E-text prepared by Marilynda Fraser-Cunliffe, Mary Meehan,
and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team
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CHAPTER I.--SOMETHING AMISS.
CHAPTER II.--MAX MAKES A DISCOVERY.
CHAPTER III.--DUDLEY EXPLAINS.
CHAPTER IV.--A PARAGRAPH IN "THE STANDARD."
CHAPTER V.--ONE MAN'S LOSS is ANOTHER MAN'S GAIN.
CHAPTER VI.--THE LITTLE STONE PASSAGE.
CHAPTER VII.--A QUESTIONABLE GUIDE.
CHAPTER VIII.--FOREWARNED, BUT NOT FOREARMED.
CHAPTER IX.--THE MAN WHO HESITATES.
CHAPTER X.--GRANNY.
CHAPTER XI.--A TRAP.
CHAPTER XII.--ESCAPE.
CHAPTER XIII.--THE SEQUEL TO A TRAGEDY.
CHAPTER XIV.--IS IT BLACKMAIL?
CHAPTER XV.--MR. WEDMORE'S SECOND FREAK.
CHAPTER XVI.--A MESSAGE FROM THE WHARF.
CHAPTER XVII.--A SORCERESS.
CHAPTER XVIII.--THE SWORD FALLS.
CHAPTER XIX.--A STRANGE PAIR.
CHAPTER XX.--THE PREY OF THE RIVER.
CHAPTER XXI.--A DUBIOUS REFUGE.
CHAPTER XXII.--TWO WOMEN.
CHAPTER XXIII.--THE BLUE-EYED NURSE.
CHAPTER XXIV.--MAX MAKES A STAND AND A DISCOVERY.
CHAPTER XXV.--THE MYSTERY EXPLAINED.
CHAPTER XXVI.--BACK TO LOVE AND LIFE.
Everybody knows Canterbury, with its Old-World charms and itsostentatious air of being content to be rather behind the times, oflooking down upon the hurrying Americans who dash through its cathedraland take snap-shots at its slums, and at all those busy moderns whocannot afford to take life at its own jog-trot pace.
But everybody does not know the charming old halls and comfortable,old-fashioned mansions which are dotted about the neighboring country,either nestling in secluded nooks of the Kentish valleys or holding astately stand on the wooded hills.
Of this latter category was The Beeches, a pretty house of warm, redbrick, with a dignified Jacobean front, which stood upon the highestground of a prettily wooded park, and commanded one of those soft,undulating, sleepy landscapes which are so characteristically English,and of which grazing sheep and ruminating cows form so important afeature. A little tame, perhaps, but very pleasant, very homely, verysweet to look upon by the tired eyes that have seen enough of theactive, bustling world....