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Bartleby the Scrivener A Story of Wall Street.txt

I might give alms to his body; but his body did not pain him; it was his soul that suffered, and his soul I could not reach. I did not accomplish the purpose of going to Trinity Church that morning. Somehow, the things I had seen disqualified me for the time from church-going. I walked homeward, thinking what I would do with Bartleby. Finally, I resolved upon this;—I would put certain calm questions to him the next morning, touching his history, etc., and if he declined to answer them openly and unreservedly (and I supposed he would prefer not), then to give him a twenty dollar bill over and above whatever I might owe him, and tell him his services were no longer required; but that if in any other way I could assist him, I would be happy to do so, especially if he desired to return to his native place, wherever that might be, I would willingly help to defray the expenses. Moreover, if, after reaching home, he found himself at any time in want of aid, a letter from him would be sure of a reply. The next morning came. “Bartleby,” said I, gently calling to him behind his screen. No reply. “Bartleby,” said I, in a still gentler tone, “come here; I am not going to ask you to do any thing you would prefer not to do—I simply wish to speak to you.” Upon this he noiselessly slid into view. “Will you tell me, Bartleby, where you were born?” “I would prefer not to.” “Will you tell me any thing about yourself?” “I would prefer not to.” “But what reasonable objection can you have to speak to me? I feel friendly towards you.” He did not look at me while I spoke, but kept his glance fixed upon my bust of Cicero, which as I then sat, was directly behind me, some six inches above my head. “What is your answer, Bartleby?” said I, after waiting a considerable time for a reply, during which his countenance remained immovable, only there was the faintest conceivable tremor of the white attenuated mouth. “At present I prefer to give no answer,” he said, and retired into his hermitage. It was rather weak in me I confess, but his manner on this occasion nettled me. Not only did there seem to lurk in it a certain calm disdain, but his perverseness seemed ungrateful, considering the undeniable good usage and indulgence he had received from me. Again I sat ruminating what I should do. Mortified as I was at his behavior, and resolved as I had been to dismiss him when I entered my offices, nevertheless I strangely felt something superstitious knocking at my heart, and forbidding me to carry out my purpose, and denouncing me for a villain if I dared to breathe one bitter word against this forlornest of mankind. At last, familiarly drawing my chair behind his screen, I sat down and said: “Bartleby, never mind then about revealing your history; but let me entreat you, as a friend,

Hound of the Baskervilles.txt

them out to-day. Then indeed you would have had him at your mercy!" It was evident to us that all pursuit was in vain until the fog had lifted. Meanwhile we left Lestrade in possession of the house while Holmes and I went back with the baronet to Baskerville Hall. The story of the Stapletons could no longer be withheld from him, but he took the blow bravely when he learned the truth about the woman whom he had loved. But the shock of the night's adventures had shattered his nerves, and before morning he lay delirious in a high fever under the care of Dr. Mortimer. The two of them were destined to travel together round the world before Sir Henry had become once more the hale, hearty man that he had been before he became master of that ill-omened estate. And now I come rapidly to the conclusion of this singular narrative, in which I have tried to make the reader share those dark fears and vague surmises which clouded our lives so long and ended in so tragic a manner. On the morning after the death of the hound the fog had lifted and we were guided by Mrs. Stapleton to the point where they had found a pathway through the bog. It helped us to realize the horror of this woman's life when we saw the eagerness and joy with which she laid us on her husband's track. We left her standing upon the thin peninsula of firm, peaty soil which tapered out into the widespread bog. From the end of it a small wand planted here and there showed where the path zigzagged from tuft to tuft of rushes among those green-scummed pits and foul quagmires which barred the way to the stranger. Rank reeds and lush, slimy water-plants sent an odour of decay and a heavy miasmatic vapour onto our faces, while a false step plunged us more than once thigh-deep into the dark, quivering mire, which shook for yards in soft undulations around our feet. Its tenacious grip plucked at our heels as we walked, and when we sank into it it was as if some malignant hand was tugging us down into those obscene depths, so grim and purposeful was the clutch in which it held us. Once only we saw a trace that someone had passed that perilous way before us. From amid a tuft of cotton grass which bore it up out of the slime some dark thing was projecting. Holmes sank to his waist as he stepped from the path to seize it, and had we not been there to drag him out he could never have set his foot upon firm land again. He held an old black boot in the air. "Meyers, Toronto," was printed on the leather inside. "It is worth a mud bath," said he. "It is our friend Sir Henry's missing boot." "Thrown there by Stapleton in his flight." "Exactly. He retained it in his hand after using it to set the hound upon the track.

Casino Royale.txt

with the new customer. It was a perfectly normal scene. They exchanged smiles over some item on the menu and apparently agreed that it would suit for the patron took the card and with, Bond guessed, a final exchange about the wine, he withdrew. The man seemed to realize that he was being watched. He looked up and gazed incuriously at them for a moment. Then he reached for a brief-case on the chair beside him, extracted a newspaper and started to read it his elbows propped up on the table. When the man had turned his face towards them, Bond noticed that he had a black patch over one eye. It was not tied with a tape across the eye, but screwed in like a monocle. Otherwise he seemed a friendly middle-aged man, with dark brown hair brushed straight back, and, as Bond had seen while he was talking to the patron, particularly large, white teeth. He turned back to Vesper. 'Really, darling. He looks very innocent. Are you sure he's the same man? We can't expect to have this place entirely to ourselves.' Vesper's face was still a white mask. She was clutching the edge of the table with both hands. He thought she was going to faint and almost rose to come round to her, but she made a gesture to stop him. Then she reached for a glass of wine and took a deep draught. The glass rattled on her teeth and she brought up her other hand to help. Then she put the glass down. She looked at him with dull eyes. 'I know it's the same.' He tried to reason with her, but she paid no attention. After glancing once or twice over his shoulder with eyes that held a curious submissiveness, she said that her headache was still bad and that she would spend the afternoon in her room. She left the table and walked indoors without a backward glance. Bond was determined to set her mind at rest. He ordered coffee to be brought to the table and then he rose and walked swiftly to the courtyard. The black Peugeot which stood there might indeed have been the saloon they had seen, but it might equally have been one of a million others on the French roads. He took a quick glance inside, but the interior was empty and when he tried the boot, it was locked. He made a note of the Paris number-plate then he went quickly to the lavatory adjoining the dining-room, pulled the chain and walked out on to the terrace. The man was eating and didn't look up. Bond sat down in Vesper's chair so that he could watch the other table. A few minutes later the man asked for the bill, paid it and left. Bond heard the Peugeot start up and soon the noise of its exhaust had disappeared in the direction of the road to Royale. When the patron came back to his table, Bond explained that Madame had unfortunately a slight touch of sunstroke. After

Pineapple Street.txt

to see these boys as the stars, to fall at their sweaty feet. What bothers me now is those boys internalizing girls as audience, there only to act as mirrors, to make their accomplishments realer.) But out on the boat, we were neither watchers nor watched; there was only the sound of water and of our cox’s voice calling for a power ten, only the muscle burn, only cold air on wet skin. By spring I was signing up again, this time for sprint season, and then I was in it for life. Or at least till senior year, when I flaked out in every way—when I quietly dropped to 115 pounds, when I stopped going to calculus, when I smoked ten cigarettes a day and started mixing Tylenol and vodka. I got in the boat that first week of sprint season and couldn’t do it, quite literally couldn’t pull my weight. I dropped off the team, blamed it on senioritis. But in college I sometimes subbed in for practice, and in New York and LA I joined rowing clubs. When I think of Granby, I see the Tigerwhip and the Connecticut before I see campus itself. I see Robin Facer’s back, her braid swishing as she rows. I see us celebrating at Stotesbury for not embarrassing ourselves, pelting each other with M&M’s in the hotel hallway. This current-day coach pointed out all the crew girls she could see in the dining hall. “There’s one,” she said, indicating a tall girl by the sandwich station. “There are three, those three together.” I said, “I love them at first sight.” I did. They seemed utterly themselves, laughing loudly, filling tall glasses with chocolate milk. The Dorian Cullers of 2018 would be out of their minds to mess with them. As we stood with our dishes, Mr. Levin said, “You know, I always knew you were going to be okay.” I felt like crying—out of bitterness? out of tenderness?—because if that was true, he was the only one who’d ever thought so. I certainly hadn’t thought it myself. He said, “You were always going to be just fine.” 11 That night, I told Fran about Britt’s podcast. “I don’t want people thinking it was my idea,” I said. Anne had taken the boys home for their bath; Fran walked me back to check out the new guesthouse, stayed for wine. “Nah.” She was opening and closing each cabinet, each drawer. “No one would even, like, put it together that you knew Thalia.” She was talking about what the faculty would think, when I meant everyone: our classmates, Thalia’s family, the world. “If you’d been best friends with Thalia, maybe they’d remember. If you were Robbie Serenho or someone. But like I was saying at dinner—what kids were here together, it’s a blur.” My housemate came out into the kitchen and introduced himself to Fran. Oliver Coleman. I was grateful for the reminder, repeated his name in my head. Oliver-Oliver-Oliver. I asked how his first day went. “They’re smart,” he said. “You were right. And

Kate-Alice-Marshall-What-Lies-in-the-Woods.txt

the condition you were in, it wouldn’t have been hard to get you to ID Stahl. Even to convince you that you had seen him.” “For a long time, I told myself that I must have,” I said. I pushed off the bed, started pacing. “I let myself believe it. I had to. If I said I was wrong, that it wasn’t him, everyone would have hated me. I was an idiot. I was a coward. I—” “Slow down, Naomi,” Ethan said. I stopped in my circuit. He stood, but kept his distance. “Let’s take this one thing at a time. Start with Persephone. Who is she?” “Her name is Jessi Walker.” I pulled up the file on my phone and showed him. He read through it with a faint frown. “She fits the type,” he said, more to himself than me. “So she could be another victim.” “Maybe.” He handed me back my phone. “There’s a trap that investigations tend to fall into. They get tunnel vision. They ram the evidence into place around a single theory, instead of staying open to the possibilities. We have a theory: Stahl killed Jessi Walker. But the only thing we know for sure is that Jessi Walker died. It might have been misadventure, not murder.” “But it makes sense. It explains why Stahl was in the woods. It means—” “It means that the right person got locked up for attacking you. It absolves you,” Ethan said. If he’d said it gently, tenderly, I think I would have hated him for it. But there was no forgiveness in his voice, just cold truth. “You need to decide if you’re trying to find out what really happened, or if you’re trying to prove you didn’t do anything wrong.” I looked away. “I never wanted to know too much about Stahl—the things he did. I’ve always just accepted that he killed all those women.” I’d never thought about his son, either—the damage done to him. The life he must have lived. I swallowed against a hard lump in my throat. “I didn’t want to think about what it would mean if everyone was wrong, and I sent an innocent man to prison,” I said. “You didn’t,” Ethan said sharply, and I glanced at him in surprise. “That is one thing you do not need to feel guilty about.” “They didn’t have enough evidence to convict him.” “That doesn’t mean they didn’t have enough to know it was him. Don’t waste any energy fretting over Stahl. He’s dead and the world’s a better place without him.” His certainty would have been comforting, if I was capable of being comforted. But I was thinking of the letter now. “Even if that’s true, if Stahl didn’t attack me, it means that whoever did got away with it. Maybe even did it again.” To a girl who wasn’t as fortunate as me, I didn’t add. Ethan rubbed a hand over his chin. “For now, let’s focus on Jessi. It’s been a long time, and Stahl sometimes drove with his victims for

Tessa-Bailey-Unfortunately-Yours.txt

having my back, man. I forgot about the whole thing with the photographer.” “I didn’t.” Julian swirled his wine. “I also remember when she threw wine in your face and you only looked angry at yourself for arguing with her in the first place.” “Yeah, that sounds like me.” Julian shook his head. Sighed. “You’re in love with her.” Suddenly, August couldn’t swallow. The music swelled in his ears. Was he in love with Natalie? No idea. If the key to her happiness was at the bottom of the ocean, he’d strap on some flippers and goggles to dive down and get it. If she showed any signs of illness, even a common cold, he would consider bringing her to the ER. If she asked him to dress like Zack Morris at Halloween so she could dress like Kelly Kapowski . . . he’d already have suggested it first. Did all of that equal love? To him? Yes. He loved her. Really, really bad. It couldn’t have seemed less natural for Julian to lay his arm across August’s shoulders, but he did. Briefly. “I have faith in you.” He stepped back. “I also have faith that she wouldn’t have gone through with this unless something was there.” “Thanks, Julian,” he managed through his parched throat. “And if you hurt her, I’ll break your nose.” “Heard you the first two times.” When Julian returned to his girlfriend’s side, August picked up an uneaten plate of food from one of the tables and dug into it with a tiny fork. Cold sea bass was not the most appetizing of choices, but God knew he’d eaten worse. How to get Natalie’s attention. How to get . . . The DJ booth released a slow plume of fog out onto the dance floor. August smiled mid-chew, finally landing on a plan. A few minutes later, the opening strains of “Brick House” filled the tent and Natalie’s shoulder blades twitched, then she was turning around and sending daggers at him with her eyes. He only winked back. When the lyrics kicked in, August strutted out onto the dance floor and pointed directly at his new wife with an open challenge. At first, he was positive she was going to throw the closest heavy object at his head, but to his everlasting happiness, she joined him in the center of the floor, causing the drunk guests in attendance to applaud. “Are you serious?” Natalie mouthed at him over the music. August unbuttoned his tuxedo jacket with a flourish and dropped it on the dance floor, moving on to the cuff links next. Rolling up his sleeves. And then he started to dance—although even he could admit that that term should be used loosely when applied to his series of exaggerated disco moves and jump spins. Not to mention a lot of finger guns. He’d developed this routine years ago as a way to shake the malaise that often overcame his team when they’d been away from their families too long and, frankly, it was ridiculous. But it was

Pineapple Street.txt

a heart attack mid-lap. Or it was a janitor, or maybe that creepy townie who liked to watch basketball practice. Even when whispers started in the crowd that it was a student—it was Hani Kayyali, it was Michelle McFadden, it was Ronan Murphy—that seemed too dramatic to be true. I said, “They sent us away, and we still didn’t know. By the time I got back to the dorm they’d already put up signs that we had mandatory dorm meetings before dinner and Camelot was canceled. We met in the common room and there were already girls crying, ones who’d figured it out.” Fran had come out of the Hoffnungs’ apartment, which she didn’t do for most dorm meetings. I remember her sitting with me on the coffee table. Her parents came out, too. I knew who it was before the teachers spoke; word had spread through the room, and, of course, Thalia was the only one missing. “Who announced it?” Britt asked. “Miss Vogel. She was young. I don’t think she stayed much longer. She taught physics and coached girls’ skiing.” It occurred to me that Angela Vogel must, as dorm head, have been the one to clear out Thalia’s room, after the police went through it. It would have fallen to Dr. Calahan, as headmistress, to call the Keiths. I couldn’t imagine breaking that news to anyone, ever. It wasn’t like being a surgeon, someone who’d trained for this moment and expected it. And then, my God, two other kids the same year. It was a miracle Dr. Calahan had stuck around another decade, hadn’t run off for some cushy fundraising job at a museum. I said, “They ordered pizza for anyone who didn’t want to go to the dining hall.” Fran and I absconded to my room with our slices, sat cross-legged on my bed. I remember Fran saying she knew it wasn’t the point, it wasn’t the main thing, but it sucked that we’d only had two of four performances and now the show was over. Fran had been playing Mordred, putting on a husky tenor and a swagger. I said, “Jesus, Fran, she was my roommate.” Fran said, “I thought you hated her.” If this hadn’t been my room, I’d have stormed out. Instead I just stared at her, dead in the eye, until she looked mortified and hugged me and I started sobbing on her shoulder. “At that point,” I said, “we still thought it was an accident. That either she’d been swimming drunk at night, or she’d gone over in the morning to exercise and—who knows.” Britt said, “When did it become clear they were investigating the death as a murder?” “Not for a few days. They did an autopsy, which I guess is standard for accidental deaths, and after that the State Police showed up.” Britt referred to her notebook. She said, “So, the State Police came on Tuesday, and the family’s own investigators did, too. That’s three full days after the body was found, and meanwhile the Granby police hadn’t even secured the

The Turn of the Screw.txt

house, the great state bed, as I almost felt it, the full, figured draperies, the long glasses in which, for the first time, I could see myself from head to foot, all struck me--like the extraordinary charm of my small charge--as so many things thrown in. It was thrown in as well, from the first moment, that I should get on with Mrs. Grose in a relation over which, on my way, in the coach, I fear I had rather brooded. The only thing indeed that in this early outlook might have made me shrink again was the clear circumstance of her being so glad to see me. I perceived within half an hour that she was so glad--stout, simple, plain, clean, wholesome woman-- as to be positively on her guard against showing it too much. I wondered even then a little why she should wish not to show it, and that, with reflection, with suspicion, might of course have made me uneasy. But it was a comfort that there could be no uneasiness in a connection with anything so beatific as the radiant image of my little girl, the vision of whose angelic beauty had probably more than anything else to do with the restlessness that, before morning, made me several times rise and wander about my room to take in the whole picture and prospect; to watch, from my open window, the faint summer dawn, to look at such portions of the rest of the house as I could catch, and to listen, while, in the fading dusk, the first birds began to twitter, for the possible recurrence of a sound or two, less natural and not without, but within, that I had fancied I heard. There had been a moment when I believed I recognized, faint and far, the cry of a child; there had been another when I found myself just consciously starting as at the passage, before my door, of a light footstep. But these fancies were not marked enough not to be thrown off, and it is only in the light, or the gloom, I should rather say, of other and subsequent matters that they now come back to me. To watch, teach, "form" little Flora would too evidently be the making of a happy and useful life. It had been agreed between us downstairs that after this first occasion I should have her as a matter of course at night, her small white bed being already arranged, to that end, in my room. What I had undertaken was the whole care of her, and she had remained, just this last time, with Mrs. Grose only as an effect of our consideration for my inevitable strangeness and her natural timidity. In spite of this timidity-- which the child herself, in the oddest way in the world, had been perfectly frank and brave about, allowing it, without a sign of uncomfortable consciousness, with the deep, sweet serenity indeed of one of Raphael's holy infants, to be discussed, to be imputed to her, and to determine us-- I

The Secret Garden.txt

a tiny bit fatter every day--and suppose some morning it should look like one--what should we do!" "Bless us all, I can see tha' has a good bit o' play actin' to do," said Susan Sowerby. "But tha' won't have to keep it up much longer. Mester Craven'll come home." "Do you think he will?" asked Colin. "Why?" Susan Sowerby chuckled softly. "I suppose it 'ud nigh break thy heart if he found out before tha' told him in tha' own way," she said. "Tha's laid awake nights plannin' it." "I couldn't bear any one else to tell him," said Colin. "I think about different ways every day, I think now I just want to run into his room." "That'd be a fine start for him," said Susan Sowerby. "I'd like to see his face, lad. I would that! He mun come back --that he mun." One of the things they talked of was the visit they were to make to her cottage. They planned it all. They were to drive over the moor and lunch out of doors among the heather. They would see all the twelve children and Dickon's garden and would not come back until they were tired. Susan Sowerby got up at last to return to the house and Mrs. Medlock. It was time for Colin to be wheeled back also. But before he got into his chair he stood quite close to Susan and fixed his eyes on her with a kind of bewildered adoration and he suddenly caught hold of the fold of her blue cloak and held it fast. "You are just what I--what I wanted," he said. "I wish you were my mother--as well as Dickon's!" All at once Susan Sowerby bent down and drew him with her warm arms close against the bosom under the blue cloak--as if he had been Dickon's brother. The quick mist swept over her eyes. "Eh! dear lad!" she said. "Thy own mother's in this 'ere very garden, I do believe. She couldna' keep out of it. Thy father mun come back to thee--he mun!" CHAPTER XXVII IN THE GARDEN In each century since the beginning of the world wonderful things have been discovered. In the last century more amazing things were found out than in any century before. In this new century hundreds of things still more astounding will be brought to light. At first people refuse to believe that a strange new thing can be done, then they begin to hope it can be done, then they see it can be done--then it is done and all the world wonders why it was not done centuries ago. One of the new things people began to find out in the last century was that thoughts--just mere thoughts--are as powerful as electric batteries--as good for one as sunlight is, or as bad for one as poison. To let a sad thought or a bad one get into your mind is as dangerous as letting a scarlet fever germ get into your body. If you let it stay there

Rachel-Lynn-Solomon-Business-or-Pleasure.txt

to the family when the elevator opens on the fourteenth floor. I’m all legs as I stumble into the hall with him, as though the slight press of his finger along my spine was what was holding me up. He stops in front of Room 1412, a lock of hair falling over his brow as he struggles with the key, like his nerves are getting in the way, which endears him to me even more. It strikes me that it could be an act, in which case I’m absolutely falling for it, but in this moment, I can’t bring myself to care. All I want is his skin on mine as we erase the world outside. A sweaty, indulgent night and a polite goodbye the next morning. The door’s barely clicked shut before he has me pinned against it, mouth on my throat. Nothing polite about it. He’s cinnamon sugar and that hint of cologne and something else, something that makes me dizzy when I drag my hands up his back and take a deep breath. My skin is buzzing, burning, alive. It’s not until he backs up to kick off his shoes, fisting a hand in his pocket to toss a conference badge onto a desk, that I get a peek at the room. He’s kept it clean, or maybe the hotel staff already stopped by to tidy up. His suitcase is open on one of those luggage racks, a closet revealing another button-up shirt and blazer. But my mind can focus on this for only a split second before he covers me again, freeing me of my denim jacket, which lands in a dark heap on the floor. I toss the bag of condoms somewhere next to it. Maybe because I’m entirely too eager, I go for his belt buckle first. A laugh slips past his lips as I yank it from his waist with a flourish. Our kisses turn deeper. Harder. He’s solid heat as he runs his hands down the sides of my body, curving over my generous hips and ass. I give it all right back. A thrust against the bulge in his jeans. A hand palming his back pockets. A shove so that I can get him against the door this time, tasting his jaw, neck, throat, fingers working to undo the buttons at his collar. Then he tugs me forward in a motion that propels us back, back, back—until my leg slams into hard, cold metal. The luggage rack. “Shit,” I hiss out, clutching at my calf as I try to regain my balance. He steadies me, eyes going wide, face gorgeously flushed. “You okay?” “Yep. I’m good.” That sting of pain doesn’t stand a chance against my libido. I could be limping and I’d still need him on top of me. “And I should also say . . .” My anxiety intervenes, reminding me I’ve never done this before. “I tested a couple weeks ago, and I’m negative.” “Me, too. Sorry, I should have said something earlier—I don’t know all the etiquette for this.”

