AustLit

An orphan and her baby go to stay with her husband's uncle in his neglected mansion when the husband is posted with the army to Africa. They have been estranged from the rest of his family by her plebian birth but the crusty uncle warms to her and the child. She learns that he banished his own son for marrying beneath him - and that she is in fact the old man's granddaughter. Her husband is wounded in Africa and appears one night unexpectedly at the mansion, frightening her as she mistakes him for the ghost of her own banished father. The old man's remorse for her cruelty years before unites them into a happy family. Loyal old house-keeper and a portrait play their part in the plot of identity discovered and inheritance restored. Well written, not outstanding. (PB)