Category: Short Stories
As you know, it is considered rather provocative to launch a book of short stories. It is asking for trouble. The least I can do is to offer a brief apology; and I cannot do this without writing a preface, which requires an apology in itself. Unless you are a Bernard Shaw you...
As you know, it is considered rather provocative to launch a book of short stories. It is asking for trouble. The least I can do is to offer a brief apology; and I cannot do thi...
2. Part 2At Christmas-time she was dismissed from her engagement, and in a pervicacious mood she promised to marry him in the spring. Paul was delirious. Nothing was good enough for his...
3. Part 3Now this may not appear to the casual reader to be a remark likely to cause irritation, but it affected old Sam Gates as a very silly and unnecessary question. It was moreover t...
4. Part 4“Mr. Gates,” he said, “you are an old brick. You will probably hear more of this. You have probably been the means of delivering something very useful into our hands. Your own h...
5. Part 5His eye searched the broken darkness in fugitive pursuit of a solution of the formless void. Quite near him, apparently, was an oblong board which amidst this wilderness of dest...
6. Part 6A shout of laughter greeted him through the door of the sitting-room. He gripped the handle and walked deliberately in. Ted Woollams was stretching himself luxuriously on the so...
7. Part 7Doubtless in his day he had been a fine and distinguished actor, and here was I, who knew nothing about him, and did not like to ask what parts he had played because I felt that...
8. Part 8“Frocks! What a part they play in our lives. Carlyle was right. Sophie was extraordinarily clever with her needle. She had a genius for combining materials. Her theatrical exper...
9. Part 9An excited individual opposite was pointing at him. The woman uttered an exclamation and snatched at her bag. The baby cried. The conductor rang the bell. Every one seemed to be...
10. Part 10Within five minutes he was forcing the door of the fowl-house with a spade. The fowls were already settling down for the night, and they clucked rather alarmingly, but Edwin’s b...
11. Part 11“Oh, I don’t know, Tom, if we’ve got to do it, we _must_ do it. If them others can stand it, we can stand it. Whatever them others can do, we can do.”
12. Part 12I found it very difficult to meet this outburst. I could think of nothing to say, so I kept silent. After a time he got up, puffing feverishly at the cigarette, and walked round...
13. Part 13“My dear Ned, How are you, dear? I hope you keep all right. My corf is now pretty middlin otherwise nothin to complain of. Now dear I have to tell you something which grieves me...