Category: Novels

Chance: A Tale in Two Parts

I believe he had seen us out of the window coming off to dine in the dinghy of a fourteen-ton yawl belonging to Marlow my host and skipper. We helped the boy we had with us to haul the boat up on the landing-stage before we went up to the riverside inn, where we found our new...

Chapters

1. Chapter 1

I believe he had seen us out of the window coming off to dine in the dinghy of a fourteen-ton yawl belonging to Marlow my host and skipper. We helped the boy we had with us to h...

2. Chapter 2

We were on our feet in the room by then, and Marlow, brown and deliberate, approached the window where Mr. Powell and I had retired. "What was the name of your chance again?" he...

3. Chapter 3

But there was nothing improper in my observing to Fyne that, last night, Mrs. Fyne seemed to have some idea where that enterprising young lady had gone to. Fyne shook his head....

4. Chapter 4

And the best of it was that the danger was all over already. There was no danger any more. The supposed nephew's appearance had a purpose. He had come, full, full to trembling--...

5. Chapter 5

"Amiable personality," I observed seeing Fyne on the point of falling into a brown study. But I could not help adding with meaning: "He hadn't the gift of prophecy though."

6. Chapter 6

She was puzzled. But I surmised that it might have been the sullenness of a man unconscious of guilt and standing at bay to fight his "persecutors," as he called them; or else t...

7. Chapter 7

Fyne was not willing to talk; but as I had been already let into the secret, the fair-minded little man recognized that I had some right to information if I insisted on it. And...

8. Chapter 8

I have said that the story of Flora de Barral was imparted to me in stages. At this stage I did not see Marlow for some time. At last, one evening rather early, very soon after...

9. Chapter 9

"You remember," went on Marlow, "how I feared that Mr. Powell's want of experience would stand in his way of appreciating the unusual. The unusual I had in my mind was something...

10. Chapter 10

Young Powell thought to himself: "The men, too, are noticing it." Indeed, the captain's behaviour to his wife and to his wife's father was noticeable enough. It was as if they h...

11. Chapter 11

Marlow emerged out of the shadow of the book-case to get himself a cigar from a box which stood on a little table by my side. In the full light of the room I saw in his eyes tha...

12. Chapter 12

Renovated certainly the saloon of the _Ferndale_ was to receive the "strange woman." The mellowness of its old-fashioned, tarnished decoration was gone. And Anthony looking roun...

13. Chapter 13

In the mess-room Powell found Mr. Franklin hacking at a piece of cold salt beef with a table knife. The mate, fiery in the face and rolling his eyes over that task, explained th...