The Pursuit

It was not the muleteer's shove, slight but significant though it was, which produced John Aylmer's shrug of irritation. His resentment was directed at himself. He realized that...

Aylmer tightened the reins, touched the rowels against the mare's flank, and lifted her out of her easy amble into something like a canter. He called to his companion and pointe...

For a moment there was silence between the two. Aylmer's fingers unconsciously wound and unwound a tiny lock of hair in the horse's mane. His eyes travelled over the woman's fac...

"Suppose we sit down long enough to smoke a cigarette," suggested Aylmer. "Perhaps the thump I received just now has had a disastrous effect upon my limited intelligence, but I...

Outside their own country two British types carry their caste marks patently. They are the tourist and the officer. Gibraltar abounds with both, the company of the first having...

As Despard and Aylmer passed out of the dark of the Waterport into the sunlight of the square, two men, who walked in front of them, halted, shook hands, appeared to exchange an...

Aylmer looked up as Despard came into the room. A kit bag lay on the floor half full and Aylmer's man was packing it. Despard raised his eyebrows in surprise.

The cavalcade of horsemen swept along a level plain of beach and from there turned aside to gain the broom-covered slope which led towards the cliff top. The white column of the...

It seemed to Aylmer that the world into which he woke was one of stillness, of neutral tints, of intrinsic peace. There was a hint of sunshine diluted by the green hangings in f...

In English these words would have sounded strangely from the lips of a child of six, but little John Aylmer was fluent in the Arab jargon of his grandfather's native household.

"What open-hearted ingenuousness!" he chuckled. "You and I now, my Captain! When one has been officer of the day a few thousand times, or sat upon a few hundred courts-martial,...

"The wells of El Djebir, Monsieur," explained Sergeant Perinaud. "It is here we should find our men, if they are proceeding by the shortest route to their hills. If not--" He sh...

The litter of a recently disturbed encampment cumbered the ground. Rags, the feathers of lately plucked chickens, the ashes of recently extinguished fires abounded. But whether...

Aylmer blinked. Himself in the shadow, he was aware of a figure opposite him in the center of a circle of light. He lay, apparently, in a circular and unfurnished room, lit by a...

A full mile out in the offing _The Morning Star_ swung at her anchorage, dipping and swerving lazily over the incoming rush of the Atlantic swell. The dawn-light was soft behind...

About the aspect of the port of Melilla there is only one thing wholly admirable. That is the curving bay which sweeps eastward from the town towards the frontier blockhouse. Th...

Muhammed's steps were bent away from the town towards the row of dilapidated hovels which fringe the bank of sand below the nearer blockhouse. And he walked quickly; there was d...

The torment of his tightly lashed limbs, the irk of the gag between his teeth, want of air, hunger, thirst--these had all done their work upon Aylmer and, as the hours went by,...

He saw an exceedingly dirty deck on which the smuts from the galley chimney appeared to have become embedded through long years of neglect. He smelt the very rich, nourishing od...

The door of the lazaret was pulled quietly back. The opening showed Miller, silhouetted as in a frame, a splash of sunshine which flowed down into the outer cabin hanging in a g...

Rescue, liberty, and, not least, triumph over Landon! These were all possibilities, even probabilities, clear to Claire Van Arlen's intelligence as she bent over Aylmer--clear,...

Aylmer looked up from his pallet on the floor--looked at the girl--looked at the walls of bare masonry--looked at the shaft of sunlight which slanted through the barred window....

The presage of the afternoon sky was amply fulfilled by midnight. The western gale howled through the window bars and the sound of the sea's thunder rolled up from the beach. Fo...

The smuggler's eyes expressed the limits of amazement. He stared at the newcomer. He turned his glance to Aylmer, as if he sought information there. He brought it back and focus...

Storm, darkness, despair--these had been the sole comrades for the two who lay bound in their old quarters in the _Santa Margarita's_ lazaret. Within a few minutes of the moment...

Out of the darkness of insensibility consciousness came slowly into being in Aylmer's brain, but memory lagged to join it. He was bound--that he realized, and his teeth were imm...

Dawn flushed into full daylight as the sun rose upon the ruined city. Morning dragged its length to midday and midday merged in afternoon. And the workers toiled on doggedly, bu...

A pall of mist and driving rain closed upon the city as evening fell, as if Nature flung a veil between herself and the handiwork of her passions. Through it the launch of the _...