The Gloved Hand

An instant's silence followed Sylvester's words, and then a little murmur of interest and excitement, as the reporters bent closer above their work. I heard a quick, deep intaki...

Godfrey's powers of recuperation have astonished me more than once, and never more so than when I found him at the breakfast-table, as fresh and rosy as though he had had a full...

The events of the day that followed--Sunday--I shall pass over as briefly as may be. It was for me a day of disappointment, culminating in despair, and, looking back at it, I re...

I saw that a change had come in Miss Vaughan's condition. Her eyes were still closed, but her body no longer lay inert and lifeless, for from moment to moment it was shaken by a...

Goldberger paused at the stair-head and looked at me, an ironical light in his eyes. I knew he suspected that Miss Vaughan's story of the handkerchief was no great surprise to me.

We found a little group of men gathered about the chair in which sat the huddled body. Two of them I already knew. One was Detective-sergeant Simmonds, and the other Coroner Gol...

It was not quite ten o'clock when Godfrey and I turned in at the gates of Elmhurst, next morning, and made our way up the drive to the house, but in the library we found a consi...

I was honestly glad to get back to the office, next morning, for I felt the need of work--absorbing work--to take my mind off the problem of Worthington Vaughan's death, and esp...

"Well," he said, looking up, at last, "I've learned something new to-day. These prints shall have the place of honour. They might not be a means of identification among the Thug...

Silva laid a hand tenderly upon the bowed head, as though in benediction, but I could have sworn there was unholy triumph in his eyes. I caught but a glimpse of it, for he veile...

"I always try to make it, Saturday night," he explained. "The chief throws the work on the other fellows, if he can. That's the reason I hustled away after the inquest. The stor...

I do not know what it was I expected to see, as I leaped from my chair and peered over Godfrey's shoulder; but certainly it was something more impressive than the soiled and rag...

We tried to follow Dr. Hinman's prescription, but not with any great success, for it is difficult to talk about one thing and think about another. So the doctor took himself off...

A shiver ran through the crowd, like a gust of wind across a field of wheat. The words, "Mahbub is Thuggee," seemed to rend the veil which obscured the tragedy. Surely it was cl...

"Miss Vaughan and I are engaged to be married," he said. "Some persons may tell you that the engagement has been broken off; more than once, I have offered to release her, but s...

I fell, rather than climbed, down the ladder, snatched the white missile from the grass, and saw that it was, indeed, a sealed and addressed envelope. I had somehow expected tha...

"I hate to wake you, Lester," Godfrey said, smiling, "but it's nearly four o'clock. Dr. Hinman will be here before long, and if you're going to hear Swain's story, you'll have t...

Words cannot paint the nauseating horror of that moment. Fear--cold, abject, awful fear--ran through my veins like a drug; my face was clammy with the sweat of utter terror; my...

The wall was masked on the other side by a dense growth of shrubbery, and struggling through this, I found myself on the gravelled path where I had seen Marjorie Vaughan. Before...

I was confused and shaken; I had no idea of the hour; I did not know whether that vision had lasted a minute or a thousand years. But when I blundered up the path to Godfrey's h...

The adept was an impressive figure, as he stood there with the sun behind him, throwing a yellow nimbus around his head. The robe he wore was of a rich purple, and gave an added...

For some moments, I stood staring up into the darkness, half-expecting that shadowy figure to reappear, descend the ladder, and rejoin me. Then I shook myself together. The fact...

I glanced at my watch, as soon as I was out of bed, and saw that it was after ten o'clock. All the sleep I had lost during the hot nights of the previous week had been crowded i...

To Sylvester, head of the Identification Bureau, it seemed that the world was tottering to its fall; but the rest of us, who had not really at the bottom of our hearts, perhaps,...

I was genuinely tired when I got back to the office, that Wednesday afternoon, for it had been a trying day--the last of the series of trying days which had marked the progress...

Mechanically I followed Godfrey down the ladder, and, guided by the flaring lights, made my way back to the car. I climbed silently into my seat, while Godfrey started the motor...

There must be a providence which protects fools and madmen, for I landed in a heavy clump of shrubbery, and got to my feet with no injury more serious than some scratches on han...

"He switched off the light and sat down facing me, and again I felt his will trying to enter and conquer me. And again I clasped the glove, and kept my mind upon it, thinking on...