Produced by Charles Bowen from page scans provided by The Internet Web Archive (The Library of Congress) Transcriber's Notes: 1. Page scan source: The Internet Web Archive https://archive.org/details/barrentitlenovel00spei (The Library of Congress) Harper's Handy Series Issued Weekly --------------------- Copyright by Harper & Brothers November 27, 1885 Subscription Price per Year, 52 Numbers, $15 --------------------- Entered the Post-Office at New York, as Second-class Mail Matter A BARREN TITLE A Novel BY T. W. SPEIGHT AUTHOR OF "THE MYSTERIES OF HERON DYKE" ETC. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- _Books you may hold readily in your hand are the most useful, after all_ Dr. JOHNSON NEW YORK HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS 1885 CONTENTS CHAP. I. SHABBY-GENTEEL. II. AT THE BROWN BEAR. III. NEGOTIATIONS. IV. TERMS PROPOSED. V. TERMS ACCEPTED. VI. MILD LUNACY. VII. "SWEET COZ." VIII. "GOOD-BYE." IX. TRANSFORMATION. X. INFATUATION. XI. CONFIDENTIAL. XII. CECILIA AND THE COUNTESS. XIII. "YOUNG PILLBOX." XIV. "TWELVE IT IS." XV. CECILIA PHILOSOPHIZES. XVI. PALLIDA MORS. XVII. GOLDEN DREAMS. XVIII. UP A LADDER. XIX. P. P. C. A BARREN TITLE. CHAPTER I. SHABBY-GENTEEL. It was about half-past two on a sunny February afternoon when Mr. John Fildew put his nose--aquiline and slightly purple as to its ridge--outside the door of his lodgings for the first time that day, and remarked to himself, with a shiver, that the weather was "beastly cold." After gazing up the street and down the street, and seeing nothing worth looking at, he shut the door behind him and strolled leisurely away. Hayfield Street, in which Mr. Fildew's lodgings were situate, was, despite its name, as far removed, both in appearance and associations, from anything suggestive of country or rural life as it well could be. It was of the town towny. Every house in it--and they were substantial, well-built domiciles, dating back some seventy or more years ago--was let out to three or four families, while in many cases the ground-floors had been converted into shops, in one or other of which anything might be bought, from a second-hand silk dress or sealskin jacket to a pennyworth of fried fish or a succulent cow-heel. In whatever part of the street you took your stand a couple of taverns were well within view, and, as a matter of course, there was a pawnbroker's emporium "just round the corner." It is needless to say that the street swarmed with children of all ages and all sizes, and that you might make sure of having the dulcet tones of a barrel-organ within earshot every ten minutes throughout the day. It was situate somewhat to the west of Tottenham-court Road, and ran at right angles with one of the main arteries that intersect that well-known thoroughfare.