When love dawns : or, Dark Magdalen by Adelaide Stirling
"When love dawns" by Adelaide Stirling is a novel written in the early 20th century. It appears to be a romantic melodrama of inheritance, reputation, and peril centered on stepsisters Dolly Arden and Magdalen Clyde, as Dolly claims her status as the late Lord Barnysdale’s wife and her little son Ronald’s rights as heir. The story quickly moves from London society’s edges to a brooding Scottish castle, where hostile servants and a
creeping sense of threat suggest deception and danger ahead. The opening of the novel shows Dolly revealing a secret marriage to the Earl of Barnysdale and producing documents—and a cold, coercive letter from the dead man—that secure her claim after his death, despite Magdalen’s wary doubts. A frightening scene in a cheap restaurant, where a drunken stranger bellows Dolly’s name, is averted when a hard-faced stranger kills the lights and spirits the sisters out; he later reappears as Dick Lovell, a down-on-his-luck but decent ally. With discreet legal handling from Mr. Barrow and a wary nod from Lord Stratharden, Ronald is accepted as heir, and Dolly retreats north to Ardmore Castle. There the welcome is icy: a palsied retainer sneers at the child’s identity, rooms are cold and bare, Magdalen endures a vivid nightmare of a silent attacker, and the housekeeper Mrs. Keith defies orders and refuses access to a locked suite said to be Stratharden’s—leaving the new household unsettled and on edge. (This is an automatically generated summary.)
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About this eBook
| Author | Stirling, Adelaide |
|---|---|
| Title | When love dawns : or, Dark Magdalen |
| Original Publication | New York: Street & Smith, 1900. |
| Series Title | Eagle series, no. 448 |
| Credits | Demian Katz and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at www.pgdp.net (Images courtesy of the Digital Library@Villanova University.) |
| Language | English |
| LoC Class | PS: Language and Literatures: American and Canadian literature |
| Subject | American fiction -- 19th century |
| Subject | Dime novels |
| Subject | Romance fiction |
| Category | Text |
| EBook-No. | 78149 |
| Release Date | Mar 8, 2026 |
| Copyright Status | Public domain in the USA. |
| Downloads | 208 downloads in the last 30 days. |
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