Kristy-Woodson-Harvey-The-Summer-of-Songbirds.txt

have to love them as best we can and help them when they need us. That’s it.” She patted my hand. “Darling, I will see you at three.” Mom was right. I didn’t need to keep secrets and tell lies to protect the people I loved. I didn’t need to try to control them because they could handle their own lives. Daphne could handle her own sobriety. I would always be there to help her because that’s what best friends do. But if she and Huff wanted to be together, I needed to butt out, once and for all. I looked out the door and could see the blue USPS box where our invitation send-off would take place, picturing how sad it would be without my best friend. We would have champagne inside. Prior experience had taught me that drinking on the sidewalk was a bad idea. I thought of Rich. My heart ached for him and all I had lost. And I realized that I had caused that same ache for Huff. “Oh,” Mom said. “And I’m assuming we shouldn’t expect Daphne?” “You know, Mom, Daphne is a better friend than I will ever hope to be, so I don’t know what to expect.” It was my responsibility to apologize. And I’d better figure out how fast or Huff would never forgive me. She blew me a kiss. “Going to have lunch next door with Daddy. Come by if you feel like it.” The man walking in—finally! A customer!—held the door for her. “May I help you find anything?” “Just wanted to surprise my wife with a little something.” How nice, I thought, when a book was a surprise your husband got you, not the news that he had quit his job without telling you—or that honesty wasn’t all that important to him, actually. Although I didn’t have a leg to stand on there. I cringed at the thought of what I had done with Rich in that sailing hut. Again. And I figured that, whatever Bryce had done, it couldn’t be worse than that. Maybe we were just two liars. Maybe we deserved each other. The sailing hut made me think of camp, which made me think of Daphne… and Huff… And, all of a sudden, I knew exactly how—in the words of Huff—to fix it. I rang up my customer and then texted Huff: I have a plan. It better be a damn good one. I smiled. It was a good plan. It totally was. Maybe I was the only person in the world who knew how to break up my brother and my best friend. But, then again, maybe I was also the only one who knew precisely how to put them back together. June THE ENDS OF THE EARTH THE SOUNDS OF LAWN MOWERS outside my door made me practically leap out of bed. Family camp had given me a renewed sense of energy. And, with that extra money in our coffers, it made me believe that maybe we could save it after all. We needed more.

Little Women.txt

he looked down at her very kindly. "I'm Beth. I love it dearly, and I'll come, if you are quite sure nobody will hear me, and be disturbed," she added, fearing to be rude, and trembling at her own boldness as she spoke. "Not a soul, my dear. The house is empty half the day, so come and drum away as much as you like, and I shall be obliged to you." "How kind you are, sir!" Beth blushed like a rose under the friendly look he wore, but she was not frightened now, and gave the hand a grateful squeeze because she had no words to thank him for the precious gift he had given her. The old gentleman softly stroked the hair off her forehead, and, stooping down, he kissed herr, saying, in a tone few people ever heard . . . "I had a little girl once, with eyes like these. God bless you, my dear! Good day. madam." And away he went, in a great hurry. Beth had a rapture with her mother, and then rushed up to impart the glorious news to her family of invalids, as the girls were not home. How blithely she sang that evening, and how they all laughed at her because she woke Amy in the night by playing the piano on her face in her sleep. Next day, having seen both the old and young gentleman out of the house, Beth, after two or three retreats, fairly got in at the side door, and made her way as noiselessly as any mouse to the drawing room where her idol stood. Quite by accident, of course, some pretty, easy music lay on the piano, and with trembling fingers and frequent stops to listen and look about, Beth at last touched the great instrument, and straightway forgot her fear, herself, and everything else but the unspeakable delight which the music gave her, for it was like the voice of a beloved friend. She stayed till Hannah came to take her home to dinner, but she had no appetite,and could only sit and smile upon everyone in a general state of beatitude. After that, the little brown hood slipped through the hedge nearly every day, and the great drawing room was haunted by a tuneful spirit that came and went unseen. She never knew that Mr. Laurence opened his study door to hear the old-fashioned airs he liked. She never saw Laurie mount guard in the hall to warn the servants away. She never suspected that the exercise books and new songs which she found in the rack were put there for her especial benefit, and when he talked to her about music at home, she only thought how kind he was to tell things that helped her so much. So she enjoyed herself heartily, and found, what isn't always the case, that her granted wish was all she had hoped. Perhaps it was because she was so grateful for this blessing that a greater was given her. At any rate she deserved both.

Robyn-Harding-The-Drowning-Woman.txt

And sick. My husband is abusive.” “Get a divorce,” I say. “You don’t have to kill yourself.” She laughs darkly. “You don’t get it.” She’s right, I don’t. My relationship history is dismal but anti-climactic. Work has always usurped relationships. In my twenties, I lived with a guy, André, for three years, but the romance petered out, due to neglect and indifference. When we split, it was cordial. He left me the couch. Since then, I’ve had lovers but few real boyfriends. There was never time; they were never a priority. It was easier to have no-strings hookups while I focused on my career. “My husband is a criminal defense lawyer. He’s rich. And he’s powerful.” She takes a swig from the bottle. “And he’s a sadist.” It might be hyperbole—people call their partners horrible names all the time—but her words send a chill through me. Something tells me that her description is literal. That this woman’s husband is turned on by abuse and humiliation. Hers. She gets up suddenly. “I have to go.” I follow her up the trail that spits us out right next to my car. Can I pretend this isn’t mine? That I, too, occupy one of the magnificent homes surrounding us? But when she looks at it, and then over at me, I realize it’s clear. This is my Toyota. This is my home. “Do you need a ride?” I ask lamely. Her eyes roam over the plastic-covered window, the cold toast on the dashboard, my cheap phone in the console. The back seat is filled with clothes—some neatly folded, some tossed haphazardly. And then I see the knife, abandoned on the front seat. It had been on my lap when I scrambled from the vehicle. Has she spotted it? “I just live up the street,” she says, looking away, ashamed for me. “Eight thousand square feet, right on the water. But it’s a prison.” “Better than living like this,” I mutter, eyes on my home on wheels. “No,” she says. “It’s not.” Without another word, she walks away. 6 I NEED MORE SLEEP, BUT I am soaking wet, with seaweed in my hair and green slime on my clothing and skin. The brackish smell of Puget Sound is strong on me, and I need to shower and change. Normally, I can go a couple of days without a proper wash, but I can’t go to the diner like this. Working quickly in the low light, I peel off my wet jeans and struggle into a pair of black tights. They stick to my skin, forcing me to wriggle and jump into them. Yesterday’s T-shirt is atop the pile in the back seat. It smells like grease, and there’s a mustard stain—or is it egg yolk?—down the front, but at least it’s dry. Though my head feels thick and cloudy, I need to focus. Strategy is key to survival for the homeless. There must be a community pool in this area where I can scam a hot shower, but I have no idea where it is. If

The-Housekeepers.txt

said, “All right. Help me in.” The rush and movement of the fabric. Pale flesh. The air was tight here, lamps burning low. Miss de Vries clutched Alice’s shoulder for balance. They were playing drums outside, and the beat matched Alice’s pulse. “Get this buckle, would you?” “Yes, Madam.” She fixed it. Miss de Vries’s breathing had quickened. It must have been the anticipation, the excitement, the promise of the night to come. “Alice,” she said. There was something tight in her tone, as if she were readying herself to ask something, give an order. Now was the moment. Alice’s mouth was dry. She spoke before Miss de Vries could. “Madam,” she said, “there’s something I need to tell you...” 26 Miss de Vries moved fast, chains clinking lightly as she held her headdress in place. Alice hurried after her, watching how the dress moved. It had an armored structure around the waist, and yet it still flowed with a ferocious sort of grace. “I wasn’t sure whether to say anything, Madam. But, knowing how many people will be here tonight, I thought perhaps it was best...” Winnie would have approved of that, she thought, feeling sick. She was following the plan perfectly. But it made her feel as if her rib cage were being squeezed. Her nerves were dancing in her skin. Miss de Vries’s tone was hard. “I’ll be the judge of that.” She was walking so quickly, faster than Alice could have expected, hurtling out of the room and toward the stairs. When Alice had told her, Miss de Vries had clenched her hands, digging her nails into her palms, as if to punish herself. As if she expected treachery in her household, as if she’d been waiting for it all along. She’d hastened to her dressing table, yanking open the drawers, rummaging inside, searching, realizing what was missing. She’d turned to Alice, face pale. “You’re right. It’s gone.” She was angry, but the anger was operating somewhere deeper than Alice had seen before, something right down at the base of the bone. She could hear it in the roughness of Miss de Vries’s voice. “I cannot stand it,” she said. “Being preyed on like this.” Alice said, feeling a prickling in her spine, “I should go and fetch Mr. Shepherd, Madam. Really, I should have gone to him first...” It was the right move to make. “Shepherd is a fool. He won’t fix a thing. These are my personal possessions.” She waved Alice away. “I’m going down to the servants’ hall myself.” They’d counted on this. They needed her downstairs, dragging the household with her, holding everyone there while the attic doors were softly opened, and Mrs. Bone’s men began trickling downstairs. They hastened toward the lift, and Alice looked over Miss de Vries’s shoulder. Stifling a gasp, she spotted the Janes on a pair of stepladders in one of the adjoining bedrooms. The door must have swung open. They were right on their tiptoes, lifting the huge, brocade drapes clean from their rails. “I’d best come down

The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes.txt

"The circumstances are of great delicacy, and every precaution has to be taken to quench what might grow to be an immense scandal and seriously compromise one of the reigning families of Europe. To speak plainly, the matter implicates the great House of Ormstein, hereditary kings of Bohemia." "I was also aware of that," murmured Holmes, settling himself down in his armchair and closing his eyes. Our visitor glanced with some apparent surprise at the languid, lounging figure of the man who had been no doubt depicted to him as the most incisive reasoner and most energetic agent in Europe. Holmes slowly reopened his eyes and looked impatiently at his gigantic client. "If your Majesty would condescend to state your case," he remarked, "I should be better able to advise you." The man sprang from his chair and paced up and down the room in uncontrollable agitation. Then, with a gesture of desperation, he tore the mask from his face and hurled it upon the ground. "You are right," he cried; "I am the King. Why should I attempt to conceal it?" "Why, indeed?" murmured Holmes. "Your Majesty had not spoken before I was aware that I was addressing Wilhelm Gottsreich Sigismond von Ormstein, Grand Duke of Cassel-Felstein, and hereditary King of Bohemia." "But you can understand," said our strange visitor, sitting down once more and passing his hand over his high white forehead, "you can understand that I am not accustomed to doing such business in my own person. Yet the matter was so delicate that I could not confide it to an agent without putting myself in his power. I have come incognito from Prague for the purpose of consulting you." "Then, pray consult," said Holmes, shutting his eyes once more. "The facts are briefly these: Some five years ago, during a lengthy visit to Warsaw, I made the acquaintance of the wellknown adventuress, Irene Adler. The name is no doubt familiar to you." "Kindly look her up in my index, Doctor," murmured Holmes without opening his eyes. For many years he had adopted a system of docketing all paragraphs concerning men and things, so that it was difficult to name a subject or a person on which he could not at once furnish information. In this case I found her biography sandwiched in between that of a Hebrew rabbi and that of a staff-commander who had written a monograph upon the deep-sea fishes. "Let me see!" said Holmes. "Hum! Born in New Jersey in the year 1858. Contralto--hum! La Scala, hum! Prima donna Imperial Opera of Warsaw--yes! Retired from operatic stage--ha! Living in London--quite so! Your Majesty, as I understand, became entangled with this young person, wrote her some compromising letters, and is now desirous of getting those letters back." "Precisely so. But how--" "Was there a secret marriage?" "None." "No legal papers or certificates?" "None." "Then I fail to follow your Majesty. If this young person should produce her letters for blackmailing or other purposes, how is she to prove their authenticity?" "There is the writing." "Pooh, pooh!

Katherine-Center-Hello-Stranger.txt

were done. The silence that followed was brutal, as those final seconds of that message echoed around in my head: “I think I’m in love with you, by the way.” Then a gasp—and “Shit! Shit! Shit!” Then, of all things: “Best wishes!” Best wishes? Best wishes? That’s how I ended the most humiliating voicemail in human history? Best frigging wishes? But then I had a comforting thought: It was fine. It really was. He’d never listen to it, anyway. Twenty-Nine I WENT TO bed that night feeling at peace with my choices. But I woke up the next day feeling nice and angry. Had I really just called the guy who ghosted me—and thanked him? Thanked him? Where exactly was my self-respect? You don’t thank people who put your heart in a meat grinder. You don’t thank people who abandon you. You don’t thank people who stare at you cold as ice and then turn away when you beg them for help. That was my plan? To absolve him of all responsibility and then pleasantly move on? He had dumped me and left town for no apparent reason without even an explanation—and he’d acted like I was the problem. Not cool. And I thought it was a good idea to leave him a grateful voicemail for that? Yes. Apparently I did. Which made me even angrier. At both of us. Because how was I supposed to get over it if I was consumed with rage? Or maybe getting consumed with rage was part of getting over it … Fine then. No more moping, no more weeping, no more pining for the future I’d lost hold of. It was time to be okay. For real. The anger was very healing—burning through me with a purifying fire. Sue approved. When she returned from her kidnapping elopement a few days later, we gave the Joe debacle one last, long hearty evening of processing, decided it was a lucky near miss for me, made a list of guys Witt could set me up with, and spent the rest of the night brainstorming what the hell, now, I should do with my career. Sue voted for “textile designer” because she thought I had a way with color. But we also considered interior designer, knitting-store owner, and boutique hotelier in the Swiss Alps. The other big news was that Sue’s parents were throwing her an elopement party. “They’re not mad that you got married without them?” “Nope,” Sue said, like that question had been bananas. “They love him. My mom knitted him a sweater with a heart on it.” Apparently, Sue’s mom thought the kidnapping elopement was very romantic. And she thought Witt was a sweet boy and a good provider. And she was a huge fan of Canada. Turned out, Mrs. Kim and Sue had been planning a little welcome-home wedding celebration during Sue’s entire cross-Canada train ride—texting pictures of flower arrangements and table settings back and forth—and her mom already had everything worked out for the Friday night after the newlyweds returned. “Wow,” I said. “Between

Frankenstein.txt

faces brought back despair to my heart. I saw an insurmountable barrier placed between me and my fellow men; this barrier was sealed with the blood of William and Justine, and to reflect on the events connected with those names filled my soul with anguish. But in Clerval I saw the image of my former self; he was inquisitive and anxious to gain experience and instruction. The difference of manners which he observed was to him an inexhaustible source of instruction and amusement. He was also pursuing an object he had long had in view. His design was to visit India, in the belief that he had in his knowledge of its various languages, and in the views he had taken of its society, the means of materially assisting the progress of European colonization and trade. In Britain only could he further the execution of his plan. He was forever busy, and the only check to his enjoyments was my sorrowful and dejected mind. I tried to conceal this as much as possible, that I might not debar him from the pleasures natural to one who was entering on a new scene of life, undisturbed by any care or bitter recollection. I often refused to accompany him, alleging another engagement, that I might remain alone. I now also began to collect the materials necessary for my new creation, and this was to me like the torture of single drops of water continually falling on the head. Every thought that was devoted to it was an extreme anguish, and every word that I spoke in allusion to it caused my lips to quiver, and my heart to palpitate. After passing some months in London, we received a letter from a person in Scotland who had formerly been our visitor at Geneva. He mentioned the beauties of his native country and asked us if those were not sufficient allurements to induce us to prolong our journey as far north as Perth, where he resided. Clerval eagerly desired to accept this invitation, and I, although I abhorred society, wished to view again mountains and streams and all the wondrous works with which Nature adorns her chosen dwelling-places. We had arrived in England at the beginning of October, and it was now February. We accordingly determined to commence our journey towards the north at the expiration of another month. In this expedition we did not intend to follow the great road to Edinburgh, but to visit Windsor, Oxford, Matlock, and the Cumberland lakes, resolving to arrive at the completion of this tour about the end of July. I packed up my chemical instruments and the materials I had collected, resolving to finish my labours in some obscure nook in the northern highlands of Scotland. We quitted London on the 27th of March and remained a few days at Windsor, rambling in its beautiful forest. This was a new scene to us mountaineers; the majestic oaks, the quantity of game, and the herds of stately deer were all novelties to us. From thence we proceeded to Oxford.

Frankenstein.txt

you; I crept along the shores of the Rhine, among its willow islands and over the summits of its hills. I have dwelt many months in the heaths of England and among the deserts of Scotland. I have endured incalculable fatigue, and cold, and hunger; do you dare destroy my hopes?" "Begone! I do break my promise; never will I create another like yourself, equal in deformity and wickedness." "Slave, I before reasoned with you, but you have proved yourself unworthy of my condescension. Remember that I have power; you believe yourself miserable, but I can make you so wretched that the light of day will be hateful to you. You are my creator, but I am your master; obey!" "The hour of my irresolution is past, and the period of your power is arrived. Your threats cannot move me to do an act of wickedness; but they confirm me in a determination of not creating you a companion in vice. Shall I, in cool blood, set loose upon the earth a daemon whose delight is in death and wretchedness? Begone! I am firm, and your words will only exasperate my rage." The monster saw my determination in my face and gnashed his teeth in the impotence of anger. "Shall each man," cried he, "find a wife for his bosom, and each beast have his mate, and I be alone? I had feelings of affection, and they were requited by detestation and scorn. Man! You may hate, but beware! Your hours will pass in dread and misery, and soon the bolt will fall which must ravish from you your happiness forever. Are you to be happy while I grovel in the intensity of my wretchedness? You can blast my other passions, but revenge remains -- revenge, henceforth dearer than light or food! I may die, but first you, my tyrant and tormentor, shall curse the sun that gazes on your misery. Beware, for I am fearless and therefore powerful. I will watch with the wiliness of a snake, that I may sting with its venom. Man, you shall repent of the injuries you inflict." "Devil, cease; and do not poison the air with these sounds of malice. I have declared my resolution to you, and I am no coward to bend beneath words. Leave me; I am inexorable." "It is well. I go; but remember, I shall be with you on your wedding-night." I started forward and exclaimed, "Villain! Before you sign my death-warrant, be sure that you are yourself safe." I would have seized him, but he eluded me and quitted the housew ith precipitation. In a few moments I saw him in his boat, which shot across the waters with an arrowy swiftness and was soon lost amidst the waves. All was again silent, but his words rang in my ears. I burned with rage to pursue the murderer of my peace and precipitate him into the ocean. I walked up and down my room hastily and perturbed, while my imagination conjured up a thousand images to torment and sting

Silvia-Moreno-Garcia-Silver-Nitr.txt

emerald green as she zipped up her jacket and tipped her chin up at him. “Well, are you with me?” she asked. “Always,” he said, tossing his cigarette away and grabbing her by the arm with a cool aloofness that disguised his nerves. Then again, he was an actor and could play the part of the tough hero for a bit. 14 They hailed a cab and headed to Montserrat’s building. As soon as Montserrat walked into her apartment, she noticed the red button blinking on the answering machine. She tossed her purse on the couch. The first message was from Samuel. “Hey, Montserrat. I have no shifts for you for the second half of December, but I might have something for you in January. I need to talk to you about the Christmas party. We’re doing a gift exchange. Phone me.” She did not intend to go to the party and waste her time having to pretend she liked whatever idiotic gift the guys had picked. She’d get her bonus and tell Mario and his buddies that she had plans that day. She deleted the message. The next message was from her sister asking her to call her back. “You didn’t tell her I was detained, did you?” Montserrat asked, turning to Tristán. But he shook his head no. Montserrat dialed Araceli. Her sister sounded cheerful when she picked up. In the background she could hear the muffled sound of Christmas music. Great. She had started playing José Feliciano. Things would only get more insufferably cheery from there. Still, she was glad to hear Araceli’s voice after her forty-eight-hour marathon session fielding questions from cops. “Hey, mom’s been calling you. She says you’re not picking up the phone.” “She didn’t leave a message.” “You know she hates machines.” “She called you to tell me that?” “Yup. She wants to know if you’re going to Morelia for Christmas. We could drive together.” Montserrat’s relationship with her mother remained somewhat distant, but she made an effort to visit on her birthday and during Christmas. Araceli was closer to their mom; they talked often on the phone. Montserrat knew she was expected to make an appearance, but she couldn’t promise that, not with the way things were. “I’ve got work,” she lied. “That’s why I haven’t been answering the phone. I’m in the middle of a research project.” “I thought you were having trouble getting hours at Antares. Are they changing their mind?” “Something like that. You should go, though.” “You’ll be alone for the holidays if I drive to Morelia.” “I’ll be with Tristán.” “He doesn’t have a new hot date yet?” Montserrat glanced at Tristán, who had plopped himself on her couch and was glancing at her curiously. “Status unknown.” “Well, if you change your mind let me know. I’ll head out on the seventeenth, to avoid all the traffic. Work is slow and I might as well go there early. If you want me to take a gift for mom I can wrap it for you.” “Sounds good.” “You need to

The Age of Innocence.txt

facing the targets, was pitched a real tent, with benches and garden-seats about it. A number of ladies in summer dresses and gentlemen in grey frock-coats and tall hats stood on the lawn or sat upon the benches; and every now and then a slender girl in starched muslin would step from the tent, bow in hand, and speed her shaft at one of the targets, while the spectators interrupted their talk to watch the result. Newland Archer, standing on the verandah of the house, looked curiously down upon this scene. On each side of the shiny painted steps was a large blue china flower-pot on a bright yellow china stand. A spiky green plant filled each pot, and below the verandah ran a wide border of blue hydrangeas edged with more red geraniums. Behind him, the French windows of the drawing-rooms through which he had passed gave glimpses, between swaying lace curtains, of glassy parquet floors islanded with chintz poufs, dwarf armchairs, and velvet tables covered with trifles in silver. The Newport Archery Club always held its August meeting at the Beauforts'. The sport, which had hitherto known no rival but croquet, was beginning to be discarded in favour of lawn-tennis; but the latter game was still considered too rough and inelegant for social occasions, and as an opportunity to show off pretty dresses and graceful attitudes the bow and arrow held their own. Archer looked down with wonder at the familiar spectacle. It surprised him that life should be going on in the old way when his own reactions to it had so completely changed. It was Newport that had first brought home to him the extent of the change. In New York, during the previous winter, after he and May had settled down in the new greenish-yellow house with the bow-window and the Pompeian vestibule, he had dropped back with relief into the old routine of the office, and the renewal of this daily activity had served as a link with his former self. Then there had been the pleasurable excitement of choosing a showy grey stepper for May's brougham (the Wellands had given the carriage), and the abiding occupation and interest of arranging his new library, which, in spite of family doubts and disapprovals, had been carried out as he had dreamed, with a dark embossed paper, Eastlake book-cases and "sincere" arm-chairs and tables. At the Century he had found Winsett again, and at the Knickerbocker the fashionable young men of his own set; and what with the hours dedicated to the law and those given to dining out or entertaining friends at home, with an occasional evening at the Opera or the play, the life he was living had still seemed a fairly real and inevitable sort of business. But Newport represented the escape from duty into an atmosphere of unmitigated holiday-making. Archer had tried to persuade May to spend the summer on a remote island off the coast of Maine (called, appropriately enough, Mount Desert), where a few hardy Bostonians and Philadelphians were camping in "native"

