Title:  Love Me Little, Love Me Long

Author:  Charles Reade

Edition:  10

Language:  English

Character set encoding:  ASCII

Release Date:  November, 2003 [Etext #4607] [Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] [This file was first posted on February 18, 2002]

The Project Gutenberg Etext of Love Me Little, Love Me Long, by Charles Reade
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Love Me Little, Love Me Long

by Charles Reade

PREFACE

Should these characters, imbedded in carpet incidents, interest the public at all, they will probably reappear in more potent scenes.  This design, which I may never live to execute, is, I fear, the only excuse I can at present offer for some pages, forming the twelfth chapter of this volume.

CHAPTER I.

Nearly a quarter of a century ago, Lucy Fountain, a young lady of beauty and distinction, was, by the death of her mother, her sole surviving parent, left in the hands of her two trustees, Edward Fountain, Esq., of Font Abbey, and Mr. Bazalgette, a merchant whose wife was Mrs. Fountain’s half-sister.

They agreed to lighten the burden by dividing it.  She should spend half the year with each trustee in turn, until marriage should take her off their hands.

Our mild tale begins in Mr. Bazalgette’s own house, two years after the date of that arrangement.

The chit-chat must be your main clue to the characters.  In life it is the same.  Men and women won’t come to you ticketed, or explanation in hand.

“Lucy, you are a great comfort in a house; it is so nice to have some one to pour out one’s heart to; my husband is no use at all.”

“Aunt Bazalgette!”

“In that way.  You listen to my faded illusions, to the aspirations of a nature too finely organized, ah! to find its happiness in this rough, selfish world.  When I open my bosom to him, what does he do?  Guess now—­whistles.”