VENTRE A TERRE.
"Now," said Haigh, as the anarchist reappeared dressed, and tore away
down the stairs, "it seems to me a reasonable supposition that there's
movement in front of us to-day, and so it's as well to prepare for it.
I'm not a breakfast eater myself, and coffee and cognac will be all I
can manage; but I'd advise you, as you are talented in that direction,
to stow away as much solid food as you can lay your hands upon. The
Lord knows what wild paper-chase that frock-coated idiot will try to
lead us on when he turns up again. That is always supposing he does
turn up, for, to tell the truth, I shouldn't be surprised if he made a
bolt of it at this stage of the proceedings, and just played on for his
own hand. And to let you into a secret, dear boy, I shouldn't be very
savage if he did sell us in that way. We've got some good plunder as it
is, and there'd be a devil of a lot of bother with one thing and
another if we set about to collar the rest."
"I can't say," I observed, "that I should object to being a billionaire
myself. I've never tried the sensation, and I dare say there are
drawbacks to it; but still, after a man's been beastly hard up all his
days, he doesn't mind going to a little trouble to make a big haul."
"You're energetic, old man; I'm not, and that's the difference between
us. When I've specie in my pocket, I've never been in the habit of
exerting myself to grab more till that's spent. I adopt the principle
which obtains hereabouts, and shrug my shoulders, and say,
'_Manana_.' However, if you're still on the gathering tack, I'm on
for helping you to the limit of my small ability. Only, as I say, I'm
not wonderfully keen on it from my own point of view."
We breakfasted at leisure, the one sketchily, the other with emphasis,
according to our appetites, and had just lit tobacco when the
swing-doors of the _cafe_ clashed and the anarchist rushed in.
"I have ordered a carriage," he exclaimed. "Come at once; we must meet
it at the stable. There is no time to drive round here. We shall barely
catch them as it is."
"Ho, ho!" said Haigh placidly; "so you've hit off the trail, have you?
Pollensa and Soller, is it?"
"No, senor; your guess was a true one. They drove off to catch the
Palma train at La Puebla. But come at once, or I must go alone."
So we went off with him to the _establo_, climbed into a
sacking-floored shandrydan, and rattled boisterously through the narrow
streets of Alcudia. Once on the broad level road beyond the walls, the
driver, who had already received his orders, made the cattle stretch
out into a canter, and the pace was pretty smart. But it did not equal
Taltavull's impatience, and every minute or so out went his head and
beard bidding the driver to hasten and hasten; and the driver, crouched
there in his little penthouse, rumbled out fierce _arr-e-ees_, and
prodding forth a blue-sleeved arm beneath his blanket, lashed the
scraggy mules into a gallop.
"Good for any one with a torpid liver this," said Haigh.
"Senor," exclaimed the anarchist, "how can you have the face to speak
of trivialities at such a moment? Is it nothing to you what we have at
stake?"
"On the contrary, it is decidedly something. But I don't let that
confounded Recipe worry me unduly, as you appear to do. Cospatric, give
me a match--there's a good fellow."
The old man glowered on him sourly, and turned to urge the driver for
increased speed.
We flew past the brown vine-stumps, and the mule-gins above the wells,
and the many ducts and gutters which drain the marshes, our animals
steaming as they strained at the traces, and the driver jerking about
like some frenzied jumping-jack as he forced them on. The pace was
almost racing pace, and to be in a race always warms one's blood. I
began to share Taltavull's excitement. He was looking at his watch ever
and anon, at each time crying that we should have scarcely time to meet
the train. And yet it was evident that the mules could go no faster.
I cast about me for some means of increasing the pace, and I was not
long in hitting off an idea. It was not very brilliant, but I thought
it worth sharing, and so spoke,--
"Look here, Monsieur Taltavull: if we chuck some of the ballast
overboard, the mules will have less to drag, and we shall go faster.
The only thing is, have we enough money with us to afford it?"
"Explain, explain! I cannot understand your barbarous sentences."
"Why, we can smash off the lid and most of the sides of this ramshackle
Noah's ark till it's as light as a Kentucky trotting wagon. The only
thing is, we must pay the driver cash down, or he may object and stop,
and we shall lose time that way."
The anarchist unbuttoned his waistcoat, and, ripping away the lining,
brought out a sheaf of notes. "A man," said he, "who never knows one
minute whether he may not be arrested and have his pockets cleared the
next, should never be without these. Senor Briton, use your big
strength and tear away all that seems you good. I will satisfy the
driver."