Emma.txt

with a cordial nod from one, and a graceful bow from the other, the two gentlemen took leave. Emma remained very well pleased with this beginning of the acquaintance, and could now engage to think of them all at Randalls any hour of the day, with full confidence in their comfort. CHAPTER VI The next morning brought Mr. Frank Churchill again. He came with Mrs. Weston, to whom and to Highbury he seemed to take very cordially. He had been sitting with her, it appeared, most companionably at home, till her usual hour of exercise; and on being desired to chuse their walk, immediately fixed on Highbury.--"He did not doubt there being very pleasant walks in every direction, but if left to him, he should always chuse the same. Highbury, that airy, cheerful, happy-looking Highbury, would be his constant attraction."-- Highbury, with Mrs. Weston, stood for Hartfield; and she trusted to its bearing the same construction with him. They walked thither directly. Emma had hardly expected them: for Mr. Weston, who had called in for half a minute, in order to hear that his son was very handsome, knew nothing of their plans; and it was an agreeable surprize to her, therefore, to perceive them walking up to the house together, arm in arm. She was wanting to see him again, and especially to see him in company with Mrs. Weston, upon his behaviour to whom her opinion of him was to depend. If he were deficient there, nothing should make amends for it. But on seeing them together, she became perfectly satisfied. It was not merely in fine words or hyperbolical compliment that he paid his duty; nothing could be more proper or pleasing than his whole manner to her--nothing could more agreeably denote his wish of considering her as a friend and securing her affection. And there was time enough for Emma to form a reasonable judgment, as their visit included all the rest of the morning. They were all three walking about together for an hour or two-- first round the shrubberies of Hartfield, and afterwards in Highbury. He was delighted with every thing; admired Hartfield sufficiently for Mr. Woodhouse's ear; and when their going farther was resolved on, confessed his wish to be made acquainted with the whole village, and found matter of commendation and interest much oftener than Emma could have supposed. Some of the objects of his curiosity spoke very amiable feelings. He begged to be shewn the house which his father had lived in so long, and which had been the home of his father's father; and on recollecting that an old woman who had nursed him was still living, walked in quest of her cottage from one end of the street to the other; and though in some points of pursuit or observation there was no positive merit, they shewed, altogether, a good-will towards Highbury in general, which must be very like a merit to those he was with. Emma watched and decided, that with such feelings as were now shewn, it could not

THE SCARLET LETTER.txt

and steeple-crowned hats, smiled not unbenignantly at the clamour and rude deportment of these jolly seafaring men; and it excited neither surprise nor animadversion when so reputable a citizen as Thesaurus animadversion: (n) censure, criticism, infinity, bulk, largeness, infiniteness, scruple: (adj, v) hesitate, demur, pause; comment, blame, reflection, infinitude, vastness, grandeur, (n) hesitation, qualm, misgiving, exception, slam, dispraise, grandness. ANTONYM: (n) lightness. distrust, objection; (n, v) mistrust; (v) disapproval, stricture, objection. nautical: (adj) maritime, aquatic, falter, question. attempts: (adj) trying. oceangoing, yachting, naval, marine seafaring: (n) sailing, navigation, bands: (n) cords, stripes. Shells, nautic; (v) seafaring; (n) sea, boating, cabotage, travelling; (adj) buccaneer: (n) pirate, corsair, shipping. marine, naval, maritime, seagoing, freebooter, pillager, sea rover, Viking, probity: (adj, n) integrity, honor, oceangoing, sea. sea robber, looter, despoiler, candor, decency; (n) goodness, starched: (adj) formal, starch, plunderer, spoiler. morality, principle, sincerity, virtue, punctilious, ceremonious, majestic, immensity: (n) greatness, veracity; (adj) faithfulness. solemn, inflexible, prim, stately, enormousness, immenseness, ANTONYM: (n) untrustworthiness. severe, ritual. 226 The Scarlet Letter old Roger Chillingworth, the physician, was seen to enter the market-place in close and familiar talk with the commander of the questionable vessel.% The latter was by far the most showy and gallant figure, so far as apparel went, anywhere to be seen among the multitude. He wore a profusion of ribbons on his garment, and gold lace on his hat, which was also encircled by a gold chain, and surmounted with a feather. There was a sword at his side and a sword-cut on his forehead, which, by the arrangement of his hair, he seemed anxious rather to display than hide. A landsman could hardly have worn this garb and shown this face, and worn and shown them both with such a galliard air, without undergoing stern question before a magistrate, and probably incurring a fine or imprisonment, or perhaps an exhibition in the stocks. As regarded the shipmaster, however, all was looked upon as pertaining to the character, as to a fish his glistening scales. After parting from the physician, the commander of the Bristol ship strolled idly through the market-place; until happening to approach the spot where Hester Prynne was standing, he appeared to recognise, and did not hesitate to address her. As was usually the case wherever Hester stood, a small vacant area- -a sort of magic circle--had formed itself about her, into which, though the people were elbowing one another at a little distance, none ventured or felt disposed to intrude. It was a forcible type of the moral solitude in which the scarlet letter enveloped its fated wearer; partly by her own reserve, and partly by the instinctive, though no longer so unkindly, withdrawal of her fellow-creatures. Now, if never before, it answered a good purpose by enabling Hester and the seaman to speak together without risk of being overheard; and so changed was Hester Prynne's repute before the public, that the matron in town, most eminent for rigid morality, could not have held such intercourse with less result of scandal than herself. "So, mistress," said the mariner, "I must bid

The-Last-Sinner.txt

leave a message, wouldn’t they? With one more sweeping glance around the park and noticing a thirty-something woman who was quickly shuttling her toddler away from the crazy woman in the dirty bathrobe, she gave up. There was nothing to do but go back home, retrieve her phone, get in her car, and start searching. Maybe someone had found Dave and had already left a message, or taken the dog to a shelter or a vet’s office. She had to put her faith in the fact that someone would find him. Someone would bring him back. Or . . . what if the dog caught up with the intruder? Her heart turned to ice. What if the intruder was the same person who attacked her, who killed Jay, who had been in her home and left her the cards with the dark rose? “Don’t go there,” she said aloud. “Hey!” a sharp male voice called from behind her. “Is this your dog?” She spun quickly and found a tall man holding a belt as a makeshift leash hooked around Dave’s collar. Her knees nearly buckled in relief. “Dave!” she said as the dog strained at the belt, leaping toward her. “Guess so,” the tall man said, walking closer, Dave’s momentum propelling him forward. “Yes, yes!” she gasped. “Oh, God, thank you!” “No worries.” “But where?” “He came right at me. Worried me for a sec.” He handed her the belt as she threw her arms around Dave’s neck. “At you?” she asked, and a niggle of apprehension skittered up her spine. Who was this guy? “Why?” “Don’t know, but he bolted out of a copse of live oaks and ran like a bat outta hell, straight at me.” “And stopped?” “Yeah. I thought he might be some kind of attack dog, but”—he shrugged, broad shoulders moving beneath a short jacket—“obviously not.” “Obviously.” She straightened and took a good look at the man, in his thirties, she guessed, with jet-black hair that brushed over the collar of his jacket and deep-set eyes that were hidden by reflective sunglasses. His beard shadow was long past the three-day mark. He had an edge to him, a tension beneath disreputable jeans, a faded black T-shirt, and scruffy jacket. No smile in that hard jaw, no spark of humor in his expression. There was a toughness to him, evident in a nose that had been broken at least once and a tiny scar near his left eye. I know you. The thought ran through her head, but she couldn’t place him. “You’re Kristi Bentz.” Not a question. For a moment she thought he might have recognized her—she’d been in the paper often enough and her picture was on the jacket of some of her books—then realized he guessed her identity because her name was etched on Dave’s collar. “Right. And you’re—?” “Doesn’t matter.” The barest hint of a smile, just a fleeting slash of white in his dark jaw. “Just a guy who found your dog.” She couldn’t tell because of the glasses, but she got the

Alex-Hay-The-Housekeepers.txt

Those eyes! Big and utterly scared. “Here you go, little goose,” said Mrs. Bone, shoving her hand through the door, holding out an envelope. “Your fee.” Sue goggled at her. “My what?” she said. Her voice was husky. “You know what for,” Mrs. Bone said, folding her arms. “Don’t pretend you don’t. I pay well when people hold their tongues.” She nodded at the envelope. “Open it.” * * * Park Lane, at dusk. “Aha.” Mrs. King lowered her binoculars. “Seen him?” “Upstairs window.” She and Mrs. Bone took the ladder and scaled the garden wall. Midnight came. Then one o’clock. Then two. The world grew quiet, shifted its dimensions. Mrs. Bone coughed into the crook of her elbow. “You can still go home, Mrs. Bone.” Mrs. Bone snuffled. “Look here, I need to say something. I thought... I thought they were pretending to be married—I never thought that Danny would have ever...” “Don’t trouble yourself,” Mrs. King replied gently. Mrs. Bone shook her head, closed her eyes. “You never should have gone into that house.” There was a great deal Mrs. King could have said in response to that. Any number of people might have altered things for her. They didn’t: because Mr. de Vries was a rich man, and being rich was a virtue—it carried all before it. Even Mrs. Bone must have believed that, on some level. “I daresay you’re right,” Mrs. King said. No need to cause a fuss. “Now look sharp. I’m going to get him.” Mrs. King crossed the garden, made for the house. She guessed where Shepherd would be. In the master’s old room. She picked up a handful of stones, aimed for the balustrade on the second floor. Her aim was straight and true. One pebble. Then another. It didn’t take long. She heard the scrape of wood. A window opening. Saw a pale and flickering light. “Mr. Shepherd,” she called up. “It’s Mrs. King.” The garden was dark and hollow all around her. The light wobbled above her, fearful. She wondered what it was like for Shepherd, living alone inside the house. Someone had to guard it till it could be sold. He was the most natural candidate. She wondered if he slept on the floor, his cheek against cold marble. She wondered if he licked the walls. The window juddered closed. The lamplight died. He was coming downstairs. It took him a while. At last, she heard the distant click of the French doors, saw a lamplit figure in a greatcoat picking his way down the steps. He’d lost weight in the past few weeks. He looked like a priest no longer. Nor even a butler. He looked more like what he was. A pimp, or a pimp’s agent, living on the underside of the world. “Evening,” she said. Mrs. Bone stayed in the shadows. Mr. Shepherd wound his fingers together. His voice was as oily as it ever was. “Mrs. King,” he said. “What a pleasant surprise.” She closed her eyes for a moment, picturing the darkest nights on Park Lane,

Oliver Twist.txt

bare the whole villainy which by these lights became plain as day. Write and appoint the evening after to-morrow, at seven, for the meeting. We shall be down there, a few hours before, but shall require rest: especially the young lady, who MAY have greater need of firmness than either you or I can quite foresee just now. But my blood boils to avenge this poor murdered creature. Which way have they taken?' 'Drive straight to the office and you will be in time,' replied Mr. Losberne. 'I will remain here.' The two gentlemen hastily separated; each in a fever of excitement wholly uncontrollable. CHAPTER L THE PURSUIT AND ESCAPE Near to that part of the Thames on which the church at Rotherhithe abuts, where the buildings on the banks are dirtiest and the vessels on the river blackest with the dust of colliers and the smoke of close-built low-roofed houses, there exists the filthiest, the strangest, the most extraordinary of the many localities that are hidden in London, wholly unknown, even by name, to the great mass of its inhabitants. To reach this place, the visitor has to penetrate through a maze of close, narrow, and muddy streets, thronged by the rougest and poorest of waterside people, and devoted to the traffic they may be supposed to occasion. The cheapest and least delicate provisions are heaped in the shops; the coarsest and commonest articles of wearing apparel dangle at the salesman's door, and stream from the house-parapet and windows. Jostling with unemployed labourers of the lowest class, ballast-heavers, coal-whippers, brazen women, ragged children, and the raff and refuse of the river, he makes his way with difficulty along, assailed by offensive sights and smells from the narrow alleys which branch off on the right and left, and deafened by the clash of ponderous waggons that bear great piles of merchandise from the stacks of warehouses that rise from every corner. Arriving, at length, in streets remoter and less-frequented than those through which he has passed, he walks beneath tottering house-fronts projecting over the pavement, dismantled walls that seem to totter as he passes, chimneys half crushed half hesitating to fall, windows guarded by rusty iron bars that time and dirt have almost eaten away, every imaginable sign of desolation and neglect. In such a neighborhood, beyond Dockhead in the Borough of Southwark, stands Jacob's Island, surrounded by a muddy ditch, six or eight feet deep and fifteen or twenty wide when the tide is in, once called Mill Pond, but known in the days of this story as Folly Ditch. It is a creek or inlet from the Thames, and can always be filled at high water by opening the sluices at the Lead Mills from which it took its old name. At such times, a stranger, looking from one of the wooden bridges thrown across it at Mill Lane, will see the inhabitants of the houses on either side lowering from their back doors and windows, buckets, pails, domestic utensils of all kinds, in which to haul the water up;

The Silmarillion.txt

Kings' in Arnor. The prefix Ar- of the Adnaic names of the Kings of Nmenor was derived from this. arien (the Maia of the Sun) is derived from a root as- seen also in Quenya r 'sunlight'. atar 'father' in Atanatri (see Atani in Index), Ilvatar. band 'prison, duress' in Angband; from original mbando, of which the Quenya form appears in Mandos (Sindarin Angband=Quenya Angamando). bar 'dwelling' in Bar-en-Danwedh. The ancient word mbar (Quenya mar, Sindarin bar) meant the 'home' both of persons and of peoples, and thus appears in many place-names, as Brithombar, Dimbar (the first element of which means 'sad, gloomy'), Eldamar, Val(i)mar, Vinyamar, Mar-nu-Falmar. Mardil, name of the first of the Ruling Stewards of Gondor, means 'devoted to the house' (i.e. of the Kings). barad 'tower' in Barad-dr, Barad Either Barad Nimras; the plural in Emyn Beraid. beleg 'mighty' in Beleg, Belegaer, Belegost, Laer C Beleg. brago 'sudden' in Dagor Bragollach. brethil probably means 'silver birch'; cf. Nimbrethil the birchwoods in Arvernien, and Fimbrethil, one of the Entwives. brith 'gravel' in Brithiach, Brithombar, Brithon. (For many names beginning with C see entries under K) calen (galen) the usual Sindarin word for 'green', in Ard-galen, Tol Galen, Calenardhon; also in Parth Galen ('Green Sward') beside Anduin and Pinnath Gelin ('Green Ridges') in Gondor. See kal-. cam (from kamba) 'hand', but specifically of the hand held cupped in the attitude of receiving or holding, in Camlost, Erchamion. carak- This root is seen in Quenya carca 'fang', of which the Sindarin form carch occurs in Carcharoth, and also in Carchost ('Fang Fort', one of the Towers of the Teeth at the entrance to Mordor). Cf. Caragdr, Carach Angren ('Iron Jaws', the rampart and dike guarding the entrance to Udun in Mordor), and Helcarax. caran 'red', Quenya carn, in Caranthir, Carnil, Orocarni; also in Caradhras, from caran-rass, the 'Red-horn' in the Misty Mountains, and Carnimirie 'red-jewelled', the rowan-tree in Treebeard's song. The translation of Carcharoth in the text as 'Red Maw' must depend on association with this word; see carak-. celeb 'silver' (Quenya telep, telp, as in Telperion) in Celeborn, Celebrant, Celebros. Celebrimbor means 'silver-fist', from the adjective celebrin 'silver' (meaning not 'made of silver' but 'like silver, in hue or worth') and paur (Quenya quare) 'fist' often used to mean 'hand'; the Quenya form of the name was Telperinquar. Celebrindal has celebrin and tal, dal 'foot'. coron 'mound' in Corollair (also called Coron Oiolair, which latter word appears to mean 'Ever-summer', cf. Oioloss); cf. Cerin Amroth, the great mound in Lothlrien. c 'bow' in Cthalion, Dor Carthol, Laer C Beleg. cuivi 'awakening' in Cuivinen (Sindarin Nen Echui). Other derivatives of the same root are Dor Firn-i-Guinar; coire, the first beginning of Spring, Sindarin echuir. The Lord of the Rings Appendix D; and coimas 'life-bread', Quenya name of lembas. cul- 'golden-red' in Culrien. curu 'skill' in Curuftn(we), Curunr. dae 'shadow' in Dor Daedeloth, and perhaps in Daeron. dagor 'battle'; the root is ndak-, cf. Haudh-en-Ndengin. Another derivative is Dagnir (Dagnir Glaurunga 'Glaurung's Bane'). del 'horror* in Deldwath; deloth 'abhorrence' in Dor Daedeloth. dn

USS-Lincoln.txt

monitoring equipment beeped and dinged, merging into a kind of constant white noise. Above several of the beds were slow-rotating 3D medical avatars. I’d make my rounds, drop by each of the patients later. For right now, I needed to check in on Sonya. I made a left through double doors beneath a sign that read “Surgical Suite.” Staff wearing pastel-colored scrubs bustled by. A harried-looking nurse noticed me. “Captain? Um … Sorry, but Doc Viv’s not allowing any—” “Sonya Winters. She’s out of surgery?” “Yes, but as I said …” It was then that I saw Hardy lean his bulk out into the corridor. “She’s in here, Cap.” I strode past the nurse. “Keep up the good work. I won’t stay long.” Sonya was sitting upright but looked to be asleep. A web of tubes and wires emerged from her shoulder dressing. Rhythmic beeps of a heart monitor echoed within the quiet compartment, punctuating the stillness. Unmoving, Hardy stood tall against an adjacent bulkhead. “How is she?” I asked. Hardy’s faceplate came alive, his holographic John Hardy face looking back at me. “She came through the surgery without any complications. Her arm was reattached at the shoulder. Prognosis … She’ll be fine within several weeks. She won’t be giving any high fives for a while—that, or playing badminton.” Sonya looked small and vulnerable, lying there in her pink bunny–patterned gown. Having been brought up within the Pylor pirate clan once led by the infamous pirate, Thunderballs, she’d been forced to grow up fast and fend for herself within a rough, male-dominated society. I’d only recently discovered this sixteen-year-old kid, and I had a familial genetic connection with her. I now thought of her, even if it wasn’t totally true, as my niece. She was special to me. Seeing her now, lying there looking broken and helpless, well, the guilt was weighing heavy on my shoulders. She wasn’t a soldier; she wasn’t one of Max’s Marines. She’d been insistent; nothing new there, but I should never have allowed her onto that Ziu mother ship. This was on me. I watched as Sonya’s chest rose and fell in a slow and steady rhythm. “Are you going to just stand there and watch me? Creepy comes to mind.” Her words had come out just above a whisper. Her eyes fluttered open. “And King Kong over there, can’t you find something for him to do?” I took a seat at the side of her bed. “How do you feel, kid?” She didn’t answer right away, and I thought she might have fallen back to sleep. “I feel like one of those monster Ziu fuckers pulled my arm off, then tossed me around like a big chew toy.” “I’m sorry, Sonya. This is my fault.” She turned her head just enough to look at me. She made a face. “Oh God … you’re getting all sappy and mushy. Hardy, find me a bucket; my uncle’s making me want to ralph.” “Knock it off. I’m allowed to be worried about you. You gave all of us, gave

A Game of Thrones.txt

though, I have some promises of my own to keep," he said as he sliced off a wedge. "I shall require three thousand helms and as many hauberks, plus swords, pikes, steel spearheads, maces, battleaxes, gauntlets, gorgets, greaves, breastplates, wagons to carry all this-" The door behind him opened with a crash, so violently that Tyrion almost dropped his cheese. Ser Kevan leapt up swearing as the captain of the guard went flying across the room to smash against the hearth. As he tumbled down into the cold ashes, his lion helm askew, Shagga snapped the man's sword in two over a knee thick as a tree trunk, threw down the pieces, and lumbered into the common room. He was preceded by his stench, riper than the cheese and overpowering in the closed space. "Little redcape," he snarled, "when next you bare steel on Shagga son of Dolf, I will chop off your manhood and roast it in the fire." "What, no goats?" Tyrion said, taking a bite of cheese. The other clansmen followed Shagga into the common room, Bronn with them. The sellsword gave Tyrion a rueful shrug. "Who might you be?" Lord Tywin asked, cool as snow. "They followed me home, Father," Tyrion explained. "May I keep them? They don't eat much." No one was smiling. "By what right do you savages intrude on our councils?" demanded Ser Kevan. "Savages, lowlander?" Conn might have been handsome if you washed him. "We are free men, and free men by rights sit on all war councils." "Which one is the lion lord?" Chella asked. "They are both old men," announced Timett son of Timett, who had yet to see his twentieth year. Ser Kevan's hand went to his sword hilt, but his brother placed two fingers on his wrist and held him fast. Lord Tywin seemed unperturbed. "Tyrion, have you forgotten your courtesies? Kindly acquaint us with our . . . honored guests." 540 GEORGE R.R. MARTIN Tyrion licked his fingers. "With pleasure," he said. "The fair maid is Chella daughter of Cheyk of the Black Ears." "I'm no maid," Chella protested. "My sons have taken fifty ears among them." "May they take fifty more." Tyrion waddled away from her. "This is Conn son of Coratt. Shagga son of Dolf is the one who looks like Casterly Rock with hair. They are Stone Crows. Here is Ulf son of Umar of the Moon Brothers, and here Timett son of Timett, a red hand of the Burned Men. And this is Bronn, a sellsword of no particular allegiance. He has already changed sides twice in the short time I've known him, you and he ought to get on famously, Father." To Bronn and the clansmen he said, "May I present my lord father, Tywin son of Tytos of House Lannister, Lord of Casterly Rock, Warden of the West, Shield of Lannisport, and once and future Hand of the King." Lord Tywin rose, dignified and correct. "Even in the west, we know the prowess of the warrior clans of the Mountains of the Moon.

