The Scarlet Pimpernel

A few minutes later she was sitting, wrapped in costly furs, near Sir Percy Blakeney on the box-seat of his magnificent coach, and the four splendid bays had thundered down the...

The house was packed, both in the smart orchestra boxes and the pit, as well as in the more plebeian balconies and galleries above. Glück’s _Orpheus_ made a strong appeal to the...

Marguerite’s aching heart stood still. She felt, more than she heard, the men on the watch preparing for the fight. Her senses told her that each, with sword in hand, was crouch...

All nature was so still that she, lying with her ear close to the ground, could distinctly trace the sound of their tread, as they ultimately turned into the road, and presently...

The _Day Dream_ had set sail, and Marguerite Blakeney stood alone on the edge of the cliff for over an hour, watching those white sails, which bore so swiftly away from her the...

Sir Percy Blakeney, as the chronicles of the time inform us, was in this year of grace 1792, still a year or two on the right side of thirty. Tall, above the average, even for a...

Marguerite had spent over fifteen hours in such acute mental torture as well-nigh drove her crazy. After a sleepless night, she rose early, wild with excitement, dying to start...

As in a dream, Marguerite followed on; the web was drawing more and more tightly every moment round the beloved life, which had become dearer than all. To see her husband once a...

In the kitchen Sally was extremely busy—saucepans and frying-pans were standing in rows on the gigantic hearth, the huge stock-pot stood in a corner, and the jack turned with sl...

At what particular moment the strange doubt first crept into Marguerite’s mind, she could not herself afterwards have said. With the ring tightly clutched in her hand, she had r...

It took Marguerite some time to collect her scattered senses; the whole of this last short episode had taken place in less than a minute, and Desgas and the soldiers were still...

Marguerite suffered intensely. Though she laughed and chatted, though she was more admired, more surrounded, more _fêted_ than any woman there, she felt like one condemned to de...

Marguerite’s breath stopped short; she seemed to feel her very life standing still momentarily whilst she listened to that voice and to that song. In the singer she had recognis...

A surging, seething, murmuring crowd of beings that are human only in name, for to the eye and ear they seem naught but savage creatures, animated by vile passions and by the lu...

It was late into the night when she at last reached “The Fisherman’s Rest.” She had done the whole journey in less than eight hours, thanks to innumerable changes of horses at t...

His Royal Highness had laughed until the tears streamed down his cheeks at Blakeney’s foolish yet funny repartees. His doggerel verse, “We seek him here, we seek him there,” etc...

Never for a moment did Marguerite Blakeney hesitate. The last sounds outside the “Chat Gris” had died away in the night. She had heard Desgas giving orders to his men, and then...

Feeling in every part of England certainly ran very high at this time against the French and their doings. Smugglers and legitimate traders between the French and English coasts...

They all looked a merry, even a happy party, as they sat round the table; Sir Andrew Ffoulkes and Lord Antony Dewhurst, two typical good-looking, well-born and well-bred English...

“Ah, yes, Louise, I daresay I shall be tired presently,” said Marguerite, kindly; “but you are very tired now, so go to bed at once. I’ll get into bed alone.”

“Faith, Madame!” said Sir Andrew, seeing that Marguerite seemed desirous to call her surly host back again, “I think we’d better leave him alone. We shall not get anything more...

She had taken an affectionate farewell of little Suzanne, and seen the child safely started with her maid, and in her own coach, back to town. She had sent one courier with a re...

The next quarter of an hour went by swiftly and noiselessly. In the room downstairs, Brogard had for a while busied himself with clearing the table, and re-arranging it for anot...

A beautiful starlit night had followed on the day of incessant rain: a cool, balmy, late summer’s night, essentially English in its suggestion of moisture and scent of wet earth...

The historic ball given by the then Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs—Lord Grenville—was the most brilliant function of the year. Though the autumn season had only just beg...

Once outside the noisy coffee-room, alone in the dimly-lighted passage, Marguerite Blakeney seemed to breathe more freely. She heaved a deep sigh, like one who had long been opp...

In a moment the pleasant oak-raftered coffee-room of the inn became the scene of hopeless confusion and discomfort. At the first announcement made by the stable boy, Lord Antony...

Marguerite Blakeney had watched the slight sable-clad figure of Chauvelin, as he worked his way through the ball-room. Then perforce she had had to wait, while her nerves tingle...

The day was well advanced when Marguerite woke, refreshed by her long sleep. Louise had brought her some fresh milk and a dish of fruit, and she partook of this frugal breakfast...

She did not know how long she was thus carried along, she had lost all notion of time and space, and for a few seconds tired nature, mercifully, deprived her of consciousness.

The few words which Marguerite Blakeney had managed to read on the half-scorched piece of paper, seemed literally to be the words of Fate. “Start myself to-morrow. . . .” This s...