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Flemington

Chapter 1: AUTHOR’S NOTE
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About This Book

The story centres on a strong-willed matriarch who rules a modest country estate and the uneasy relationships among neighbours and kin, set against a rugged coastal landscape. Social ambitions, old loyalties and competing desires produce secret schemes and betrayals that culminate in a daring seizure of a ship. Local clergy, gentry and servants react in ways that expose human vanity, courage and hypocrisy. Episodes move through seasons and social gatherings to trace consequences for individuals and the community, balancing intimate domestic scenes with larger acts of adventure and moral reckoning, and ending in a reflective epilogue.

FLEMINGTON

FLEMINGTON

BY VIOLET JACOB

(MRS. ARTHUR JACOB)
AUTHOR OF “THE INTERLOPER,” “THE SHEEP-STEALERS,” &c.

LONDON
JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET, W.
1911

TO
 
EVELYN FRANCES MUNRO

AUTHOR’S NOTE

THIS book has no claim to be considered an historical novel, none of the principal people in it being historic characters; but the taking of the ship, as also the manner of its accomplishment, is true.

V. J.

CONTENTS

BOOK I
CHAPTER       PAGE
I. PROLOGUE     1
II. JETSAM     16
III. A COACH-AND-FIVE     30
IV. BUSINESS     46
V. THE HAPPY LAND     64
VI. IN DARKNESS AND IN LIGHT     72
VII. TREACHERY     84
VIII. THE HEAVY HAND     100
IX. TOUJOURS DE LAUDACE     124
BOOK II
X. ADRIFT     135
XI. THE GUNS OF MONTROSE     150
XII. INCHBRAYOCK     161
XIII. THE INTERESTED SPECTATOR     177
XIV. IN SEARCH OF SENSATION     185
XV. WATTIE HAS THEORIES     200
XVI. THE TWO ENDS OF THE LINE     212
XVII. SOCIETY     222
XVIII. BALNILLO FINDS PERFECTION     234
BOOK III
XIX. THE WINTER     251
XX. THE PARTING OF THE WAYS     263
XXI. HUNTLY HILL     280
XXII. HUNTLY HILL (continued)     288
XXIII. THE MUIR OF PERT     299
XXIV. THE VANITY OF MEN     313
XXV. A ROYAL DUKE     327
XXVI. THE VANISHING BIRD     335
XXVII. EPILOGUE     346