Bartleby the Scrivener A Story of Wall Street.txt

is common usage. Every copyist is bound to help examine his copy. Is it not so? Will you not speak? Answer!” “I prefer not to,” he replied in a flute-like tone. It seemed to me that while I had been addressing him, he carefully revolved every statement that I made; fully comprehended the meaning; could not gainsay the irresistible conclusions; but, at the same time, some paramount consideration prevailed with him to reply as he did. “You are decided, then, not to comply with my request—a request made according to common usage and common sense?” He briefly gave me to understand that on that point my judgment was sound. Yes: his decision was irreversible. It is not seldom the case that when a man is browbeaten in some unprecedented and violently unreasonable way, he begins to stagger in his own plainest faith. He begins, as it were, vaguely to surmise that, wonderful as it may be, all the justice and all the reason is on the other side. Accordingly, if any disinterested persons are present, he turns to them for some reinforcement for his own faltering mind. “Turkey,” said I, “what do you think of this? Am I not right?” “With submission, sir,” said Turkey, with his blandest tone, “I think that you are.” “Nippers,” said I, “what do you think of it?” “I think I should kick him out of the office.” (The reader of nice perceptions will here perceive that, it being morning, Turkey’s answer is couched in polite and tranquil terms, but Nippers replies in ill-tempered ones. Or, to repeat a previous sentence, Nippers’ ugly mood was on duty and Turkey’s off.) “Ginger Nut,” said I, willing to enlist the smallest suffrage in my behalf, “what do you think of it?” “I think, sir, he’s a little luny,” replied Ginger Nut with a grin. “You hear what they say,” said I, turning towards the screen, “come forth and do your duty.” But he vouchsafed no reply. I pondered a moment in sore perplexity. But once more business hurried me. I determined again to postpone the consideration of this dilemma to my future leisure. With a little trouble we made out to examine the papers without Bartleby, though at every page or two, Turkey deferentially dropped his opinion that this proceeding was quite out of the common; while Nippers, twitching in his chair with a dyspeptic nervousness, ground out between his set teeth occasional hissing maledictions against the stubborn oaf behind the screen. And for his (Nippers’) part, this was the first and the last time he would do another man’s business without pay. Meanwhile Bartleby sat in his hermitage, oblivious to every thing but his own peculiar business there. Some days passed, the scrivener being employed upon another lengthy work. His late remarkable conduct led me to regard his ways narrowly. I observed that he never went to dinner; indeed that he never went any where. As yet I had never of my personal knowledge known him to be outside of my office. He was a perpetual sentry in

Quietly-Hostile.txt

Loneliest Number” Man, I’m a bitch. That fancy book party Carrie had? The one with the flowers and catered snacks?! That shit is absolutely not happening. Nobody’s regular-ass book tour looks like that. A color scheme? A stylist?! BAHAHAHAHA SHUT UP. No, Carrie’s book event’s gotta look like all the ones I’ve ever had: crammed in the back of an independent bookstore with a dozen disheveled people who just got off work staring expectantly up at her as she stammers through an intro for a book those folks are definitely not gonna pay thirty bucks for; while other people mill around in the background shopping, yelling at their kids, trying to get a coffee at the in-store café, and loudly stage-whispering, “WHO IS THIS? IS HER BOOK ANY GOOD?” to a stranger at the back of the crowd. Once during a book tour stop in San Francisco, the store I was at got fucking robbed while I was standing behind the lectern making my little jokes, and they told me to just…keep going? So yeah, I’m putting Carrie at a rickety folding table hastily set up in the story time clearing in the middle of the children’s section in a suburban bookstore with a handful of old ladies who treat the bookstore like a library and shush her every time her reading gets too animated, and the three people who are paying attention give her little more than a polite chuckle. She’ll retire from writing books that night. Episode 8: “I Love a Charade” I was not a fan of Carrie visiting Big in LA in the episode before this one, mostly because Big is such a New York guy that he just seemed like an alien out there in all that sunshine and fresh air. Listen, I loved Berger. He was funny and charming and apparently wrote a fantastic book. And watching Carrie dump all her relationship breakup baggage onto him during that impromptu picnic in the grass made my brain scream, but they were so good together, I wished they could’ve figured it out. I haven’t dated a writer, but I have a lot of close writer friends, and the only way to survive the menacing voice in your head that’s whispering “Her book is better than your book; her book is better than your book” on a loop is to just pretend she doesn’t have one. I do it all the time! I buy my friends’ books, but I don’t always read them, because I don’t like having my deficits spread before me as I am forced to examine them. Maybe this is the self-loathing, mentally unstable personal essayist in me, but I get Berger, and he and Carrie could’ve been the dream couple. Also, I just hate Big so much, I can’t help it. It should be a felony for a man to waste that much of a woman’s time. But I love Berger and Carrie’s collective wit and charm and incredible chemistry. If only he’d just taken his ass off his shoulders for five minutes and not

Confidence_-a-Novel.txt

me to sit in the seat in front of the readout screen, where he attached the Bliss-Mini to my head and adhered a few meaningless wires to the skin below my ears, to the base of my neck, and to the top of my forehead. Then he switched on the screen behind me, which began to display an x-axis stretched and compressed into a series of jagged peaks and valleys. “This is Ezra’s brain activity without the help of the Bliss-Mini,” Orson said. “He’s experiencing what we call negative activity, which is when fear centers like the amygdala take over.” “Begin now,” I said, and with those words my sine wave’s peaks and dips became curves. The venture capitalists murmured among themselves. “How do you feel, Ezra?” he asked. “Calmer,” I said. “Relaxed.” The venture capitalists wanted to try it for themselves: Orson magnetized their brains, watching them all say “begin now” and un-tense, generating aesthetically pleasing waves on the screen. To a one, they reported feeling calmer, able to think more clearly, soothed. “This is cutting-edge technology made portable and practical,” Orson said. “This is the future in your hands.” When we were finished, I watched Orson stand at the back of the room shaking hands, accepting invitations to dinners in members-only clubs in Manhattan. He was in his element. He was happy, and I was glad to have made him happy. He could ask me to jump and I’d jump as high as he wanted. Love is a great unlocker of potential. * * * It may be surprising to learn that a reverse merger is not a difficult thing to pull off. It happens in stages, and it happens quietly, and at the end you come away with a public company. It’s better than going public the traditional way, which is like trying to put lipstick on a pig. First: find the target. I spent hours looking up penny stocks online—defunct or near-defunct companies whose shares sold for a matter of pennies—trying to find the most ignored ones. There were whole forums dedicated to this sort of thing, where finance bros would “pump and dump” penny stocks by buying up millions of worthless shares and then letting people believe the company was about to “make an announcement,” leading unsuspecting forum users to buy up shares themselves. By doing this, the conniving finance bro could raise the share price by five or ten cents and make a decent amount of money when he sold his million shares. This happened with all sorts of public zombie companies: Fielding Dishes, ASO Systems, MEGA Computers. For a few months, I lurked while Johnny and Timmy and Ricky pumped money into the penny stocks and then dumped them on the heads of other forum users. The cycle was endless and unfair but remained unbroken. I struggled to understand not only why people participated in this, but why finance bros always wanted to add y’s to the ends of their names. Eventually I found what I was looking for: RSO Diamond Corp., a company that

Fifty-Shades-Of-Grey.txt

I set out onto the main road. “You’re sure about this?” “Yes,” Christian says tightly, telling me he’s not sure about this at all. Oh, my poor, poor Fifty. I want to laugh at both him and myself because I’m nervous and excited. A small part of me wants to lose Sawyer and Ryan just for the kicks. I check for traffic then inch the R8 out onto the road. Christian curls up with ten- sion and I can’t resist. The road is clear. I put my foot down on the gas and we shoot forward. “Whoa! Ana!” Christian shouts. “Slow down—you’ll kill us both.” I immediately ease off the gas. Wow, can this car move! “Sorry,” I mutter, trying to sound contrite and failing miserably. Christian smirks at me, to hide his relief, I think. “Well, that counts as misbehaving,” he says casually and I slow right down. I glance in the rearview mirror. No sign of the Audi, just a solitary dark car with tinted windows behind us. I imagine Sawyer and Ryan flustered, frantic to catch up, and for some reason this gives me a thrill. But not wanting to give my dear husband a coronary, I decide to behave and drive steadily with growing con- fidence toward the 520 bridge. Suddenly, Christian swears and struggles to pull his BlackBerry from the pocket of his jeans. “What?” he snaps angrily at whoever it is on the other end of the line. “No.” he says and glances behind us. “Yes. She is.” I briefly check the rearview mirror, but I don’t see anything odd, just a few cars behind us. The SUV is about four cars back, and we’re all cruising at an even pace. “I see.” Christian sighs long and hard and rubs his forehead with his fingers, tension radiates off him. Something’s wrong. “Yes . . . I don’t know.” He glances at me and lowers the phone from his ear. “We’re fine. Keep going,” he says calmly, smiling at me, but the smile doesn’t touch his eyes. Shit! Adrenaline spikes through my system. He picks the phone up again. “Okay on the 520. As soon as we hit it . . . Yes . . . I will.” He slots the phone into the speaker cradle, putting it on hands-free. “What’s wrong, Christian?” 99/551 “Just look where you’re going, baby,” he says softly. I’m heading for the on-ramp of the 520 in the direction of Seattle. When I glance at Christian, he’s staring straight ahead. “I don’t want you to panic,” he says calmly. “But as soon as we’re on the 520 proper, I want you to step on the gas. We’re being followed.” Followed! Holy shit. My heart lurches into my mouth, pounding, my scalp prickles and my throat constricts with panic. Followed by whom? My eyes dart to the rearview mirror and, sure enough, the dark car I saw earlier is still behind us . Fuck! Is that it? I squint through the tinted windshield to see who’s driving, but I see nothing. “Keep your

Great Expectations.txt

in the fire, with her pretty hair fluttering in the wind and her eyes scorning me, - often at such a time I would look towards those panels of black night in the wall which the wooden windows then were, and would fancy that I saw her just drawing her face away, and would believe that she had come at last. After that, when we went in to supper, the place and the meal would have a more homely look than ever, and I would feel more ashamed of home than ever, in my own ungracious breast. Chapter 15 As I was getting too big for Mr. Wopsle's great-aunt's room, my education under that preposterous female terminated. Not, however, until Biddy had imparted to me everything she knew, from the little catalogue of prices, to a comic song she had once bought for a halfpenny. Although the only coherent part of the latter piece of literature were the opening lines, When I went to Lunnon town sirs, Too rul loo rul Too rul loo rul Wasn't I done very brown sirs? Too rul loo rul Too rul loo rul - still, in my desire to be wiser, I got this composition by heart with the utmost gravity; nor do I recollect that I questioned its merit, except that I thought (as I still do) the amount of Too rul somewhat in excess of the poetry. In my hunger for information, I made proposals to Mr. Wopsle to bestow some intellectual crumbs upon me; with which he kindly complied. As it turned out, however, that he only wanted me for a dramatic lay-figure, to be contradicted and embraced and wept over and bullied and clutched and stabbed and knocked about in a variety of ways, I soon declined that course of instruction; though not until Mr. Wopsle in his poetic fury had severely mauled me. Whatever I acquired, I tried to impart to Joe. This statement sounds so well, that I cannot in my conscience let it pass unexplained. I wanted to make Joe less ignorant and common, that he might be worthier of my society and less open to Estella's reproach. The old Battery out on the marshes was our place of study, and a broken slate and a short piece of slate pencil were our educational implements: to which Joe always added a pipe of tobacco. I never knew Joe to remember anything from one Sunday to another, or to acquire, under my tuition, any piece of information whatever. Yet he would smoke his pipe at the Battery with a far more sagacious air than anywhere else - even with a learned air - as if he considered himself to be advancing immensely. Dear fellow, I hope he did. It was pleasant and quiet, out there with the sails on the river passing beyond the earthwork, and sometimes, when the tide was low, looking as if they belonged to sunken ships that were still sailing on at the bottom of the water. Whenever I watched the vessels standing out to sea

Fifty-Shades-Of-Grey.txt

lace panties, while I gasp at his words—my insides liquefying. He’s just so . . . naughty. Gathering up my clothes and sandals, he stands in one swift, graceful move, like an athlete. “Go and stand beside the table,” he says calmly, pointing with his chin. Turn- ing, he strides over to the museum chest of wonder. He glances back and smirks at me. “Face the wall,” he commands. “That way you won’t know what I’m planning. We aim to please, Mrs. Grey, and you wanted a surprise.” I turn away from him listening acutely—my ears suddenly sensitive to the slightest sound. He’s good at this—building my expectations, stoking my de- sire . . . making me wait. I hear him put my shoes down and, I think, my clothes on the chest, followed by the telltale clatter of his shoes as they drop to the floor, one at a time. Hmm . . . love barefoot Christian. A moment later, I hear him pull open a drawer. Toys! Oh, I love, love, love this anticipation. The drawer closes and my breathing spikes. How can the sound of a drawer render me a quivering mess? It makes no sense. The subtle hiss of the sound system coming to life tells me it’s 115/551 going to be a musical interlude. A lone piano starts, muted and soft, and mournful chords fill the room. It’s not a tune I know. The piano is joined by an electric gui- tar. What is this? A man’s voice speaks and I can just make out the words, something about not being frightened of dying. Christian pads leisurely toward me, his bare feet slapping on the wooden floor. I sense him behind me as a woman starts to sing . . . wail . . . sing? “Rough, you say, Mrs. Grey?” he breathes in my left ear. “Hmm.” “You must tell me to stop if it’s too much. If you say stop, I will stop imme- diately. Do you understand?” “Yes.” “I need your promise.” I inhale sharply. Shit, what is he going to do? “I promise,” I murmur breath- less, recalling his words from earlier: I don’t want to hurt you, but I’m more than happy to play. “Good girl.” Leaning down, he plants a kiss on my naked shoulder then hooks a finger beneath my bra strap and traces a line across my back beneath the strap. I want to moan. How does he make the slightest touch so erotic? “Take it off,” he whispers at my ear, and hurriedly I oblige and let my bra fall to the floor. His hands skim down my back, and he hooks both of his thumbs into my panties and slides them down my legs. “Step,” he orders. Once more I do as I’m told, stepping out of my panties. He plants a kiss on my backside and stands. “I am going to blindfold you so that everything will be more intense.” He slips an airline eye mask over my eyes, and my world is plunged into the

The Silmarillion.txt

and Thangorodrim was broken, the Edain alone of the kindreds of Men fought for the Valar, whereas many others fought for Morgoth. And after the victory of the Lords of the West those of the evil Men who were not destroyed fled back into the east, where many of their race were still wandering in the unharvested lands, wild and lawless, refusing alike the summons of the Valar and of Morgoth. And the evil Men came among them, and cast over them a shadow of fear, and they took them for kings. Then the Valar forsook for a time the Men of Middle-earth who had refused their summons and had taken the friends of Morgoth to be their masters; and Men dwelt in darkness and were troubled by many evil things that Morgoth had devised in the days of his dominion: demons, and dragons, and misshapen beasts, and the unclean Orcs that are mockeries of the Children of Ilvatar. And the lot of Men was unhappy. But Manw put forth Morgoth and shut him beyond the World in the Void that is without; and he cannot himself return again into the World, present and visible, while the Lords of the West are still enthroned. Yet the seeds that he had planted still grew and sprouted, bearing evil fruit, if any would tend them. For his will remained and guided his servants, moving them ever to thwart the will of the Valar and to destroy those that obeyed them. This the Lords of the West knew full well. When therefore Morgoth had been thrust forth, they held council concerning the ages that should come after. The Eldar they summoned to return into the West, and those that hearkened to the summons dwelt in the Isle of Eressa; and there is in that land a haven that is named Avalln, for it is of all cities the nearest to Valinor, and the tower of Avalln is the first sight that the mariner beholds when at last he draws nigh to the Undying Lands over the leagues of the Sea. To the Fathers of Men of the three faithful houses rich reward also was given. Enw came among them and taught them; and they were given wisdom and power and life more enduring than any others of mortal race have possessed. A land was made for the Edain to dwell in, neither part of Middle-earth nor of Valinor, for it was sundered from either by a wide sea; yet it was nearer to Valinor. It was raised by Oss out of the depths of the Great Water, and it was established by Aul and enriched by Yavanna; and the Eldar brought thither flowers and fountains out of Tol Eressa. That land the Valar called Andor, the Land of Gift; and the Star of Erendil shone bright in the West as a token that all was made ready, and as a guide over the sea; and Men marvelled to see that silver flame in the paths of the Sun. Then the Edain set sail upon the

The-Lost-Bookshop.txt

anxious thoughts. I counted one … two … three. The house creaked softly and I closed my eyes for a moment. I had an image of a cradle being gently rocked in a bough. Madame Bowden’s words returned to me. If you’re not scared, you’re not living. Up to now, I had never associated fear with anything positive. But maybe there were different kinds of fear. ‘There’s only one way to find out.’ My eyes flew open wide. She was there, again, sneaking up on me. ‘What?’ ‘You’re going to miss your bus at this rate, now shoo!’ I didn’t move and looked at her with pleading eyes. ‘What if I can’t do it? What if everyone else is smarter than me?’ ‘I don’t recall you having any doubts about your abilities to work here – and, frankly, you were mediocre at the start.’ ‘Thanks. That really helps,’ I replied flatly. She pursed her lips and sighed heavily. ‘Tell me, that book you’ve been reading in the kitchen when you think I’m not looking …’ ‘Normal People?’ ‘Yes, that one. Do you like it?’ I considered her question. It wasn’t at all what I expected. I don’t know if I liked it as such, but I couldn’t stop reading it. Connell and Marianne had also come to feel like real people to me. I was completely invested in their lives. ‘It’s good because I feel like I’m a fly on the wall, watching everything happen. And I like that Connell is a country boy, applying to Trinity.’ I smiled. ‘So, the characters are relatable.’ ‘Yes! That’s it. But I get so angry with Marianne. I mean, why would she let people treat her that way?’ ‘Maybe she thinks she deserves it.’ The realisation was cold and hard. Even I couldn’t see why someone would feel so unlovable that they’d accept abuse. I’d been uncomfortable reading her story all along but at the same time I felt like I wasn’t going through this alone. If it could happen to someone like Marianne, who was wealthy and intelligent, it could happen to anyone. ‘I think it’s easy to get confused about what love is when you’re young. Even the title kind of suggests that we normalise bad behaviour in relationships, or assume that being normal is the most important thing, so we hide all of the ugly stuff that happens to us. I mean, who even is normal, anyway?’ ‘Congratulations. You’ve just delivered your first critical review of a book. Now off you go and no more of this nonsense.’ As I walked down the steps of 12 Ha'penny Lane, I looked back to see her fading reflection in the glass of the living-room window. That was how it was when I tried to read her; she was always obscured by the light, rather than illuminated by it. Like an overexposed photograph. She was unlike anyone I’d ever met and maybe that was a good thing. Chapter Thirty-Three HENRY The air felt different somehow, as I got off the bus in O’Connell Street. They

Kalynn-Bayron-Youre-Not-Supposed.txt

know. I didn’t think so.” I clench my jaw and turn my face away from him so he doesn’t see me smile. I’m usually super professional, playing my part to the very end, but this guy is so scared, I really do feel bad for him. I’m glad he’s going to claim the prize of a shitty T-shirt and what is sure to be a hideous picture of himself emerging from under the Camp Mirror Lake signage. We stumble down Path #3, past the campfire ring and the main office, past the parking lot with the beat-up camp truck, Bezi’s car, and another one that belongs to the guests and Tasha’s “lifeless” body. The prop ax is sticking out of her chest, and she’s gone way overboard with the fake blood. It’s going to take her forever to get it out of her hair and off her skin, but knowing Tasha, she’s having the time of her life. In the darkness, I can’t even see the rise and fall of her chest. She really looks dead. I usher the last guest past her and under the big wooden sign, where we cling to the metal gate. I pause. I wait. Nothing happens. “What—what do we do now?” the guy stammers. I scan the tree line for Kyle. He should be making his way toward us from the opposite side of the gate by now. It takes me a minute to spot the darkened silhouette down the road. He’s a little off his cue, but it’s still workable. “Oh no,” I say, trying my best to sound desperate and terrified. “Oh no! Please!” The figure moves closer, and I let my fingers dance over the handle of the fake butcher knife tucked in my waistband. Just then, there is movement in the brush to my right. I glance over, straining to see into the dark. Another figure—tall and hulking—is just beyond the tree line. My gaze darts between the two. My first thought is that one of the guests got turned around and somehow ended up outside the perimeter of the camp. But Bezi would have seen that, and she would have let me know. Some of the light from the parking lot filters through the trees, and I see that the figure to my right is Kyle. I turn my attention back to the figure in the road, and as they stalk forward, I take a step back from the gate. This is wrong. There’s someone else in the game, and it’s not someone I recognize. My heart kicks up. “What’s going on?” the blond guy asks. Suddenly, the floodlights in the parking lot come up. They bathe the entire area in a brilliant white haze. The Halloween theme music begins to play, and the other staff and guests emerge from their holding areas. “I want my damn money back!” yells one of the guests as he stalks up to the gate. “Supposed to be a serial killer out here, right? Whose grandma is this?” He gestures to the other side of

Pineapple Street.txt

over someone, even “soft power,” is structural imbalance. Abuse does not have to equal rape. Still no statement from @msbodiekane. Hello, @starletpod? Even if #JeromeWager faces repercussions, the damage is done. How many gallery shows should have gone to other people? How much money has he made wielding his power and keeping others down? if you need to ask how that mural was racist you’re the problem. We have ONE law in this country about the age of consent, and it’s the age of 18. Someone 18 can screw someone 100, and I’m sorry but it’s PERFECTLY LEGAL. Actually some places it’s younger but this is not about the age of consent, you absolute dingbat. I was angry—I was shaking—and I was certain now that my anger had less to do with loyalty to Jerome or concern over his reputation than with the stunning contrast between this easy online outrage and the outrage any one of us should have felt for years over people like you, people like Dorian. It was like seeing someone hanged for stealing gum when down the street someone else was robbing a bank. I shouldn’t have done anything. Sober, I wouldn’t have done anything. But I was not sober. I typed out a thread of messages with my pruning thumbs, posting each after a quick scan for drunken typos: Has Jasmine Wilde even asked for repercussions? This is a work of art, not, as far as I know, a call to action. 1/ I’m no longer with Jerome Wager, but as a survivor of ACTUAL sexual assault, this all sits wrong with me. Age is not the only form of power. You could argue that working for the gallery, Jasmine had as much career power over him as he had over her. 2/ Are we talking here about the feminism of empowerment, or the feminism of victimhood? Either a 21-year-old woman is an adult who can make her own decisions or a helpless waif who needs our protection against big scary men. Which is it? It can’t be both. 3/ Are we saying a 21-year-old woman lacks sexual agency? Lacks the ability to make decisions about her own body? Whose permission does she need to date someone older? Her father’s? This is infantilizing. 4/ What age range WOULD be acceptable to all of you? Is five years older okay? Is one year older okay? One month? 5/ That said, Jasmine has created an evocative piece of art. Let’s leave it at that: art, not a call for a Twitter mob. 6/6 I stopped myself, because my blood pressure was only going up, and I hadn’t run any of this by Jerome and there were already replies coming in that I didn’t want to read. I managed not to slip on the floor, managed to make it to the bed. 31 I didn’t really sleep, just rested my body and fitfully sobered up. Across the state, Omar was awake this whole night too; this is when he removed his own gauze and made his pillowcase into a kind

Dune.txt

he remained in the dream, Paul knew he would remember it upon awakening. He always remembered the dreams that were predictions. The dream faded. Paul awoke to feel himself in the warmth of his bed -- thinking . . . thinking. This world of Castle Caladan, without play or companions his own age, perhaps did not deserve sadness in farewell. Dr. Yueh, his teacher, had hinted that the faufreluches class system was not rigidly guarded on Arrakis. The planet sheltered people who lived at the desert edge without caid or bashar to command them: will-o'-the-sand people called Fremen, marked down on no census of the Imperial Regate. Arrakis -- Dune -- Desert Planet. Paul sensed his own tensions, decided to practice one of the mind-body lessons his mother had taught him. Three quick breaths triggered the responses: he fell into the floating awareness . . . focusing the consciousness . . . aortal dilation . . . avoiding the unfocused mechanism of consciousness . . . to be conscious by choice . . . blood enriched and swift-flooding the overload regions . . . one does not obtain food-safety-freedom by instinct alone . . . animal consciousness does not extend beyond the given moment nor into the idea that its victims may become extinct . . . the animal destroys and does not produce . . . animal pleasures remain close to sensation levels and avoid the perceptual . . . the human requires a background grid through which to see his universe . . . focused consciousness by choice, this forms your grid . . . bodily integrity follows nerve-blood flow according to the deepest awareness of cell needs . . . all things/cells/beings are impermanent . . . strive for flow-permanence within . . . Over and over and over within Paul's floating awareness the lesson rolled. When dawn touched Paul's window sill with yellow light, he sensed it through closed eyelids, opened them, hearing then the renewed bustle and hurry in the castle, seeing the familiar patterned beams of his bedroom ceiling. The hall door opened and his mother peered in, hair like shaded bronze held with a black ribbon at the crown, her oval face emotionless and green eyes staring solemnly. "You're awake," she said. "Did you sleep well?" "Yes." He studied the tallness of her, saw the hint of tension in her shoulders as she chose clothing for him from the closet racks. Another might have missed the tension, but she had trained him in the Bene Gesserit Way -- in the minutiae of observation. She turned, holding a semiformal jacket for him. It carried the red Atreides hawk crest above the breast pocket. "Hurry and dress," she said. "Reverend Mother is waiting." "I dreamed of her once," Paul said. "Who is she?" "She was my teacher at the Bene Gesserit school. Now, she's the Emperor's Truthsayer. And Paul . . . " She hesitated. "You must tell her about your dreams." "I will. Is she the reason we got Arrakis?" "We did not get Arrakis." Jessica

