POPULAR NOVELS
BY
_MRS. MARY J. HOLMES_.
TEMPEST AND SUNSHINE.
ENGLISH ORPHANS.
HOMESTEAD ON HILLSIDE.
’LENA RIVERS.
MEADOW BROOK.
DORA DEANE.
COUSIN MAUDE.
MARIAN GREY.
EDITH LYLE.
DAISY THORNTON (_New_).
DARKNESS AND DAYLIGHT.
HUGH WORTHINGTON.
CAMERON PRIDE.
ROSE MATHER.
ETHELYN’S MISTAKE.
MILLBANK.
EDNA BROWNING.
WEST LAWN.
MILDRED.
FORREST HOUSE (_New_).
“Mrs. Holmes is a peculiarly pleasant and fascinating writer. Her books
are always entertaining, and she has the rare faculty of enlisting the
sympathy and affections of her readers, and of holding their attention
to her pages with deep and absorbing interest.”
All published uniform with this volume. Price $1.50 each. Sold
everywhere, and sent _free_ by mail on receipt of price,
BY
G. W. CARLETON & CO., Publishers,
New York.
FORREST HOUSE.
A Novel.
BY
MRS. MARY J. HOLMES,
AUTHOR OF
TEMPEST AND SUNSHINE.—’LENA RIVERS.—DARKNESS AND DAYLIGHT.—MARIAN
GREY.—ENGLISH ORPHANS.—HUGH WORTHINGTON.—MILLBANK.—ETHELYN’S
MISTAKE.—EDNA BROWNING, ETC., ETC.
“_Longueville._—What! are you married, Beaufort!
_Beaufort._—Ay, as fast
As words, and hands, and hearts, and priest,
Could make us.” BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER.
[Illustration]
NEW YORK:
_G. W. Carleton & Co., Publishers_,
MADISON SQUARE.
MDCCCLXXIX.
COPYRIGHT, 1879,
BY
DANIEL HOLMES.
[_All Rights Reserved._]
SAMUEL STODDER,
STEREOTYPER,
90 ANN STREET, N. Y.
TROW
PRINTING AND BOOK-BINDING CO.
N. Y.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER PAGE
I. TWO LETTERS 7
II. DR. MATTHEWSON 10
III. THE MOCK MARRIAGE 19
IV. THE FORREST HOUSE 27
V. BEATRICE BELKNAP 37
VI. MOTHER AND SON 44
VII. JOSEPHINE 56
VIII. EVERARD 61
IX. THE RESULT 67
X. HUSBAND AND WIFE 84
XI. AFTER TWO YEARS 90
XII. COMMENCEMENT 95
XIII. THE RECEPTION 100
XIV. TWO MONTHS 108
XV. THE HOUSE OF CARDS BEGINS TO FALL 111
XVI. THE HOUSE OF CARDS GOES DOWN 122
XVII. THE NEXT DAY 129
XVIII. THE SHADOW OF DEATH 135
XIX. THE JUDGE’S WILL 142
XX. THE HEIRESS 150
XXI. A MIDNIGHT RIDE 160
XXII. THE NEW LIFE AT ROTHSAY 166
XXIII. BEE’S FAMILY 176
XXIV. IN THE SUMMER 196
XXV. MRS. FLEMING’S BOARDERS 203
XXVI. JOSEPHINE’S CONFIDENCE 212
XXVII. EVENTS OF ONE YEAR AT THE FORREST HOUSE 218
XXVIII. SOMETHING DOES HAPPEN 225
XXIX. MRS. J. E. FORREST 232
XXX. HOW ROSSIE BORE THE NEWS 240
XXXI. MRS. FORREST’S POLICY 243
XXXII. WHAT THE PEOPLE SAID AND DID 252
XXXIII. EVERARD FACES IT 254
XXXIV. EVERARD AND ROSSIE 259
XXXV. MR. AND MRS. J. E. FORREST 263
XXXVI. ROSAMOND’S DECISION 273
XXXVII. MATTERS ARE ADJUSTED 277
XXXVIII. “WAITING AND WATCHING FOR ME” 283
XXXIX. HOW THE TIDE EBBED AND FLOWED IN ROTHSAY 288
XL. DR. MATTHEWSON’S GAME 292
XLI. HOW THE GAME WAS PLAYED 296
XLII. ALAS, POOR ROSSIE! 318
XLIII. THE LETTERS 323
XLIV. THE NEW HEIR 327
XLV. THE NEW REIGN AT THE FORREST HOUSE 336
XLVI. THE LETTER FROM AUSTRIA 343
XLVII. AGNES FINDS THE LETTER 348
XLVIII. LA MAISON DE SANTE 356
XLIX. THE ESCAPE 364
L. GOING HOME 370
LI. BREAKING THE NEWS AT THE FORREST HOUSE 373
LII. BREAKING THE NEWS TO EVERARD 377
LIII. THE ARREST 383
LIV. TELLING THE TRUTH TO ROSSIE 387
LV. CONCLUSION 389
THE FORREST HOUSE.
CHAPTER I.
TWO LETTERS.
