Content Warning: The novel and the guide reference the death of a child and the contemplation of suicide.

William Vane, the Earl of Mount Severn, meets with a young lawyer named Archibald Carlyle. The earl is ill and suffering from financial troubles; he has put his home, East Lynne (the name of the house and estate) up for sale because he is desperate. Archibald offers to purchase the estate and agrees to keep the sale secret: The earl will continue to live there, and it will not be publicized that the property has changed hands. Archibald also meets the earl’s beautiful young daughter, Lady Isabel Vane.

Isabel goes to have tea with Mrs. Levinson and Mrs. Vane. Mrs. Vane is married to Isabel’s relative (who is also her father’s heir since women could not inherit at this time), and Mrs. Levinson is Mrs. Vane’s grandmother. During the visit, Isabel briefly meets a handsome young man named Captain Francis Levinson; he is Mrs. Vane’s cousin and Mrs. Levinson’s grandson. Isabel is wearing a cross that her late mother gave her, and Francis accidentally breaks it.