The-Silver-Ladies-Do-Lunch.txt

I was past all that now.’ ‘You’re an attractive widow,’ Lin said, then her face was sad. ‘And I’m an abandoned wife.’ ‘No, you’re not.’ Josie hugged Lin’s arm. ‘Where’s Neil now?’ ‘He took the car – he was driving Dangerous to Tadderly. He said he had to buy some bits and pieces for it.’ ‘On a Sunday?’ ‘Andy’s Motor Mart is open on a Sunday morning.’ ‘So will he be joining us later?’ Lin shook her head sadly. ‘Are you okay, Lin?’ ‘I think so.’ Lin felt the familiar salty rush of tears in her eyes. ‘He’s just always so busy nowadays. He has no time for me.’ ‘Why don’t you suggest a day out together? Tell him you’re feeling a bit neglected.’ ‘I was thinking about it,’ Lin said. ‘It’s our fiftieth wedding anniversary this year and I wondered if we could maybe manage a romantic weekend somewhere really nice.’ ‘October is a long way away,’ Josie said quietly. ‘It is.’ As they approached the woods, the air suddenly became cooler. They stepped beneath a green canopy of leaves surrounded by thick clusters of trees. A squirrel scampered across the path and scrambled up a tall trunk, disappearing along a branch. In a clearing, a group of people sat on the grass around a large cloth covered with dishes of food. Cecily was perched on a camping chair, looking pleased with herself. Her mobility scooter was parked a little way off. She waved eagerly. ‘Here we all are.’ Josie and Lin called out greetings and a chorus of replies echoed back. Minnie was sitting cross-legged on the ground, warm in a military coat, black beret and sunglasses, next to a woman in dungarees with pale hair, hunched awkwardly as if she’d rather be elsewhere. Josie called, ‘Minnie, Tina – it’s good to see you.’ Florence was next to them on a cushion, wearing a cardigan over a loose dress, and next to her Jack Lovejoy was strumming a guitar, his fringe covering deep-set eyes. Cecily smiled gleefully. ‘I asked Jack to come.’ Florence seemed a little uncomfortable, shifting position away from him as Jack launched into ‘With a Little Help From My Friends’. Cecily was the queen at the head of the table. She smiled towards Florence. ‘Poor Florence couldn’t be the only young one with all us Silver Ladies. Jack’s a very good musician.’ Jack smiled. ‘Cecily has a guitar – she plays a lot.’ ‘I do,’ Cecily admitted. ‘She used to sing to us when we were at school,’ Minnie added. ‘What did you sing?’ Jack asked. ‘“Wake Up, Little Susie”,’ Lin recalled. ‘“Jail House Rock”,’ Josie added. ‘We loved it – anything but “Shenandoah”…’ Minnie agreed. Tina took a breath. ‘When I was in Miss Hamilton’s class, we all sang “Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weeny Yellow Polka Dot Bikini”.’ She laughed. ‘We thought it was dead racy.’ ‘Then let’s sing it now,’ Jack grinned, playing the chords. Josie was surprised he knew all the old songs – he had an incredible repertoire. They launched into the song together,

Happy Place.txt

of Wyn’s fingers against mine. Kimmy’s gaze darts to Cleo, her grin flagging at Cleo’s stunned expression. “We’ve talked about it forever,” Sabrina goes on, “and this is the perfect time. To commemorate our last trip to the cottage and the last ten years of friendship. Something that will always connect us.” My stomach sinks, even as my heart feels like a crazed bird fighting its way up through my windpipe. It’s one thing to accept that I might always be a little bit in love with Wyn Connor. It’s another to put a permanent reminder of that on my body. Before I’ve come close to finding a way out of this, Cleo says, “I don’t think so, Sab.” You’d think the shocked silence might’ve prepared her for this, but Sabrina looks genuinely flabbergasted. “What do you mean you don’t think so?” Cleo shrugs. “I don’t think we should get matching tattoos tonight.” Kimmy touches her arm, some unspoken sentiment passing between them. Sabrina laughs. “Why not?” “Because I don’t want to,” Cleo says. “And looking around, I’m not sure anyone else does either.” Sabrina blinks and scans us. “It’s not that,” I say. “It’s just . . . really sudden.” “We’ve been talking about this for a decade,” she says. “And we’ve never decided what it would even be,” Wyn says. “Who cares what it is?” Sabrina says. “It’s about the bond.” “Maybe next time,” I suggest. “We can pick a design tonight, and then everyone has some time to get used to it, and then—” “I’ve already put a deposit down,” she says. “I got the shop to stay open for us.” Cleo rubs the spot between her brows. “Sab. You should have asked us before you did that. You can’t assume we’ll go along with whatever you want.” “What the hell does that mean, Cleo,” Sabrina says, hurt splashed across her face. “She just means this is a big, permanent decision,” I say. “We all need a little time to commit to this kind of thing.” “That’s not what I mean,” Cleo says calmly. “I meant what I said. That she can’t just decide how things should be between all of us and then bulldoze all of us to get her way.” “She’s not bulldozing anyone,” Parth says, stepping in toward Sabrina. “She’s doing all of this for you all. This whole trip was for you. All of it.” “If it’s for us,” Cleo says, “then you’ll respect my decision not to do something I’m uncomfortable with.” “You have, like, nineteen separate tattoos,” Sabrina says. “What’s so uncomfortable about this one?” “Can we please drop this?” Cleo says, averting her gaze. “Sure,” Sabrina says. “I’ll drop it. I’ll drop the fact that one of my best friends keeps canceling plans and the other will barely text me back, and my dad’s selling the only place that’s ever felt anything like home to me, and that no one except me seems to give a fuck that we’re growing apart.” She turns back toward where we left the car. “I’ll talk

A Day of Fallen Night.txt

snapped in the hearth. Shunted back to wakefulness, she pushed away the furs. When Einlek had written to invite her to Hróth, she had thought of refusing him. Inys needed its queen more than ever, in the aftermath of the Grief of Ages. She had not wanted to part from Sabran, even though she had milk nurses now, and could hold up her own head. By the Feast of Late Summer, her ladies had encouraged her to go. Helisent had seen it first – that she found it harder and harder to rise, as if her bones were not just lined with iron, but with stone. Siyu had warned her that some mothers experienced a deep sorrow after pregnancy, but Glorian had refused to accept it. She had no time or room for that. Yet her own mother had carried a certain darkness, even years after being with child. King Bardholt had called it unmód, when the mind seemed to detach and sink. The Virtues Council had finally agreed that it would be good for Glorian to visit her cousin, to recover from everything. She had arrived in Eldyng as the sky lights began their dance. Einlek had taken her to Isborg and Askdral, and then to the bleak towers of Vattengard, to finally meet the Sea King. Glorian had floated like a dead fish through that day. Einlek had been there to support her, but when she had clapped eyes on Magnaust Vatten, with a reserved Princess Idrega, her thoughts had come untethered, and she remembered little after that. Now she rose and went to the window. Her bedchamber had a breathtaking view – the snowbound trees of a drunken forest. Once the royal visits were over, Einlek had brought her to his hunting lodge in the Nithyan Mountains, where all was quiet, and she could rest. Outside, the daylight was still low, the moon out with the dawn. When she stepped into the snow, her breath froze before her. Hróth was always crisp in late autumn, but this depth of cold was unusual, even in the mountains. The passing of the comet had somehow quenched the Womb of Fire, but in its wake, the cooling had gone on. Glorian had always weathered the cold well, and walked in only her shift and fur boots. When she saw the woman sitting under an ash tree, a streak of white in her hair, she stopped. ‘Aunt Ólrun,’ she said, after a moment. ‘Are you all right?’ ‘You feel it, niece,’ Ólrun Hraustr said, eyes closed. ‘The great chilling – the Vildavintra.’ Glorian stepped a little closer, wary. Her aunt had always been troubled. ‘Vildavintra?’ Wild winter, it meant. ‘We will survive it.’ Ólrun had the same eyes and nose as her dead brother. ‘You and I are touched by night, as Bardholt never was. Einlek will see, in the Vildavintra.’ Unsure of what to say, Glorian continued through the snow. Her aunt had survived two wars. Of all people, she needed peace. The stovehouse was a short walk away, tucked among the

spare.txt

phoned Willy. I couldn’t speak. He couldn’t either. He was sympathetic,<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">and more. (Raw deal, Harold.) At moments he was even angrier about the<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">whole thing than I was, because he was privy to more details about the spin<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">doctor and the backroom dealings that had led to this public sacrifice of the<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">Spare.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p3"><span class="s1"></span><br></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">And yet, in the same breath, he assured me that there was nothing to be<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">done. This was Pa. This was Camilla. This was royal life.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p3"><span class="s1"></span><br></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">This was our life.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p3"><span class="s1"></span><br></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">I phoned Marko. He too offered sympathy.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p3"><span class="s1"></span><br></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">I asked him to remind me, What was this editor’s name? He said it, and I<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">committed it to memory, but in the years since then I’ve avoided speaking it,<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">and I don’t wish to repeat it here. Spare the reader, but also myself. Besides,<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">can it possibly be a coincidence that the name of the woman who pretended I<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">went to rehab is a perfect anagram for...Rehabber Kooks? Is the universe<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">not saying something there?<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p3"><span class="s1"></span><br></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">Who am I not to listen?<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p3"><span class="s1"></span><br></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">Over several weeks, newspapers continued to rehash the Rehabber Kooks<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">libels, along with various new and equally fabricated accounts of goings-on<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">in Club H. Our fairly innocent teenage clubhouse was made to sound like<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">Caligula’s bedchamber.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p3"><span class="s1"></span><br></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">Around this time one of Pa’s dearest friends came to Highgrove. She was<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">with her husband. Pa asked me to give them a tour. I walked them around the<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">gardens, but they didn’t care about Pa’s lavender and honeysuckle.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p3"><span class="s1"></span><br></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">The woman asked eagerly: Where's Club H?<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p3"><span class="s1"></span><br></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">An avid reader of all the papers.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p3"><span class="s1"></span><br></p> <p class="p3"><span class="s1"></span><br></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">79<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p3"><span class="s1"></span><br></p> <p class="p3"><span class="s1"></span><br></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">https://m.facebook.com/groups/182281287 1297698 https://t.me/Afghansalarlibrary<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p3"><span class="s1"></span><br></p> <p class="p3"><span class="s1"></span><br></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">I led her to the door, opened it. I pointed down the dark steps.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p3"><span class="s1"></span><br></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">She breathed in deeply, smiled. Oh, it even smells of weed!<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p3"><span class="s1"></span><br></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">It didn’t, though. It smelt of damp earth, stone and moss. It smelt of cut<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">flowers, clean dirt—and maybe a hint of beer. Lovely smell, totally organic,<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">but the power of suggestion had taken hold of this woman. Even when I<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">swore

The-Housekeepers.txt

beyond earning a fortune greater than our wildest dreams?” “Yes.” Mrs. King finished her ice. “Why do you ask?” “Because I know you. You’re a proud woman. But you’re not that proud.” “What’s that supposed to mean?” “You lost your job. Bad luck, poor you. But you’re not struggling. You’ve got your wits about you. You’ll be fine.” Winnie looked contemplative. “One doesn’t tear a house down every time she grows tired of gainful employment.” Mrs. King laughed. “Oh, doesn’t one?” “No,” said Winnie stubbornly. “So I’m asking: is there something more going on?” Sometimes, in the dark of the night, Mrs. King thought about the one thing that frightened her about her plan. Other people. All their strange little fears, their jealousies, their persistent needs. Animals didn’t buck authority this way. Birds didn’t. They flew in perfect formation, a powerful confederacy. “Oh,” said Mrs. King, “probably.” Winnie’s eyes narrowed. “Tell me.” There were times when a titbit, a tiny particle of information, soothed her fine band of women. It was like training dogs, feeding birds. She swiveled position on the bench. “When I first came to Park Lane, Mr. de Vries made me a promise.” She stretched her legs. “Two promises, actually.” Something darkened in Winnie’s eyes. “Mr. de Vries?” “Yes. First: that people wouldn’t ask me where I came from. Second: he’d pay my mother’s hospital fees.” “Hospital?” “Yes. I don’t know what you’d call it. A workhouse. An asylum.” “I understand.” “Do you? I’m not sure I do.” “I’m sorry,” Winnie said. Images came into Mrs. King’s mind, the old ones. Gray light. Mother’s stare, growing stranger. “They promised me I wouldn’t have to talk about it. I could put everyone behind me. Mother. Alice, too.” Winnie said slowly, “We’ve never discussed this, you know. In all our years together, never. I always thought it was a strange thing.” “What was?” “You. Coming to Park Lane. Right out of the blue. No family, no papers. You didn’t even know how to tie your apron properly.” “Well,” said Mrs. King, “I had you to teach me, didn’t I?” Winnie tilted her head. “We know what sort of girl arrives in a house without a character.” Mrs. King laughed. “I wasn’t in that sort of trouble, Winnie.” “No?” “No.” “Then why did Mr. de Vries hire you?” Mrs. King had been asked that question before. “Old friend of the family.” Winnie let out a short laugh. “An old friend. I see.” She shook her head. “Good Lord. When I think about the way we bent over backward for you, made exceptions for you. Changed breakfast time, suppertime, gave you the nice chores, extra candles, extra sugar, more tea. A bed by the window, a room of your own, new caps, free mending...” “You didn’t do so badly by him yourself.” “I worked. I worked my fingers to the bone. I’ve never worked so hard in my life.” Winnie’s face glimmered with something hard to read. Mrs. King had to allow that it was true. Winnie had plodded through that house like

Katherine-Center-Hello-Stranger.txt

arguing with the nervousness in my chest in a way that would make Dr. Nicole very proud. This was doable. No dry heaving out behind the mechanical room necessary. I could just … breathe. And admire Mrs. Kim’s magazine-worthy tables. And feel the rays of the setting sun warming my skin. And enjoy my skirt’s ruffles swishing around my calves. And sway a little bit to the music of the band. If that’s not a triumph, I don’t know what is. * * * ON A SCIENTIFIC level, it was totally fascinating to watch the fusiform face gyrus somewhere in between functioning and not functioning—seeing it do its thing in real time. It kept prompting me to think about everything my miraculous body did all the time without ever needing help or acknowledgment. Which made me feel grateful. Scientifically and otherwise. There was one confounding variable, though, in my data-gathering. One totally unfamiliar face that should have—by all established patterns—been unintelligible … showed up on the rooftop fully intact. I could see it loud and clear. A guy in a dark blue suit arrived maybe half an hour in … and I recognized him right away—even though I’d never seen him before. I sidled my way over to Sue and elbowed her until I had her attention. “What?” she said. “Tell me who that is,” I said, tilting my head in the blue suit guy’s direction. Sue peeked over. “Oh god, I’m sorry!” she said. “My dad invited him.” “Tell me it’s not—” “It’s Joe,” Sue confirmed, with a no-sense-fighting-it nod. “No, no, no,” I said. Had I just been boasting about how okay I was? “My dad loves him, apparently,” Sue said. “He’s helped him move furniture so many times, my dad nicknamed him Helpful. Did you know that?” “I did,” I said. “My dad invited him as a setup! For you! I cleared it all up and explained that being willing to help move furniture does not definitively make anyone a good person and that a setup was useless because he’d already dumped you and broken your heart. But by then it was too late.” He’d already dumped me and broken my heart. Wow. He sure had. While Joe greeted the Kims, up here in the breeze, against a brilliant pink sunset, I let myself watch him. Seeing my mom’s portrait had been bittersweet bliss. Seeing my own real face in the mirror had been a relief. Seeing Sue and the Kims and various friends from art school had been all varying levels of fun. This was something different. First of all, I wasn’t seeing Joe again. I can’t even capture how mind-bending it is to see someone for the very first time—and recognize him. I mean, I had kissed this guy! Twice! But I’d never seen him before. A memory of Joe’s naked torso as he threw me down on my bed rumbled through my memory like thunder. I shook it off. Fine, fine—I’d seen him but hadn’t seen him. It was a brain glitch. Not news. We got

I-Have-Some-Questions-for-You.txt

flared on-screen when he thought he was onto some new lead, or when he talked with palpable hate about Robbie. “I figured you’d be lurking,” I said, not unaware of my word choice. “You finding good stuff?” “Sure. Maybe. Hey, you’re testifying about the dots, right? What are you planning to say?” “You know I can’t answer that. Plus, I think you’re recording.” He looked bewildered, then glanced at the iPad, still gripped in front of his crotch. He said, “No, I—” and flung the device across the frozen lawn like a Frisbee. It landed against one of the icebergs of old, brown snow. “I’m still not telling you,” I said. Seeing the iPad lie there, I realized I had an unprecedented opportunity—speaking to Dane in person with no email trail, no recording phone. There were other ways, besides the witness stand, to get information into the world. There were other ways to blast out your name, in time for some relevant person to hear it and come forward. And whatever I told Dane could make it online by tomorrow. I sat down cross-legged, so my face was closer to his. I said, “Can I give you some advice, though?” He seemed to brace for something, like I was going to tell him to get a life. I added, “A lead.” “Be my guest.” I said, “I was never the biggest Robbie Serenho fan. He was that guy we all knew in high school, the big shot. And he wasn’t a great boyfriend to Thalia. But that doesn’t mean he did anything. You’re missing the obvious.” Dane laughed awkwardly. I could tell he wanted to defend himself against such an accusation, but didn’t want to blow his chance of hearing what I had to say. He said, “I’m listening.” “I hinted about it on the podcast, but the lawyers wouldn’t let me say the name. Dennis Bloch, the music director. He was definitely having sex with her. You have a guy whose marriage is on the line, whose job is on the line. Thalia’s about to graduate, maybe he can’t handle that. There’s something off about him to begin with, right? Not so much in being attracted to her”—I added because Dane was, himself, clearly a man in his forties with a thing for an adolescent Thalia—“but to manipulate her like that, take advantage of her, break every rule. He ruined her life. Chances are he took it, too.” It was a melodramatic speech, to be sure. But I knew by then the way Dane talked, the way he thought. I said, “The worst part is, he’s still teaching. He’s spent the past twenty-seven years out there, moving on to other kids.” Dane cleared his throat. “I think,” he said, “that speaks more to the kind of cover-up Granby is okay with than to that particular individual. I’ve looked into Dennis Bloch, don’t think I haven’t. The school has covered up dozens of guys like him over the years. They give a letter of recommendation and send them on. I’m sure he

Cold People.txt

Gardens of Babylon were located in Nineveh, one of the seven wonders of the Ancient World. During the coalition invasion he watched his country collapse into anarchy. Having lost many of his family under Saddam’s tyrannical rule, he lost the survivors during the occupation. With no one left, he’d turned mad with grief. Whereas some embraced fanaticism of a destructive kind, Kasim had embraced fanaticism of a protective kind, clinging onto the only thing remaining that he loved – the ruins of Nineveh, swearing to protect them against any man who tried to damage them, defending Nineveh from anyone desecrating the site. Rumours quickly spread that there was a madman – the madman of Mosul, killing those who trespassed with harmful intent. When Islamic State soldiers arrived with earth diggers to smash the Lamassus, the legendary figure of a hybrid human with the wings of a bird and the body of a bull, a masterpiece which sat atop the ancient Nirgal Gate, intending to raze them, he’d used his sniper rifle to pick off the men. When soldiers tried to hunt him, he’d killed them one by one, knowing the maze of tunnels better than any man alive, laying traps, digging holes until finally the ruins were left alone, some people believing them to be protected by the vengeful spirit of King Sennacherib. Living in isolation underground, without phones or computers, he had no idea about the alien occupation until he felt vibrations rippling through the ground. At first, he’d presumed they were a result of Mosul Dam’s collapse. He knew it wasn’t the devastating tremors that follow an earthquake; it was more like the vibrations from a tuning fork, precise and controlled. There’d been a tingle across his skin – his hairs were standing on end. He’d left the underground chamber, walking out into the open. There was no damage that he could see, no fallen rocks, no cracks in the ground. There were no screams, no gunfire, there was no sound of any kind. Puzzled, he arrived at the great gate and stared not at desert but at blue sky. Standing under the Lamassu, his toes were at a cliff edge. One more step and he’d fall, a sheer drop – five hundred metres or more. The ruins of Nineveh were in the air, carved out of the land and floating like a small cloud travelling through the sky. Kasim had been convinced that he was dead, that this was the afterlife, and so he sat calmly, cross-legged under the Nigral Gate, and watched his homeland pass underneath him, thinking that this was a splendid way to transition into the next life: he even cried at the prospect of being reunited with his family. For the first time in many years, he wouldn’t be alone. Soon he began to doubt this idea, replacing it with a far more incredible notion – this was real. The night sky had been filled with shimmering vessels of a kind he’d never seen before, giant in size; these were alien ships, a god-like power

USS-Lincoln.txt

help. You don’t have to go all snotty know-it-all on me.” Hardy crab-walked, finding several solid handholds. The power outlet would have been easy to miss since it had a hinged flap over it. He lifted it, properly positioned the jack cable plug into it, and pressed. He felt it lock into place. “That should do it … Please, please … hold your applause. It was nothing.” Quintos said, “Max, flip the aux power switch. Let’s see if this worked.” Hardy felt the cable come alive with thousands of volts of electricity. Within reach, also covered by a metal flap, was the ship’s starboard flight bay manual access panel. He waited for a prompt to appear. “It’s going to take a few minutes before the ship’s root access protocols are initialized,” Sonya said. The prompt displayed. Hardy entered a fifteen-digit access code, one that worked for all US Space-Navy vessels. “What’s going on, Hardy? Over,” came the captain’s less-than-patient-sounding voice. “The bay doors should have opened,” Hardy said. “Shoulds are shit at this point. Get those doors open.” As if on cue, a near-blinding vertical swath of light, contrasting with the blackness of deep space, emanated from Hardy’s left. The bay doors were indeed opening. Chapter 11 Lost Tombstone Star System Genoma, Stratham Hold Captain Gail Pristy An hour after her shower was rudely interrupted, Captain Pristy had quansported off USS Hercules. Stephan Derrota, Dr. Patty Kline, Superintendent LaSalle, and Petty Officer Second-Class Aubrey Laramie had already amassed within Stratham Hold’s control center. All wore black combat fatigues, body armor, and their tagger sidearms. Pristy gave them a quick overview of the situation, ending with, “Dr. Kline, stay here. If there are wounded, we’ll need you ready. LaSalle, you hang with Corporal Bower The rest, come with me.” Dr. Kline handed a medic’s pack to Aubrey, who slung it over one shoulder, then the time travelers quickly headed below. They’d taken the rickety lift deep down into the rocky, cavernous base there—where the ringularity portal awaited. Derrota had brought along his own field kit, just in case it was needed. Resnick hadn’t said any of these things would be necessary, but Pristy wasn’t about to put her people in jeopardy; trust of the enigmatic general only went so far. She wondered, upon their arrival below, if he’d be annoyed. He always seemed to be annoyed. Pristy would be more sympathetic if the man hadn’t interrupted her shower just an hour earlier—and simply to let her know she needed to assemble her team. Not that I would have minded something more … under different circumstances. The thought colored her cheeks. Sure, Resnick was good looking in a rustic kind of way, well-built, and add to the fact it had been far too long since she’d … She mentally chastised herself. He’s an arrogant asshat. What are you thinking? “Pondering something special, Captain?” Aubrey asked, derailing her train of thought. The young woman looked at her with a bemused expression. “Or maybe someone?” “You enjoy being a petty officer?” Pristy asked. She heard Aubrey

