these synopses
©
part of an edition of
Sir Edmund Orme
on
the Ladder : a Henry James website
The ghost of a jilted lover appears to ensure that the daughter of the woman involved doesn’t get away with behaving coquettishly.
An unnamed executor explains why he is publishing this narrative, albeit with the names changed, which was written for its author’s own benefit and for which the executor cannot even vouch as a report of a real occurrence.
The narrator is friends with Mrs Marden, a widow, and her daughter who live in Brighton. One day, while Charlotte is strolling with a rival suitor, the narrator suggests that she is something of a coquette and Mrs Marden reveals that, in her youth, she herself was a ‘bad’ girl and has been punished for it through life. She seems to suffer some shock in talking about it. A week later she reveals that she has ‘intuitions’. Then after dining out the next day she drops a cup of tea the narrator passes her, and is unable to meet anyone the next day.
The narrator is called away, so they next meet at the country-house Tranton, in the Sussex countryside. At church the narrator sees a silent gentleman sitting for a time in the pew he shares with Charlotte Marden, who doesn’t seem to notice him. Mrs Marden however has seen the man and later reveals to the narrator that he is her punishment, the ghost of Sir Edmund Orme, whom she jilted and who committed suicide because of it. She believes that the spirit haunts her to worry her and to make her ensure that Charlotte behaves well. As the narrator declares his love to Charlotte the ghost appears again. She declines his offer, so he leaves Tranton.
Some months later they are all at a musical party in Brighton. On the balcony the narrator renews his suit, and Sir Edmund appears again. Simultaneously Mrs Marden collapses and has to be taken home. Next day, she allows the narrator to visit her. It seems that Charlotte will bow to her desire for the marriage and Sir Edmund Orme appears, for the last time, as she dies.