



Produced by Suzanne Shell, Cathy Maxam, and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
file was produced from images generously made available
by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)









   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.
  CHATEAU D'OR.
  QUEENIE HETHERTON.
  BESSIE'S FORTUNE.
  DARKNESS AND DAYLIGHT.
  HUGH WORTHINGTON.
  CAMERON PRIDE.
  ROSE MATHER.
  ETHELYN'S MISTAKE.
  MILBANK.
  EDNA BROWNING.
  WEST LAWN.
  MILDRED.
  FORREST HOUSE.
  MADELINE.
  CHRISTMAS STORIES.
  GRETCHEN (_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."


G.W. DILLINGHAM, PUBLISHER,

  SUCCESSOR TO

G.W. CARLETON & Co., New York.




    GRETCHEN.

    A Novel.


      BY

MRS. MARY J. HOLMES,


    AUTHOR OF

  TEMPEST AND SUNSHINE.--DARKNESS AND DAYLIGHT.--MILBANK.--ENGLISH
  ORPHANS.--'LENA RIVERS.--ETHELYN'S MISTAKE.--HUGH
  WORTHINGTON.--MADELINE.--WEST LAWN.--EDNA
  BROWNING.--MARIAN GREY.--BESSIE'S
  FORTUNE, ETC.


[Illustration]


  NEW YORK

  _G.W. Dillingham, Publisher_,
  SUCCESSOR TO G.W. CARLETON & CO.

  LONDON: S. LOW, SON & CO.
  MDCCCLXXXVII.




  COPYRIGHT, 1887,
  BY DANIEL HOLMES.
  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

  STEREOTYPED BY
  SAMUEL STODDER,
  42 DEY STREET, N.Y.




CONTENTS.


CHAPTER                 PAGE

      I. The Telegram      9

     II. Arthur Tracy      12

    III. Mr. and Mrs. Frank Tracy      19

     IV. Getting Accustomed to It      24

      V. At the Park      32

     VI. The Cottage in the Lane      38

    VII. The Party      45

   VIII. Arthur      48

     IX. Who is Gretchen?      60

      X. Arthur Settles Himself      72

     XI. The Storm      78

    XII. The Tramp House      87

   XIII. The Woman      94

    XIV. Little Jerry      108

     XV. Jerry at the Park      114

    XVI. The Funeral, and After      122

   XVII. "Mr. Crazyman, Do You Want Some Cherries?"      131

  XVIII. Arthur and Jerry      139

    XIX. Arthur's Plan      158

     XX. The Working of Arthur's Plan      164

    XXI. Mrs. Tracy's Diamonds      175

   XXII. Searching For the Diamonds      184

  XXIII. Arthur's Letter      198

   XXIV. Ten Years Later      209

    XXV. The Two Faces in the Mirror      216

   XXVI. Maude's Letter      224

  XXVII. "He Cometh Not," She Said      230

 XXVIII. In Shannondale      237

   XXIX. Why Harold Did Not Go to Vassar      249

    XXX. The Walk Home      258

   XXXI. At Home      264

  XXXII. The Next Day      269

 XXXIII. At the Park House      283

  XXXIV. Under the Pines with Tom      287

   XXXV. The Garden Party      293

  XXXVI. Out in the Storm      301

 XXXVII. Under the Pines with Dick      307

XXXVIII. At Le Bateau      312

  XXXIX. Maude      326

     XL. "Do You Know What You Have Done?"      336

    XLI. What Jerrie Found under the Floor      341

   XLII. Harold and the Diamonds      352

  XLIII. Harold and Jerrie      366

   XLIV. Jerrie Clears Harold      372

    XLV. What Followed      379

   XLVI. The Letters      382

  XLVII. Arthur      389

 XLVIII. What They were Doing and had Done in Shannondale      393

   XLIX. Telling Arthur      404

      L. The Flower Fadeth      416

     LI. Under the Pines with Harold      422

    LII. "For Better, For Worse."      427

   LIII. After Two Years      441




GRETCHEN.




CHAPTER I.

THE TELEGRAM.


    "BREVOORT HOUSE, NEW YORK, Oct. 6th, 18--.

