The secret in the hill

I. I first see Joshua Pilbrow II. A Great Loss and a Queer Equivalent III. Uncle Jenico IV. My First View of the Hill V. The Story Of The Earthquake VI. Mrs. Puddephatt and Fanc...

I. The Badger II. The Great Storm III. Open Sesame IV. The Secret in the Hill V. A Reappearance VI. An Odd Compact VII. “Facilis Descensus Averni” VIII. The Feast of Lanterns IX...

When I was a very little boy my mother died. I was too young to feel her loss long, though I missed her badly at first; but the compensation was that it brought my father nearer...

I looked in Mr. Quayle’s face; but I asked him no question. The mud we trod seemed colder, the houses we passed more frowning than before; but I asked no question. I could not f...

That same evening Uncle Jenico arrived. I was just put to bed at the time, but he came and stood by me a little before I went to sleep and dreamt of him. He was not the least gr...

It turned out not so badly, yet pretty badly. Uncle Jenico took cheap lodgings for us in the town, and for two or three months was busy flitting between Ipswich and London windi...

Providence, I cannot but believe, had all this time humoured us along a seeming “Road of Casualty,” which was, in truth, the direct path to its own wonderful ends. We talk of lu...

The following day my uncle was near himself again, and we left the Flask inn and took lodging with the widow Puddephatt. The Playstow was a little green, about half-way down the...

I think, perhaps, Uncle Jenico foresaw it no more than I. Without doubt, at first, he would have laughed to scorn the idea of sinking all his eager interests in this little Suff...

For a fortnight succeeding our arrival the weather remained calm and bright, so that Uncle Jenico and I were able to explore the locality with great comfort and satisfaction. Th...

It was that obnoxious penny, I believe, which was responsible for my uncle’s continued pursuit of his new Lobby, until the hobby itself became an obsession. If we had come home...

When I had been washed, and my cuts and bruises salved, Mr. Sant took me in to dinner, having already sent a message to my uncle that I should be late. I was horribly stiff, wit...

I came in all glowing to Mr. Sant, who greeted my good news with a sigh of such relief that one could have thought a nightmare had rolled off his chest.

It is with an odd sense of nervousness, and almost of oppression, that I open upon the second act of my story. In the first, the schoolboy, with his “shining morning face” and s...

“Which it’s well known that ’ope deferred maketh a cat sick,” said Mrs. Puddephatt, with unintentional irreverence, referring to my report to my uncle of our late meeting with M...

I had a vision sometimes of our tight little island lying on the sea like a round of bread and butter on a plate, and the Angel of the Storm amusing himself by biting patterns o...

My first impression, as I sat up to gather my wits, was of awakening from a falling nightmare to the comfortable security of bed and early morning. The frantic fears engendered...

On the day following that of our adventure Harry was due at Yokestone. I had arranged to walk part of the way with him, for we had much and momentous matter to discuss--our disc...

Age, that forgets its yesterday’s company, often puts one to shame in the memories of long ago. I had pondered the problem, even while proposing it, of Joshua’s introduction to...

I had forgotten all our late troubles in this wonderful encounter. Aaron’s snake had swallowed the others. This peaked wintry little ghost out of the past, starved and frost-bit...

I remember I ate a very large supper that night, to the happy reassurance of Uncle Jenico. That suffocating tightness of the midriff, which anxiety brings, seems to expand, in i...

But the morning, rising cold and bright, though still misty, found me on the rebound once more. The day, after all, is what we make it, and I _would_ not think evil of so smilin...

The memory of that awful time is soothed and assuaged to me by virtue of the strong soul who, under Providence, was given to us to command it. If destiny had used him its instru...

What a fantastic nightmare in my memory is that amazing voyage! Were souls as oddly consorted ever launched on an odder? Looking back at this date on all the circumstances, our...

Confession, discussion, incredulity, conviction, with all their concomitants of amazement, awe, emotion, were long over; long put aside in reservation was the unsolvable problem...

You remember old Jacob? ’Twas he seconded Harry so unhandsomely in the great fight. He had retired upon his savings now, and did no work, save when a still night persuaded him f...

By common consent we would speak no more on the subject until nature had been restored. There was a scent of battle, not to speak of eggs and bacon, in the air, which inspired u...

The village was long asleep when at last we issued forth, as blamelessly agitated a body of brigands as ever trod the corridors of night. We had taken our measures with infinite...