The girl from Scotland Yard

As Lady Raytham drew aside the long velvet curtains, she looked down into Berkeley Square. It was half-past four o’clock on a cheerless February evening. Rain and sleet were fal...

Lady Raytham put out her hand and gripped the back of the chair; her face was bloodless; she opened her mouth to speak, but no word came. Greta was staring at the big woman, but...

Leslie came striding briskly along the Thames Embankment. It was a bitterly cold night, and the nutria coat was not proof against the icy norther that was blowing. The man who w...

“I know you hate mysteries. Everybody in Scotland Yard does,” she said; “and one day I will tell you just what I mean. Do you remember last August you gave me a month’s vacation?”

Dear Miss Maughan: I have lodgings at the above address, and in spite of the neighbourhood they are very comfortable, though my landlady is certainly the most unprepossessing fe...

“I thought so,” she said. “The second button has been fastened to the third buttonhole. Whoever killed him, put on his overcoat and buttoned it. Now you can unfasten it.”

“I know he’s dead!” she exclaimed. “I know he’s dead! Heaven knows who killed him, but I found him there. I saw him as my car was passing--on the sidewalk. I somehow knew it was...

It was two o’clock when a taxicab stopped in Severall Street, Lambeth, and a very weary girl alighted. The detective whom she had asked by telephone to meet her was waiting at t...

Druze--a woman! It was incredible--almost impossible! Yet that shrewd old man would not have jested with her. She dragged herself up the stairs, her limp body aching for rest, h...

“Druze was illiterate, but, like all illiterate people, had acquired a certain form of culture and was very clever to conceal this misfortune. I think, in fact I know, she had t...

The apartment that Greta Gurden occupied was on the first floor of a house in Portman Crescent. Hers was one of those artistic little flats that reflected every taste but her ow...

Peter found it very difficult to concentrate his mind upon his work, and although his task was purely mechanical he stopped from time to time and allowed his thoughts to wander....

It was twelve o’clock when he put down his pen and rubbed his cramped hands. Throwing up the window to let out the smoke, he munched a biscuit and meditated; and then his face b...

They went by bus to the southern end of Westminster Bridge and walked along York Road together. Just before they reached Severall Street they saw a small motor truck turn into t...

Rarely did Mrs. Greta Gurden permit herself the luxury of brooding upon her injuries. She was no philosopher, and it was sheer necessity which made her disregard the irritations...

“Queer, isn’t it? But, Lord bless you, mothers do rum things! I’ve known cases--but you’ve heard about ’em, too, Leslie. Peter went down to Wimbledon to raise the devil for some...

When Lady Raytham had begun a letter to her husband the district messenger arrived with Leslie’s note. His lordship, in his aimless way, had gone on to Bombay, and was suffering...

At that moment Greta Gurden’s bedroom reeked with the pungent scent of frying sausages that wafted in from the little gas-ring in her “dining hall.” When Greta was her own provi...

“But, Anita,” wailed the other, “I can’t do that! I must see him, Nita. What a stupid thing you are! What difference does it make? If you don’t like him you needn’t show yoursel...

Children--little Elizabeth and that unseen boy of his! Peter Dawlish walked up and down his cramped room, his hands in his pockets, an unlighted cigarette between his lips. The...

As the car moved off a man came running across the road, stepped lightly on to the foot-board and wriggled his way to a place beside the driver. The car was held up outside the...

It seemed to Peter Dawlish that he had been unconscious for an eternity when he turned over on his back with a groan and carefully felt his damaged head. His face was wet and st...

It was not often that Mrs. Donald Dawlish made a call at any hour of the day. The appearance in Berkeley Square of her big car at eleven o’clock at night was something of an event.

“I’m sorry to have brought you down to this very unpretentious little flat of mine,” said Leslie, “but I have discovered in myself some of the qualities of a showman, and really...