The Diamond Coterie

"Your honor, and gentlemen; I have been successful beyond my expectations. You see what a guilty conscience can do. I wished to convince this court that my client has enemies in...

Both Constance and Dr. Heath fancy that they comprehend the situation almost instantaneously. The stranger's movements have been so cat-like, his voice so carefully modulated, t...

The events of the two previous days no longer seemed to her imagination a chaotic disturbing mass of tribulations; they had arranged themselves in their proper order, been revie...

Doctor Heath stood at his office window looking out upon the street, and whistling softly. Below and directly under his gaze, stood a fine bay horse, harnessed to a new light ro...

It is almost sunset, and Constance Wardour is standing alone at her dressing-room window, which faces the west. It is still in confusion, but she cares little for that. Her thou...

It is three o'clock. The rain has ceased falling, but the sky is still gray and threatening. The wind howls dismally among the old trees that surround John Burrill's shallow gra...

Constance Wardour arose early on Sunday morning. In spite of youth, health, and her splendid self-poise, she had slept but little; and such slumber as had visited her eyelids, h...

Mrs. Aliston seated in a big dressing chair, with a tempting breakfast tray drawn close beside her, looked up serene and comfortable, and said, after setting down her porcelain...

The mystery round about her, her inability to cope with the unknown, the inaction, the waiting, was almost more than she could calmly endure; and all this distress of mind and u...

Miss Wardour and the private detective had just completed their work of transferring to paper a minute description of the Wardour diamonds, when the door opened quietly, and Fra...

Clifford Heath turned slowly away from the small iron-barred window; he looked a trifle disturbed by this announcement, for he had just been interviewed by Mr. O'Meara, who for...

Doctor Heath and the detective went in silence down the wide shrub-bordered walk, to the spot where the doctor's horse awaited him. Here the detective paused suddenly and listen...

All that day, or what remained of it after his father's departure, and the almost simultaneous withdrawal of the private detective, Frank Lamotte passed in an uneasy reverie. He...

Constance followed her friend up to the room where they had so often passed long hours together, wondering idly at Sybil's composure and seeming resignation, and shudderingly re...

Wardour Place, the home of Miss Constance Wardour, and the scene of the "_great_ Diamond robbery," lies a little east from the town, away from the clamor of its mills, and the c...

While Frank Lamotte, in his own chamber, is preparing himself for emergencies, Constance Wardour stands by the bedside of her unconscious friend, struggling for self control; sh...

Early on the following morning, there was unusual stir about Mapleton. John Burrill was to be buried that day, and the sad funeral preparations were going on. People were moving...

Mr. Jasper Lamotte is a tall man, a dark man, and a stately man. He is grave of speech, yet very suave and pleasing. He is open handed and charitable, and a very popular man amo...

It is night, late and lowering; especially gloomy in that quarter of W---- where loom the great ugly rows of tenements that are inhabited by the factory toilers; for the gloom a...

Constance Wardour catches her breath, and bends forward to look at her lover, the color coming and going hotly in her cheeks. She had chosen to hear nothing of his past, and so...

But these were exceptional days; life does not move on thus, especially in the usually staid and well regulated town of W----. Men and women are not qualified to run a long, hig...

Mapleton stands high on an eminence, which may have arisen expressly to hold, and to exhibit, the splendid edifice erected thereon by Mr. Jasper Lamotte. It is the only hill wit...

Sybil sat alone in her boudoir. It was yet early in the evening, but, feeling little inclined to remain in the society of her family, who assembled, with all due formality, in t...

"It is impossible, sir! utterly impossible! and, pardon me for saying it, most absurd! This matter has been dragged on too long already. And on such evidence I utterly refuse to...

Clifford Heath utters a sharp exclamation. He starts forward suddenly, and looks, not upon the dead face, but straight at the white thing that is still held in the hand of one o...

The sudden and surprising exit of Burrill caused, for a moment, a stay of proceedings, and left the group, so rapidly gathered in Nance Burrill's kitchen, standing _en tableaux_...

The prisoner is a little paler, a little graver than his ordinary self. But is his ordinary self in every other respect; as proud of bearing, as self-possessed, as handsome, and...

During the night that saw Sybil Burrill's reason give way under the long, horrible strain, that had borne upon it; the night that witnessed the downfall of Frank Lamotte's cheri...

"For several years past," began Mr. Bathurst, "the city and many of the wealthier suburban towns have been undergoing a systematic overhauling. Through the network of big thefts...

"Humph! well, that's according to how you put it. My knowledge is sufficient unto the day, at any rate. I am to visit Heath at once, taking young Vandyck with me; I am to insist...

Doctor Clifford Heath sat alone in his office at half-past eleven o'clock. His horse, "all saddled and bridled," stood below in the street, awaiting him. On a small stand, near...

It is Mr. Wedron, of the New York Bar, who utters this monosyllable. He sits at the library table in the little lawyer's sanctum; opposite him is his host, and a little farther...

"From the moment when I appeared among you as Brooks, my work was double. I was bent upon posting myself thoroughly in regard to Jasper Lamotte, and day by day I became more int...

When Sybil Burrill, after uttering her defiance in the face of father and husband, had swept from the room, closely followed by her mother, another form moved away from the imme...

"If you please, Mr. Lamotte," said that gentleman's coachman, appearing before his master, less than an hour before the time appointed for the moving of the funeral cortege, and...

Doctor Benoit was old and deaf; he was also very talkative. One of those physicians who invariably leave a titbit of news alongside of their powders and pellets. A constant talk...

The morning of the following day breaks gray and dismal. The wind has been blowing all the night through, and wherever a tree stands, there the fallen leaves lie, thick and rain...

"Clifford," says the heiress of Wardour, standing beside her lover, one winter day, not long after the extinction of the Diamond Coterie, "Clifford I have been to Mapleton to-da...

All that long morning Clifford Heath sat alone in his cosy, parlor, and what his thoughts were no observer, had there been such, could have guessed. His features were grave, eve...

Jasper Lamotte was hurriedly eating a bountiful and appetizing lunch, and washing it down with plenty of light claret; and Frank was seated near the table, smoking a strong sega...

At ten o'clock that night, business was running lively at the low ceiled, dingy, riverside saloon, that was most popular with the factory men, the colliers, the drovers, and the...

On a certain Saturday in June, year of our Lord 1880, between the hours of sunrise and sunset, the town of W----, in a State which shall be nameless, received two shocks.

Like a man in a dream, Frank Lamotte obeys his father's call, never once thinking that the summons is strangely worded. Over and over in his mind the question is repeating itsel...

Late that night a man is walking slowly up and down the little footpath that leads from the highway, just opposite Mapleton, down to the river and close past that pretty, white...

Miss Wardour, being Miss Wardour, was apt to succeed in most things, and it is fair to suppose that her visit to Mapleton, in the character of intercessor for the erring Sybil,...

"I never before in all my career, brought to justice a criminal whom I both pitied unreservedly, and justified fully. Viewing all things from his standpoint, Evan Lamotte is les...

Clifford Heath's trial follows close upon his indictment. A month rolls away, and with the first days of winter comes the assembling of judge and jury, and his case is the first...