The House of Whispers

"Because my senses of hearing and feeling are sharper and more developed than those of other folk perhaps," replied the grey-bearded old gentleman, as he turned his sharp-cut, g...

There are few of the Perthshire castles that more plainly declare their feudal origin and exhibit traces of obsolete power than does the great gaunt pile of ruins known as Glenc...

Ten minutes later she returned, panting, her face pale and haggard, her mouth hard-set. For a moment she stood in silence upon the threshold of the open doors leading to the gro...

In the spreading dawn the house party had returned from Connachan and had ascended to their rooms, weary with the night's revelry, the men with shirt-fronts crumpled and ties aw...

Breakfast was late, and at table, when the loss was mentioned, Gabrielle offered to drive over to Connachan in the car and make inquiry and search. The general opinion was that...

Along the cloister they went to the great hall, where Walter's mother advanced to greet her. Full of regrets at the girl's inability to attend the dance, she handed her the miss...

A week had gone by. Stewart, the lean, thin-faced head-keeper, who spoke with such a strong accent that guests from the South often failed to understand him, and who never seeme...

Gabrielle Heyburn recognised this truth. She had the will to love, and she had the resolve to perish--perish by her own hand--rather than allow her secret to be exposed. Those w...

In the few days which followed, Lady Heyburn's attitude towards Gabrielle became one of marked affection. She even kissed her in the breakfast-room each morning, called her "dea...

At nine o'clock that night Gabrielle left her father, and ascended to her own pretty room, with its light chintz-covered furniture, its well-filled bamboo bookcases, its little...

What had startled Gabrielle was certainly extraordinary and decidedly uncanny. She was standing near the southern wall, when, of a sudden, she heard low but distinct whispers. A...

Gabrielle was silent for a moment. No doubt Stewart meant what he said; he was not endeavouring to alarm her unduly, but thoroughly believed in supernatural agencies. "I suppose...

The following afternoon was glaring and breathless. Gabrielle had taken Stokes, with May Spencer (a girl friend visiting her mother), and driven the "sixteen" over to Connachan...

Gabrielle and Walter were seated together under one of the big oaks at the edge of the tennis-lawn at Connachan. With May Spencer and Lady Murie they had been playing; but his m...

One evening, a few days later, Gabrielle, seated beside her father at his big writing-table, had concluded reading some reports, and had received those brief, laconic replies wh...

Walter Murie had chosen politics as a profession long ago, even when he was an undergraduate. He had already eaten his dinners in London, and had been called to the Bar as the f...

"Monsieur Goslin, Sir Henry," Hill announced, entering his master's room one morning a fortnight later, just as the blind man was about to descend to breakfast. "He's in the lib...

The Twelfth--the glorious Twelfth--had come and gone. "The rush to the North" had commenced from London. From Euston, St. Pancras, and King's Cross the night trains for Scotland...

Gabrielle crossed quickly to one of the long windows, which she unbolted and flung open, expecting to hear the shrill whir of the burglar-alarm, which, every night, Hill switche...

"What are you doing here at this hour?" Gabrielle's father demanded slowly, releasing her hand. "Why are you prying into my affairs?" He had not detected Flockart's presence, an...

Sir Henry refused to speak with his daughter when, on the following morning, she stole in and laid her hand softly upon his arm. He ordered her, in a tone quite unusual, to leav...

At the Villa Heyburn--that big, square, white house with the green sun-shutters, surrounded by its great garden full of spreading palms, sweet-smelling mimosa, orange-trees lade...

Felix Krail, his cigarette held half-way to his lips, stood watching the effect of his insinuation. He saw a faint smile playing about Flockart's lips, and knew that it appealed...

On their left were several white villas, before which pink and scarlet geraniums ran riot, with spreading mimosas golden with their feathery blossom, for Ospedaletti makes a fra...

Midway between historic Fotheringhay and ancient Apethorpe, the ancestral seat of the Earls of Westmorland, lay the long, straggling, and rather poverty-stricken village of Wood...

"Whatever you have to say may surely be said in the hearing of a third person?" was her dignified answer. His sudden appearance had startled her, but only for a moment. She was...

The girl hurried on, her heart filled with wonder, her eyes brimming with tears of indignation. The one thought occupying her whole mind was whether Walter really wished to see...

Was it really true what Flockart had told her? Did Walter actually wish to see her again? At one moment she believed in her lover's strong, passionate devotion to her, for had s...

"Being with those fellows who were anxious to go along and see the show at the Empire last night, I had no opportunity of having a chat with you, my dear old chap. That's why I...

Edgar Hamilton sat with his eyes fixed upon the dingy, inartistic, smoke-begrimed windows of the chambers opposite. The man before him was acquainted with Gabrielle Heyburn! For...

To Hamilton it was evident that the man Krail, now smartly dressed in country tweeds, was telling the girl something which surprised her. He was speaking quickly, making involun...

Late on the following afternoon Gabrielle was seated at the old-fashioned piano in her aunt's tiny drawing-room, her fingers running idly over the keys, her thoughts wandering b...

The big, rather severely but well-furnished room overlooked the busy Boulevard des Capucines in Paris. In front lay the great white façade of the Grand Hotel; below was all the...

"Well, you and your friend Felix have placed me in a very pleasant position, haven't you?" asked Lady Heyburn of Flockart, who had just entered the green-and-white morning-room...

Gabrielle, in her short tweed skirt, golf-cape, and motor-cap, had strolled, with Walter Murie at her side, from the house along the winding path to the old castle. From the con...

Gabrielle fell back in fear. Her handsome countenance was blanched to the lips. This man intended to speak--to tell the terrible truth--and before her lover too! She clenched he...

To where they stood had come the sound of wheels upon the gravelled drive outside, and a moment later Hill entered, announcing, "A gentleman to see you very urgently, Sir Henry....

Stokes the chauffeur had driven Murie and Hamilton in the car down to the village, where the last-named, after a conversation with the police inspector, went to the "Strathavon...

After long consultation--Krail having been removed in custody back to the village--it was agreed that the only charges that could be substantiated against Flockart were those of...