"Hooray!" shouted Haigh. "If there's one thing I do love, it's
destruction. Cospatric, I'll bear a hand here. Now, then, heave with
those big shoulders of yours; tear and rip; splinter and smash; don't
spare; the thing's got no friends. Use your feet, old chappie, if you
want to; all's fair here. Faith, look at that worthy farmer toting up
his mule-cart load of seaweed for manure!" He broke off into a roar of
laughter, and hove a cushion right against the man's gaping mouth as we
tore past. "If he doesn't go home and report us to his wife and cronies
as stark staring maniacs, I'm a Scotsman. _Whoop_! work away, Don
Miguel. There's more joy over one brick hove through a windowpane than
in a whole house furnished on the hire system. Ain't we making a bally
wreck of it? Good business! Wrench away the back of this seat, and I'll
lug off the steps. _Arr-e-ee!_ Send those beasts along, Pedrillo.
Make 'em burn the ground."
The lust for destruction, when once thoroughly lit in an able-bodied
man, is not an easy flame to extinguish, and in consequence we went
ruthlessly on with the dismantlement of the carriage, till even
Taltavull, hardened destructor as he was himself, was fain to call upon
us to leave off.
"But don't you think," said Haigh, "that we might just snap the thing
in two amidships, and leave the hind wheels and all the back part
behind? It would ease the load by at least three hundred-weight, and I
think we could all perch on the foot-board in front. I'm sure the pole
would keep it right side up."
However, it was judged that quite enough was done already; and though
Haigh seemed inclined to argue, further freaks were put a stop to by
another incident turning up.
The pace had slackened.
Taltavull shrieked for the driver to quicken, and the driver used the
butt of his whip-stock with true Southern mercilessness.
"Why, that poor brute of a near mule has a stone in its shoe," Haigh
called out. "It's going dead lame."
"I know," said Taltavull. "It's a great nuisance, but it can't be
helped. The stone may be knocked out again."
"The stone won't be knocked out again. It's jammed firmly in, and gets
set tighter every time it touches ground. The mule's in awful pain."
"I can't help that."
"By God, I can though. Here, pull up."
"Senor Haigh, you must be mad."
"I may be that, but I'm hanged if I'll sit here and see that poor
miserable mule tortured. Here, Cospatric, stand by to grab this elderly
person if he interferes.--And now, Mr. _Cochero_, pull 'em up in
their tracks or I'll do it for you."
The driver did as he was bade willingly enough, and Haigh nipped down
and levered out the stone with his knife. I stayed where I was. I had
my arms full. To be accurate, they were wrapped round the third member
of our trio, who was wriggling like a demon, and foaming at the mouth
in his wrath.
But after all the halt was only a short one. "All clear," shouted
Haigh, thirty seconds after he had descended. "_Arr-e-ee_, and
away you go, my tulip. Not much time lost there, Senor Taltavull, after
all."
The anarchist favoured him with the most poisonous look of hatred that
I ever beheld, and spoke with shut teeth: "If we fail through this
halt, Senor Haigh, look to yourself."
"Thanks," replied Haigh, squinting at him coolly enough; "I'm quite
capable of doing that same, so think well before you play any pranks."
We didn't talk much after that, but squatted upon our ruin like three
bears, the mules meanwhile being sent along for all they were worth. It
would be hard for me to say how long we took over the passage, as I
didn't clock it, but I dare bet that we covered the ground in record
time for a four-wheeled conveyance.
Only once Haigh spoke. "If we miss this 7.55 train, when's the next?"
he asked.
"Five fifty-five in the afternoon," returned Taltavull gloomily.
"Surely there's a train out of La Puebla before. The service can't be
as fragmentary as all that."
"Yes, another train leaves there at 2.45 for the San Bordils Junction;
but it doesn't go through, and there is no connection on."
"And how far is it by road to Palma?"
The old man did not know, and so I mentioned that the fifty-five
kilometre post was by the quay at Alcudia Port.
"Oh, come," said Haigh, "that isn't so bad after all;" but what he
meant I did not understand, as he relapsed into silence again. But we
were pulling in the last knots very rapidly then, and presently we
passed the cemetery, and got into the wished-for La Puebla. We tore
through the place with the one casualty of a small black porker run
over and left squalling in the road, and pulled up before the station
in time to see the 7.55 train steam out along the metre-gauge track.
