



Produced by Charles Bowen from page scans provided by Google Books









Transcriber's Notes:

1. Page scan source:
        http://books.google.com/books?id=NTQPAAAAQAAJ.

2. The diphthong oe is represented by [oe].






                                               Miss Arnott's
                                               Marriage






                    |-------------------------------|
                    |      BY THE SAME AUTHOR       |
                    |                               |
                    |           *   *   *           |
                    |                               |
                    | CURIOS                        |
                    | ADA VERNHAM, ACTRESS          |
                    | MRS MUSGRAVE AND HER HUSBAND  |
                    | THE MAGNETIC GIRL             |
                    |                               |
                    |           *   *   *           |
                    |                               |
                    | John Long, Publisher, London  |
                    |_______________________________|







                         Miss Arnott's Marriage




                                   By
                             Richard Marsh

                      Author of "The Beetle," etc.





                                 London
                               John Long
                 13 & 14 Norris Street, Haymarket
                                  1904





                                CONTENTS


      CHAP.

         I. ROBERT CHAMPION'S WIFE.

        II. THE WOMAN ON THE PAVEMENT.

       III. THE HEIRESS ENTERS INTO HER OWN.

        IV. THE EARL OF PECKHAM'S PROPOSAL.

         V. TRESPASSING.

        VI. AN AUTHORITY ON THE LAW OF MARRIAGE.

       VII. MR MORICE PRESUMES.

      VIII. THE LADY WANDERS.

        IX. THE BEECH TREE.

         X. THE TALE WHICH WAS TOLD.

        XI. THE MAN ON THE FENCE.

       XII. WHAT SHE HEARD, SAW AND FOUND.

      XIII. AFTERWARDS.

       XIV. ON THE HIGH ROAD.

        XV. COOPER'S SPINNEY.

       XVI. JIM BAKER.

      XVII. INJURED INNOCENCE.

     XVIII. AT THE FOUR CROSS ROADS.

       XIX. THE BUTTONS OFF THE FOILS.

        XX. THE SOLICITOR'S CLERK.

       XXI. THE "NOTE".

      XXII. ERNEST GILBERT.

     XXIII. THE TWO MEN.

      XXIV. THE SOMNAMBULIST.

       XXV. HUGH MORICE EXPLAINS.

      XXVI. THE TWO MAIDS.

     XXVII. A CONFIDANT.

    XXVIII. MRS DARCY SUTHERLAND.

      XXIX. SOME PASSAGES OF ARMS.

       XXX. MISS ARNOTT IS EXAMINED.

      XXXI. THE TWO POLICEMEN.

     XXXII. THE HOUSEMAID'S TALE.

    XXXIII. ON HIS OWN CONFESSION.

     XXXIV. MR DAY WALKS HOME.

      XXXV. IN THE LADY'S CHAMBER.

     XXXVI. OUT OF SLEEP.

    XXXVII. WHAT WAS WRITTEN.

   XXXVIII. MISS ARNOTT'S MARRIAGE.





                         Miss Arnott's Marriage




                               CHAPTER I

                         ROBERT CHAMPION'S WIFE


"Robert Champion, you are sentenced to twelve months' hard labour."

As the chairman of the Sessions Court pronounced the words, the
prisoner turned right round in the dock, and glanced towards where he
knew his wife was standing. He caught her eye, and smiled. What
meaning, if any, the smile conveyed, he perhaps knew. She could only
guess. It was possibly intended to be a more careless, a more
light-hearted smile than it in reality appeared. Robert Champion had
probably not such complete control over his facial muscles as he would
have desired. There was a hunted, anxious look about the eyes, a
suggestion of uncomfortable pallor about the whole countenance which
rather detracted from the impression which she had no doubt that he had
intended to make. She knew the man well enough to be aware that nothing
would please him better than that she should suppose that he regarded
the whole proceedings with gay bravado, with complete indifference,
both for the powers that were and for the punishment which they had
meted out to him. But even if the expression on his face had not shown
that the cur in the man had, for the moment, the upper hand, the
unceremonious fashion in which the warders bundled him down the
staircase, and out of sight, would have been sufficient to prevent any
impression being left behind that he had departed from the scene in a
halo of dignity.

As regards his wife, the effect made upon her by the whole proceedings
was an overwhelming consciousness of unbearable shame. When the man
with the cheap good looks was hustled away, as if he were some inferior
thing, the realisation that this was indeed her husband, was more than
she could endure. She reached out with her hand, as if in search of
some support, and, finding none, sank to the floor of the court in a
swoon.

"Poor dear!" said a woman, standing near. "I expect she's something to
do with that scamp of a fellow--maybe she's his wife."

"This sort of thing often is hardest on those who are left behind,"
chimed in a man. "Sometimes it isn't those who are in prison who suffer
most; it's those who are outside."

When, having regained some of her senses, Violet Champion found herself
in the street, she was inclined