The Project Gutenberg EBook of Coralie, by Charlotte M. Braeme

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net

Title: Coralie

Author: Charlotte M. Braeme

Release Date: August 12, 2004 [EBook #13162]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CORALIE ***

Produced by Steven desJardins and Distributed Proofreaders.

EVERYDAY LIFE LIBRARY No. 2

CORALIE

By CHARLOTTE M. BRAEME

Author of "Dora Thorne," "The Mystery of Colde Fell," "The Belle of
Lynn," "Madolin's Lover," "The Heiress of Hilldrop," Etc., Etc.

[Illustration]

CHAPTER I.

"Eighty pounds a year!" My reader can imagine that this was no great
fortune. I had little or nothing to spend in kid gloves or cigars;
indeed, to speak plain, prosaic English, I went without a good dinner
far oftener than I had one. Yet, withal, I was passing rich on eighty
pounds a year.

My father, Captain Trevelyan, a brave and deserving officer, died when I
was a child. My mother, a meek, fragile invalid, never recovered his
loss, but died some years after him, leaving me alone in the world with
my sister Clare.

When I was young I had great dreams of fame and glory. I was to be a
brave soldier like my dear, dead father, or a great writer or a
statesman. I dreamed of everything except falling into the common
grooves of life--which was my fate in after years. My mother, believing
in my dreams, contrived to send me to college--we both considered a
college education the only preliminary to a golden future. How she
managed it out of her slender means I cannot tell, but she kept me at
college for three years. I was just trying to decide what profession to
adopt, when a letter came summoning me suddenly home.

My mother was ill, not expected to live.

When I did reach home I found another source of trouble. My sister
Clare, whom I had left a beautiful, blooming girl of eighteen, had been
ill for the past year. The doctors declared it to be a spinal complaint,
from which she was not likely to recover, although she might live for
years.

She was unable to move, but lay always on a couch or sofa. The first
glimpse of her altered face, so sweet, so sad and colorless, made my
heart ache.

All th