Taltavull rushed into the waiting-room, and tried to storm the
barricade, offering threats, money, anything to have the train stopped,
if only for three seconds, whilst he got on board. But the officials
were stolid and obdurate; they were unaccustomed to hurry and flurry,
and they refused to do anything to help him; and the old man came out
to us again, wringing his bony hands, and using language that was
plaintive and powerful alternately.
Meanwhile Haigh had shown unwonted activity. The populace of La Puebla,
roused by our furious passage through the town, had followed hot-foot
after us to stare at the ragged vehicle, and to throw ten score of
questions at the driver, who, from a casual acquaintance of most of
them, had sprung into a public character. So hurried had the summons
been that many of them--of both sexes, save the mark--had apparently
run out of doors in the apparel which served them under the bedclothes.
Through this crowd Haigh shouldered his way, with a leery grin which
seemed to win every heart (more especially the female ones), and went
over to a double-muled carriage that was drawn up in front of the
little _casa_ across the way. It was a private carriage, and the
coachman naturally did not own the animals; but Haigh flourished under
his nose three hundred-peseta notes, and before that mine of wealth the
man's honesty fell. With his own hands he started untracing his cattle.
Seeing what was in the wind, I stepped down and with ready help from
the crowd set free the jaded animals that had brought us so far; and
before our frock-coated companion had well emerged from the station
again, we had picked him up and were off once more as hard as we could
pelt. He was a goodish man at plotting and planning beforehand, that
same Taltavull; but when it came to brisk action, he wasn't always
prompt enough. A bit of a reverse seemed to daze him.
"It's money that makes the world go round," remarked Haigh after we had
got beyond the cheerful howls of the crowd, and our two fine mules had
settled down to a steady hand-gallop. "If you look, you'll just see the
tail end of the train swinging out of sight round that curve. If we
have any luck, and the engine yonder doesn't forget its dignity and
exceed the orthodox Spanish crawl, we should overhaul 'em before they
make the next station. Our present pace is distinctly good. It's a
clinking fine pair this I've requisitioned, and from the condition
they're in, it's plain to see they haven't been rattled along like this
for a longish time. I guess somebody'll be wrath when he sees the two
screws his coachy has swapped for them. However, the resultant ructions
are for _manana_, and suffice it for the present we're having a
regal time. Come, cheer up, Monsieur Taltavull; you aren't half
enjoying yourself."
"It is terrible this uncertainty," groaned the old man, the words being
jolted out of him in gasps. "We do not know whether or no the wretches
are in that train after all. We may even be racing away from them.
Senores, you have been too precipitate."
"Precipitate?" rejoined Haigh; "not a bit of it, _amigo_. Both
'wretches,' as you are pleased to style them, are in a drab-lined
first-class compartment in the middle of the centre coach. I saw Madame
Cromwell looking at us through the window, and took off my hat to her.
She bowed, and mentioned our presence to M. l'Aveugle. So you see they
understand our game, and see that we have tumbled to theirs. Three
A.B.'s to a clever woman and a wily blind man. The latter combination
is slightly the weaker of the two, and therefore is allowed start
according to the ordinary handicap. Nothing could be fairer. I'm open
to back either side for a win in anything up to ten carats of
diamonds."
Bar accidents, it seemed to me certain that we must overtake the train;
but as we went along, the Book of our Fate read otherwise. Apparently
that was the only day in the record of the world when a Spanish train
had run true to time, and with anything approaching speed. There was
only one explanation for it: our rivals must have "got at" the
engine-driver. However, be that as it may, we hung very closely on to
their heels, and always viewed them when the course of the line was at
all straight.
Indeed, at the junction of the Manacor branch the train was still in
the station as we drove up outside at a furious gallop; but before we
could get in and past those infernally placid officials, she steamed
out again, and we had a desperate run along the platform for nothing.
At least, Taltavull and I did. Nothing could induce Haigh to pick up
his feet for anything quicker than a walk.
We lost ground over this excursion, as the old man was so infernally
blown with the sprint that he could scarcely totter back to the
carriage; and by the time we had got under way again, the tail of the
train was a good two kilometres ahead. But the mules were all the
better for the short breather, and entering gamely into the spirit of
the thing, stretched out into a long swinging lope that kept the chase
from gaining a single inch.
It was their frequent halts at the little wayside stations that helped
us on, and if we had only had the gumption to fly on past the junction
when we were level, we should have been able to board the train at the
next stop without hurry. However, we only discovered that afterwards,
and as the mistake once made could not be rectified, we held grimly on.
