E-text prepared by Suzanne Shell, Mary Meehan,
and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team
THE TYSONS
(MR. AND MRS. NEVILL TYSON)
BY MAY SINCLAIR
Author of THE DIVINE FIRE, THE HELPMATE, etc.
1906
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I.--MR. NEVILL TYSON
CHAPTER II.--MRS. NEVILL TYSON
CHAPTER III.--MR. AND MRS. NEVILL TYSON AT HOME
CHAPTER IV.--THE FIRST STONE
CHAPTER V.--THE NIGHT WATCH
CHAPTER VI.--A SON AND HEIR
CHAPTER VII.--SIR PETER'S NEW CLOTHES
CHAPTER VIII.--TOWARDS "THE CROSS-ROADS"
CHAPTER IX.--AN UNNATURAL MOTHER
CHAPTER X.--CIRCUMSTANTIAL EVIDENCE
CHAPTER XI.--THE RETURN OF ODYSSEUS
CHAPTER XII.--A FLAT IN TOWN
CHAPTER XIII.--MRS. WILCOX TO THE RESCUE
CHAPTER XIV.--THE "CRITERION"
CHAPTER XV.--CONFLAGRATION
CHAPTER XVI.--THE NEW LIFE
CHAPTER XVII.--THE CAPTAIN OF HIS SOUL
CHAPTER XVIII.--A MIRACLE
CHAPTER XIX.--CONFESSIONAL
CHAPTER XX.--A MAN AND A SPHINX
CHAPTER XXI.--OUT OF THE NIGHT
CHAPTER XXII.--IN THE DESERT
CHAPTER XXIII.--IN MEMORIAM
CHAPTER I
MR. NEVILL TYSON
There were only two or three houses in Drayton Parva where Mr. and Mrs.Nevill Tyson were received. A thrill of guilty expectation used to gothrough the room when they were announced, and people watched them witha fearful interest, as if they were the actors in some enthralling butforbidden drama.
Perhaps, if she had been tried by a jury of her peers—but Mrs. NevillTyson had no peers in Drayton Parva. She was tried by an invisible andincorruptible jury of ideas in Miss Batchelor's head. Opinion sways allthings in Drayton Parva, and Miss Batchelor swayed opinion.
As for Mr. Nevill Tyson, he had dropped into Leicestershire from heavenknows where, and was understood to be more or less on his trial. Nobodyknew anything about him, except that he was a nephew of old Tyson ofThorneytoft, and had come in for the property. Nobody cared much forold Tyson of Thorneytoft; he was not exactly—well, no matter, he wasvery respectable and he was dead, which entitled him to a littleconsideration. And as Mr. Nevill Tyson was an unmarried man in thosedays he naturally attracted some attention on his own account, as wellas for the sake of the very respectable old man, his uncle.
He was first seen at a dinner at th