The Da Vinci Code.txt

had asked an unusual passing question about Sophie's mother's maiden name. Chauvel. The question now made sense. "And Chauvel?" she asked, anxious. Again he shook his head. "I'm sorry. I know that would have answered some questions for you. Only two direct lines of Merovingians remain. Their family names are Plantard and Saint-Clair. Both families live in hiding, probably protected by the Priory." Sophie repeated the names silently in her mind and then shook her head. There was no one in her family named Plantard or Saint-Clair. A weary undertow was pulling at her now. She realized she was no closer than she had been at the Louvre to understanding what truth her grandfather had wanted to reveal to her. Sophie wished her grandfather had never mentioned her family this afternoon. He had torn open old wounds that felt as painful now as ever. They are dead, Sophie. They are not coming back. She thought of her mother singing her to sleep at night, of her father giving her rides on his shoulders, and of her grandmother and younger brother smiling at her with their fervent green eyes. All that was stolen. And all she had left was her grandfather. And now he is gone too. I am alone. Sophie turned quietly back to The Last Supper and gazed at Mary Magdalene's long red hair and quiet eyes. There was something in the woman's expression that echoed the loss of a loved one. Sophie could feel it too. "Robert?" she said softly. He stepped closer. "I know Leigh said the Grail story is all around us, but tonight is the first time I've ever heard any of this." Langdon looked as if he wanted to put a comforting hand on her shoulder, but he refrained. "You've heard her story before, Sophie. Everyone has. We just don't realize it when we hear it." "I don't understand." "The Grail story is everywhere, but it is hidden. When the Church outlawed speaking of the shunned Mary Magdalene, her story and importance had to be passed on through more discreet channels... channels that supported metaphor and symbolism." "Of course. The arts." Langdon motioned to The Last Supper. "A perfect example. Some of today's most enduring art, literature, and music secretly tell the history of Mary Magdalene and Jesus." Langdon quickly told her about works by Da Vinci, Botticelli, Poussin, Bernini, Mozart, and Victor Hugo that all whispered of the quest to restore the banished sacred feminine. Enduring legends like Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, King Arthur, and Sleeping Beauty were Grail allegories. Victor Hugo's Hunchback of Notre Dame and Mozart's Magic Flute were filled with Masonic symbolism and Grail secrets. 175 "Once you open your eyes to the Holy Grail," Langdon said, "you see her everywhere. Paintings. Music. Books. Even in cartoons, theme parks, and popular movies." Langdon held up his Mickey Mouse watch and told her that Walt Disney had made it his quiet life's work to pass on the Grail story to future generations. Throughout his entire life, Disney had been hailed as

Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy.txt

of his companions. "Well, I suppose we'd better be going then, hadn't we?" he suggested. "Shhh!" said Zaphod. "There's absolutely nothing to be worried about." "Then why's everyone so tense?" "They're just interested!" shouted Zaphod. "Computer, start a descent into the atmosphere and prepare for landing." This time the fanfare was quite perfunctory, the voice distinctly cold. "It is most gratifying," it said, "that your enthusiasm for our planet continues unabated, and so we would like to assure you that the guided missiles currently converging with your ship are part of a special service we extend to all of our most enthusiastic clients, and the fully armed nuclear warheads are of course merely a courtesy detail. We look forward to your custom in future lives ... thank you." The voice snapped off. "Oh," said Trillian. "Er ..." said Arthur. "Well?" said Ford. "Look," said Zaphod, "will you get it into your heads? That's just a recorded message. It's millions of years old. It doesn't apply to us, get it?" "What," said Trillian quietly, "about the missiles?" "Missiles? Don't make me laugh." Ford tapped Zaphod on the shoulder and pointed at the rear screen. Clear in the distance behind them two silver darts were climbing through the atmosphere towards the ship. A quick change of magnification brought them into close focus - two massively real rockets thundering through the sky. The suddenness of it was shocking. "I think they're going to have a very good try at applying to us," said Ford. Zaphod stared at them in astonishment. "Hey this is terrific!" he said. "Someone down there is trying to kill us!" "Terrific," said Arthur. "But don't you see what this means?" "Yes. We're going to die." "Yes, but apart from that." "Apart from that?" "It means we must be on to something!" "How soon can we get off it?" Second by second the image of the missiles on the screen became larger. They had swung round now on to a direct homing course so that all that could be seen of them now was the warheads, head on. "As a matter of interest," said Trillian, "what are we going to do?" "Just keep cool," said Zaphod. "Is that all?" shouted Arthur. "No, we're also going to ... er ... take evasive action!" said Zaphod with a sudden access of panic. "Computer, what evasive action can we take?" "Er, none I'm afraid, guys," said the computer. "... or something," said Zaphod, "... er ..." he said. "There seems to be something jamming my guidance system," explained the computer brightly, "impact minus forty-five seconds. Please call me Eddie if it will help you to relax." Zaphod tried to run in several equally decisive directions simultaneously. "Right!" he said. "Er ... we've got to get manual control of this ship." "Can you fly her?" asked Ford pleasantly. "No, can you?" "No." "Trillian, can you?" "No." "Fine," said Zaphod, relaxing. "We'll do it together." "I can't either," said Arthur, who felt it was time he began to assert himself. "I'd guessed that," said Zaphod. "OK computer,

Dracula.txt

as we used to sit, and I would try to tell you what I feel. I do not know how I am writing this even to you. I am afraid to stop, or I should tear up the letter, and I don't want to stop, for I do so want to tell you all. Let me hear from you at once, and tell me all that you think about it. Mina, pray for my happiness. Lucy P.S.--I need not tell you this is a secret. Goodnight again. L. LETTER, LUCY WESTENRA TO MINA MURRAY 24 May My dearest Mina, Thanks, and thanks, and thanks again for your sweet letter. It was so nice to be able to tell you and to have your sympathy. My dear, it never rains but it pours. How true the old proverbs are. Here am I, who shall be twenty in September, and yet I never had a proposal till today, not a real proposal, and today I had three. Just fancy! Three proposals in one day! Isn't it awful! I feel sorry, really and truly sorry, for two of the poor fellows. Oh, Mina, I am so happy that I don't know what to do with myself. And three proposals! But, for goodness' sake, don't tell any of the girls, or they would be getting all sorts of extravagant ideas, and imagining themselves injured and slighted if in their very first day at home they did not get six at least. Some girls are so vain! You and I, Mina dear, who are engaged and are going to settle down soon soberly into old married women, can despise vanity. Well, I must tell you about the three, but you must keep it a secret, dear, from every one except, of course, Jonathan. You will tell him, because I would, if I were in your place, certainly tell Arthur. A woman ought to tell her husband everything. Don't you think so, dear? And I must be fair. Men like women, certainly their wives, to be quite as fair as they are. And women, I am afraid, are not always quite as fair as they should be. Well, my dear, number One came just before lunch. I told you of him, Dr. John Seward, the lunatic asylum man, with the strong jaw and the good forehead. He was very cool outwardly, but was nervous all the same. He had evidently been schooling himself as to all sorts of little things, and remembered them, but he almost managed to sit down on his silk hat, which men don't generally do when they are cool, and then when he wanted to appear at ease he kept playing with a lancet in a way that made me nearly scream. He spoke to me, Mina, very straightfordwardly. He told me how dear I was to him, though he had known me so little, and what his life would be with me to help and cheer him. He was going to tell me how unhappy he would be if I did not care

Emily Wildes Encyclopaedia of Faeries.txt

one youth (naturally this youth is said to be of surpassing beauty and/or talent, particularly musical talent, a feature that will not surprise scholars even superficially versed in folklore). Yet here in Hrafnsvik, five have been taken in the last four years. I mentioned stories, and I will turn to those now. Most, unsurprisingly, concern encounters with the common fae. I have thus far recorded a round dozen, some fragmentary (perhaps part of a larger saga?) and others filling multiple pages. I will summarize here those that I find most intriguing—later I will choose one of them for my encyclopaedia. The Woodcutter and His Cat (NB: I have been informed that this is the oldest folktale of Hrafnsvik origin, though one villager argues that it drifted here from Bjarðorp, a village ten miles to the east. The story follows a familiar pattern in folklore: faeries often aid mortals in roundabout ways, and their generosity is instantly turned to vengefulness if their gifts are unappreciated.) A woodcutter dwelt at the edge of the forest in a tiny hut that was all he could afford, and he could barely hold body and soul together. In his youth, after a night of drinking, he became lost and wandered into the mountains. He lost his right hand to frostbite and was terribly disfigured. The woodcutter struggled in his work, naturally, and was sometimes forced to borrow money from his brother, who never missed a chance to rail against his foolishness, though the brother was a rich man whose larder was always full. Near the woodcutter’s house, along a path that was sometimes there and sometimes not, was a faerie tree. Its leaves were red and gold no matter the season, and abundant even in winter, and it was huge and hoary, with knots like windows for the Folk to peep through. Though lovely, it was an offputting thing, for the sun never touched it, and its boughs were cold and clammy, the ground sodden with dew. The village priest often visited the woodcutter to complain about the tree. This was in the days when the Church tried to stand against the Folk and sent dozens of poor priests on doomed missions to kill or convert them. But the woodcutter was too fearful of the Folk to cut it down, and the priest went away disappointed. One winter’s eve, after a particularly frustrating argument with the priest, the woodcutter decided that he might as well see if the faeries would help him —if not, he would consider cutting down their tree, just to silence the tedious priest. The woodcutter travelled along the path that was sometimes there and sometimes not. The faerie tree was all aglow in the darkness, its golden light spilling over the snow like coins, and the woodcutter heard the distant sound of bells and the clink of cutlery. He knelt and asked for the faeries to give him a new hand. He waited for a long time, but there was no reply; the music played on, and the Folk attended to their dinner.

Costanza-Casati-Clytemnestra.txt

lips. “Yes, we do.” She is about to draw her dagger, but he moves first. With a gesture far too quick for a man of his age, he takes a knife out of his sleeve and points it at her. She doesn’t step back but grabs his wrist without effort and twists it. He drops the knife. She lets her own dagger trace the contours of his face, from his hollow little eyes to his thin lips. He doesn’t struggle. “You won’t spill blood in here,” he says. He doesn’t sound scared, only a little surprised. “You are not that bold.” She is amused he would say that after drawing a knife out of his vest. “You do not know how bold I am,” she says. She sticks the dagger into his eye, the very same eyes that saw her daughter must be sacrificed. He drops to his knees, screaming, and she cuts his throat quickly before anyone can hear. He falls onto the floor, his body small and decrepit in the large vest. In the shadows, it looks like an empty sack. She remains standing, catching her breath. Everything inside her is cold and hateful. She can feel it like tendrils spreading around her bones. She turns to the door, and there is the Trojan girl. Clytemnestra approaches her with caution, putting away her jeweled dagger. Cassandra takes a step forward, her chin out, challenging. She is not afraid. “Do it,” she says when Clytemnestra is close enough. “Do it now.” She truly is a princess. Only royalty would give orders like that. Clytemnestra reaches out and touches her arm gently. “Hide here,” she says. “No one will hurt you, I promise.” The look Cassandra gives her is of utter distrust. Clytemnestra understands. If she were the girl, she wouldn’t trust her either. * * * Dungeon Aegisthus has promised himself that he will trust Clytemnestra, but an entire lifetime of wariness is getting the better of him. This saddens him. If he can’t trust the only woman he has cared for in all his life, then maybe it is too late for him. He is sitting in the dungeon, his hands tied to a wooden column, a guard standing by the door. They can hear the cheers coming from the dining hall, the whispers and clattering from the kitchen. The place is bringing back bad memories. Atreus had once thrown him down here after he had lost yet another wrestling game. “So you learn what it means to lose,” he had said, and Aegisthus had spent two days alone in the dark with rats creeping around him. Agamemnon had come to see him, and when Aegisthus asked him for food, Agamemnon frowned. “You wouldn’t learn anything, would you?” There is also the memory of Thyestes in a cell, how he told him that the sword Aegisthus was wielding was his and that he was his long-lost son. Aegisthus banishes the thoughts and focuses. He had gotten out by himself all those years ago, hadn’t he? He needs to do the

The-One.txt

it might go off. Not to mention that someone might recognize the outline of a pistol in her pocket. Evelyn steps around the corner of the corridor at the same time as Sloane. “Hey.” “Oh!” Sloane puts her other hand to her chest. Evelyn laughs. “Sorry, didn’t mean to startle you. I heard you were looking for me.” Calm down. Sloane nods while taking a slow breath. “What’d you need?” “Um…” All Sloane can think about is the pistol in her pocket. From the weight of it, she guesses it’s loaded. Evelyn looks at her expectantly, the smile fading from her face the longer it takes Sloane to respond. “Oh. I had Logan start a potassium infusion for your patient in room four, Grant Hopkins, for a potassium of two point two. I also had him hold off on the insulin until after he gets another potassium level. Just wanted to let you know.” “Okay, thanks.” Evelyn crosses her arms, glancing behind her before taking a step toward Sloane. “Ethan came to see me yesterday. Asking about Chelsea Carr.” She’s nearly whispering. “Is everything okay between you two now?” Evelyn hadn’t seen Sloane shout at Logan not to give Narcan. So why had Ethan seemed so sure of my guilt after talking to her? Sloane forges a smile. “Yeah, things are great. Why?” “Well, he kept saying that his questions were standard procedure. That he needed a second review of Chelsea Carr’s medical records, since yours would be a conflict of interest, being you’re his wife. But…” She tilts her head to the side. “He seemed to get fixated on you letting me go on break before Chelsea Carr was brought in. So, I explained to him it was because I’m pregnant.” Sloane nods, masking the angst building in her chest from Evelyn’s revelation. Evelyn shrugs. “The conversation just seemed…a little weird, I guess.” “Hmm.” Sloane presses her lips together. “Knowing Ethan, I think he was just being thorough.” Evelyn uncrosses her arms as she appears to weigh Sloane’s words. “We’re happier than ever now,” Sloane adds. “Good. I’m glad to hear it.” Evelyn’s eyes drop to Sloane’s hand on her front pocket. Frozen still, Sloane resists the urge to follow her gaze. Just be cool. She can’t see it. The sides of Evelyn’s mouth lift into a smile when she looks up. “You are pregnant, aren’t you?” Sloane swallows, feeling herself nod. “Yes. Yes, I am.” Evelyn’s eyes widen with joy. “It’s still really early, so don’t say anything to any—” “Of course, I won’t!” Evelyn pulls Sloane into a hug before she can stop her. Sloane steps back, afraid Evelyn could feel the outline of the gun behind Sloane’s hand. “Shh!” She looks around, but they’re alone in the corridor. “Sorry,” Evelyn whispers, lifting her shoulders. “Congratulations!” “Thanks.” Sloane steps to the side, giving Evelyn a wide enough berth that she doesn’t go in for another hug as Sloane moves past. “I’m actually not feeling well. Can you stitch up the patient in treatment room seven while I run to

The Invisible Man- A Grotesque Romance.txt

thing unseen. There was a pushing and shuffling, a sound of heavy feet as fresh people turned up to increase the pressure of the crowd. People now were coming out of the houses. The doors of the Jolly Cricketers were suddenly wide open. Very little was said. Kempt felt about, his hand seeming to pass through empty air. "He's not breathing," he said, and then, "I can't feel his heart. His side--ugh!" Suddenly an old woman, peering under the arm of the big navvy, screamed sharply. "Looky there!" she said, and thrust out a wrinkled finger. And looking where she pointed, every one saw, faint and transparent as though it was made of glass, so that veins and arteries and bones and nerves could be distinguished, the outline of a hand, a hand limp and prone. It grew clouded and opaque even as they stared. "Hullo!" cried the constable. "Here's his feet a-showing!" And so, slowly, beginning at his hands and feet and creeping along his limbs to the vital centres of his body, that strange change continued. It was like the slow spreading of a poison. First came the little white nerves, a hazy grey sketch of a limb, then the glassy bones and intricate arteries, then the flesh and skin, first a faint fogginess and then growing rapidly dense and opaque. Presently they could see his crushed chest and his shoulders, and the dim outline of his drawn and battered features. When at last the crowd made way for Kemp to stand erect, there lay, naked and pitiful on the ground, the bruised and broken body of a young man about thirty. His hair and beard were white--not grey with age but white with the whiteness of albinism, and his eyes were like garnets. His hands were clenched, his eyes wide open, and his expression was one of anger and dismay. "Cover his face!" said a man. "For Gawd's sake, cover that face!" and three little children, pushing forward through the crowd, were suddenly twisted round and sent packing off again. Some one brought a sheet from the Jolly Cricketers; and having covered him, they carried him into that house. The Epilogue So ends the story of the strange and evil experiment of the Invisible Man. And if you would learn more of him you must go to a little inn near Port Stowe and talk to the landlord. The sign of the inn is an empty board save for a hat and boots, and the name is the title of this story. The landlord is a short and corpulent little man with a nose of cylindrical protrusion, wiry hair, and a sporadic rosiness of visage. Drink generously, and he will tell you generously of all the things that happened to him after that time, and of how the lawyers tried to do him out of the treasure found upon him. "When they found they couldn't prove who's money was which, I'm blessed," he says, "if they didn't try to make me out a blooming treasure trove! Do I look

Divine Rivals.txt

to wipe the perspiration that began to drip from her jaw. The adrenaline that had fueled her across the field was ebbing, leaving behind a tremor in her bones. She wondered if Roman could feel it, how she was quaking against him, and when his hand pressed harder into her back, she knew he could. Wings flapped steadily above them. Shadows and cold air continued to trickle over their bodies. A chorus of screeches split the clouds, reminiscent of nails on a chalkboard. Iris chose to focus on the musty scent of the grass around her, broken from their fall. The way Roman breathed as a counterpoint to her—when his chest rose, hers was collapsing, as if they were sharing the same breath, passing it back and forth. How his warmth seeped into her, greater than the sun. She could smell his cologne. Spice and evergreen. It ushered her back in time to moments they had spent together in the lift and in the office. And now her body was draped across his and she couldn’t deny how good it felt, as if the two of them fit together. A flicker of desire warmed her blood, but the sparks swiftly dimmed when she thought of Carver. Carver. The guilt nearly crushed her. She kept him at the forefront of her mind until a shiver spun through her, and she felt a strange prompting to open her eyes. She dared to do so, only to discover Roman was intently studying her face. Her hair lay tangled across his mouth, and her sweat was dripping onto his neck, and yet he didn’t move, just as she had ordered. He stared at her and she stared back, and they waited for the end to come. It felt as if spring had blossomed into midsummer by the time the eithrals retreated. The shadows fled, the air warmed, the light brightened, the wind returned, and the grass sighed against Iris’s shoulders and legs. Somewhere in the distance, she could hear shouting as life slowly returned to Avalon Bluff. It took her a few more moments to quell her fear, to be confident enough to move again, to trust that the threat was gone. She winced as she pushed upward, her wrists and shoulders numb from holding herself frozen. A slight groan escaped her as she sat back on Roman’s waist, her hands tingling with pins and needles. The pain was good; it reminded her of how furious she was at him, for arriving unannounced in the middle of a siren. How his utter foolishness had nearly killed them both. Iris glared down at him. He was still watching her attentively, as if waiting for her to lift the command over him, and a smirk played across his lips. “What the hell are you doing here, Kitt?” she demanded, shoving his chest. “Have you lost your mind?” She felt his hands slide down her back, resting on the curve of her hips. If she wasn’t so exhausted and stiff from the harrowing encounter they had miraculously survived, she

Their Eyes Were Watching God.txt

night of Stew Beef making dynamic subtleties with his drum and living, sculptural, grotesques in the dance. Next day, no Indians passed at all. It was hot and sultry and Janie left the field and went home. Morning came without motion. The winds, to the tini- est, lisping baby breath had left the earth. Even before the sun gave light, dead day was creeping from bush to bush watching man. Some rabbits scurried through the quarters going east. Some possums slunk by and their route was definite. One or two at a time, then more. By the time the people left the fields the procession was constant. Snakes, rattlesnakes began to cross the quarters. The men killed a few, but they could not be missed from the crawling horde. People stayed indoors until daylight. Several times during the night Janie heard the snort of big animals like deer. Once the muted voice of a pan- ther. Going east and east. That night the palm and banana trees began that long distance talk with rain. Several people 182 Zora Neale Hurston took fright and picked up and went in to Palm Beach anyway. A thousand buzzards held a flying meet and then went above the clouds and stayed. One of the Bahaman boys stopped by Tea Cake’s house in a car and hollered. Tea Cake came out throwin’ laughter over his shoulder into the house. “Hello Tea Cake.” “Hello ’Lias. You leavin’, Ah see.” “Yeah man. You and Janie wanta go? Ah wouldn’t give nobody else uh chawnce at uh seat till Ah found out if you all had anyway tuh go.” “Thank yuh ever so much, Lias. But we ’bout decided tuh stay.” “De crow gahn up, man.” “Dat ain’t nothin’. You ain’t seen de bossman go up, is yuh? Well all right now. Man, de money’s too good on the muck. It’s liable tuh fair off by tuhmorrer. Ah wouldn’t leave if Ah wuz you.” “Mah uncle come for me. He say hurricane warning out in Palm Beach. Not so bad dere, but man, dis muck is too low and dat big lake is liable tuh bust.” “Ah naw, man. Some boys in dere now talkin’ ’bout it. Some of ’em been in de ’Glades fuh years. ’Tain’t nothin’ but uh lil blow. You’ll lose de whole day tuhmorrer tryin’ tuh git back out heah.” “De Indians gahn east, man. It’s dangerous.” “Dey don’t always know. Indians don’t know much uh nothin’, tuh tell de truth. Else dey’d own dis country still. De white folks ain’t gone nowhere. Dey oughta know if it’s Their Eyes Were Watching God 183 dangerous. You better stay heah, man. Big jumpin’ dance tuhnight right heah, when it fair off.” Lias hesitated and started to climb out, but his uncle wouldn’t let him. “Dis time tuhmorrer you gointuh wish you follow crow,” he snorted and drove off. Lias waved back to them gaily. “If Ah never see you no mo’ on earth, Ah’ll meet you in Africa.” Others hurried east like the Indians and rabbits and

Their Eyes Were Watching God.txt

bed but a chair couldn’t hold her. She dwindled down on the floor with her head in a rocking chair. After a while there was somebody playing a guitar out- side her door. Played right smart while. It sounded lovely too. But it was sad to hear it feeling blue like Janie was. Then whoever it was started to singing “Ring de bells of mercy. Call de sinner man home.” Her heart all but smothered her. “Tea Cake, is dat you?” “You know so well it’s me, Janie. How come you don’t open de door?” But he never waited. He walked on in with a guitar and a grin. Guitar hanging round his neck with a red silk cord and a grin hanging from his ears. “Don’t need tuh ast me where Ah been all dis time, ’cause it’s mah all day job tuh tell yuh.” “Tea Cake, Ah—” “Good Lawd, Janie, whut you doin’ settin’ on de floor?” Their Eyes Were Watching God 143 He took her head in his hands and eased himself into the chair. She still didn’t say anything. He sat stroking her head and looking down into her face. “Ah see whut it is. You doubted me ’bout de money. Thought Ah had done took it and gone. Ah don’t blame yuh but it wasn’t lak you think. De girl baby ain’t born and her mama is dead, dat can git me tuh spend our money on her. Ah told yo’ before dat you got de keys tuh de kingdom. You can depend on dat.” “Still and all you went off and left me all day and all night.” “’Twasn’t ’cause Ah wanted tuh stay off lak dat, and it sho Lawd, wuzn’t no woman. If you didn’t have de power tuh hold me and hold me tight, Ah wouldn’t be callin’ yuh Mis’ Woods. Ah met plenty women before Ah knowed you tuh talk tuh. You’se de onliest woman in de world Ah ever even mentioned gitting married tuh. You bein’ older don’t make no difference. Don’t never consider dat no mo’. If Ah ever gits tuh messin’ round another woman it won’t be on account of her age. It’ll be because she got me in de same way you got me—so Ah can’t help mahself.” He sat down on the floor beside her and kissed and play- fully turned up the corner of her mouth until she smiled. “Looka here, folks,” he announced to an imaginary audi- ence, “Sister Woods is ’bout tuh quit her husband!” Janie laughed at that and let herself lean on him. Then she announced to the same audience, “Mis’ Woods got herself uh new lil boy rooster, but he been off somewhere and won’t tell her.” 144 Zora Neale Hurston “First thing, though, us got tuh eat together, Janie. Then we can talk.” “One thing, Ah won’t send you out after no fish.” He pinched her in the side and ignored what she said. “’Tain’t no need of neither one of us workin’ dis mornin’. Call Mis’ Samuels and let

