Project Gutenberg's The Imaginary Marriage, by Henry St. John Cooper

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Title: The Imaginary Marriage

Author: Henry St. John Cooper

Release Date: February 18, 2005 [EBook #15103]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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THE IMAGINARY MARRIAGE

by Henry St. John Cooper

CHAPTER I

A MASTERFUL WOMAN

"Don't talk to me, miss," said her ladyship. "I don't want to hear any
nonsense from you!"

The pretty, frightened girl who shared the drawing-room at this moment
with Lady Linden of Cornbridge Manor House had not dared to open her
lips. But that was her ladyship's way, and "Don't talk to me!" was a
stock expression of hers. Few people were permitted to talk in her
ladyship's presence. In Cornbridge they spoke of her with bated breath
as a "rare masterful woman," and they had good cause.

Masterful and domineering was Lady Linden of Cornbridge, yet she was
kind-hearted, though she tried to disguise the fact.

In Cornbridge she reigned supreme, men and women trembled at her
approach. She penetrated the homes of the cottagers, she tasted of their
foods, she rated them on uncleanliness, drunkenness, and thriftlessness;
she lectured them on cooking.

On many a Saturday night she raided, single-handed, the Plough Inn and
drove forth the sheepish revellers, personally conducting them to their
homes and wives.

They respected her in Cornbridge as the reigning sovereign of her small
estate, and none did she rule more autocratically and completely than
her little nineteen-year-old niece Marjorie.

A pretty, timid, little maid was Marjorie, with soft yellow hair, a
sweet oval face, with large pathetic blue eyes and a timid, uncertain
little rosebud of a mouth.

"A rare sweet maid her be," they said of her in the village, "but
terribul tim'rous, and I lay her ladyship du give she a rare time of
it...." Which was true.

"Don't talk to me, miss!" her ladyship said to the silent girl. "I know
what is best for you; and I know, too, what you don't think I