The first, a small half-sheet, inclosed in a large thick envelope, and
addressed in a childish, unformed hand to Mr. James Everard Forrest,
Junior, Ellicottville, Berkshire County, Massachusetts, with a request
in the lower left-hand corner for the postmaster to forward immediately;
the second, a dainty little perfumed missive, with a fanciful monogram,
directed in a plain round hand to J. Everard Forrest, Esq.,
Ellicottville, Mass., with the words “in haste” written in the corner.
Both letters were in a hurry, and both found their way together to a
brown-haired, brown-eyed, brown-faced young man, who sat under the
shadow of the big maple tree on the Common in Ellicottville, lazily
puffing his cigar and fanning himself with his Panama hat, for the
thermometer was ninety in the shade, and the hour 10 A. M. of a sultry
July day. At first it was almost too much exertion to break the seals,
and for a moment J. Everard Forrest, Jr., toyed with the smaller
envelope of the two, and studied the handwriting.
“I may as well see what Josey wants of me _in haste_,” he said at last,
and breaking the seal, he read:
“HOLBURTON, July 15.
“DEAR NED: You must come to-morrow on the four o’clock train.
Everything has gone at sixes and sevens, for just at the very last
Mrs. Murdock, who has been dying for twenty years or more, must really
die, and the Murdock boys can’t act, so you must take the character of
the bridegroom in the play where I am to be the bride. You will have
very little to say. You can learn it all in fifteen minutes, but you
must come to-morrow so as to rehearse with us once at least. Now,
don’t you _dare_ fail. I shall meet you at the station.
“Yours lovingly,
“JOSEPHINE FLEMING.
“P. S.—Do you remember I wrote you in my last of a Dr. Matthewson, who
has been in town a few days stopping at the hotel? He has consented to
be the priest on condition that _you_ are the bridegroom, so do not
fail me.
Again, with love, JOE.”
“And so this is my lady’s great haste,” the young man said, as he
finished reading the letter. “She wants me for her bridegroom, and I
don’t know but I’m willing, so I guess I’ll have to go; and now for
Rossie’s interesting document, which must be ‘forwarded immediately.’ I
only wish it may prove to have money in it from the governor, for I am
getting rather low.”
So saying he took the other letter and examined it carefully, while a
smile broke over his face as he continued:
“Upon my word, Rossie did not mean this to go astray, and has written
everything out in full, even to Massachusetts and Junior. Good for her.
But how crooked; why, that junior stands at an angle of several degrees
above the Mr. Rossie ought to do better. She must be nearly thirteen;
but she’s a nice little girl, and I’ll see what she says.”
What she said was as follows:
“FORREST HOUSE, July 14th.
“MR. EVERARD FORREST:
“_Dear Sir_:—Nobody knows I am writing to you, but your mother has
been worse for a few days, and keeps talking about you even in her
sleep. She did not say send for you, but I thought if you knew how bad
she was, you would perhaps come home for a part of your vacation. It
will do her so much good to see you. I am very well and your father
too. So no more at present.
“Yours respectfully,
“ROSAMOND HASTINGS.
“P. S.—Miss Beatrice Belknap has come home from New York, and had the
typhoid fever, and lost every speck of her beautiful hair. You don’t
know how funny she looks! She offered me fifty dollars for mine to
make her a wig, because it curls naturally, and is just her color, but
I would not sell it for the world: would you? Inclosed find ten
dollars of my very own money, which I send you to come home with,
thinking you might need it. Do not fail to come, will you?
“ROSAMOND.”
Everard read this letter twice, and smoothed out the crisp ten-dollar
bill, which was carefully wrapped in a separate bit of paper. It was not
the first time he had received money in his sore need from the girl, for
in a blank-book, which he always carried in his pocket, were several
entries, as follows: “Jan. 2, from Rosamond Hastings, five dollars:
March 4th, two dollars: June 8th, one dollar,” and so on until the whole
amount was more than twenty dollars, but never before had she sent him
so large a sum as now, and there was a moisture in his eyes and his
breath came heavily as he put it away in his purse, and said:
“There never was so unselfish a creature as Rossie Hastings. She is
always thinking of somebody else. And I am a mean, contemptible dog to
take her money as I do; but then, I honestly intend to pay her back
tenfold when I have something of my own.”
Thus reassuring himself, he put his purse in his pocket, and glancing
again at Rossie’s letter his eye fell upon Miss Belknap’s name, and he
laughed aloud as he said: “Poor bald Bee Belknap. She must look comical.
I can imagine how it hurts her pride. Buy Rossie’s hair, indeed! I
should think not, when that is her only beauty, if I except her eyes,
which are too large for her thin face; but that will round out in time,
and Rossie may be a beauty yet, though not like Josey; no, never like
Josey.”
And that brought the young man back to Miss Fleming’s letter, and its
imperative request. Could he comply with it now? Ought he not to go at
once to the sick mother, who was missing him so sadly, and who had made
all the happiness he had ever known at home? Duty said yes, but
inclination drew him to Holburton and the fair Josephine, with whom he
believed himself to be and with whom he was, perhaps, as much in love as
any young man of twenty well can be. Perhaps Rossie had been unduly
alarmed; at all events, if his mother were so very sick, his father
would write, of course, and on the whole he believed he should go to
Holburton by the afternoon train, and then, perhaps, go home.
And so the die was cast, and the young man walked to the telegraph
office and sent across the wires to Miss Josephine Fleming the three
words: “I will come.”