A-Living-Remedy.txt

as usual drawing a few curious glances from patrons who hadn’t been expecting to see an older redheaded white woman with her Asian daughter. Mom got the Reuben she’d told me she wanted, and I ordered a hearty farmer’s breakfast that made me think of the occasional weekends when my dad would bring me along to the diner where his football pool met. I’d read the Sunday comics and savor my bacon and hash browns while the men, all dads I knew, dissected the week’s games, and afterward I would unstick myself from the Naugahyde bench and my father and I would go to a nearby park. It was always special to have a little time alone with him on the weekend, because he had so few of them off. Sitting in my mother’s favorite diner, a warm, well-lit space filled with chairs and tables painted in a cozy kaleidoscope of colors, I struggled to recall the last time we’d gone out to eat together, just the two of us. Mom and I had never really gotten into having “girls’ days” together, shopping sprees or spa visits without Dan or my dad or the kids. Those things weren’t necessarily her idea of fun, and when we did get to see each other, which wasn’t nearly often enough, she wanted to spend time together as a family. Soon, I knew, we would head back to the Airbnb, and her attention would be on the kids. She asked me if they had any big plans for the day. A gingerbread-house-making party, I told her. Though it was the last thing either of us wanted to talk about, I wondered if I should seize this moment of privacy to once again broach the subject of Mom’s advance directives—she had no living will, and had thus far been resistant to discussing anything that had to do with her last wishes. I had printed the necessary forms and brought them along on this trip, hoping that I could get her to fill them out and have them witnessed. They were sitting in the bag I’d looped over my chair. I couldn’t bring myself to mention them. When we both had only an inch or two of coffee left in our mugs, she brought up Dad. “I wish he were here,” she said. “Sometimes I wonder what he would say. It’s so hard going through all of this without him.” I had not considered my father an especially calm or steadying influence. When I was in high school and my mother got sick, I knew I couldn’t talk to Dad about it; he seemed even more fearful and agitated than I was. When he tried to teach me to drive, he made it as far as our neighbor’s mailbox before saying, I can’t do this, turn around, and never got into a car with me in the driver’s seat again. His temper could be unpredictable. He was not what I’d call good in a crisis. At times, though, he surprised me. I remembered his serene pride at my

Kate-Alice-Marshall-What-Lies-in-the-Woods.txt

said. “What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked, bristling. He rested a hand on his hip and shook his head almost regretfully. “That girl was a walking disaster. She had a half dozen guys wrapped around her finger thinking they loved her. Oscar just about lost his damn mind over her. Fractured a guy’s wrist for pinching her ass in the diner, but she wouldn’t give him the time of day.” “He commits assault and she’s supposed to drop her panties?” I asked. Jim scowled at me. Interesting that he didn’t know they’d hooked up—or maybe it wasn’t. Jim wasn’t the kind of guy to keep a close watch on his son’s love life. “Look, I’m just telling you the girl liked drama. She made bad decisions and laughed about them. Everything was a game to her.” He said it all in a matter-of-fact tone, like he was reporting on nothing more fraught than the weather. “That kind of girl doesn’t end up with a happily ever after.” “I don’t think she got one,” I said. I watched his expression, feeling that familiar sense of not knowing where I stood. He’d had an abysmal opinion of Jessi Walker, that was clear. Yet there wasn’t a trace of anger or hatred in his voice. It was like he didn’t care at all. That was the way he’d always seemed to me—disconnected. Everyone else seemed to know this affable, charismatic man, but for me it had always felt like talking to a plank of wood, whatever the subject. It was like a milder version of Oscar—I didn’t get to see the charm, because I wasn’t worth the trouble of putting on a show. He grunted, done with the conversation. “Oscar’s out back. Don’t take too much of his time.” With that, he turned and headed into the office. I stood there, teeth clenched. Plenty of people would put me in the category “that kind of girl.” The only reason my life wasn’t a mess of drama was that I packed up and left everything behind every time things got hairy. I finally understood why I’d never been able to figure out how Jim felt about me. It was the same reason he could say all those things about Jessi Walker without the faintest flicker of emotion. She was beneath caring about. And so was I. He’d done the necessary steps to fulfill his obligations and play his part—mayor, best friend’s father, charitable member of society. And that was it. Except for the moments I intersected with some task he needed to complete, I didn’t even exist to him. Oscar was across the lot when I came around the back of the offices, wiping his hands on a greasy rag, a toolbox open beside him. He looked over and saw me as I approached, but he didn’t move. Waited for me to come to him. I made my way across the rut-striped yard, keeping my steps steady and reminding myself I was a long way from eleven. Oscar was no kind of threat to me

David Copperfield.txt

- for me!' Traddles rose from his chair, and, with a triumphant smile, put his hand upon the white cloth I had observed. 'However,' he said, 'it's not that we haven't made a beginning towards housekeeping. No, no; we have begun. We must get on by degrees, but we have begun. Here,' drawing the cloth off with great pride and care, 'are two pieces of furniture to commence with. This flower-pot and stand, she bought herself. You put that in a parlour window,' said Traddles, falling a little back from it to survey it with the greater admiration, 'with a plant in it, and - and there you are! This little round table with the marble top (it's two feet ten in circumference), I bought. You want to lay a book down, you know, or somebody comes to see you or your wife, and wants a place to stand a cup of tea upon, and - and there you are again!' said Traddles. 'It's an admirable piece of workmanship - firm as a rock!' I praised them both, highly, and Traddles replaced the covering as carefully as he had removed it. 'It's not a great deal towards the furnishing,' said Traddles, 'but it's something. The table-cloths, and pillow-cases, and articles of that kind, are what discourage me most, Copperfield. So does the ironmongery - candle-boxes, and gridirons, and that sort of necessaries - because those things tell, and mount up. However, "wait and hope!" And I assure you she's the dearest girl!' 'I am quite certain of it,' said I. 'In the meantime,' said Traddles, coming back to his chair; 'and this is the end of my prosing about myself, I get on as well as I can. I don't make much, but I don't spend much. In general, I board with the people downstairs, who are very agreeable people indeed. Both Mr. and Mrs. Micawber have seen a good deal of life, and are excellent company.' 'My dear Traddles!' I quickly exclaimed. 'What are you talking about?' Traddles looked at me, as if he wondered what I was talking about. 'Mr. and Mrs. Micawber!' I repeated. 'Why, I am intimately acquainted with them!' An opportune double knock at the door, which I knew well from old experience in Windsor Terrace, and which nobody but Mr. Micawber could ever have knocked at that door, resolved any doubt in my mind as to their being my old friends. I begged Traddles to ask his landlord to walk up. Traddles accordingly did so, over the banister; and Mr. Micawber, not a bit changed - his tights, his stick, his shirt-collar, and his eye-glass, all the same as ever - came into the room with a genteel and youthful air. 'I beg your pardon, Mr. Traddles,' said Mr. Micawber, with the old roll in his voice, as he checked himself in humming a soft tune. 'I was not aware that there was any individual, alien to this tenement, in your sanctum.' Mr. Micawber slightly bowed to me, and pulled up his shirt-collar. 'How do you

Kika-Hatzopoulou-Threads-That-Bi.txt

that he actually saw other-born as human beings? Why did other-born need to prove their worth to the world by servicing a city that kept pushing them to the fringes whatever chance it got? Protecting the same people who created this screwed-up system, where other-born were a thing to fear? Io shook with fury. This was such propagandist bullshit, and the worst thing was these people were eating it all up! “And I know, friends,” Saint-Yves said, “because I have worked closely with other-born to form the proposal of my Initiative. Because . . .” The crowd teetered with excitement. “I am very much in love with one.” He threw one arm toward the side door; the spotlights swung to it. “My dear friends,” Saint-Yves said, “I would like you to meet my best friend, the love of my life—and as of last night, my fiancée—Thais Ora!” CHAPTER XVIII YOU, MOSTLY IO EXPECTED SHOCK, anger, or sadness to register, but nothing came. Only a single thought, dragged sluggishly out of the depths of her mind: Thais looks stunning. For most of their lives, Thais was a sylphid, slim and pale, all ribs and jutting cheekbones. Now her cheeks were full. Her skin vibrant and rosy. Her figure had curves in all the right places, and a little extra on the hips, like every Ora woman. Her silky brown hair framed her face beautifully, reaching just past her ears. She wore glittering eye shadow and a plum lipstick and a necklace with jade beads around her slender neck. Her high heels echoed across the stage, and her white skirt billowed gracefully with every step. She looked like you would imagine a girl of 64 Hanover Street. Smiley, sunny, shiny. She placed her hand in Saint-Yves’s and let him pull her to his side, where he pressed a kiss on her forehead. It was a tender moment, the kind you see on the cover of romance novels, and Io felt both embarrassed and hungry for more. Then someone from the crowd heckled, “How’d he propose?” On the stage, Thais gave Saint-Yves her famous lopsided smile. Io prepared herself for the shock of hearing her sister’s voice after two whole years, after Leave me alone. Haven’t you done enough? “We were going over his notes for this very presentation, sitting on the floor of our living room, surrounded by empty boxes of Iyen food,” she said sweetly. “And suddenly, he took my hand, and he said he couldn’t have done this without me. That he never wanted to do anything without me. And he gave me his grandmother’s ring.” Thais extended her ringed finger to them—the crowd went nuts, exploding with applause, whistles, and supportive crooning. “My fiancée,” Saint-Yves called over the ruckus, “is moira-born. A weaver. She was the first volunteer to join our Initiative and to use her powers to track the connections between other-born and their victims. Tell them, darling, what made you decide to join us?” “You, mostly.” Thais laughed, and the crowd joined her. They were loving this. They were

Of Human Bondage.txt

something he couldn't get any other way." "Damn El Greco," said Lawson, "what's the good of jawing about a man when we haven't a chance of seeing any of his work?" Clutton shrugged his shoulders, smoked a cigarette in silence, and went away. Philip and Lawson looked at one another. "There's something in what he says," said Philip. Lawson stared ill-temperedly at his picture. "How the devil is one to get the intention of the soul except by painting exactly what one sees?" About this time Philip made a new friend. On Monday morning models assembled at the school in order that one might be chosen for the week, and one day a young man was taken who was plainly not a model by profession. Philip's attention was attracted by the manner in which he held himself: when he got on to the stand he stood firmly on both feet, square, with clenched hands, and with his head defiantly thrown forward; the attitude emphasised his fine figure; there was no fat on him, and his muscles stood out as though they were of iron. His head, close-cropped, was well-shaped, and he wore a short beard; he had large, dark eyes and heavy eyebrows. He held the pose hour after hour without appearance of fatigue. There was in his mien a mixture of shame and of determination. His air of passionate energy excited Philip's romantic imagination, and when, the sitting ended, he saw him in his clothes, it seemed to him that he wore them as though he were a king in rags. He was uncommunicative, but in a day or two Mrs. Otter told Philip that the model was a Spaniard and that he had never sat before. "I suppose he was starving," said Philip. "Have you noticed his clothes? They're quite neat and decent, aren't they?" It chanced that Potter, one of the Americans who worked at Amitrano's, was going to Italy for a couple of months, and offered his studio to Philip. Philip was pleased. He was growing a little impatient of Lawson's peremptory advice and wanted to be by himself. At the end of the week he went up to the model and on the pretence that his drawing was not finished asked whether he would come and sit to him one day. "I'm not a model," the Spaniard answered. "I have other things to do next week." "Come and have luncheon with me now, and we'll talk about it," said Philip, and as the other hesitated, he added with a smile: "It won't hurt you to lunch with me." With a shrug of the shoulders the model consented, and they went off to a _cremerie_. The Spaniard spoke broken French, fluent but difficult to follow, and Philip managed to get on well enough with him. He found out that he was a writer. He had come to Paris to write novels and kept himself meanwhile by all the expedients possible to a penniless man; he gave lessons, he did any translations he could get hold of, chiefly business

Talia-Hibbert-Highly-Suspicious.txt

in…” “Years,” I finish. “What did he say?” It’s embarrassing to admit, even to Mum, that he said pretty much nothing. That, even when faced with his own child, he still wasn’t moved enough to apologize or attempt to make amends. That he didn’t try to get in contact afterward, that he scurried away as soon as he could and didn’t look back. Again. My throat feels tight. “Ah,” Mum murmurs. “Aren’t you angry with me? For…for hiding it?” She turns to look at me for so long I become mildly concerned we might run a red light. After a moment, she says, “I did you girls a disservice when I chose your father. I should’ve chosen a man who would always do his duty. You shouldn’t know what this feels like.” Protest rises without a second thought. “No. It’s not your fault, Mum. His behavior is his choice. You can’t control other people.” She smiles as she checks the rearview mirror. “Mmm. That’s hard to remember sometimes.” “Yeah,” I whisper. “Yeah, it is.” Because even as I said the words, I knew how much of a hypocrite I am. I know my dad disappearing so completely has nothing to do with me as a person, but the hurt’s still there. “How you feel about your father,” Mum begins, “and how you choose to deal with it—I cannot dictate that. It isn’t happening to me. Not in the same way. So I’m sad you didn’t tell me then, Celine, and I’m sad you’ve been alone with this, but I’m grateful you’re telling me now.” My chest is tight because the truth is, I wasn’t alone. I had Brad and he wouldn’t leave me alone for a second, but I still tried to leave him first. “I’ve been thinking.” “Yes?” “What do you think about, like…counseling and stuff? For me, I mean? I did some research,” I add quickly, “and it doesn’t have to be expensive.” It’s amazing what a quick Google search at the back of a bus will teach you. There’s all kinds of options, and one of them’s got to help, because I am sick of being like this—anxious and afraid. “If that’s what you want,” Mum says slowly, “it might be a good idea. And believe it or not, Celine,” she adds dryly, “we have money for important things. We are not utterly destitute.” I flush. “I know.” “Or even slightly destitute.” “I know—” “Good. Maria suggested counseling to me years ago, for you girls.” She chews on her lip. “I didn’t think it was necessary. You seemed…fine. Your sister was angry, yes, but I assumed that was normal. I suppose that was unwise of me. What is normal? What is fine? I don’t know.” She sighs, shrugs. “We’ll sort something out, baby. If that’s what you want. We will.” I take a breath, and as my lungs expand my shoulders rise, looser than I thought they could be. “Thanks, Mum.” She pats my knee and shifts gears. “You said your father’s supposed to be at this ball?” “Maybe.

The Age of Innocence.txt

the table. Therefore, for totally different reasons, her food was as poor as Mrs. Archer's, and her wines did nothing to redeem it. Her relatives considered that the penury of her table discredited the Mingott name, which had always been associated with good living; but people continued to come to her in spite of the "made dishes" and flat champagne, and in reply to the remonstrances of her son Lovell (who tried to retrieve the family credit by having the best chef in New York) she used to say laughingly: "What's the use of two good cooks in one family, now that I've married the girls and can't eat sauces?" Newland Archer, as he mused on these things, had once more turned his eyes toward the Mingott box. He saw that Mrs. Welland and her sister-in-law were facing their semicircle of critics with the Mingottian APLOMB which old Catherine had inculcated in all her tribe, and that only May Welland betrayed, by a heightened colour (perhaps due to the knowledge that he was watching her) a sense of the gravity of the situation. As for the cause of the commotion, she sat gracefully in her corner of the box, her eyes fixed on the stage, and revealing, as she leaned forward, a little more shoulder and bosom than New York was accustomed to seeing, at least in ladies who had reasons for wishing to pass unnoticed. Few things seemed to Newland Archer more awful than an offence against "Taste," that far-off divinity of whom "Form" was the mere visible representative and vicegerent. Madame Olenska's pale and serious face appealed to his fancy as suited to the occasion and to her unhappy situation; but the way her dress (which had no tucker) sloped away from her thin shoulders shocked and troubled him. He hated to think of May Welland's being exposed to the influence of a young woman so careless of the dictates of Taste. "After all," he heard one of the younger men begin behind him (everybody talked through the Mephistopheles- and-Martha scenes), "after all, just WHAT happened?" "Well--she left him; nobody attempts to deny that." "He's an awful brute, isn't he?" continued the young enquirer, a candid Thorley, who was evidently preparing to enter the lists as the lady's champion. "The very worst; I knew him at Nice," said Lawrence Lefferts with authority. "A half-paralysed white sneering fellow--rather handsome head, but eyes with a lot of lashes. Well, I'll tell you the sort: when he wasn't with women he was collecting china. Paying any price for both, I understand." There was a general laugh, and the young champion said: "Well, then----?" "Well, then; she bolted with his secretary." "Oh, I see." The champion's face fell. "It didn't last long, though: I heard of her a few months later living alone in Venice. I believe Lovell Mingott went out to get her. He said she was desperately unhappy. That's all right--but this parading her at the Opera's another thing." "Perhaps," young Thorley hazarded, "she's too unhappy to be left at home." This

The Mysteries of Udolpho.txt

Bow not their tall heads beneath their frolic play. To music's softest sounds they dance away the hour, Till moon-light steals down among the trembling leaves, And checquers all the ground, and guides them to the bow'r, The long haunted bow'r, where the nightingale grieves. Then no more they dance, till her sad song is done, But, silent as the night, to her mourning attend; And often as her dying notes their pity have won, They vow all her sacred haunts from mortals to defend. When, down among the mountains, sinks the ev'ning star, And the changing moon forsakes this shadowy sphere, How cheerless would they be, tho' they fairies are, If I, with my pale light, came not near! Yet cheerless tho' they'd be, they're ungrateful to my love! For, often when the traveller's benighted on his way, And I glimmer in his path, and would guide him thro' the grove, They bind me in their magic spells to lead him far astray; And in the mire to leave him, till the stars are all burnt out, While, in strange-looking shapes, they frisk about the ground, And, afar in the woods, they raise a dismal shout, Till I shrink into my cell again for terror of the sound! But, see where all the tiny elves come dancing in a ring, With the merry, merry pipe, and the tabor, and the horn, And the timbrel so clear, and the lute with dulcet string; Then round about the oak they go till peeping of the morn. Down yonder glade two lovers steal, to shun the fairy-queen, Who frowns upon their plighted vows, and jealous is of me, That yester-eve I lighted them, along the dewy green, To seek the purple flow'r, whose juice from all her spells can free. And now, to punish me, she keeps afar her jocund band, With the merry, merry pipe, and the tabor, and the lute; If I creep near yonder oak she will wave her fairy wand, And to me the dance will cease, and the music all be mute. O! had I but that purple flow'r whose leaves her charms can foil, And knew like fays to draw the juice, and throw it on the wind, I'd be her slave no longer, nor the traveller beguile, And help all faithful lovers, nor fear the fairy kind! But soon the VAPOUR OF THE WOODS will wander afar, And the fickle moon will fade, and the stars disappear, Then, cheerless will they be, tho' they fairies are, If I, with my pale light, come not near! Whatever St. Aubert might think of the stanzas, he would not deny his daughter the pleasure of believing that he approved them; and, having given his commendation, he sunk into a reverie, and they walked on in silence. A faint erroneous ray Glanc'd from th' imperfect surfaces of things, Flung half an image on the straining eye; While waving woods, and villages, and streams, And rocks, and mountain-tops, that long retain The ascending gleam, are all one swimming scene, Uncertain if beheld.*

Casino Royale.txt

of Crdit Lyonnais, his working capital amounted to twenty-three million francs, or some twenty-three thousand pounds. For a few moments Bond sat motionless, gazing out of the window across the dark sea, then he shoved the bundle of banknotes under the pillow of the ornate single bed, cleaned his teeth, turned out the lights and climbed with relief between the harsh French sheets. For ten minutes he lay on his left side reflecting on the events of the day. Then he turned over and focused his mind towards the tunnel of sleep. His last action was to slip his right hand under the pillow until it rested under the butt of the .38 Colt Police Positive with the sawn barrel. Then he slept, and with the warmth and humour of his eyes extinguished, his features relapsed into a taciturn mask, ironical, brutal, and cold. CHAPTER 2 - DOSSIER FOR M Two weeks before, this memorandum had gone from Station S of the Secret Service to M, who was then and is today head of this adjunct to the British Defence Ministries: To: M. From: Head of S. Subject: A project for the destruction of Monsieur Le Chiffre (alias 'The Number', 'Herr Nummer', 'Herr Ziffer', etc.), one of the Opposition's chief agents in France and undercover Paymaster of the 'Syndicat des Ouvriers d'Alsace', the Communist-controlled trade union in the heavy and transport industries of Alsace, and as we know, an important fifth column in the event of war with Redland. Documentation: Head of Archives' biography of Le Chiffre is attached at Appendix A. Also, Appendix B, a note on SMERSH. We have been feeling for some time that Le Chiffre is getting into deep water. In nearly all respects he is an admirable agent of the USSR, but his gross physical habits and predilections are an Achilles heel of which we have been able to take advantage from time to time and one of his mistresses is a Eurasian (No 1860) controlled by Station F, who has recently been able to obtain insight into his private affairs. Briefly, it seems that Le Chiffre is on the brink of a financial crisis. Certain straws in the wind were noticed by 1860 - some discreet sales of jewellery, the disposal of a villa at Antibes, and a general tendency to check the loose spending which has always been a feature of his way of life. Further inquiries were made with the help of our friends of the Deuxime Bureau (with whom we have been working jointly on this case) and a curious story has come to light. In January 1946, Le Chiffre bought control of a chain of brothels, known as the Cordon Jaune, operating in Normandy and Brittany. He was foolish enough to employ for this purpose some fifty million francs of the moneys entrusted to him by Leningrad Section III for the financing of SODA, the trade union mentioned above. Normally the Cordon Jaune would have proved a most excellent investment and it is possible that Le Chiffre was motivated more by a

