THE GUESTS OF HERCULES Long shadows of late afternoon lay straight and thin across the garden path; shadows of beech trees that ranged themselves in an undeviating line, like an inner wall within the convent wall of brick; and the soaring trees were very old, as old perhaps as the convent itself, whose stone had the same soft tints of faded red and brown as the autumn leaves which sparsely jewelled the... more...

Our Hero Introduced with some of his Friends. A poor schoolmaster named Benson died, not long ago, in a little town on the south-east coast of England, which shall be called Cranby. He left an only son, Jeffrey, and an elder brother, Jacob, to mourn his loss. The son mourned for his father profoundly, for he loved him much. The brother mourned him moderately, for he was a close-fisted, hard-hearted,... more...

It was late in the afternoon when Mr Philip Ashton walked up to the door of his residence in Portman-square. His hand touched the knocker irresolutely. “It must be done,” he said to himself. “May strength be given to all of them to bear the blow!” His hand shook as he rapped. The hall door flew open, a servant in handsome livery stood ready to take his hat and gloves. As he entered the... more...

An interrupted Bathe. It was a desperately hot day. There had been no day like it all the summer. Indeed, Squires, the head gardener at Garden Vale, positively asserted that there had been none like it since he had been employed on the place, which was fourteen years last March. Squires, by the way, never lost an opportunity of reminding himself and the world generally of the length of his services to... more...

CHAPTER I. IN A YEAR. The room fronted the west, but a black cloud, barred with red, robbed the hour of twilight's tranquil charm. Shadows haunted it, lurking in corners like spies set there to watch the man who stood among them mute and motionless as if himself a shadow. His eye turned often to the window with a glance both vigilant and eager, yet saw nothing but a tropical luxuriance of foliage... more...

“I’ll have to do it.” Claire Gifford stood in the salon of the Brussels pension which had been her home for the last three years, and bent her brows in consideration of an all-absorbing problem. “Can I marry him?” she asked herself once and again, with the baffling result that every single time her brain answered instantly, “You must!” the while her heart rose up in rebellion, and cried,... more...

CHAPTER I At the end of a long, straight avenue of symmetrically developed water maple trees (the trunks of all the trees whitewashed to precisely the same height from the ground) the house gleamed creamy-white, directly facing the Pike. Its broad front door came exactly within the middle distance of this vista of maples, as though the long-ago builder had known that Miss Eliza's orderly soul... more...

CHAPTER I A sweeping curve of glistening beach. A full palpitating sea lying under the languid heat of a late June afternoon. The low, red Life Saving Station, with two small cottages huddling close to it in friendly fashion, as if conscious of the utter loneliness of sea and sand dune. And in front of one of these houses sat Cap'n Billy and his Janet! They two seemed alone in the silent expanse... more...

A NEW DEPARTURE. "But, mother, it isn't as if I were going away from home, like the Lloyd girls; you might have a right to cry if that were the case." "I know, dear; it's all right, and I ought to be very thankful; but I'm a foolish woman. I can't bear to think of my little girl, whom I have guarded so tenderly, going among all those girls and men, and fighting her way... more...

AUNT ANNE. Barbara entered the nursery with rather a worried look on her face. "Aunt Anne is coming to-morrow, children," she announced. "To-morrow!" exclaimed a fair-haired boy, rising from the window-seat. "Oh, I say, Barbe, that's really rather hard lines—in the holidays, too." "Just as we were preparing to have a really exciting time," sighed Frances, who was... more...