Seven Miles to Arden

Recovering from pneumonia, Patsy O'Connell has eight dollars and seventy-six cents, an unpaid boarding-house bill, and little prospect of acting work before August. Her Irish theatrical company has gone bankrupt, leaving her to consider her next move from a hospital cot. Ruth Sawyer introduces a young actress whose teasing answers about her origins and generous attention to other patients give practical worries a lively, conversational setting.

The story later follows Patsy along the road toward Arden, with a vanished tinker, changes of clothing, and Billy Burgeman's troubling confession drawing her into uncertainty. A feather becomes an improvised guide when she cannot work out which direction to take. Published in 1916, this novel brings together romantic adventure, theatrical playfulness, and a mystery surrounding the people Patsy encounters. Readers interested in resourceful young women and stories shaped by chance meetings will find a character whose humor carries into precarious circumstances.