Red Money by Fergus Hume

Having come to the only possible arrangement, consistent with the difficult position in which they stood, Lambert and Lady Agnes took their almost immediate departure from The Manor. The young man had merely come to stay there in response to his cousin's request, so that his avoidance of her should not be too marked, and the suspicions of Pine excited. Now that the man was dead, there was no need to behave in this judicious way, and having no great love for Garvington, whom he thoroughly despised, Lambert returned to his forest cottage. There he busied himself once more with his art, and waited patiently to see what the final decision of Agnes would be. He did not expect to hear for some weeks, or even months, as the affairs of Garvington, being very much involved, could not be understood in a moment. But the lovers, parted by a strict sense of duty, eased their minds by writing weekly letters to one another.

Needless to say, Garvington did not at all approve of the decision of his sister, which she duly communicated to him. He disliked Lambert, both as the next heir to the estates, and because he was a more popular man than himself. Even had Pine not prohibited the marriage in his will, Garvington would have objected to Agnes becoming the young man's wife; as it was, he stormed tempests, but without changing the widow's determination. Being a remarkably selfish creature, all he desired was that Agnes should live a solitary life as a kind of banker, to supply him with money whenever he chose to ask for the same. Pine he had not been able to manage, but he felt quite sure that he could bully his sister into doing what he wanted. It both enraged and surprised him to find that she had a will of her own and was not content to obey his egotistical orders.