The World Masters

It was the 27th of January, the Kaiser's birthday, and the reception-rooms of the German Embassy, on the Nevski Prospekt, overlooking the snow-covered quays and ice-bound waters...

"And so, Monsieur le Ministre, I am to take that as your final word? I have given you every proof that I can--saving the impossible--the bringing of my apparatus from Strassburg...

It was a lovely May morning on the English Channel, and the steam yacht _Nadine_ was travelling under easy steam at about eight knots an hour midway between Guernsey and Southam...

During breakfast it had been agreed that Lamson, as the discoverer of the mysterious tin box, should open it by himself, and, after examining its contents, report on them to Har...

The _Nadine_ had been lying for a fortnight in Southampton Water, and all that was mortal of the man who might have been master of the world was resting in a nameless grave in t...

Miss Chrysie's European visit had come to an end, and she and her father had accepted Hardress's invitation to take a trip home in the _Nadine_. Doctor Lamson was also a guest o...

The village of Elsenau, which has hardly yet risen to the dignity of a town, lies somewhere midway between the Hartz Mountains and the Thuringia Wald, which, as everyone knows,...

By the time the prince had ceased speaking there was not the slightest doubt in Lord Orrel's mind that, in some most mysterious manner, he was connected with the discovery which...

In the midst of the desolation which had so swiftly and unexpectedly fallen upon her, the help and solace even of those whom she now knew to be her enemies--enemies perhaps to t...

Within a week after the funeral Adelaide and Madame de Condé returned to the late prince's hotel on the Ringstrasse in Vienna. They had taken most cordial leave of Lord Orrel an...

Ten days had passed since Victor Fargeau's conversation with Adelaide de Condé in Vienna. He had adhered to the decision that he had come to so suddenly under the spell of her w...

It was not until four days later that Victor's friend in the Ministry of War was able to procure an appointment for him with General Ducros. Pressure of business was Captain Gas...

Nearly a year had passed since General Ducros had dined with Count Valdemar and Ma'm'selle Sophie in Paris. It was Cowes week, and there was quite a cosmopolitan party at Orrel...

Sophie opened the door in answer to her father's murmured "entrez," and closed it very gently behind her. She had not noticed Chrysie as she slipped into her own room, for her b...

While all this plotting and counter-plotting had been going on in England and Europe, and France, thanks to what some might call the patriotic treachery of Victor Fargeau, was r...

That same morning, as it happened, Adelaide received a letter from Victor Fargeau, dated from Paris, telling her, among other things, that the two alleged Polar expeditions woul...

"And so, Ma'm'selle la Comtesse, it comes to this: you would have me reward hospitality with treachery? You would have me betray my host, my father's friend, and his son, into t...

Cowes week was over, and the house party at Orrel Court had broken up. Madame de Bourbon had yielded to her niece's earnest persuasions, and consented to become a guest on the _...

When the _Nadine_ left her moorings, at about four o'clock on a lovely June afternoon, she sauntered easily down to the Needles at about twelve knots. For reasons of his own her...

On the morning of the second day out, when Adelaide came on deck, she was astonished, and not a little disquieted, to see nearly the whole of the yacht's crew, under the command...

Adelaide had professed the utmost wonder and concern at the accident, and Miss Chrysie, who now knew rather more than she did, watched her with unwinking steadiness from the tim...

While the captain and the chief engineer were mustering such men as were in any way fit to work the ship, or to help in getting the port engine into running order, Chrysie and h...

The _Nadine_ ranged alongside, Miss Chrysie still sitting at her Maxim, with Robertson beside her ready to see to the ammunition feed, and the president, leaning over the forwar...

Within ten days of the sinking of the _Vlodoya_ Europe was electrified by the news, published far and wide through the English and Continental press, of what amounted to a pitch...

Every day after the issue of the circular the wire which connected the Storage Works with Winnipeg was kept hot with the news of what was going on in the far-away civilised worl...

Eight days out of the ten calculated by the president and Doctor Lamson for the progress of the Great Experiment had expired, and Europe presented the extraordinary spectacle of...

The news of the coming of the expeditions was allowed to spread without comment through the works, and, to the intense surprise of the three involuntary guests of the Trust, no...

Lord Orrel and the count started from the little station just outside the western gate of the works in the private car used by the directors and drawn by a neat little electric...

A dead silence of some moments' duration--during which hosts and guests looked at each other as men might before the outburst of a storm--then Victor Fargeau, after an exchange...

Almost at the moment that the man and the two women who, but a few moments ago, had been standing in the full pride of their youth and health and beauty, had dropped to the eart...

Until five o'clock there was silence both in the works and on the ships in the harbour. Then, as the southern sun began to climb on its upward curve, the eight searchlights on t...