Juggernaut

Out of what seemed a long dark night, filled with shapeless images, Esther woke at last. She believed herself in her comfortable bed at the Villa Firenze, and for a brief moment...

It was nearly midnight when Dr. Bousquet at last took his departure. An hour before that time Esther became conscious, but was so utterly weak he would not allow her to speak or...

Five minutes later Roger, hastily attired in his shirt, trousers and dressing-gown, his eyes heavy with sleep and fever, descended the stairs and looked inquiringly about. The h...

"I wish, miss, we could manage to keep Mr. Roger from going about in all weathers the way he's doing. With this fever on him I'm afraid he'll come to harm. It fair frightens me...

Three days later Esther sat by the window in the hotel sitting-room of the Cliffords' suite, waiting for Roger. She had made rapid progress during the past twenty-four hours, bu...

Twenty-four hours after this Esther slammed down the lid of her steamer trunk and sat upon it. If her breath came quickly it was less from her exertions than from the stinging m...

A few minutes later Roger was shown into his father's room. His first sight of the old man, lying flat on his back, his emaciated arms limp on the smooth white coverlet, his fac...

For a short space Esther believed herself lost. If Holliday found her, which seemed almost inevitable, she knew she would be powerless to put up a defence. It would be a simple...

"Roger, make him let go, the old swine, the beast, _le sale chameau_! I dismiss him here, now; he must leave my house. I will have him arrested for attacking me. I... Take him a...

In blank astonishment Roger stared as three men in uniform filed into the room and stood at attention. Two wore the regulation dress of sergents-de-ville, the third was clearly...

"Yes. I should think she merely meant to postpone it a little. I have figured it out like this: she dislikes to have me here, so she omitted to send that cable in order to put o...

An hour later Esther sat at a table in the magnificent Restaurant des Ambassadeurs, drinking her tea with enjoyment and revelling in the scene before her. She felt a little guil...

With one accord they peered up the dim well of the staircase. On the floor above, leaning over the rail, one hand clutching an army revolver, was a dishevelled young man, his ha...

There was little sleep for her that night. The most serious problem she had ever had to face presented itself, demanding a speedy solution. What course ought she to pursue? Hour...

Of the foregoing incident Esther remained in total ignorance. Accordingly, when next morning she heard Lady Clifford's maid, Aline, say that her mistress had had a bad night and...

All the servants of the household, drawn by Aline's screams, now crowded upon the steps and looked on with frightened faces. From them issued a confusion of hazarded explanation...

Why should Lady Clifford show so much curiosity about a technical thing like a medical chart? She was told several times a day exactly how her husband was progressing. She seeme...

"I mean Aline, sir; it was she who found it out. I've been about the house the whole night, sir; I've never closed my eyes. No one could have got past me without my knowing it."

"Sure!" he repeated sharply, and with a gesture of annoyance. "I tell you you had it in your hand when you bolted out of the room. There is no question about it."

About an hour before this Arthur Holliday left the Restaurant des Ambassadeurs and, with a slight frown on his face, got into his car and drove rapidly to La Californie. When he...

He spoke in excellent English, and had a brisk and businesslike air. He was a small and dapper man with ginger hair cut _en brosse_, and red-brown eyes behind thick glasses. Set...

Having finished a late and lazy breakfast next morning, Roger ascended to his father's room. He found the old man lying tranquil if weak, his temperature fallen to normal with t...

What sound was that? The noise of ringing. Was it within her own brain? No, surely not; it was the bell downstairs, a loud, persistent peal. Not the telephone; no, it must be th...

She heard her own voice, muffled and unnatural. It seemed to work a sort of magic, for the python vanished, melted away like mist; she drew a great shuddering breath and found s...

They descended to the floor below and sat on the broad stairs in semi-darkness. Esther waited, curious to know what he was going to say. He lit a cigarette and seemed reluctant...

"I felt it from the first," continued Miss Clifford. "You see, his symptoms were so exactly like Bannister's--that is the maid who is ill. There was only this difference, that m...

Esther stood still for a second, trying not to betray that she was annoyed. Why couldn't the woman leave her poor husband alone? Recalling the doctor's injunction to her, she wo...

For a full second all the onlookers merely gazed, completely dumbfounded. Miss Clifford seemed unable to make a move, the doctor stood rooted to the spot by the table, his face...

Esther was not mistaken in her surmise that the doctor was by choice at least more of a scientist than a physician. Patients he had to be sure, a respectable number, composed mo...

Several days slipped by, during which she heard nothing further of the Cliffords. Nor indeed did she think about them very much, there being more vital matters to occupy her att...

When Esther rang the bell of Numero 86 Route de Grasse, she felt within her that pleasant sort of stage-fright--a mixture of dread and exhilaration--which one is apt to experien...

It was as if all his latent contempt for the opposite sex was concentrated into that one vitriolic burst. Well----! Some physicians, she knew, practised with hyper-emotional sub...

On hearing this, Roger expressed his regret at having so nearly ended the other's career. The little man's animosity had quite vanished, his black eyes shone with kindly affecti...

One bright afternoon about ten days after this the Rolls Royce of the Cliffords drew up at the doctor's door, and when the sandy-haired chauffeur had descended and rung the bell...

Within twenty-four hours Sir Charles was in a condition bordering on coma. Arrangements were hurriedly made for a consultation of physicians to be held the following day, it bei...

At the _gare_ next morning, Miss Clifford, having selected a likely train, leaned forward in her brother's car and eagerly scanned each arrival as he issued from the exit. What...

Esther was repeating to herself that phrase, "the hands of the successful _cocotte_," which somehow seemed oddly illuminating. Lady Clifford's hands had a meaning for her now. T...

When one is eager to know the reasons why they did or failed to do a thing, instead of satisfying one's curiosity they go quietly away and say nothing. Women in the same positio...

Esther jumped at the sudden sound of a man's voice close to her ear, and looked up from the accounts she was writing. She had heard someone moving about in the salon, but she ha...