The tomb of Ts'in

A man walked carelessly through Hyde Park with the air of one who had no destination. He was tall and straight, his shoulders were thrown back, his chin had that upward lift whi...

Tillizinni, spare of build, with his keen, eager face and his black and white colouring, formed a strong note in that room of soft pearl-blue draperies and shaded lights. He off...

It was a busy night for Captain Talham. The clocks were striking three when he hailed a taxi-cab. Tillizinni joined him as he stood on the edge of the pavement, and the two conv...

Gregory de Costa favoured his father in that he was below the medium height and somewhat stout for a man of twenty-four. His complexion had a tinge of bronze-red, which is to be...

Mr. de Costa, senior, sat in his study until late that night. His son had gone to a musical comedy to the relief of his mind and the repair of a crushed spirit, and Mr. de Costa...

Whoever the masked man was who was working so deliberately at the back door of Mr. de Costa’s respectable dwelling, he went to work methodically and without any indication that...

“You must come,” said Talham gravely. “I did perhaps overstep the conventions when, without consulting you, I accepted this invitation on your behalf. But I think you will enjoy...

It was a drizzling, miserable night; the streets were crowded with cars and cabs carrying their occupants to theatreland. On the drenched pavements the newspaper boys drove a th...

Yvonne Yale had spent a tiring and a busy day shopping with her mother. It was not a relaxation which she often allowed herself. Mrs. Yale took shopping very seriously, and woul...

Yvonne Yale had sat in silence during that mad rush through the City. Once in a frenzy of terror she had half risen to throw herself from the car. Instantly Soo’s hand grasped her.

For a second only Soo stood. He saw the gleam of two pistol barrels directed at his breast, and then with a sudden jerk of his arm, he brought the girl into the line of fire.

It was an embarrassing situation for Tillizinni. He saw the older man’s eyes fixed on him accusingly as the youth, dazed and white, picked himself up from the floor. Yet the det...

Talham had proposed to Yvonne Yale. It had followed many meetings, many calls at the house in Upper Curzon Street, many lengthy orations on the future of applied mechanics deliv...

Mrs. Yale sniffed, and searched aimlessly for her handkerchief, but thought better of it. After all, Yvonne was not the sort of girl to be moved by tears. She did not need to ha...

When De Costa went back to his house he was determined at all costs to revenge himself upon the man who had slighted him, and who had brought such misery to his son.

The landscape which the travellers beheld was an especially uninviting one; the country was flat, except about the horizon, where a range of low hills were half veiled in mist.

The Mandarin’s face was a study. Between fear of consequence, the sure reprisal which would come to him from the Government if his visitors were harmed, and the fear of the grea...

“There is one at Tai Pan,” he said, looking straightly at the other. “That is the nearest. Otherwise you would have to go to Cho Sin, which is a hundred and fifty _li_ from here.”

Yvonne Yale was in the little room which overlooked the courtyard of the Governor’s yamen. She sat on the edge of the _kang_, her hands clasped on her knees, her face tense and...

Left alone in the darkness of the tomb the two men stood motionless. Tillizinni was the first to realise the awfulness of their position. None knew the secret of the door save t...