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Edith and Bruce Ottley could not be called idyllically married. But a form of love persists between them, and their two precocious young children, Archie and Dilly, provide a further bond.
Bruce’s latest enthusiasms in their social circle are the Mitchells, whose parties are slightly risque and enormous fun, attracting all comers except the most staid. There the Ottleys meet Aylmer Ross, a handsome widowed barrister. Edith and he are drawn together irresistibly. But whilst Aylmer would like to take things further, Edith is loyal to Bruce. Their friendship, almost immediately quite intense, suffers onrushes and reverses as they grow to understand one another’s limits.
Then one day in Kensington Gardens Edith’s world of loyalty is torn apart. She sees a couple clearly in love, hand in hand, sitting in a secluded seat. On closer examination she can’t believe her eyes - one of them is Bruce! And the other is Miss Townsend, Archie and Dilly’s governess! Will this deceit be enough to sway Edith and send her into Aylmer’s willing embrace? What must she do ensure that everything turns out as it should?
In Tenterhooks, her fourth novel, Ada Leverson rehearsed quite closely details of her own life. The decision of her husband Ernest to leave her and emigrate to Canada had been a major wrench. Exactly how nearly the plot follows reality is not known for certain but, with dash and sureness, the author delineates a sensitive and principled woman’s responses to adversity, super-imposing upon them the wit and gaiety for which she was so renowned, creating a moving and entertaining portrait of a crisis in a marriage. The second of the three Ottleys novels, Tenterhooks was first published in 1912.
