Fiction Books

he IWC program was a newscast by Bill Howard, and the news was particularly vicious that night. Bill, his big homely face leaning across a desk toward the viewer, talked in horrified tones of the "pest-sub" that had reputedly got stuck in the Suez and spread epidemic across Cairo. It was easy to assume, Bill told his audience, that the nations most interested in creating a crisis in the world... more...

CHAPTER IHONOURS ‘Oh, there’s that stick.  What can he want?’ sighed one of a pair of dignified elderly ladies, in black silk, to the other, as in a quiet country-town street they saw themselves about to be accosted by a man of about forty, with the air of a managing clerk, who came up breathlessly, with a flush on his usually pale cheeks. ‘Miss Lang; I beg pardon!  May I be allowed a few... more...

CHAPTER I. THE TRANSMUTATION OF LING I: INTRODUCTION The sun had dipped behind the western mountains before Kai Lung, with twenty li or more still between him and the city of Knei Yang, entered the camphor-laurel forest which stretched almost to his destination. No person of consequence ever made the journey unattended; but Kai Lung professed to have no fear, remarking with extempore wisdom, when... more...

NICK BABA'S LAST DRINK. t was Christmas Eve, and the one narrow main street of a small country town was ablaze. Extra lights were glowing in all the little shops; yet all this illumination served only to make more apparent the untidy condition of the six-by-nine window panes, as well as the goods therein. Men and women were hastening homeward with well-filled baskets which they had provided for... more...

PREFACE Deep in every heart there seems to be a longing for a more primitive existence; and though in practice it is often an illusion, the South Seas lend themselves better to such dreams than any other part of the world. There are fewer races more attractive than the Polynesians. Frank, winning, gay and extraordinarily well-mannered, the higher types are often remarkably good-looking, and scarcely... more...

CHAPTER I. The bright rays of an Autumn sun fell upon the richly stained glass, sending a flood of soft, mellow rainbow tinted light through the quaintly curved and deeply mullioned windows which adorned a portion of the eastern wing of that grand old Baronial residence, Vellenaux, on a fine September morning, at the period during which our story opens. This handsome pile, now the property of Sir... more...

SUDDEN DEATH She sought in vain! The young woman, who was finishing her toilette, lost patience. With a look of annoyance she half turned round, crying, "Well, Captain, it is easy to see that you are not accustomed to women's ways!" This pretty girl's lover, a man about forty, with an energetic countenance, and a broad forehead adorned with sparse locks, was smoking a Turkish... more...

HOW IT ALL BEGAN "We can hold out six months longer,—at least six months." My mother's tone made the six months stretch encouragingly into six long years. I see her now, vividly as if it were only yesterday. We were at our scant breakfast, I as blue as was ever even twenty-five, she brave and confident. And hers was no mere pretense to reassure me, no cheerless optimism of ignorance, but... more...

CHAPTER I Even in college Alfred Hardy was a young man of fixed ideas and high ideals and proud of it. His friend, Jimmy Jinks, had few ideas and no ideals, and was glad of it, and before half of their first college term had passed, Jimmy had ridded himself of all such worries as making up his own mind or directing his own morals. Alfred did all these things so much better, argued Jimmy, furthermore,... more...

TALE LI. Because he would not have his son make a poor marriage, theDuke of Urbino, contrary to the promise given to his wife,hanged a young maiden by whom his son was wont to inform hissweetheart of the love he bore her. The Duke of Urbino, called the Prefect, (1) the same that married the sister of the first Duke of Mantua, had a son of between eighteen and twenty years of age, who was in love with a... more...