Gabriel Betteredge’s cottage was cosy, his employment rewarding and his status respectable, but his cup of happiness was not quite full.
The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins is a detective story (arguably the first) about a mysterious gem, told in the form of a series of narratives by different writers. One of these is Gabriel Betteredge, who digresses into a reminiscence about his bachelor days and how he met his future wife. At the time, he had just found a very comfortable position as bailiff to Sir John and Lady Julia Verinder.
Walter Hartright tried to help a distressed woman find her way into London, but the incident has left him with nagging doubts.
Walter Hartright has gone for a walk, daydreaming about his promised new job as drawing master to the Fairlie family in Limmeridge, Cumberland. His reverie was broken by a young woman in evident distress asking the way into London, whom he saw off in a cab; but her restless manner, her peculiar questions, and the astounding coincidence that she had once lived in Limmeridge, have all left him uneasy.
At twenty-five and owner of his own business, Walter Wilding thought his world was secure, but it was about to be rocked to its foundations.
‘No Thoroughfare’ came out in 1867 as both a novel and a play, and was co-authored by Charles Dickens and his friend Wilkie Collins. It is essentially a thriller, but it has some familiar Dickensian touches, such as the moral that character is what matters, not parentage or wealth.