"Curse him!" said Colonel Tempest to Mr. Swayne in a hoarse whisper, his eyes bloodshot. "That boy should not get in my light!" The schoolboy John had been left the entire Tempest estate by Colonel Tempest's brother Jack -- who had written that will out of pure, bitter spite. The philosophical Mr. Swayne calmly regarded Tempest. "What's the harm of a small bet about it? One thousand to ten. And what's ten thousand pounds for you to risk, if you come into such a property?" Mr. Swayne snapped his fingers. "And no trouble to nobody. Nothing for you to do but pay up quietly when the time comes. It don't concern you who takes up the other bets. You know nothing at all about it. You lay your money, and, look here, Colonel, you mark my words, some way or somehow, some time or other, that boy will disappear."

Author Biography

Mary Cholmondeley (1859 - 1925) was an English novelist. She began writing with serious intent in her teens. She wrote in her journal in 1877, "What a pleasure and interest it would be to me in life to write books. I must strike out a line of some kind, and if I do not marry (for at best that is hardly likely, as I possess neither beauty nor charms) I should want some definite occupation, besides the home duties." She succeeded in publishing some stories in The Graphic and elsewhere. Her first novel was The Danvers Jewels (1887), a detective story that won her a small following. It appeared in the Temple Bar magazine published by Richard Bentley, after fellow novelist Rhoda Broughton had introduced her to George Bentley. It was followed by Sir Charles Danvers (1889), Diana Tempest (1893) and A Devotee (1897). The satirical Red Pottage (1899) was a best-seller on both sides of the Atlantic and is reprinted occasionally. It satirizes religious hypocrisy and the narrowness of country life and was denounced from a London pulpit as immoral. It was equally sensational because it "explored the issues of female sexuality and vocation, recurring topics in late-Victorian debates about the New Women." Despite the book's great success, however, the author received little money for it because she had sold the copyright.