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Place the will of the late baronet in my hands, and before this day month you shall be my wife and mistress of the the manor." "And should I survive you," she said, "Vellenaux and its broad lands "
It was pleasant to listen to the cool, gurgling sound of the brawling brook, whose bright waters skipped, danced and glittered, as they forced their way over the pebbles and other impediments in their serpentine course along the shady dell that skirted the Home Park, wherein, under the venerable oaks, the red and fallow deer rested, dreamily sniffing the delicious fragrance that pervaded the air, borne upon the light summer wind from the rich parterre which stretched the entire length of the south wing at Vellenaux.
Jack Frost, with his usual attendant and companion, snow, heralded the approach of old Father Christmas, who filed an appearance at Vellenaux on the morning of the twenty-fifth of December, and right heartily was the old fellow welcomed.
Yet it must not be imagined that she was ungrateful or the less thankful to her kind protectors, the Bartons, for she could now well realize what might have been her situation had she been compelled to act upon the plan that had first suggested itself to her on leaving Vellenaux that of becoming a governess or companion to some antiquated Dowager in Europe. The repeated assurances from Mrs.
He knew her great ambition, and that the sole object of her life was to become mistress of Vellenaux, and to gain this she would risk everything. It was her weak point, the only vulnerable part he could attack with any hope of success.
The lawyer and the Baronet had been upon terms of intimacy for several years prior to the marriage, and Sir Jasper being a bachelor saw no objection to his friend's wife visiting Vellenaux, although she had, as he would facetiously observe, risen from the ranks. The lady in question was, at eighteen, tall, pretty and ambitious.
With such zeal and good will did the lawyers on both sides work, that in less than three months from the death of Sir Ralph Coleman, Edith was in possession of Vellenaux, and Arthur had been recognized and installed as Earl of Castlemere, and master of Carlton Abbey, that being the name of the estate in Nottinghamshire, where the old Earl died.
Having carried her point and thus secured for herself a comfortable income, together with a handsome suite of apartments within the walls of Vellenaux, which she very naturally concluded would be a permanent home, at least during the life of Sir Ralph, he being completely in her power, as she could at any time, by the production of the late Baronet's will, drive him ignominiously from his present luxurious abode.
The grey-headed old Butler had been at Vellenaux since he was a lad of fourteen, and had known Colonel Effingham, who had frequently, prior to leaving the service, visited his old companion-in-arms, Sir Jasper Coleman, at his favorite residence, felt much concerned that the niece of his old master should have been left unprovided for.
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