An Amiable Charlatan

I scarcely recognized Mr. Cullen when he first accosted me in the courtyard of the Milan. At no time of distinguished appearance, a certain carelessness of dress and gait had br...

At ten o'clock the following morning my telephone bell rang and a visitor was announced. I did not catch the name given me, and it was only when I opened the door to him in resp...

Mr. Bundercombe who, notwithstanding his wife's temporary absence in the country, had not been in the best of spirits for several days, during the course of our tete-a-tete dinn...

By what certainly seemed to be, at the time, a stroke of evil fortune, I invited Mrs. Bundercombe and Eve to lunch with me at Prince's restaurant a few days after our return fro...

I never remembered seeing Mr. Bundercombe look more cheerful than when, at his urgent summons, I left Eve in the drawing-room and made my way into the study. He was standing on...

On seeing us the girl advanced into the room. I called Mr. Parker's attention to her and he rose at once to his feet. It was a cold evening in April and she was wearing a long c...

I spent a very restless and disturbed night. I rose at six o'clock the following morning, and at ten o'clock I rang up 3771A Gerrard. My inquiry was answered almost at once by M...

At about half past ten the following morning I turned into Prince's Gardens, to find a four-wheel cab drawn up outside the door of Mr. Bundercombe's house. On the roof was a dre...

My slight impulse of irritation at such a description applied to one of my wedding guests passed when I looked up and saw the person to whom Mr. Bundercombe had directed my atte...

The thing happened so suddenly that I really had very little time to make up my mind what course to adopt under somewhat singular circumstances. I was seated at my favorite tabl...

The next morning at twelve o'clock I took a taxi-cab round to Banton Street. The hall porter, who was beginning to know me well, seemed a little surprised at my appearance.

The moment I opened my paper the next morning the very announcement I had dreaded to find was there in large type! I read the particulars breathlessly: DARING BURGLARY IN HAMPST...

Luigi's face, when he met the Parkers and myself at the entrance of the restaurant, was a study. His polite bow and smile of welcome seemed suddenly frozen on his face as his ey...

"Cheero!" he said brightly as he seated himself in my easy-chair and tapped the end of one of my cigarettes upon the tablecloth. "I haven't been up so early for months, but I ha...

The dinner party, which I arranged for in the Milan restaurant, was, on the whole, a great success. My sister played hostess for me and confessed herself charmed with Eve, as in...