Miss Gibson's approaching departure had spread through the household before the one o'clock dinner-time came; and Mr. Coxe's dismal countenance was a sourc...

The wedding went off much as such affairs do. Lord Cumnor and Lady Harriet drove over from the Towers, so the hour for the ceremony was as late as possible. Lord Cumnor came in...

During all the months that had elapsed since Mrs. Hamley's death, Molly had wondered many a time about the secret she had so unwittingly become possessed of that last day in the...

It appeared as if Mrs. Gibson's predictions were likely to be verified; for Osborne Hamley found his way to her drawing-room pretty frequently. To be sure, sometimes prophets ca...

Roger had turned over many plans in his mind, by which he thought that he could obtain sufficient money for the purpose he desired to accomplish. His careful grandfather, who ha...

On Thursday, the quiet country household was stirred through all its fibres with the thought of Roger's coming home. Mrs. Hamley had not seemed quite so well, or quite in such g...

One day, for some reason or other, Mr. Gibson came home unexpectedly. He was crossing the hall, having come in by the garden-door--the garden communicated with the stable-yard,...

For some days after the ball Cynthia seemed languid, and was very silent. Molly, who had promised herself fully as much enjoyment in talking over the past gaiety with Cynthia as...

"I wish I'd never married again," she said, now fairly crying, and looking round the room, as if in vain search for a mouse-hole in which to hide herself. Then, as if the sight...

Molly grew up among these quiet people in calm monotony of life, without any greater event than that which has been recorded--the being left behind at the Towers--until she was...

Mrs. Gibson was slow in recovering her strength after the influenza, and before she was well enough to accept Lady Harriet's invitation to the Towers, Cynthia came home from Lon...

Osborne and Roger came to the Hall; Molly found Roger established there when she returned after this absence at home. She gathered that Osborne was coming; but very little was s...

It was outbursts of affection such as these that always called Molly back, if she had been ever so unconsciously wavering in her allegiance to Cynthia. She had been wishing down...

Mrs. Gibson came back full of rose-coloured accounts of London. Lady Cumnor had been gracious and affectionate, "so touched by my going up to see her so soon after her return to...

"He's gone to bed," said he at length. "Robinson and I have got him there. But just as I was leaving him he called me back and asked me to let you stop. I'm sure I don't know--b...

When Mr. Gibson returned to Hollingford, he found an accumulation of business waiting for him, and he was much inclined to complain of the consequences of the two days' comparat...

Mr. Gibson came in rubbing his hands after his frosty ride. Molly judged from the look in his eye that he had been fully informed of the present state of things at the Hall by s...

If Molly thought that peace dwelt perpetually at Hamley Hall she was sorely mistaken. Something was out of tune in the whole establishment; and, for a very unusual thing, the co...

Affairs were going on worse at the Hall than Roger had liked to tell. Moreover, very much of the discomfort there arose from "mere manner," as people express it, which is always...

Time was speeding on; it was now the middle of August,--if anything was to be done to the house, it must be done at once. Indeed, in several ways Mr. Gibson's arrangements with...

Molly's father was not at home when she returned; and there was no one to give her a welcome. Mrs. Gibson was out paying calls, the servants told Molly. She went upstairs to her...

Cynthia was always the same with Molly: kind, sweet-tempered, ready to help, professing a great deal of love for her, and probably feeling as much as she did for any one in the...

Robinson opened the door for Molly almost before the carriage had fairly drawn up at the Hall, and told her that the Squire had been very anxious for her return, and had more th...

"If you can without fatigue, dear, do come down to dinner to-day; you'll then see the people one by one as they appear, instead of having to encounter a crowd of strangers. Holl...

"No!" said she. "That I won't. Unless I'm to leave here at once. And you know I have not another place to go to--without warning, I mean. I daresay my uncle would take me in; he...

The whole town of Hollingford came to congratulate and inquire into particulars. Some indeed--Mrs. Goodenough at the head of this class of malcontents--thought that they were de...

The conversation ended there for the time. Wedding-cake and wine were brought in, and it was Molly's duty to serve them out. But those last words of Mrs. Goodenough's tingled in...

It seemed curious enough, after the storms of the night, to meet in smooth tranquillity at breakfast. Cynthia was pale; but she talked as quietly as usual about all manner of in...