Hills bothered us a little at times, and the windings of the road added
to our handicap; but when at last we came down to the semicircular
plain on whose edge Palma stands, we thought we saw victory ahead.
"There's between eight and ten kilometres to do," said Haigh, "and as
it's all on the flat and straight, we should, with luck, be home first,
and waiting to meet them."
"Don't you be too cocksure," said I. "It isn't all over but the
shouting by a very long chalk. If you notice, there's been some rain
falling here, and down on the flat there's been a lot by the look of
it. I'm afraid that will mean heavy going for our wheels."
As we got down to the level this evil prophecy showed itself a true
one. There was gluey mud on the well-made track often three inches
deep, and though our driver flogged industriously, the tired mules were
seldom able to muster up anything better than a lumbering canter. We
had the train in sight all the time, and could see that we were
dropping astern at every stride. It was very mortifying.
But as the race neared its close Fortune again pulled a string in our
favour. A distant whistle screamed, and we saw the train gradually
bring up to a standstill alongside a signal-post. The respite was not
for long, for the barrier was soon withdrawn, and she steamed into the
station; but it had enabled us to see the pair we were chasing come
sharply out of the buildings, enter a carriage, and get driven away
through the gate into the city.
"What now?" demanded Haigh.
"On after them," exclaimed the anarchist.
"What! in this rattletrap?"
"Of course," said I.
"But everybody will stare."
"Oh, what the devil does that matter?"
"Why, for myself, I must say that in a fashionable place like this,
with a lot of girls about, I----Hullo! that settles it, though."
"What?"
"Look ahead, dear boy. There's a heavy cart just shed a wheel slap-bang
in the middle of the _puerto_. The way will be blocked for an hour
at least."
"Out we get then, and follow 'em to earth on foot. Thank goodness, the
streets are very crowded, so their carriage won't be able to get along
at more than a foot's pace."
Our pursuit was not very rapid. Haigh flatly refused to move at
anything beyond a smart walk, saying that he should collapse if he did.
I could have run them down if I had wished, but had no hankering for a
row in the public streets, and so stayed with my shipmate. And
Taltavull we kept with us whether he liked it or not. I do not think,
though, that he was very keen to race on alone. "They cannot get out of
the island, senores," said he, "as no steamer leaves to-day, and they
must understand by this that they cannot escape us. I suspect that they
will go to the Fonda de Mallorca, and await us there to treat for
terms."
So we wound our way down the narrow, busy streets (wherein every fifth
building was put to ecclesiastical uses), and finally landed out into
the head of the Calle de Conquistador, where another surprise awaited
us.
The hotel is in the middle of the hill, and as we arrived in sight of
it we saw our two birds, accompanied by a dark-complexioned chap (whom
I took to be Sadi, Pether's confidential valet), get out of the vehicle
which had brought them so far, into another smarter one, which drove
off at a rapid pace as soon as they were under the tilt.
Taltavull started wringing his hands. "What now? what now?" moaned he.
"The Lord knows," said I. "Where's the nearest hack-stand? Say, quick."
"At the bottom of the street."
"Well, here's a tram going down. Up you jump."
The three of us hung on the tail-board, and rode to the bottom of the
Calle de Conquistador, where we exchanged to the most likely-looking
vehicle we could see.
"You saw that carriage that just rushed by down towards the harbour?"
"_Si, senor_," grinned the driver.
"Then after it like blue hades, and there's a hundred pesetas for you
when we're alongside."
"_Ah, senores, muchos grac----_"
"Drive, you scoundrel; don't talk."
Away we went again, clattering, jolting, rattling, till the teeth of us
were fairly loosened in their steps. Sharp to the right it was, past
the Longa, and on by the tram-lines alongside the old walls; then an
S-turn; and then a sweep round to the left; always with the
tram-lines beside our tires. We were heading out for the white suburb
which is beneath the Bellver Castle, and what harbourage the fugitives
could hope to find in that direction we couldn't for the life of us
imagine. But that was their affair. Our business--or the business we
made for ourselves--was to get within speaking range.
Up the hill we spun, and through the pretty suburb, with its
orange-trees, and its tattered palms, and its sprawling clumps of
prickly pears; and past Porto Pi, the silted-up Carthaginian harbour;
and then, leaving population and tram-lines behind, we opened out on to
the magnificent road that sweeps round the western horn of Palma Bay.
But always at a fixed distance in front of us hovered a billowing halo
of amber-coloured dust, which no frenzied strain on our part could
bring a metre nearer.
