Fiction Books

THE MARTYRDOM OF "MEALY" JONES A WAIL IN B MINOR Oh, what has become of the ornery boy, Who used to chew slip'ry elm, "rosum" and wheat: And say "jest a coddin'" and "what d'ye soy;" And wear rolled-up trousers all out at the seat? And where is the boy who had shows in the barn, And "skinned a cat backards" and turned "summersets;" The boy... more...

INTRODUCTION The Bell Vireo (Vireo bellii Aud.) is a summer resident in riparian and second growth situations in the central United States south of North Dakota. In the last two decades this bird has become fairly common in western, and to a lesser extent in central, Indiana and is apparently shifting its breeding range eastward in that state (Mumford, 1952; Nolan, 1960). In northeastern Kansas the... more...

Hotel Massilon, N. Y.April 25My dearest Anne, Please forgive the delay in replying to your letters and cable. The truth is that I was quite unable to write, anxious as I was to do so. It's a rather long story, but I would like to explain just how this came to be and so prove how unfounded your suspicions were. You see, shortly after I arrived here, I ran into a Professor Phelps-Smythe Burdinghaugh,... more...

CHAPTER I The rays of the September sun flooded the great halls of the old chateau of the Dukes of Charmerace, lighting up with their mellow glow the spoils of so many ages and many lands, jumbled together with the execrable taste which so often afflicts those whose only standard of value is money. The golden light warmed the panelled walls and old furniture to a dull lustre, and gave back to the... more...

The Woman Who Tried to Be Good [1913] Before she tried to be a good woman she had been a very bad woman—so bad that she could trail her wonderful apparel up and down Main Street, from the Elm Tree Bakery to the railroad tracks, without once having a man doff his hat to her or a woman bow. You passed her on the street with a surreptitious glance, though she was well worth looking at—in her furs and... more...

IT SEEMED they had argued for years as they were arguing tonight. The man paced back and forth chain-smoking cigarettes; the woman sat motionless, watching him. They glanced at their watches with fearful eyes. They heard, with acutely alert ears, the goings and comings of people in the hall; heard the shattering blast of rockets in the sky above the city. And they argued."So you're going... more...

I INTRODUCING—THE SETTLEMENT HOUSE There is a certain section of New York that is bounded upon the north by Fourteenth Street, upon the south by Delancy. Folk who dwell in it seldom stray farther west than the Bowery, rarely cross the river that flows sluggishly on its eastern border. They live their lives out, with something that might be termed a feverish stolidity, in the dim crowded flats, and... more...

The starship waited. Cylindrical walls enclosed it, and a transparent plastic dome held it back from the sky and the stars. It waited, while night changed to day and back again, while the seasons merged one into another, and the years, and the centuries. It towered as gleaming and as uncorroded as it had when it was first built, long ago, when men had bustled about it and in it, their shouting and... more...

To make it clear how normal everything was when the evening started out, I'll let you in at the time Willy phoned me. I was in my apartment with a lady from down the hall.... I had asked her what she liked and she'd purred, "You." I had asked her with soda or gingerale and she'd said, "Straight," so I'd obliged and poured myself a triple too and sank into the sofa... more...

CHAPTER I I had placed the lumber inside the yard as directed, and was already rehitching the traces, when the man crossed the street slowly, switching his light cane carelessly in the air. I had noticed him before standing there in the doorway of the drug store, my attention attracted by the fashionable cut of his clothes, and the manner in which he watched me work. Now, as he rounded the heads of the... more...