St. Ronan's Well

The novel portrays the fashionable society of the fictional spa-town of Saint Ronan's. The plot revolves around the enmity of two half-brothers, Valentine Bulmer and Francis Tyrrel. Their father, the Earl of Etherington has secretly married Tyrrel's mother abroad, then later made a public marriage to Bulmer's mother. Bulmer is thus the recognized heir and Tyrrel considered to be illegitimate. Bulmer tries to sow discord between the Earl and his half-brother, by encouraging Tyrrel's secret courtship of Clara Mowbray. Discovering however that union with Clara would bring fortune and earn the Earl's favour, he impersonates Tyrrel at a midnight marriage. The brothers quarrel and Tyrrel spares Bulmer's life on condition that he leave Saint Ronan's, and permit Clara to continue living under her maiden name. The Earl dies and Bulmer inherits his title. His profligacy has led him to the brink of financial ruin when he learns that he will inherit a fortune if Clara acknowledges their marriage. He returns to Saint Ronan's to persecute her and blackmails Clara's brother, John, a fellow gambler, into threatening his sister's life if she does not accept him as her husband. Tyrrel meanwhile is expecting papers which will prove his own claim to the earldom. Bulmer intercepts them and thereby learns that he is himself illegitimate. His accomplices betray him, and his designs are exposed by Mr Touchwood, a benignly meddlesome nabob. The mental strain on Clara, though, proves too great and she dies from a brain haemorrhage. Bulmer is killed in a duel by John Mowbray. Tyrrel inherits the earldom but leaves Britain in despair.