Once where the road wound in stately zigzags down the cliff of a slope,
our driver took the ditch and cut an angle, heading across the rough
ground which intervened; but the pace had to be lessened, and the
carriage was nearly wrenched to pieces, and the experiment was not
repeated. We had lost time by it.
And so the race continued, and the monotony of it dulled our interest
in surroundings.
We thought only of the conclusion. Where the actual winning-post could
be we had given up trying to conjecture. "It seems," Haigh remarked
once, "that those two fools have made up their minds to race round this
five-franc bit of an island for so long as we three fools choose to
chivy them. It's a mad set-out whichever side you take it from, and the
fun's evaporating. I don't know what you chaps are going to do, but the
next chance I see I'm going to get down for a drink. I'm parched within
an inch of dissolution."
How long this state of things went on I can't tell. I was bruised by
the bumping from hat to heel, and was much engaged in fending myself
against further abrasions. But at last a sharp cry from the driver
roused me to look out of one of the window-ports, and I saw that we had
opened out a small bay that was backed by a high rocky island of red
and yellow stone. One end of the island showed a curious profile of a
man's face, and I recognized it as Dragonera; but what the bay was
called I didn't remember, though I had a sort of dim recollection of an
anchorage for small craft there.
Anchorage it was sure enough too, for as we rose the inlet further, I
saw a small screw boat riding there to some sort of moorings and
lifting languidly to the swell. She was an ex-yacht, Cowes or Clyde
built for a wager, of the sort one sees in small Mediterranean ports
for the petty coasting traffic; a lean, slender craft of some eighty or
hundred tons register, with all her pristine smartness thoroughly
submerged in southern happy-go-lucky squalor. There was a faint gray
pencil of steam feathering away from her escape-pipe, and as we drew
nearer I saw she had hove short, and was ready to break her anchor out
of the ground at a moment's notice.
Another cry from the driver called off my attention. The carriage ahead
had stopped; its three passengers had descended, and hand in hand were
running over the rough ground towards the shore. A small dinghy was
waiting for them at the edge of the shingle. So there had been method
in their mad scurry after all.
Our driver cursed and _arr-e-e'd_ and forced his cattle into a
scrambling gallop, and we drew up with the deserted carriage, whose
mules were standing straddle-legged, and panting as though they were
going to burst. He pulled up there, but Haigh snatched hold of the
reins through the front window, and turning the animals off the road,
sent them with a yell into the palm scrub that fringed it. The poor
beasts took fright and sprang off at fresh gallop, the carriage leaping
and bumping after them like a tin kettle at a dog's tail, till at one
jolt stronger than the rest it lost balance, and fell over with a
splintering crash to its side.
We were all heaped over to leeward amongst a tidy heap of wreckage; but
we soon managed to scramble out, and saw the fugitives making rapid
going towards their boat.
"Now, Cospatric, ye wiry divil," shouted Haigh, "run for all you're
worth, and put Pether in your pocket."
Off I started, and measured my length twice in the first fifty yards.
The ground was awfully uneven, and the palmetto scrub so thick that one
could not see where to tread. The trio ahead were close upon their
boat, and it seemed to me an absolute certainty that I should be too
late. But a fresh crashing amongst the spiky shrubs behind made me turn
my head, and I saw the absurd figure of the old man charging down on a
mule that he had cut adrift. He passed me like a flash, his face
glowering like a fiend's, and he reached the shingle just as the dinghy
had got two boat-lengths away.
The passengers were encouraging the two sailors at the oars to every
exertion; but Taltavull pulled up as his mule's feet splashed in the
water, and whipping out a blue revolver covered the two rowers and
sharply bade them stop. They easied in the middle of a stroke, and
raised their oar-blades, glistening and dripping.
"And now, Senor Pether, I hold you covered. I am a dead shot, and if
you carry the Recipe a yard farther away you bring your fate upon your
own head. I, Taltavull, swear it."
I saw Mrs. Cromwell lean over and cover the blind man's body with her
own. Sadi also made a movement, apparently for the same purpose. But
Pether waved them both back. He slipped a hand into his breast-pocket,
and brought out the little mahogany case.
"Here it is, Senor Taltavull. You'll share the contents with your two
friends?"
"Yes," exclaimed the old man, stretching out his bony hands; "I have
promised."
"Then there you are, Senor Taltavull," said the other quietly. He
deliberately drew back the shutter, exposed the yellowy-green film to
the full sun-glare, and flung it from him with a sideways jerk.
