The Highwayman

Harry was not gone far. In Long Acre stood a tavern calling itself 'The Hand of Pork.' This had always tempted Harry, whose tastes were of the people. While still a domesticated...

Mr. Waverton had an idea in his head. That was not the least unusual. It was, unhappily, a wrong one. That was not unusual either. We must have a trifle of Latin. Mr. Waverton,...

It was a time of wild plots. The long war of Marlborough had left England impregnably triumphant, and France ambitious of nothing but peace. No fear remained that foreign arms w...

Harry Boyce addressed Queen Anne in glittering verse. She was not present. She had, however, no cause to regret that, for he was tramping the Great North Road at four miles by t...

It seems that, years afterwards, Harry and Alison were afflicted with a dreary and remorseful wonder at these wars. Both, as they grew older, had something of a turn for moralis...

Late in that evening one of Alison's servants rode up to the "Hand of Pork" and inquired for Mr. Boyce. After some parley, he was told that Mr. Boyce had not been in the tavern...

There is reason to believe that from the first Mr. Hadley suspected he was making a fool of himself. This sensation, the common accompaniment of an attempt to do your duty, was...

Thus Colonel Boyce blandly arranged the lives of his young friends. It is believed that he had a peculiar pleasure in manoeuvring his fellow-creatures from behind a veil of secr...

There came in a man of many colours. Dazzled eyes, recovering from their first dismay, might admit that his splendours were harmonious. A red coat with gold buttons, a waistcoat...

Mr. Hadley and Sir John Burford in the hall at Tetherdown looked at each other across the fire. "Would you call for a pipe now, Charles?" says Sir John, fidgeting.

When Harry came back to his tavern, he was, you'll believe, not anxious to be seen. He made one step from the coach to the door, scurried through the tap and upstairs. But the c...

Captain McBean and Mr. O'Connor halted steaming horses before the door of Tetherdown. The butler announced that Mr. Waverton had gone out, and then impressed by the evidence of...

In a small, bare room Colonel Boyce sat himself down on a pallet bed and made a wry face at his son. "My poor, dear boy," he said, and shifted uneasily, and looked round at the...

With grim irony Harry congratulated himself on his decision. When first he came into the house he heard Alison singing. There was indeed (as he told himself clearly) nothing won...

Alison was gone back to her house at Highgate--and immediately regretted it. She took her adventures in a youthful, egoistic fashion: saw herself as a lovely woman made the prey...

Harry was kept a long time in a guard room. Once or twice an officer came in and looked him over, but he was asked no questions, and he asked none. He was ill at ease. Not, I be...

"Damme, you cannot be so mad! 'Tis packed with Whigs. They must have wind of you, curse them. Marlborough is there, and Argyll and Sunderland, burn his foxy face. It might have...

So all this while Alison lacked an answer to her letter. She fretted at the delay, she grew angry soon, but it does not appear that she allowed herself any new pique against Har...

Do you remember how frightened Swift was of the Mohocks? How he came home early, and even (that was bitter) spent some pence on being carried in a sedan chair to avoid the "race...

She made sure of that and sat herself beside him to wait. It was not, you know, a thing which she did well. She looked down at him gravely. Afterwards Harry would accuse her tha...

In the old house on the hill Mrs. Weston sat alone. She was looking out of the oriel window at a garden of wintry emptiness and wind swept. The westerly gale roared and moaned,...

So they swung round, and soon hitting upon a lane saw the village and the trees about the palace. In a little while, "Mr. Boyce: how much do you know?" the Pretender said; and s...

It was on the second day after that Susan Burford and Mr. Hadley rode in to the Lincoln's Inn Fields. They found Alison and Mrs. Weston together, and both sewing--a fact which f...

You behold Mr. Waverton exhibiting a high impatience. He was alone in the best room of the "Peacock" at Islington, a well-looking place after its severe old oak fashion. Disorde...

Harry, dazed at the mere fact, could not be very sure how it had happened or why. The Wavertons, mother and son, had assaulted the Colonel with hospitality--for a night--for ano...

They were under the great beeches in Hampstead Lane, breasting the rise to the heath, on their march for that kindly chapel, where, if you dined in the tavern annexed, the incum...

Captain McBean, healthily red and brown, showed no sign of having been out of bed all night. From cold water and a razor in his own lodgings he came back at a round pace to St....

It seems certain that on this day Alison wore a dress of a blue like peacock's feathers. That colour--as you may see, she wears it in both the Kneller and the Thornhill portrait...

There is reason to believe that the Earl of Sunderland and Colonel Boyce fell out. Sunderland, never an easy man, suspected that he had been ridiculous and was nervously eager t...

The irruption of Mrs. Oliver Boyce could not easily have been foretold. That the past life of Colonel Boyce was likely to throw shadows over his son Harry might have considered,...

Alison turned and stared into the fire. Harry filled himself a glass of port and drank it and laughed. She looked round at him. "Faith, Mr. Waverton is mighty good entertainment...

Where the lane from Fortis Green crosses the high road there stood an ale-house. On the wettest days, and some others, the place was Harry's resort. Not that he had a liking for...

It was always in after life alleged by Mr. Hadley that his steady interest in the family of his uncle was nothing but a desire to keep the old gentleman out of mischief. Sir Joh...

"He did not--saving the tongue of him. But I had broke my whip upon him, so I broke his nose to be even. Egad, he was beautiful before and behind. He cannot show this long while...