Among the "county people" (as Mrs. Gibson termed them) who called upon her as a bride, were the two young Mr. Hamleys. The Squire, their father, had done his congratulations, as...

All the rest of that day Molly was depressed and not well. Having anything to conceal was so unusual--almost so unprecedented a circumstance with her that it preyed upon her in...

"My dear Molly, why didn't you come and dine with us? I said to sister I would come and scold you well. Oh, Mr. Osborne Hamley, is that you?" and a look of mistaken intelligence...

And now it was late June; and to Molly's and her father's extreme urgency in pushing, and Mr. and Mrs. Kirkpatrick's affectionate persistency in pulling, Cynthia had yielded, an...

With his head bent down--as if he were facing some keen-blowing wind--and yet there was not a breath of air stirring--Mr. Gibson went swiftly to his own home. He rang at the doo...

Mrs. Kirkpatrick was only too happy to accept Lady Cumnor's invitation. It was what she had been hoping for, but hardly daring to expect, as she believed that the family were se...

The autumn drifted away through all its seasons. The golden corn-harvest, the walks through the stubble-fields, and rambles into hazel-copses in search of nuts; the stripping of...

Lady Cumnor had so far recovered from the violence of her attack, and from the consequent operation, as to be able to be removed to the Towers for change of air; and accordingly...

It was afternoon. Molly had gone out for a walk. Mrs. Gibson had been paying some calls. Lazy Cynthia had declined accompanying either. A daily walk was not a necessity to her a...

To begin with the old rigmarole of childhood. In a country there was a shire, and in that shire there was a town, and in that town there was a house, and in that house there was...

One day, to Molly's infinite surprise, Mr. Preston was announced as a caller. Mrs. Gibson and she were sitting together in the drawing-room; Cynthia was out--gone into the town...

Molly had her out-of-door things on, and she crept away as she was bidden. She lifted her heavy weight of heart and body along till she came to a field, not so very far off,--wh...

All Hollingford felt as if there was a great deal to be done before Easter this year. There was Easter proper, which always required new clothing of some kind, for fear of certa...

It is not to be supposed that such an encounter as Mr. Preston had just had with Roger Hamley sweetened the regards in which the two young men henceforward held each other. They...

Osborne had his solitary cup of coffee in the drawing-room. He was very unhappy too, after his fashion. He stood on the hearth-rug pondering over his situation. He was not exact...

Mr. Preston was now installed in his new house at Hollingford; Mr. Sheepshanks having entered into dignified idleness at the house of his married daughter, who lived in the coun...

The next morning saw Mrs. Gibson in a much more contented frame of mind. She had written and posted her letter, and the next thing was to keep Cynthia in what she called a reaso...

On Tuesday afternoon Molly returned home--to the home which was already strange, and what Warwickshire people would call "unked," to her. New paint, new paper, new colours; grim...

That was the way in which Mrs. Gibson first broached her intention of accompanying Cynthia up to London for a few days' visit. She had a trick of producing the first sketch of a...

Things were not going on any better at Hamley Hall. Nothing had occurred to change the state of dissatisfied feeling into which the Squire and his eldest son had respectively fa...

to show them how much I'm pleased. I shall give Clare something towards her rigging out, and they shall have a breakfast at Ashcombe Manor-house. I'll write to Preston about it....

Sixteen years before this time, all Hollingford had been disturbed to its foundations by the intelligence that Mr. Hall, the skilful doctor, who had attended them all their days...

It was a day or two afterwards, that Mr. Gibson made time to ride round by Hamley, desirous to learn more exact particulars of this scheme for Roger than he could obtain from an...

If Squire Hamley had been unable to tell Molly who had ever been thought of as her father's second wife, fate was all this time preparing an answer of a pretty positive kind to...

The evening of the day on which Mr. Gibson had been to see the Squire, the three women were alone in the drawing-room, for Mr. Gibson had had a long round and was not as yet com...

All this had taken place before Roger's first meeting with Molly and Cynthia at Miss Brownings'; and the little dinner on the Friday at Mr. Gibson's, which followed in due seque...

Mr. Gibson was not at home at dinner--detained by some patient, most probably. This was not an unusual occurrence; but it _was_ rather an unusual occurrence for Mrs. Gibson to g...

Meanwhile the love-affairs between the middle-aged couple were prospering well, after a fashion; after the fashion that they liked best, although it might probably have appeared...