Bride of the night

Dr. Atherley’s bungalow was the resort of British officials who passed through Duke Town on their way to and from various posts in West Africa. It was an ugly, hygienic structur...

“_Thus we know not the day, nor the morrow,_ _Nor yet what a night may bring forth,_ _Nor the storm, nor the sleep, nor the sorrow,_ _Nor the strife, nor the rest, nor the wrath._”

In the lounge hall of the hotel the visitors were assembling. Gathered in little groups, they were talking, smoking and drinking cocktails before going in for dinner. Half hidde...

When the girl in black turned into the winter garden, Lebrassa was conscious of only one thing--a desire to follow and find out who she was. Then the approach of a page took his...

Leslie Graham and Molly Seaton were comrades of some years’ standing, who had met under unusual circumstances. Business had taken Molly to one of the big London railway stations...

At about six o’clock, when shops and offices were closing, one figure showed up in sharp contrast to the rest of the hurrying pedestrians: that of a girl who went along at a slo...

Two hours later Leslie was sitting before a gas fire in a bedroom of a Bloomsbury boarding-house. During the last few months two men, both strangers, both met in the most casual...

On board the S.S. _Batava_, outward bound for West Africa, all was bustle and confusion. On the lower deck a couple of men stood, one of whom was watching the passengers coming...

The Calabar River crept along sluggishly, bringing with it all the drainings of a dark continent. A dense forest lined one bank right down to its boulder-strewn edge; the other...

In the west, ominous clouds were banked, lurid and luminous, splashed and barred by the deep flaming crimson of the setting sun that lay, a pool of fiery red, in the midst of th...

Outside the Lebrassa & Cooper factory, all was quiet and peaceful in the early morning sun. Inside, the business of the day had started, and Cooper was issuing orders to the col...

Roses nodded sleepily over the veranda rail of Cooper’s bungalow, saturating the air with their sweetness. Their scent mingled with that of a hundred subtle foreign perfumes unt...

It was midnight when Leslie arrived back at the garden gate of Cooper’s residence. Dismissing the hammock and its bearers, she went up the silent, leafy path alone. Everything a...

On the plateau behind Duke Town, where several official bungalows were situated, only one showed any sign of habitation. From there a blaze of light flared out, cutting like a g...

Along a narrow forest track leading to a native village, Leslie and Lebrassa were walking. They had come up the river by boat, landing within easy distance of the place.

When Leslie returned to consciousness she seemed to be in quite a different world--a world of darkness, damp and chill, full of wild howls and animal snarlings, and over it all...

Presently she picked out one and went back to the lounge. As she seated herself she tried not to see the blackness of the hands that arranged the cushions for her with clumsy te...

The first puff of cool afternoon wind came sighing up from the distant sea, stirring the creepers on Harding’s veranda. As the cool breeze moved the heated air there was a sligh...

“Love of my life! we had lights in season-- Hard to part from, harder to keep. We had strength to labor and souls to reason, And seed to scatter and fruits to reap. Though time...

He had come to them some eight months before, clad only in a loin-cloth, speaking an uncouth African dialect, and with a habit of squatting on his heels. Now, he was sitting out...

Mail day was the great event of the month at Tuata, Northern Nigeria, one of the most isolated of British outposts. The district was a vast tract of dense forest with no means o...

In a summer-house of one of the several châlets perched up among the Cintra mountains sat Leslie. Far below was a vista of hill and dale, forests of cork and chestnut, groves of...

Mammy Illa and her little brown piccaninny were well known on the steamers that plied up and down the West Coast of Africa. It was nearly eighteen months since she had first app...

The first red beam shot out of the east, sending the rich fiery glow of dawning day over a vista of densely wooded country, breaking up the thick veil of mist that night had dra...

Like one numbed, she walked with him up to the gilded gates, and on through a maze of flowers and trees until a building was reached. She passed through an arch into a room--a r...

The early morning breeze came whispering through the shady little courtyard that lay in the midst of the palace. It brought a shower of white petals fluttering down in the golde...

Mhaki, the high-priest, squatted among the ruins of a forgotten city watching the night shadows gather. He sat with his back against a marble block, listening to the sounds drif...

A vast hall of darkness, so great that it seemed to have no end; a place blacker than the deepest night, with no glint of light or life. Yet life was there, for out of the gloom...

The Sultan Nanza was holding audience in the market-square. Three days had passed since the deposing of his cousin. Down in the great underground temple Lebrassa lay, recovering...

As the great mass of rock swung back into position Leslie stood for a few moments conscious of a queer, dizzy feeling, glad of the quietness after the wild uproar she had left,...

All day long war drums had been sending their wild tattoo echoing through the forest. Savage figures flitted to and fro among the ruins of ancient Kallu. War-palaver was being h...

On the veranda of Harding’s bungalow Leslie was sitting. Over two months had passed since, away in the wilds, Essel, Earl of Alglenton, the man known as the Hyena, had died. The...