Donovan, Volume 2 (of 3): A novel

Donovan, Volume 2 (of 3) by Edna Lyall is a novel written in the late 19th century. It follows Donovan Farrant, a proud, grieving young skeptic cast out by his stepfather, as he drifts from a lost home into London’s gambling underworld while battling bitterness and a still-stirring conscience. Around him move the compliant Mrs. Farrant, the predatory Ellis Farrant, the gambler duo Rouge and Noir Frewin, and a moral counterpoint in the clear-sighted Gladys. Themes of injustice, temptation, stark class contrast, and the chance of redemption shape his path.

The opening of the novel shows Ellis Farrant provoking a final rupture just after Donovan comes of age, refusing him any allowance and driving him from Oakdene despite his mother’s tears. Reeling with grief, Donovan visits little Dot’s grave and heads to London with his dog Waif; on the train he is lured into high-stakes cards with Rouge and Noir Frewin. In London, after a fruitless round of appeals to a lawyer and former acquaintances—and a despairing spell on Westminster Bridge—he meets Noir again, hears his story of wrongful conviction and ruin, and agrees to serve as his “second” in a gambling scheme, lodging with the Frewins in Drury Lane. The squalid life hardens him, yet kindness breaks through: he befriends the frail old Captain Rouge and vows abstinence to steady him; a child’s invitation into a square garden and a glimpse of his mother at the opera (as Ellis is shaken by “Faust”) momentarily soften him; and on a crowded train he quietly shields Gladys from rowdy gamblers. Still, by winter he remains entangled with Noir, his health ebbing as he sets out ill—yet keeping his teetotal pledge—for another scheme.