Darkness and Daylight

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Darkness and Daylight, by Mary J. Holmes

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Title: Darkness and Daylight
Author: Mary J. Holmes
Release Date: December, 2003 [Etext #4721] [Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] [This file was first posted on March 7, 2002]
Edition: 10
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
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DARKNESS AND DAYLIGHT.
A Novel
BY
MRS. MARY J. HOLMES,
AUTHOR OF "LENA RIVERS," "MARIAN GREY," "MEADOW BROOK," "HOMESTEAD," "DORA DEANE," "COUSIN MAUDE," "TEMPEST AND SUNSHINE," "ENGLISH ORPHANS," ETC.

CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
COLLINGWOOD II. EDITH HASTINGS GOES TO COLLINGWOOD III. GRACE ATHERTON IV. RICHARD AND EDITH V. VISITORS AT COLLINGWOOD AND VISITORS AT BRIER HILL VI. ARTHUR AND EDITH VII. RICHARD AND ARTHUR VIII. RICHARD AND EDITH IX. WOMANHOOD X. EDITH AT HOME XI. MATTERS AT GRASSY SPRING XII. LESSONS XIII. FRIDAY XIV. THE MYSTERY AT GRASSY SPRING XV. NINA XVI. ARTHUR'S STORY XVII. NINA AND MIGGIE XVIII. DR. GRISWOLD XIX. EX OFFICIO XX. THE DECISION XXI. THE DEERING WOODS XXII. THE DARKNESS DEEPENS XXIII. PARTING XXIV. THE NINETEENTH BIRTHDAY XXV. DESTINY XXVI. EDITH AND THE WORLD XXVII. THE LAND OF FLOWERS XXVIII. SUNNYBANK XXIX. THE SISTERS XXX. ARTHUR AND NINA XXXI. LAST DAYS XXXII. PARTING WITH THE DEAD AND PARTING WITH THE LIVING XXXIII. HOME XXXIV. NINA'S LETTER XXXV. THE FIERY TEST XXXVI. THE SACRIFICE XXXVII. THE BRIDAL XXXVIII. SIX YEARS LATER

DARKNESS AND DAYLIGHT.
CHAPTER I.
COLLINGWOOD.
Collingwood was to have a tenant at last. For twelve long years its massive walls of dark grey stone had frowned in gloomy silence upon the passers-by, the terror of the superstitious ones, who had peopled its halls with ghosts and goblins, saying even that the snowy-haired old man, its owner, had more than once been seen there, moving restlessly from room to room and muttering of the darkness which came upon him when he lost his fair young wife and her beautiful baby Charlie. The old man was not dead, but for years he had been a stranger to his former home.
In foreign lands he had wandered--up and down, up and down--from the snow-clad hills of Russia to where the blue skies of Italy bent softly over him and the sunny plains of France smiled on him a welcome. But the darkness he bewailed was there as elsewhere, and to his son he said, at last, "We will go to America, but not to Collingwood--not where Lucy used to live, and where the boy was born."
So they came back again and made for themselves a home on the shore of the silvery lake so famed in song, where they hoped to rest from their weary journeyings. But it was not so decreed. Slowly as poison works within the blood, a fearful blight was stealing upon the noble, uncomplaining Richard, who had sacrificed his early manhood to his father's fancies, and when at last the blow had fallen