The Car of Destiny

That night, in my villa above “the road of the great Moor-killing,” the nightingales were the only _serenos_. Their song was the song of the stars; and the song of the stars was...

“Yet, you know mighty well, if you want a Mercutio, I’ll be ready to take up the rôle at a moment’s notice all for the sake of your _beaux yeux_. Well, you’re right. There’s som...

When the second night closed in, I made up my mind that he had decided upon my death. Perhaps, if I had been docile, when the time fixed by his employer had expired, he might ha...

The Cherub’s face lit up. “I knew your father well,” said he. “We learned soldiering together as boys, though he was four or five years my senior, and the hero of my youth. Our...

“Are you willing that I should try my luck again with your mother?” I had written. “If not, will you consent to a runaway marriage with a man who loves you better than his life?”

One of the civil guard had fired from a distance, but with precise aim, as a yell of pain announced. A man already wounded got another souvenir of the encounter; and out of the...

Meanwhile I was moving on after that broad back of which I must not lose sight, and away from the neighbourhood of the royal box. I was in the lane of the procession, close in f...

Pilar’s delight in the first part of my story was dashed by the sequel. Of course, she said, it must come right in the end, since Monica and I understood each other at last. But...

The King’s Car The Girl The Guest Who Was Not Asked “I Don’t Threaten—I Warn” A Mystery Concerning a Chauffeur Puzzle: Find the Car The Impudence of Showing a Handkerchief Over...

Then came a pang of such pain and anger as I had never known—anger not against the girl, but against Carmona; and the knife which pierced me was dipped in the poison of jealousl...

This big, open space, shaped like a parallelogram, walled by hotels, Government buildings, and shops, struck me as a Spanish combination of Piccadilly Circus and the Mansion Hou...

“Forgive me,” he said. “I saw you weren’t strong enough to bear it at first. I wanted you to eat, and then—I’d have kept it back a bit longer if I could, just till I got you to...

They were close to the chapel in which I stood. Half turning I saw the group, which consisted of six persons. Dick was not among them, and I wondered whether he were absent by d...

In three-quarters of an hour Sherlock Holmes kept his word by sending in a short note, addressed (as I had suggested) to Waring. “Honoured Sir,” it ran, “Lecomte remains night....

Suddenly the first beams of the sun streamed down the white slopes of the far Sierra Nevada, touched the vast fertile plain, and wrought magic with a castled hill which floated...

“To herself. But I must tell you what worries me, señor. As I was leaving the outer room, I heard a sound like a cry of distress, from the inner room. I looked back, and Her Maj...

There, in the towering Alcázar, had Rodrigo betrayed his beautiful queen, Egilona, for the still more beautiful Florinda, daughter of Julian, Espatorios of Spain; at least, so l...

Ropes had to light the lamps before we saw more of Manzanares than an illusive church spire which kept appearing and disappearing like a will-o’-the-wisp. But the petrol held ou...

Far below us the white houses of Algeciras lay scattered, a broken necklace of white beads; and from across the water that dark lion, Gibraltar, crouched as if waiting to spring.

“I wonder you don’t know!” said he. “Why, the tale runs that, more than a hundred years ago, the baby heir of the Carmonas was ailing. If they lost him, the title would go to an...

As for me, I must sit until the leave-taking of the royalties and royal guests should empty also the Carmona box. I wondered, as the first bull rushed into the ring, whether the...

My map, which I consulted as Dick drove, said that we had passed out of Navarre into Alava; and suddenly I noticed that we had crossed the watershed, for the bright streams, ins...

But five o’clock and Don Cipriano came together. Carmona had been to the club. The Conde de Roldan had not spoken to him, but the Duke had talked to another man, a motoring frie...

To hurry a Spanish official, I had often heard my father say, in old days, is a thing impossible, and we avoided an air of anxiety. The three men in the big red car appeared to...

Through a flowery field of cloth-of-gold we came, while the afternoon was young, into Cordoba—“Kartuba the Important,” lying like a grave entombing its dead glory, prone at the...

The Cherub’s idea of a “little while” and a “long while” were always rather vague, and apt to dovetail confusingly one into another; but knowing what it was his aim to accomplis...

Far as the eye could travel spread the fair land, green with the tender green of spring, yellow with patches of golden sand, darkly tufted with woods; struck with flying shafts...

“She is perfectly safe,” said the Cherub, in answer to an uneasy look from me. “She’s as well known over there almost as the herdsmen who tend the bulls from their birth; beside...

“It is true, sir, that we were engaged,” she replied to the question in his look. “I love him still, and only promised to marry the Duke because he said, if I did, he would save...