51 Tenant Of Wildfell Hall - Read By Stephanie Poppins

Contrary to early 19th-century norms, Helen Huntington escapes her abusive marriage, changes her name, and earns an income by selling her pictures. Her strict seclusion soon leads to gossip in the neighboring village, and she becomes a social outcast. Refusing to believe anything scandalous about her, Gilbert befriends her and discovers her past.

Helen's brother gives Gilbert a much-awaited update.

Transcript

Hello.

Welcome to Sleep Stories with Steph,

A romantic bedtime podcast guaranteed to help you drift off into a calm,

Relaxing sleep.

Come with me as we travel back to a time long ago where Helen Huntingdon is sacrificing everything she knows in order to protect her son.

But before we begin let us take a moment to focus on where we are now.

Take a deep breath in through your nose then let it out on a long sigh.

It is time to relax and really let go.

Feel your shoulders melt away from your ears as you sink into the support beneath you.

Feel the pressure seep away from your cheeks as your breath drops into a natural rhythm.

There is nothing you need to be doing right now and nowhere you need to go.

We are together and it is time for sleep.

The Tenant of Wildfelm Hall by Helen Huntingdon Read and abridged by Stephanie Poppins Chapter 50 It was just about this time Helen was called to sustain another blow in the death of her uncle,

A worthless old fellow enough in himself I dare say,

But he'd always shown more kindness and affection to her than any other creature.

And she'd always been accustomed to regard him as a parent.

She was with him when he died and had assisted her aunt to nurse him during the last stage of his illness.

Her brother Frederick went to Stanley to attend the funeral and told me upon his return she was still there endeavouring to cheer her aunt with her presence and likely to remain some time.

This was bad news for me,

But while she continued there I could not write to her.

I did not know the address and would not ask it of him.

But week followed week and every time I enquired she was still at Stanley.

Where is Stanley?

I asked at last.

There was something so cold and dry in the manner of Frederick's tone I was effectively deterred from requesting a more definite account.

Well when will she return to Grasdale was my next question.

I don't know.

Confound it,

I muttered.

Why Markham?

Asked my companion with an air of innocent surprise but I did not deign to answer him save by a look of silent,

Sullen contempt.

Lawrence and I somehow just could not manage to get on very well together.

The fact is we were both too a little touchy.

It's a troublesome thing this susceptibility to affronts where none are intended.

I know martyr to it now as you can bear me witness.

I have learned to be merry and wise to be more easy with myself and more indulgent to my neighbours and I can afford to laugh at both Lawrence and you Halford.

Partly from accident,

Partly from willful negligence on my part several weeks elapsed before I saw my friend again.

When we did meet it was he that sought me out.

One bright morning early in June he came into the field when I was just commencing my hay harvest.

It's long since I saw you Markham,

Said he after the first few words.

Do you ever mean to come to Woodford again?

I called once and you were out.

I was sorry but that was long since.

I hoped you'd call again and now I have called and you were out which you generally are where I would do myself the pleasure of calling more frequently.

Determined to see you this time I've left my pony in the lane and come over hedge and ditch to join you for I'm about to leave Woodford for a while and may not have the pleasure of seeing you again for a month or two.

Where are you going?

To Grasdale first,

Said he with a half smile.

He would willingly have suppressed if he could.

To Grasdale?

Is she there then?

Yes but in a day or two she'll leave it to accompany Mrs Maxwell for the benefit of the sea air.

I shall go with them.

Frederick seemed to expect me to take advantage of the circumstance to entrust him with some sort of message.

I believe he would have undertaken to deliver it without any material objections if I had the sense to ask him.

But I could not bring myself to make the request and it was not till after he was gone I saw how fair an opportunity I had lost.

I deeply regretted my stupidity and my foolish pride.

But it was now too late to remedy the evil.

He did not return till towards the latter end of August.

He wrote to me twice or thrice but his letters were most provokingly unsatisfactory dealing in generalities or in trifles I cared nothing about.

He said nothing about his sister and little more about himself.

I would wait however till he came back.

Perhaps I could get something more out of him then.

At all events I would not write to her now while she was with him and her aunt.

Who doubtless would be still more hostile to my presumptuous aspirations than himself.

When she was returned to the silence and solitude of her own home it would be my fittest opportunity.

When Frederick came however he was as reserved as ever on the subject of my keen anxiety.

He told me Helen had derived considerable benefit from her stay away and her son was quite well.

Alas both of them were now gone back with Mrs Maxwell to Stanningley.

There they would stay at least three months.

But instead of boring you with my chagrin my expectations and disappointments my varying resolutions how to drop it and to preserve it to make a bold push and let things pass and patiently abide my time I will employ myself in settling the business of one or two of the characters introduced in the course of this narrative.

Sometime before Mr Huntington's death Lady Lobra eloped with another gallant to the continent where having lived a while in reckless gaiety and dissipation they quarrelled and parted.

She went dashing on for a season but years came and money went.

She sunk at length in difficulty and debt disgrace and misery and died at last as I've heard in penury neglect and utter wretchedness.

This might only be a report they may be living yet for anything I or any of her relatives or former acquaintance can tell.

They've lost all sight of her long years ago and would as thoroughly forget her if they could.

Her husband however upon this second misdemeanor immediately sought and obtained a divorce and not long after married again.

It was as well he did for Lord Lobra,

Morose and moody as he seemed was not the man for a bachelor's life.

He had a son and a nominal daughter it's true but they too painfully reminded him of their mother.

The unfortunate little Annabella was a source of perpetual bitterness to his soul.

He had obliged himself to treat her with paternal kindness forced himself not to hate her and even perhaps to feel some degree of kindly regard but the bitterness of his self-condemnation for his inward feelings towards that innocent being his constant struggles to subdue the evil promptings of his nature could be known to God in his own heart alone.

So also was the hardness of his conflicts with the temptation to return to the vice of his youth and seek oblivion for past calamities and deadness to the present misery of a blighted heart by yielding again to that insidious foe to health and sense and virtue which had so deplorably enslaved and degraded him before.

The second object of his choice was widely different from the first.

Some wondered at his taste some even ridiculed it but in this their folly was more apparent than his.

The lady was about his own age between 30 and 40 remarkable neither for the beauty nor wealth nor brilliant accomplishments or any other thing I ever heard of except genuine good sense unswerving integrity active piety warm-hearted malevolence and a fund of cheerful spirits.

These qualities however as you may readily imagine combined to render her an excellent mother to the children and an invaluable wife to his lordship.

He with his usual self-deprecation thought her a world too good for him and while he wondered at the kindness of Providence in conferring such a gift and even at her taste in preferring him to other men he did his best to reciprocate the good she did him and so far succeeded that she was and I believe still is one of the happiest and fondest wives in England.

As for that low scoundrel Grimsby I can only tell you he went from bad to worse.

As for Mr Hattersley he had never wholly forgotten his resolution to come out from them and behave like a man and a Christian and the last illness and death of his once jolly friend Huntingdon so deeply and seriously impressed him with the evil of their former practices he never needed another lesson of the kind.

His father the banker having died some years ago and left him all his riches he has now the scope for the exercise of his prevailing tastes and I need not tell you that Ralph Hattersley Esquire is celebrated throughout the country for his noble breed of horses.

Reviews

Thank you for the wonderful reading, I so enjoyed the story with your voice. 💝

Ah, dissipated humanity… and the trend continues in reality!😅😢 thank you dear…❤️🙏🏼