It flew circling to the anarchist's feet; and for a moment we were all
so paralyzed with the action that no one spoke or moved. Sooner than
share or surrender, the man had deliberately destroyed the Recipe for
good and all.
The anarchist was first to act. Slowly I saw him raise his weapon, and
as if fascinated I could not move to interrupt him. With a leathery
grin of cruelty he had brought it to bear, and in another moment there
would have been murder done. But at that instant a flash of something
brown shot by, and Taltavull and his mount were bowled over amongst the
palmettos.
A cavalry reinforcement had arrived. Haigh had cut loose another of the
mules, and had deliberately ridden the old man down.
"It's an old polo trick," said he, with a pleased grin. "Useful when a
man persistently crosses you; quite simple when you know
it.--Good-afternoon, Mrs. Cromwell.--Afternoon, Juggins, dear boy. Let
me congratulate you on drawing this game. I thought we were going to
gather in the beans.--Eh, what's that?"
Taltavull was sitting up amongst the scrubs, and was shaking a
trembling fist at the boat and snarling out the word "iconoclast."
"'Iconoclast' indeed. Faith, that's the pot libelling the kettle most
unjustly.--I say, Cospatric, just take that melodramatic old fool's gun
away from him, and wring his neck if he won't behave himself.--My dear
Mrs. Cromwell, I must really apologize for our companion. I assure you
that nothing but stress of circumstances could have driven us into such
dubious society. Well, the fun's all over now, and I hope you and Mr.
Pether bear no ill-will. I'm sure Cospatric and I harbour no grudge."
Mrs. Cromwell gave an order, the boat backed in to the shingle, and we
found ourselves shaking hands with one another, as if we were dear
friends who had always worked for one another's welfare.
"Mentone and Paris will be our neighbourhoods for winter and summer,"
said Pether, "and you two men must contrive to beat us up somehow and
compare notes over this mutual score."
"Ladies are seldom averse to jewellery," said Haigh. "Will Mrs.
Cromwell deign to accept from Mr. Cospatric and myself this small
packet of diamonds, to be mounted as she sees fit?"
In fact, for the space of half an hour we were fulsomely civil to one
another; and then they bobbled off in the dinghy, and the yacht took
them I know not where; and we, after putting Taltavull in one of the
carriages, drove off ourselves to Palma in the other.
"Faith," said Haigh, "it's a different man I am this day from when I
saw you first in Genoa, old chappie. But after all this fresh air and
exercise I must really go on the rampage for a bit. Come now, Palma for
a few days, and then we'll hark back to the ugly cutter and go off
somewhere else. Where shall we go?"
"Note which way the wind blows, and start before it."
"Right," said Haigh. "There's nothing like having definite plans
beforehand."
THE END.
NELSON'S LIBRARY
A Selection of the best Fiction by the most popular writers of the day,
COPYRIGHT, and issued in handsome cloth binding, library style, at a
popular price.
_NOW READY._
White Fang JACK LONDON.
The Octopus FRANK NORRIS.
The Pit (_May 20_) "
Sir John Constantine "Q."
The Princess Passes C. N. & A. M. WILLIAMSON.
"_Good print, strong binding, and a general handsomeness of appearance
render them marvels of cheapness, quite apart from the value which
their high literary character adds to them._"--PRESS OPINION.
NELSON'S LIBRARY
A Lame Dog's Diary S. MACNAUGHTAN.
The Fortune of Christina M'Nab. S. MACNAUGHTAN.
The Man from America Mrs. H. de la PASTURE.
The Battle of the Strong Sir GILBERT PARKER.
The Translation of a Savage. Sir GILBERT PARKER.
The Lady of the Barge W. W. JACOBS.
The Odd Women GEORGE GISSING.
The Intrusions of Peggy ANTHONY HOPE.
Quisante "
The King's Mirror "
The God in the Car "
The Marriage of William Ashe Mrs. HUMPHRY WARD.
David Grieve "
Robert Elsmere "
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If Youth but Knew "
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No. 5 John Street RICHARD WHITEING.
John Charity H. A. VACHELL.
Clementina A. E. W. MASON.
The American Prisoner EDEN PHILLPOTTS.
The Hosts of the Lord Mrs. F. A. STEEL.
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_Nelson's New Century Library._
NELSON'S
INDIA PAPER
SHAKESPEARE
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Six Exquisite Volumes. Coloured Frontispieces.
Specially Clear Type.
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