Maud Ruthyn—Dudley Ruthyn

Maud Ruthyn and Dudley Ruthyn are cousins, but kinship becomes in Dudley’s hands a pretext for pressing an intimacy Maud does not want. Their relationship is defined by a persistent mismatch: he presents himself as affectionate and deserving, while she recognizes his approach as intrusive and rejects it. As Silas’s financial distress and Maud’s inheritance sharpen the stakes, the proposed marriage becomes part of a wider struggle over her autonomy and safety.

Kinship, money, and the first advances

Dudley invokes their shared family connection as though it naturally entitled him to Maud’s warmth. When he returns to speak with her alone, he insists that he wants to know why she fears him, assures her he would never hurt her, and describes cousins as people who are always together and loving. Maud does not accept this familial language as reassurance: she asks him to leave and makes clear that she wants to be alone. His appeal to kinship thus serves less to establish trust than to challenge the boundary she is trying to set.

The courtship develops against a material crisis. Dudley complains that his father has no money, that he himself has bills and lawyers’ letters to deal with, and that the trustees will not provide him with money until they have an opinion about the settlement. He threatens to sell Silas’s books and jewels, then turns to Maud for sympathy, calling himself unfortunate. His need is not presented as separate from his pursuit: the household’s money troubles provide the setting in which Maud’s inheritance and marriage become consequential. Austin’s will gives Silas a legacy and the use of Bartram-Haugh for life, while the rest of the estate is held in trust for Maud; Dudley’s appeal takes place within that unequal financial arrangement.

A pursuit Maud refuses

When Milly leaves Maud briefly, Dudley comes back to ask why Maud is supposedly vexed with him. Maud is startled and angry, suspecting that Milly’s departure has been contrived to leave her alone with him. Dudley again presents himself as harmless and affectionate, describing her as his cousin and telling her that he likes her. Maud’s response is direct: she tells him to return to his dog-cart and leave. He counters her refusal by saying that another man might respond angrily or try to kiss her, while he prefers coaxing and kindness. His account of himself as gentle does not change the fact that he continues to disregard her plainly stated wish to be left alone.

Dudley soon makes the purpose of his attentions explicit. He says that he likes Maud better than any other woman and asks her to marry him. He acknowledges that he has little money and that his father has run through much of his own, but presents his affection and promise to provide for her as reasons to accept. When Maud does not welcome the proposal, Dudley continues to approach her physically; she steps back, becomes furious, and tells him that nothing in her conduct could have led him to believe she liked him. She names his audacity and says that she is going to Silas. The scene marks a change in Maud’s response: instead of trying merely to end an uncomfortable conversation, she confronts the presumption behind Dudley’s suit.

Silas’s intervention and the imposed delay

Silas intervenes by urging Maud to recognize Dudley’s supposed good qualities, including his courage, honour, and family blood. He warns that Dudley will have to leave home if Maud persists in rejecting him, and asks her to postpone her decision for a fortnight. The request places Maud’s refusal under pressure from the guardian who controls her circumstances: Dudley’s desire to remain at Bartram is made part of the case for delaying her answer.

During the fortnight, Dudley does not appear at luncheon as he sometimes had before, nor does he look in at the breakfast window. Instead, flowers are left beside Maud’s plate each morning, and an anonymous green parrot arrives in a gilt cage with instructions identifying the bird as Maud. Maud leaves the bouquets untouched and insists that Milly keep the bird. These gestures are presented as tokens of pursuit, but they do not soften her decision; the gifts leave her response unchanged while Silas’s requested interval postpones, rather than resolves, the conflict.

The marriage revealed and the danger that follows

The later disclosure that Dudley has a wife transforms the meaning of his proposal. When his connection to Sarah Matilda Mangles is exposed, Maud reflects that Dudley had solicited her marriage while already newly married. She also believes Silas was as ignorant of the marriage as she was and had no part in that particular deception. The revelation does not merely discredit Dudley’s claims of affection: it shows that his suit was made under a concealed and decisive fact.

Dudley’s connection to Maud remains dangerous after the proposal is over. When Meg asks whether Maud saw him, Maud says she thinks she saw him climbing a ladder; Meg confirms that Dudley did not travel beyond Todcaster and had stayed in Feltram. Maud recognizes that her worst suspicion has been established. Later, Dudley secretly enters Maud’s room at Bartram-Haugh through a window opened with its bars, carrying a modified hammer. The entry makes the earlier pattern of ignored refusals part of a broader threat to Maud’s safety.

The plot explains that Maud’s return to Bartram was concealed: Monica had been led to believe Maud had gone to France, and the secret of Maud’s fate would have rested with only a few people. Maud’s account connects the scheme to a design to seize her property by murder after the plan to marry her to Dudley had failed by fair means and then foul. The relationship therefore ends not in reconciliation or marriage but in exposure and danger. Dudley’s repeated claims of affection and kinship stand in sharp contrast to the deception surrounding his marriage and his later clandestine entry, making Maud’s refusal an essential assertion of judgment and self-protection.