The Well of Pen-Morfa

by Elizabeth Glaskell

Genre: Drama
Setting: America
Format of Original Source: Short Story
Recommended Adaptation Length:

Candidate for Adaptation? Not Reviewed

EXCERPT:

Though her body may be crippled, her poor heart is the same–alas!–and full of love for you. Edward, you don’t mean to break it off because of our sorrows. You’re only trying me, I know,’ said she, as if begging him to assure her that her fears were false. ‘But, you see, I’m a foolish woman–a poor, foolish woman–and ready to take fright at a few words.’ She smiled up in his face; but it was a forced, doubting smile, and his face still retained its sullen, dogged aspect.

‘Nay, Mrs Gwynn,’ said he, ‘you spoke truth at first. Your own good sense told you Nest would never be fit to be any man’s wife–unless, indeed, she could catch Mr Griffiths of Tynwntyrybwlch; he might keep her a carriage, maybe.’ Edward really did not mean to be unfeeling; but he was obtuse, and wished to carry off his ’embarrassment by a kind of friendly joke, which he had no idea would sting the poor mother as it did. He was startled at her manner.

‘Put it in words like a man. Whatever you mean by my child, say it for yourself, and don’t speak as if my good sense had told me anything. I stand here, doubting my own thoughts, cursing my own fears. Don’t be a coward. I ask you whether you and Nest are troth-plight?’
Public_Domain Two Fragments of Ghost Stories ,Drama ,Short Story ,America %%%Two Fragments of Ghost Stories Glaskell Elizabeth I remember the wide-awake feeling which the icy coldness of the fine linen sheets gave me, when I was lying across them; stretching out, I undrew the crimson moreen curtain. There was no candle; but a bright light–very red; more like the very earliest blush of dawn on a summer’s morning than anything else; but very red and glowing. It seemed to come from, or out of–I don’t know how–the figure of a woman, who sat in the easy chair by the head of the bed. I think she was a young woman, but I did not see her face; it was bent down over a little child which she held in her arms, and rocked backwards and forwards, as if she were getting it to sleep, with her cheek on its head. She took no notice of my drawing back the curtain, though it made a rustling noise, and the rings grated a little on the rod. I could draw the pattern of the chintz gown she wore; of a kind called by my mother, a palampore: an Indian thing, with a large straggling print on it, but which had been in fashion many years before.

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