The Guilty River

Short novel originally published as the 1886 Arrowsmith's Christmas Annual. Written late in Collins's career, it incorporates two of the themes often featured in his work: the psychological effects of physical handicap, in this case deafness, and the love of a middle-class man for an intelligent and independent woman from a lower social stratum. Collins began writing in September and worked twelve hours a day to enable the story to be published on 15 November 1886. Gerard Roylake returns from Germany on the death of his father to take up his inheritance at Trimley Deen. On his first evening he walks to the nearby River Loke and recognises his childhood friend, Cristel Toller, the miller's daughter. He also meets a deaf man living at the mill known only as The Lodger. Gerard's stepmother, meanwhile, is keen to introduce him to local society and in particular to her friend Lady Rachel's sister.