The Project Gutenberg EBook of My Lady's Money, by Wilkie Collins

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Title: My Lady's Money

Author: Wilkie Collins

Release Date: March 21, 2006 [EBook #1628]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MY LADY'S MONEY ***

Produced by James Rusk and David Widger

MY LADY'S MONEY

by Wilkie Collins

AN EPISODE IN THE LIFE OF A YOUNG GIRL

PERSONS OF THE STORY

Women:

Lady Lydiard (Widow of Lord Lydiard)

Isabel Miller (her Adopted Daughter)

Miss Pink (of South Morden)

The Hon. Mrs. Drumblade (Sister to the Hon. A. Hardyman)

Men

The Hon. Alfred Hardyman (of the Stud Farm)

Mr. Felix Sweetsir (Lady Lydiard's Nephew)

Robert Moody (Lady Lydiard's Steward)

Mr. Troy (Lady Lydiard's Lawyer)

Old Sharon (in the Byways of Legal Bohemia)

Animal

Tommie (Lady Lydiard's Dog)

PART THE FIRST.

THE DISAPPEARANCE.

CHAPTER I.

OLD Lady Lydiard sat meditating by the fireside, with three letters
lying open on her lap.

Time had discolored the paper, and had turned the ink to a brownish hue.
The letters were all addressed to the same person--"THE RT. HON. LORD
LYDIARD"--and were all signed in the same way--"Your affectionate
cousin, James Tollmidge." Judged by these specimens of his
correspondence, Mr. Tollmidge must have possessed one great merit as a
letter-writer--the merit of brevity. He will weary nobody's patience,
if he is allowed to have a hearing. Let him, therefore, be permitted, in
his own high-flown way, to speak for himself.

_First Letter._--"My statement, as your Lordship requests, shall be
short and to the point. I was doing very well as a portrait-painter
in the country; and I had a wife and children to consider. Under
the circumstances, if I had been left to decide for myself, I should
certainly have waited until I had saved a little money before I ventured
on the serious expense of taking a house and studio at the west end of
London. Your Lordship, I positively declare, encouraged me to try the
experiment without waiting. And here I am, unknown and unemployed, a
helpless artist lost in London--with a sick wife and hungry children,
and