Character guide

Magdalen Vanstone

major

Also known as Miss Vanstone, Miss Magdalen, the younger Miss Vanstone, Offer Miss Vanstone

Magdalen is the younger Vanstone daughter — quick, fearless, and used to being adored — until the discovery that her parents' marriage was invalid leaves her and Norah nameless and penniless overnight. Where her sister submits, Magdalen burns to fight back, and her variable spirits swing between feverish gaiety and intractable despair as she enlists the disreputable Captain Wragge for a campaign of disguise and deception. Her willingness to stake her identity itself on revenge is what drives the novel's central, uneasy question: how far will she go, and what will it cost her?

Norah Vanstone

major

Also known as Norah, the sedate Norah, Norah Bartram

Norah is the sedate daughter, slower to charm but deeper in loyalty, whose rooted distrust of Frank Clare and refusal to bend put her at odds with the family long before disaster strikes. When the sisters are disinherited, she chooses endurance and respectable work while Magdalen chooses war, and the rift between their temperaments becomes the novel's emotional fault line. Her longing for her sister — and Magdalen's confession that she wanted only to put her arms round Norah's neck — keeps the story tethered to something warmer than vengeance.

Mrs. Lecount

major

Also known as Lecount, Virginie Lecount, Madame Virginie Lecompte

Mrs. Lecount governs Sea-View Cottage and its foolish master with quiet, absolute authority — until the arrival of the Bygraves threatens her position and her plans. She fights back not with open anger but with forged descriptions, anonymous notes, and a vigilance that never sleeps, testing Noel's secrets by watching doors and windows before sunrise. Her duel with Captain Wragge is the novel's sharpest contest of wits, and her tigerish patience makes her far more dangerous than any mere domestic tyrant.

Noel Vanstone

major

Also known as Mr. Noel Vanstone, Vanstone, Mr. N. V.

Noel inherits the Vanstone fortune that should have been the sisters', and lives in timid luxury under Mrs. Lecount's thumb at Sea-View Cottage. Vain, suspicious, and secretly delighted by his own cleverness, he fancies himself a match for his housekeeper even as Captain Wragge and Magdalen play him like an instrument. His vacillation and self-congratulating cunning are exactly what make him so easy to maneuver — and so central to the schemes closing around him.

Captain Wragge

major

Also known as Wragge, the wary Wragge, Horatio Wragge, Horace

Captain Wragge lives by his wits, staging elaborate domestic fictions with his addle-headed wife Matilda recast as 'Mrs. Bygrave' and Magdalen as his niece 'Miss Bygrave.' He is a rogue with a relish for the game, coaching Magdalen in deceit while privately applauding his own audacity, and his running battle with Mrs. Lecount is a duel of con artists. His cheerful amorality gives the novel its comic energy — and makes him the engine of Magdalen's descent into disguise.

Miss Garth

supporting

Also known as the plainspoken Miss Garth, Garth, Harriet Garth

Miss Garth has long been the household's high authority on domestic questions, and she flatly declines to step off her pedestal for anyone — not for Frank Clare, not for the parents who favored him. Her bristling congratulations and ominously prophetic eyes make her a tart counterweight to the family's easy enthusiasms. When the sisters are cast adrift, she remains their steadiest, most unsentimental friend, the one Magdalen can still ask for help 'for my father's sake and my mother's sake.'

Mr. Pendril

supporting

Also known as Pendril, William Pendril

Pendril is the trusted legal adviser whose appointment at the deserted house forces him to break the news that will shatter the Vanstone sisters' security. Restrained to the point of coldness, he meets Miss Garth in the dead man's study with a formality that barely conceals his own agitation, and his refusal to answer her earlier letter while Mrs. Vanstone lived has already bred distrust between them. His professional honesty makes him the reluctant instrument of the novel's central catastrophe, and his loyalty to Mr. Vanstone's memory shapes how the sisters learn what they have lost.

George Bartram

supporting

Also known as Mr. George Bartram, Mr. Bartram, George, Master George

George is the amiable young man whose courtship of Norah offers one of the few uncomplicated hopes in the sisters' reduced circumstances. His position is complicated by his dependence on his uncle the Admiral, whose estate is bound by a secret trust that may determine the Vanstone inheritance. Earnest and straightforward where the plot is devious, he becomes a pivot between the family's legal fortunes and its emotional ones, and his sincerity throws the scheming around him into sharp relief.

Admiral Bartram

supporting

Also known as Arthur, Arthur Everard Bartram, Dear Admiral Bartram

Admiral Bartram holds the Vanstone fortune in his keeping, but a private letter from the dead man restricts how he may dispose of it, making him a legal gatekeeper rather than a free agent. His odd, retired habits at St. Crux and his fondness for his nephew George give him a human face, yet the secret trust he guards makes every visit to his house a contest over money and legitimacy. Until the terms of that document surface, the sisters' claims hang on the whim of a man who may not even know the full weight of what he holds.