    "To Mr. Frank Tracy, of Tracy Park, Shannondale.

    "I arrived in the Scotia this morning, and shall take the train for
    Shannondale at 3 P.M. Send some one to the station to meet us.

    "ARTHUR TRACY."

This was the telegram which the clerk in the Shannondale office received
one October morning, and dispatched to the Hon. Frank Tracy, of Tracy
Park, in the quiet town of Shannondale, where our story opens.

Mr. Frank Tracy, who, since his election to the State Legislature for
two successive terms, had done nothing except to attend political
meetings and make speeches on all public occasions, had an office in
town, where he usually spent his mornings, smoking, reading the papers,
and talking to Mr. Colvin, his business agent and lawyer, for, though
born in one of the humblest New England houses, where the slanting roof
almost touched the ground in the rear, and he could scarcely stand
upright in the chamber where he slept, Mr. Frank Tracy was a man of
leisure now, and as he dashed along the turnpike in his handsome
carriage, with his driver beside him, people looked admiringly after
him, and pointed him out to strangers as the Hon. Mr. Tracy, of Tracy
Park, one of the finest places in the county. It is true it did not
belong to him, but he had lived there so long that he looked upon it as
his, while his neighbors, too, seemed to have forgotten that there was a
Mr. Arthur Tracy, who might at any time come home to claim his own and
demand an account of his brother's stewardship. And it was this Arthur
Tracy, whose telegram announcing his return from Europe was read by his
brother with feelings of surprise and consternation.

"Not that everything isn't fair and above board, and he is welcome to
look into matters as much as he likes," Frank said to himself, as he sat
staring at the telegram, while the cold chills ran up and down his back
and arms. "Yes, he can examine all Colvin's books; he will find them
straight as a string, and didn't he tell me to take what I thought right
as remuneration for looking after his property while he was gallivanting
over the world; and if he objects that I have taken too much, I can at
once transfer those investments in my name to him. No, it is not that
which affects me so; it is the suddenness of the thing, coming without
warning, and to night of all nights, when the house will be full of
carousing and champagne. What will Dolly say? Hysterics, of course, if
not a sick headache. I don't believe I can face her till she has had a
little time to brace up. Here, boy, I want you!" and he rapped on the
window at a young lad who happened to be passing with a basket on his
arm. "I want you to do an errand for me," he continued, as the boy
entered the office and, removing his cap, stood respectfully before him.
"Take this telegram to Mrs. Tracy, and here is a dime for you."

"Thank you; but I don't care for the money," the boy said. "I was going
to the park anyway to tell Mrs. Tracy that grandma is sick and can't go
there to-night."

"Sick! What is the matter?" Mr. Tracy asked, in dismay, feeling that
here was a fresh cause of trouble and worry for his wife.

"She catched cold yesterday fixing up mother's grave," the boy replied;
and, as if the mention of that grave had sent Mr. Tracy's thoughts
straying backward to the past, he looked thoughtfully at the child for a
moment, and then said:

"How old are you, Harold?"

"Ten, last August," was the reply; and Mr. Tracy continued:

"You do not remember your mother?"

"No, sir; only a great crowd, and grandma crying so hard," was Harold's
reply.

"You look like her," Mr. Tracy said.

"Yes, sir," Harold answered; while into his frank, open face there came
an expression of regret for the mother who had died when he was three
years old, and whose life had been so short and sad.

"Now, hurry off with the telegram, and mind you don't lose it. It is
from my brother. He is coming to night."

"Mr. Arthur Tracy, who sent the monument for my mother--is he coming
home? Oh, I am so glad!" Harold exclaimed, his face lighting up with
joy, as he put the telegram in his pocket and started for Tracy Park,
wondering if he should encounter Tom, and thinking that if he did, and
Tom gave him any chaff, he should thresh him, or try to.

"Darn him!" he said to himself, as he recalled the many times when Tom
Tracy, a boy about his own age, had laughed at him for his poverty and
coarse clothes. "He ain't any better than I am, if he does wear velvet
trousers and live in a big house. 'Tain't his'n; it's Mr. Arthur's, and
I