Bella Wilfer Timeline and Summary

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• Bella finds out that her fiancé, John Harmon, has been murdered on his way to England. Bella feels weird about the whole thing.
• On the one hand, she didn't like the fact that she was betrothed to John in the will of some old guy she's never met. But on the other hand, John Harmon was about to inherit a huge amount of money and make Bella rich.
• Part of Bella wants to marry for love, and part of her wants to marry for money… but now that she's had a whiff of money, Bella decides she'll probably never marry for love.
• The people who end up inheriting John Harmon's fortune are Mr. and Mrs. Boffin, and these folks feel so bad about Bella's disappointment that they take her under their wing and give her all kinds of money. Now Bella really wants to marry someone rich.
• As the novel goes on, Mr. Boffin's secretary (Mr. Rokesmith) declares his love for Bella. But Bella says she's too good for him and turns him down.
• Bella feels bad about the fact that she wants to marry for money, but she can't see any way around it.
• Bella gets upset when she sees how Mr. Boffin's fortune is turning him into a greedy and unkind man, especially since he used to be so nice. Eventually, Boffin's treatment of Mr. Rokesmith gets so bad that Bella abandons the Boffins and their fortune, declaring that she's in love with Rokesmith.
• Bella and Rokesmith get married and have a baby girl together. Bella loves their modest life together, but Rokesmith insists on asking whether she'd like to have a lot of money someday.
• One day, Bella and Rokesmith run into a lawyer named Mortimer Lightwood, who recognizes Rokesmith as Julius Handford. It turns out that Rokesmith and Handford are both made-up names and that Rokesmith is actually John Harmon. In other words, the terms of Old Man Harmon's will are fulfilled and John and Bella are now going to be rich.
• John and Bella move into a fancy new house in London and take in the Boffins as their new servants.