Mrs. Wragge

supporting

Also known as the impenetrable Wragge, poor Mrs. Wragge, Matilda

Matilda Wragge is a simple, drowsy woman whose husband rehearses her in false names and false relations as if she were a piece of stage furniture. Her confusion is comic, but it also measures the moral squalor of the Captain's schemes: she is coached to call herself Julia Bygrave and to forget she was ever anyone else. Her helplessness and her occasional flashes of tenderness toward Magdalen make her both a tool of the plot and one of its quietest victims.

Frank Clare

supporting

Also known as Mr. Francis Clare, Frank, Francis Clare

Frank Clare is the young man Magdalen loves, and his failure to stand by her when the Vanstone fortune collapses becomes the wound that drives her toward desperate schemes. He is handsome, self-pitying, and easily offended, more concerned with his own injured dignity than with the woman sobbing on the sofa before him. His departure for a career abroad, arranged by his father, closes the door on the sisters' old life and hardens Magdalen's resolve to reclaim what she believes is hers.

Michael Vanstone

minor

Also known as Mr. Andrew Vanstone, Michael, the late Mr. Vanstone

The deceased father of Magdalen and Norah, whose secret marriage causes the inheritance crisis.

Andrew Vanstone

minor

Also known as Andrew, Mr. Vanstone, Andrew Vanstone

The late Mr. Vanstone's brother, who inherits the estate and dies shortly after.

Mrs. Vanstone

minor

Also known as Mrs. Vanstone

The mother of Magdalen and Norah, who dies early in the story.

Mr. Bygrave

minor

Also known as Bygrave, wily Mr. Bygrave, Thomas Bygrave, Thomas

An alias used by Captain Wragge during his schemes with Magdalen.

Miss Bygrave

minor

Also known as the beautiful Miss Bygrave, this Miss Bygrave, the false Miss Bygrave

An alias used by Magdalen when posing as Captain Wragge's niece.

John Loscombe

minor

Also known as Mr. John Loscombe, Mr. Loscombe

A solicitor who represents Magdalen in her legal battles.

Mrs. Drake

minor

Also known as IV From Mrs. Drake

The housekeeper at St. Crux, loyal to Admiral Bartram.

Old Mazey

minor

Also known as Mazey, Mr. Mazey

An old sailor and friend of Admiral Bartram, who assists George.

Captain Kirke

minor

Also known as Mr. Kirke, Kirke, Uncle Kirke

A sea captain who becomes a friend and later husband to Magdalen.

Louisa

minor

Also known as The meek and melancholy Louisa, The discreet Louisa

A maid in the Vanstone household, later employed by Mrs. Lecount.

Mr. Huxtable

minor

Also known as Huxtable

A local tradesman and friend of the Vanstone family.

Mr. Merrick

minor

A doctor who attends to Noel Vanstone during his illness.

Alfred de Bleriot

minor

Also known as Mr. de Bleriot

A general agent in London employed by Mrs. Lecount.

Mrs. Girdlestone

minor

Also known as Poor Mrs. Girdlestone

A neighbor of the Vanstones who dies early in the story.

Abraham Bulmer

minor

Also known as Sergeant Bulmer

A detective sergeant who investigates the Vanstone case.

Mrs. Ruddock

minor

A lodging-house keeper who provides information to Mr. Loscombe.

Miss Marrable

minor

Also known as Mrs. Marrable

A neighbor and acquaintance of the Vanstone sisters.

Aaron

minor

A servant in the Vanstone household.

Julia

minor

Also known as the sentimental Julia

A friend of Magdalen's from her school days.

Robert

minor

A servant at the Vanstone estate.

Mrs. Attwood

minor

A landlady who provides lodging to Magdalen.

Miss Blake

minor

A friend of Norah's who appears briefly.

Brutus

minor

A dog owned by Captain Wragge.

Joyce

minor

A servant at St. Crux.

Jack

minor

A minor character mentioned in passing.

Cassius

minor

Another dog owned by Captain Wragge.

Allonby

minor

A friend of Frank Clare's who appears briefly.

Falkland

minor

A historical figure mentioned in the narrative.

Lizzie

minor

A servant in the Wragge household.

Sophia Drake

minor

A relative of Mrs. Drake who appears briefly.

Dawkes

minor

A servant at the Vanstone estate.

Matilda Wragge

minor

Also known as matilda wragge

Captain Wragge's mother, mentioned in passing.

Lydia

minor

Also known as Miss Lydia Languish

A character from a play referenced in the story.

Professor Lecompte

minor

Also known as Zurich, Professor Lecompte

A professor from Zurich, mentioned in relation to Mrs. Lecount.

Snap

minor

A dog owned by the Wragges.

Selina

minor

A servant in the Vanstone household.

Major Kirke

minor

Captain Kirke's brother, mentioned briefly.

Charles Mathews

minor

Also known as Mathews

An actor mentioned in the narrative.

Miss Brock

minor

A friend of the Vanstone sisters.

Nagle

minor

A servant at St. Crux.