{"product_id":"2940013744240","title":"The Fortress","description":"'All is well,' Judith said quietly, coming forward and stroking the\u003cbr\u003ered apples of the sofa.  'I shall not leave you, Jennifer.  It is\u003cbr\u003ebetter I remain.'\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAs her hand mechanically stroked those same rosy apples, so\u003cbr\u003efriendly and familiar, she reflected.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eYes, this simple sentence declared the crisis of her whole\u003cbr\u003eexistence.  Nothing ever again could matter to her so deeply as\u003cbr\u003ethis decision.  With it she had cut away half her life, and perhaps\u003cbr\u003ethe better half.  She was not by nature a dramatic woman; moreover,\u003cbr\u003eshe had but lately returned from the funeral of the best friend she\u003cbr\u003ehad, and she was forty-seven years of age in this month of January\u003cbr\u003e1822.  So--for women then thought forty-seven a vast age--she\u003cbr\u003eshould be past drama.  Quietly she sat down on the sofa, leaned\u003cbr\u003eforward, looking into the fire.  Jennifer Herries was speaking with\u003cbr\u003eeager excitement, but Judith did not hear her.  Jennifer was fifty-\u003cbr\u003etwo and should also be past drama but, although a lazy woman, she\u003cbr\u003eliked sensation when it did not put herself to discomfort.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eJudith at that moment heard and saw nothing but the past, the past\u003cbr\u003ethat she was irrevocably forsaking.  Strange how the same patterns\u003cbr\u003ewere for ever returning!  Her father had been a rogue and a\u003cbr\u003evagabond, a rebel against all the order and material discipline of\u003cbr\u003ethe proper Herries.  In his early years he had married Convention\u003cbr\u003eand of her had had a son, late in life he had married a gipsy and\u003cbr\u003eof her had had a daughter in his old age, when he was over seventy.\u003cbr\u003eDavid at one end of his life, Judith at the other.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn their histories again the pattern had been repeated.  David of\u003cbr\u003ehis marriage had had two sons: Will the money-maker, Francis the\u003cbr\u003edreamer.  Will prospered even now in the City; Francis was a\u003cbr\u003efailure, dead of his own hand.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd with their children again the pattern was repeated.  For Will's\u003cbr\u003eson Walter was triumphant near by in his house at Westaways, and\u003cbr\u003eFrancis' widow, Jennifer, and Francis' children, John and Dorothy,\u003cbr\u003eremained, undefended, here at Uldale.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt was here that she, Judith, came into the pattern.  Daughter of\u003cbr\u003etwo vagabonds, mother of an illegitimate boy, she should be\u003cbr\u003evagrant.  Half of her--the finer, truer, more happy and fortunate\u003cbr\u003ehalf--(she nodded at the fire in confirmation) was so.  But the\u003cbr\u003eother half was proper, managing, material, straight-seeing Herries.\u003cbr\u003eShe threw her wild half into the blaze (her hand flickered towards\u003cbr\u003ethe fire).  It was gone.  She remained to fight for Jennifer,\u003cbr\u003eJennifer's children, John and Dorothy, and, maybe who knows? . . .\u003cbr\u003eher own boy Adam.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTo fight whom?  Here Jennifer's voice broke through:\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e'. . . That will be most agreeable.  I have always said that the\u003cbr\u003eYellow Room needs but a trifle altering and it will make . . . but\u003cbr\u003eFrancis would never see it.  And with a new wallpaper . . .  We\u003cbr\u003emust certainly have a new wallpaper . . .'\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTo fight Walter Herries, and all that were his.  As 'Rogue' Herries\u003cbr\u003ein his tumble-down house in Borrowdale had fought all the world, as\u003cbr\u003eFrancis his grandson had tried to fight the world and failed, so\u003cbr\u003enow would she fight Walter, flamboyant, triumphing Walter, made of\u003cbr\u003eWill and his money-bags, sworn to extinguish Jennifer and her\u003cbr\u003echildren and all that were in Fell House, Uldale.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt had been the wish of her whole life to flee from all the Herries\u003cbr\u003eand live in the hills as her mother had lived before her, but\u003cbr\u003eWalter Herries had challenged her and she had taken up the\u003cbr\u003echallenge.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e'. . . Not that it should be difficult,' Jennifer was saying, 'to\u003cbr\u003efind another girl to work with Doris.  Girls will come willingly\u003cbr\u003eenough now that you are going to remain, Judith, dear . . .'","brand":"WDS Publishing","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47172029350128,"sku":"2940013744240","price":2.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940013744240_p0.jpg?v=1763589674","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940013744240","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}