Blowback.txt

for, 63–64, 65–66, 71, 218, 219 efforts to deny Ukraine military aide by, 152, 211–12 FBI’s 2022 search of home of, 117, 122, 263 firings by, 58–59, 68, 102, 111, 114, 124, 144–45, 183–84, 217, 286, 288 first cabinet meeting of, 61 first impeachment trial of (2020), 37, 80, 152, 211–12, 213, 214, 306 as fixated on GOP predecessors, 42–43 GOP 2016 inoculation plans and attempts to moderate extremist views of, 19–23 government shutdown of (2018–19), 149, 163, 166 gun violence issue and, 78, 79, 80, 145 hasty and careless military proposals of, 64, 66, 71, 133, 146–47, 217, 219, 220, 225–27 hostility to careerists of, 83, 84, 85 hurricane threat response and relief of, 62–63, 83–84, 126, 127 illegal and potentially illegal proposals of, 9, 10, 107, 141–42, 151–52, 167–68, 172, 173, 178–79, 180, 182, 183, 190, 191, 217 immigration and border obsession of, 9, 10, 31, 44, 51, 52, 79–80, 86, 97–98, 100–101, 106, 107–9, 120, 133, 141–42, 145, 151, 162–63, 166–83, 187, 188, 189–90, 191–92, 217, 225, 235 inability to focus of, 58, 61, 62, 63–64, 127, 135 inciting of violence by, 3, 254, 257–58, 261 Insurrection Act invocation efforts of, 9, 225–26, 263 ISIS threat and, 56, 58, 59, 66, 146 isolationist positions of, 20, 60, 64, 220 judges resented and feared by, 9, 23, 94, 109, 121–22, 180 justice system tampering by, 58, 111, 112, 113, 118–20, 123–24, 137, 271 lawsuits used as weapons against political adversaries by, 117, 124, 192, 271 London attacks (2017) and, 50–51, 52 looming midterm elections as check on, 133 loyalty demanded by, 28, 36, 69, 70, 74, 76, 80–82, 102, 112, 153 McCain’s death and, 131–32 media targeted by, 99, 157 militia groups and, 115–16, 192, 261, 263 “Muslim ban” and travel restrictions of, 22–23, 29, 31, 32, 50, 91–94, 122, 170, 205, 206 Nielsen’s tense relations with, 107, 172, 173–74, 175, 178–81, 182–83 North Korea threat and, 96, 97, 98 officials as protecting “Doomsday Book” from, 185, 186, 194 officials as wary of sharing sensitive information with, 56, 218–19 and outsourcing warfare to private contractors proposal, 226–27 in 2017 Oval Office meeting with Russian officials, 59–60, 66 paranoia and mental instability of, 81, 101, 111–12, 119, 129, 135, 136, 139, 142, 211 pardons offered by, 10, 182, 183 post-2016 election transition period of, 27–29 proliferation of leaders modeled after, 10, 11, 34, 35, 41 Puerto Rico/Greenland swap proposal of, 126–27 Putin and, 9, 25, 52, 60, 80, 135, 136, 141, 224 rallies of, 2–3, 173, 243, 254 Russian election interference denied by, 23, 24, 25, 31, 119, 133, 140–41 Russian investigation and, 58–59, 99, 111, 119, 140 sexism of, 10, 25, 103 “Sharpiegate” and, 83–84 thin skin of, 60, 102, 110 in trip to southern border (2019), 176, 177, 181–83 tweeting by, 5, 42, 53, 59, 60, 67, 68, 71, 83, 96, 112, 124, 136, 137, 145, 146, 170, 171, 213, 257–58, 271, 288 in 2016 election, 19, 20, 21–26, 34, 35, 37, 49, 53, 169, 285 2019 State of the Union Address of, 225 in 2020 election, 38, 42,

Tess of the d'Urbervilles.txt

"What!" said he, thinking from the strangeness of her manner that she was in some delirium. "I have done it--I don't know how," she continued. "Still, I owed it to you, and to myself, Angel. I feared long ago, when I struck him on the mouth with my glove, that I might do it some day for the trap he set for me in my simple youth, and his wrong to you through me. He has come between us and ruined us, and now he can never do it any more. I never loved him at all, Angel, as I loved you. You know it, don't you? You believe it? You didn't come back to me, and I was obliged to go back to him. Why did you go away--why did you--when I loved you so? I can't think why you did it. But I don't blame you; only, Angel, will you forgive me my sin against you, now I have killed him? I thought as I ran along that you would be sure to forgive me now I have done that. It came to me as a shining light that I should get you back that way. I could not bear the loss of you any longer--you don't know how entirely I was unable to bear your not loving me! Say you do now, dear, dear husband; say you do, now I have killed him!" "I do love you, Tess--O, I do--it is all come back!" he said, tightening his arms round her with fervid pressure. "But how do you mean--you have killed him?" "I mean that I have," she murmured in a reverie. "What, bodily? Is he dead?" "Yes. He heard me crying about you, and he bitterly taunted me; and called you by a foul name; and then I did it. My heart could not bear it. He had nagged me about you before. And then I dressed myself and came away to find you." By degrees he was inclined to believe that she had faintly attempted, at least, what she said she had done; and his horror at her impulse was mixed with amazement at the strength of her affection for himself, and at the strangeness of its quality, which had apparently extinguished her moral sense altogether. Unable to realize the gravity of her conduct she seemed at last content; and he looked at her as she lay upon his shoulder, weeping with happiness, and wondered what obscure strain in the d'Urberville blood had led to this aberration--if it were an aberration. There momentarily flashed through his mind that the family tradition of the coach and murder might have arisen because the d'Urbervilles had been known to do these things. As well as his confused and excited ideas could reason, he supposed that in the moment of mad grief of which she spoke her mind had lost its balance, and plunged her into this abyss. It was very terrible if true; if a temporary hallucination, sad. But, anyhow, here was this deserted wife of his, this passionately-fond woman,

Romantic-Comedy.txt

In fact, I did before he did, and as I moaned, with his right shoulder by my mouth and his mouth by my left ear, he said in a low, quiet voice, “Oh, Sally,” and then he pulled out and ejaculated all over my stomach and I thought about how Jessa, the older daughter of my mother’s best friend, had told me when I was thirteen that when you didn’t like a guy, the disgusting things about sex were disgusting, and when you did like a guy, the disgusting things about sex were sexy. I tugged Noah onto me, and he said, “Am I too heavy?” and I said, “You’re perfect,” and we both lay still for a long time, my arms wrapped around him, his full weight on me, his face pressed against my neck, his left hand fiddling with my hair. My mind wasn’t racing; I wasn’t nervous; there was nothing other than this that I wanted. After some number of minutes—eight? Or twenty-five?—he rolled off me, onto his side, and pulled me so I was on my side, too, so we were facing each other and he looked at me from about three inches away with such intensity and affection that I had to avert my gaze; I couldn’t help it. But then I looked back at him and said, “You’re definitely worth driving twenty-six hours for. And definitely not boring, even though you don’t work at TNO.” He laughed. “And you haven’t even tasted my pan-seared salmon yet.” “By the way I have an IUD. In case next time you want to—” I paused and raised my eyebrows, aware again of the strangeness of how the most precise and succinct way of saying something could feel splendidly obscene. I continued, “In case next time you want to come inside me.” “I’d love to come inside you next time.” He grinned. “I hope I didn’t make too much of a mess before.” “It was a good kind of mess,” I said. “And I also have, uh, a clean bill of health. Sexually.” “Good to know and same for me.” He leaned in and kissed my mouth and the sex we had that time was slower and calmer before it reverted to clawing and devouring each other. After the second time, before the third time, when it became apparent there was going to be a third time, he was on his back, and I was straddling him, and I didn’t care about the pooching of my stomach because I’d decided I was beautiful just as I was. Just kidding! Because it was getting dark and also because presumably sex hormones were coursing through me. He wasn’t yet inside me again though I could feel his erection, and I said, “Did you take Viagra?” “Wow,” he said. “Thanks a lot.” “That wasn’t an insult. It was a compliment.” “To which one of us?” Without waiting for an answer, he said, “Sorry that I’m really turned on by you. No, I didn’t take Viagra.” Sincerely, I said, “I apologize if that was

Kate-Alice-Marshall-What-Lies-in-the-Woods.txt

to go back to drink alone at the bar. I’d rather drink alone, period. But the Corner Store would still be open. Marsha was still behind the counter, counting the day’s take. I gave her a curt wave and headed for the back. I grabbed the nearest, cheapest bottle of red and ambled up to the counter. She gave it A Look and I bounced one right back at her. “That stuff is basically cold medicine cut with a little grape juice,” she told me. “That suits the mood I’m in,” I replied blithely. She looked amused. “Can’t blame you. But there are better ways to get where you’re going,” she said. She reached behind the counter, and plunked down a half-full bottle of bourbon. Not bad quality, either. “Pretty sure you’re not allowed to sell the hard stuff, Marsha,” I said, feigning shock. “On the house. Given the circumstances.” She pushed it toward me. It was a Chester kind of gift. So much so I almost laughed. Here you go, kid, get drunk and puke on some spruces. I slapped down a twenty. “I said on the house,” she grouched. I grabbed a Snickers bar. “For the candy. Keep the change.” I left before she could object. I should have gone back to my room. Back to the stiff motel sheets and Forensic Files and the faint scent of mold. I got into my car instead. I tried not to think where I was heading, even though I knew before I started the engine. Outside of town the streetlights dropped to an occasional smudge of light. The forest had grown more wild and dense than it had ever been in my childhood. Everywhere else, nature was retreating. But here it was galloping back. From green to brown and back again, like a slow season turning. I wasn’t sure how I knew when to pull off the road, only that this was the place. Twenty years ago, this stretch of road had been blocked by a dozen cars, an ambulance, police, a seething crowd of onlookers. This was where Cody Benham had stumbled out of the woods with a girl in his arms, most of the way to dead. I parked. I kept the light on in the car, even though it left me blind to the outside. It felt safer. I opened the bottle that Marsha had given me and took a swig. I winced. I wasn’t much for straight liquor. Wasn’t that big on drinking, all things considered, but when the occasion called for it … It had happened right here. Well. Not right here. It ended here, though that was the part I remembered least of all. My brief consciousness while Cody was carrying me had failed before we reached the road. I had a memory of the ambulance and the commotion that followed the discovery of my broken little body, but I knew it wasn’t real, just an amalgam of all the stories I’d been told. The reel always ran backward in my mind. Cody’s arms, and then

After Death.txt

likes the cover of the California oaks marshalled along its length. Because the trees are year-around shedders, the ground is mantled with small, dry, oval leaves like beetle shells that crunch underfoot. The sound isn’t loud enough to draw the attention of anyone in the house, and Calaphas likes it so much that he takes shorter and more steps than necessary; the sound makes him feel powerful, like a giant scoring points by stomping through the puny structures of elves, like a massive dragon under whose taloned feet the bones of vanquished knights are crushed to splinters and dust. Killing is always satisfying work. The pathetic plea for mercy, whether spoken or unvoiced. The desolate last cry of pain and fear. The pale clouding or else the sudden bloody brightness of the eyes. The rattle in the throat, the stuttering of a last word that can’t quite be pronounced. The final flexing of the hands as they grasp at what they may no longer have. The terminal cascade of fluids. The spasms and shudders before the long stillness. As rewarding as it is to execute and witness any murder, by far the best experiences are those in which the labor is as hands-on as possible. Recently, with events moving at roller-coaster speed, Calaphas has been required by circumstances to use only a gun and finish the task expeditiously. He theorizes that advancement through the game occurs more rapidly when the killings are intimate and the thrill is therefore greatest: strangulation with bare hands, bludgeoning either with fists or a hammer, stabbing and slashing, a good long smothering with a pillow, a wire garrote applied with such measured force that the victim is able to hold on to false hope for an agonizing minute. If Michael Mace is the game-winning kill toward which Calaphas’s life has been directed, perhaps a disabling gunshot wound can be only preliminary to a more protracted and entertaining little circus of pain and blood. Amped on bennies, having become a dragon if only in his mind, with a priapism that can be relieved only by orgasmic violence, Calaphas arrives at the motor court in front of the grand residence. Near the steps to the terrace stands Carter Woodbine’s Bentley—the treasure that symbolizes absolute power and that every game worth playing comes to in the end—enveloped in a supernatural glow, the moon favoring it above all things. At the house, the second-floor windows are dark, but light is universal downstairs. As Calaphas approaches the Bentley, intending to pause there to reconnoiter further, he sees a woman at a window. He has come this far under the presumption that Michael Mace is on the run alone, as he was when he escaped Beautification Research and as he still seemed to be, less than twenty-four hours earlier, when he took half a million dollars from Woodbine. Calaphas doesn’t know this woman, can’t imagine who she might be or why she might have cast her lot with Mace. Then his astonishment swells into perplexity when a young boy appears next to her.

The-Silver-Ladies-Do-Lunch.txt

Cherwell. Clad in a fedora, a military jacket and black Doc Martens, she was strolling down to where the Cherwell met the Thames to watch the punts glide past. The Christ Church Meadow walk was one of her favourites; she’d often ambled along the riverbank over the years, dawdling with lovers or wandering alone, thinking about her studies. It was a calm place, passing the Jubilee bridge, the overhanging branches dipping leaves in the green river. Minnie was still thinking about her conversation with Tina several days ago. It disturbed her, like an itch she couldn’t reach. Minnie had reminded her they were flesh and blood, and Tina had replied, ‘That’s all we are, though.’ It had taken her breath away. She thought about the hug they’d exchanged on the allotments as they parted. Tina had felt vulnerable, fragile. Minnie had never imagined Tina as anything other than robust, healthy, but she was reminded now of her sister’s mortality. Neither she nor Tina were young any more, and the thought made Minnie strangely melancholy. She reached the boathouse; the river was beautiful and still. She loved the glassy smoothness of it, the way it reflected back the sky and the clouds, the foliage that hung over. There was a tranquil symmetry, a poetry; Minnie sat down on the bank where the students would often load themselves into boats and row away, arms pumping in unison. A starling landed in a small puddle and beat its wings, splashing in the water. From nowhere, one or two punters glided past, their poles digging deep as they called to each other cheerily. Then they were gone. There would be more boats soon; the river would be busy on a Sunday in summer. Minnie looked deeply into the Thames, often called the Isis in Oxford, a place of stories and memories, and she loved the deep mystery of it. However hard you stared, you couldn’t see the bottom. It was dangerous to swim in it, twenty metres deep, she’d heard, but the sight of the Thames twisting into the distance always thrilled her. Minnie liked unfathomable depths; it was like knowledge, it intrigued her, there was always more waiting to be plumbed, to be discovered beneath the smooth surface. Minnie smiled; her mood was lifting. Then she heard footsteps behind her, followed by a warm New York accent. ‘It’s Minnie, isn’t it?’ She whirled round. Jensen Callahan was smiling, wearing a blue jacket and neat jeans. She recognised the unruly white hair that stuck out from his head like a cloud, the gold-rimmed spectacles, the intelligent face. ‘We met at a dinner party – Francine and Melvyn’s…’ ‘We did – hello, Jensen.’ Minnie had never been one to play games in relationships; other women might have paused, nonplussed, pretended they didn’t remember him, but Minnie had always been direct when faced with an attractive man. She didn’t believe in batting her eyelashes and playing coy. ‘What are you doing down here?’ he asked, interested. ‘Walking – my Sunday constitutional,’ she replied simply. ‘And you?’ ‘The same…’

Christina Lauren - The True Love Experiment.txt

swiping the card at the door. Silence swallows us up as she drops her clutch and key on the table, and I’m consumed with a flushing panic. I’m not an idiot; I know this is exactly how sex starts. I’ve had sex with her already, am half in love with her at this point, and we’re both high on party vibes and champagne. Coming up here was a bloody terrible idea. Fizzy walks over, turning her back to me. “Get to work.” Luckily—or unluckily, depending on how you look at it—unbuttoning her gown goes infinitely faster than buttoning it did. But to my relief and true to her word, she does not immediately let it fall to the floor and face me in whatever complicated lacy underwear situation she’s hiding under there. She steps away with a hand holding it up at the front, smiling over her shoulder at me. “I’m gonna change in the bathroom; you get the episode pulled up.” I find the remote, connect to the right app, and get it ready to play. With Fizzy still changing, I duck out onto the balcony to call Stevie. The cool sea air washes over my flushed skin, and I draw in a steadying breath before pulling my phone from my pocket. When Nat answers, I can hear another breathless, adrenaline-fueled voice chattering in an excited stream in the background. “Greetings from fangirl central,” Nat says. “Again?” I ask, laughing. I wasn’t sure Stevie would still be awake but should have known better. The Wonderland concert DVD has been viewed no fewer than ten times in the week since Fizzy gave it to my kid. “She’s watching with Insu and giving him a blow-by-blow of the concert with you and Fizzy. You’re a shoo-in for parent of the year, you jackass. How’s the wedding?” “Gorgeous.” “How’s Fizzy?” Ahh, the real question. “Equally gorgeous,” I say on a pained exhale. “I see.” “We’re in her hotel room to watch the show. She’s changing.” I can almost hear Nat’s brows lift through the line. “I seeeeee.” I push away the image of Fizzy’s bare back before she turned to grab her pajamas from the drawer and duck into the loo. “It’s fine,” I tell her. What I don’t tell Nat is that I slipped a couple of condoms into my wallet this morning. I’m not having sex with Fizzy. I’m not. But my lesson in being unprepared for this kind of thing turns eleven in January. You don’t have to tell me twice. I move to the railing on the balcony. During the day, Fizzy’s room would have a stunning view of the ocean. I can see it now, but only as a dark mass of churning movement in the distance. The proximity is underscored by the loud tumble of waves as they crash. The unremitting turbulence mirrors what’s happening in my chest. “Anyway, I called to tell Stevie good night, but if she’s busy, I’ll just catch her in the morning.” “You sure? I can grab her.” “No, let her educate Insu.

1984.txt

one another and do not live alone--to a time when truth exists and what is done cannot be undone: From the age of uniformity, from the age of solitude, from the age of Big Brother, from the age of doublethink--greetings! He was already dead, he reflected. It seemed to him that it was only now, when he had begun to be able to formulate his thoughts, that he had taken the decisive step. The consequences of every act are included in the act itself. He wrote: Thoughtcrime does not entail death: thoughtcrime IS death. Now he had recognized himself as a dead man it became important to stay alive as long as possible. Two fingers of his right hand were inkstained. It was exactly the kind of detail that might betray you. Some nosing zealot in the Ministry (a woman, probably: someone like the little sandy-haired woman or the dark-haired girl from the Fiction Department) might start wondering why he had been writing during the lunch interval, why he had used an old-fashioned pen, WHAT he had been writing--and then drop a hint in the appropriate quarter. He went to the bathroom and carefully scrubbed the ink away with the gritty dark-brown soap which rasped your skin like sandpaper and was therefore well adapted for this purpose. He put the diary away in the drawer. It was quite useless to think of hiding it, but he could at least make sure whether or not its existence had been discovered. A hair laid across the page-ends was too obvious. With the tip of his finger he picked up an identifiable grain of whitish dust and deposited it on the corner of the cover, where it was bound to be shaken off if the book was moved. file:///F|/rah/George%20Orwell/Orwell%20Nineteen%20Eighty%20Four.txt (18 of 170) [1/17/03 5:04:51 AM] file:///F|/rah/George%20Orwell/Orwell%20Nineteen%20Eighty%20Four.txt Chapter 3 Winston was dreaming of his mother. He must, he thought, have been ten or eleven years old when his mother had disappeared. She was a tall, statuesque, rather silent woman with slow movements and magnificent fair hair. His father he remembered more vaguely as dark and thin, dressed always in neat dark clothes (Winston remembered especially the very thin soles of his father's shoes) and wearing spectacles. The two of them must evidently have been swallowed up in one of the first great purges of the fifties. At this moment his mother was sitting in some place deep down beneath him, with his young sister in her arms. He did not remember his sister at all, except as a tiny, feeble baby, always silent, with large, watchful eyes. Both of them were looking up at him. They were down in some subterranean place--the bottom of a well, for instance, or a very deep grave--but it was a place which, already far below him, was itself moving downwards. They were in the saloon of a sinking ship, looking up at him through the darkening water. There was still air in the saloon, they could still see him and he them, but all the while they were sinking down,

The-One.txt

me your opinion on some things. I could bring you a coffee?” She breathes into the phone. “Okay, fine. I can meet you at The Evergreen Café beside the hospital in half an hour. But I can’t stay long. And I’ll take a decaf latte.” “You got it. And thank you.” Chapter 39 Her doorbell rings again, longer this time. Sloane pushes herself to her feet and takes a deep breath before going inside. The doorbell chimes a third time as she moves through the house. She stops, wondering if Brody has come back. She tries to make out the figure through the frosted glass of her front door, wishing she had taken the time to install the doorbell video camera on their front porch. It’s been collecting dust in the entryway cabinet practically all year. She can tell it’s not Brody from the lean silhouette. It’s a woman. Her hand still trembles from Brody’s attack when Sloane unlocks the door and swings it open. “Oh.” Ethan’s mother, Kay, retracts her hand from the doorbell. “Hello, dear. I was starting to think you weren’t expecting me.” Sloane is at a loss for words as Kay brushes past her into the house, trailing her Louis Vuitton suitcase behind her. “Thanks for having me.” she adds. Her mother-in-law’s Chanel perfume catches in Sloane’s throat, still aching from Brody’s grip. Sloane scans the empty street in front of her house for Brody. “I Ubered from downtown,” Kay says, following Sloane’s gaze. Sloane closes the door, her mind still focused on Brody as she tries to make sense of her mother-in-law’s impromptu visit from California. Being the founding partner of the biggest legal firm in the Bay Area makes her a busy woman. In the nearly ten years she’s been married to Ethan, her mother-in-law had never visited Seattle. Sloane hasn’t seen her since her late husband’s funeral last March. “Is everything okay?” Kay glances toward the direction of the garage. “I thought I heard a scream.” “Oh.” Sloane clears her throat. “Yeah. I just got home from…um…yoga.” Kay raises her eyebrows. “And someone marked up the hood of my car while I was in class.” Sloane motions toward the garage. “I was just assessing the damage. And it’s pretty bad.” Her mother-in-law puts a hand over her heart. “That’s terrible. I’m so sorry, dear.” She shakes her head. “Crime seems to be on the rise everywhere these days. I hate going anywhere in San Francisco without secure parking. I’m just glad you’re okay.” Sloane forces a smile. “Thank you.” What on earth is she doing here? And why did it have to be now? Kay’s heels clack against the hardwood floor as Sloane follows her into the living room. Her platinum-blonde bob is teased a good inch at the roots, adding to her already tall stature. Kay stands a good head taller than Sloane’s own mother, and Sloane wonders what Kay would think of Crystal if she were still alive. Kay is a well-kept woman, sparing no cost in her appearance. Crystal bleached her hair

The Hunger Games.txt

death while the crowds urge on my killer. To tell or not to tell? My brain still feels slow from the wine. I stare down the empty corridor as if the decision lies there. Peeta picks up on my hesitation. “Have you been on the roof yet?” I shake my head. “Cinna showed me. You can practi- cally see the whole city. The wind’s a bit loud, though.” I translate this into “No one will overhear us talking” in my head. You do have the sense that we might be under surveil- lance here. “Can we just go up?” “Sure, come on,” says Peeta. I follow him to a flight of stairs that lead to the roof. There’s a small dome-shaped room with a door to the outside. As we step into the cool, windy evening air, I catch my breath at the view. The Capitol twinkles like a vast field of fireflies. Electricity in District 12 comes and goes, usually we only have it a few hours a day. Often the evenings are spent in candlelight. The only time you can count on it is when they’re airing the Games or some important govern- ment message on television that it’s mandatory to watch. But here there would be no shortage. Ever. 80 Peeta and I walk to a railing at the edge of the roof. I look straight down the side of the building to the street, which is buzzing with people. You can hear their cars, an occasional shout, and a strange metallic tinkling. In District 12, we’d all be thinking about bed right now. “I asked Cinna why they let us up here. Weren’t they wor- ried that some of the tributes might decide to jump right over the side?” says Peeta. “What’d he say?” I ask. “You can’t,” says Peeta. He holds out his hand into seeming- ly empty space. There’s a sharp zap and he jerks it back. “Some kind of electric field throws you back on the roof.” “Always worried about our safety,” I say. Even though Cin- na has shown Peeta the roof, I wonder if we’re supposed to be up here now, so late and alone. I’ve never seen tributes on the Training Center roof before. But that doesn’t mean we’re not being taped. “Do you think they’re watching us now?” “Maybe,” he admits. “Come see the garden.” On the other side of the dome, they’ve built a garden with flower beds and potted trees. From the branches hang hun- dreds of wind chimes, which account for the tinkling I heard. Here in the garden, on this windy night, it’s enough to drown out two people who are trying not to be heard. Peeta looks at me expectantly. I pretend to examine a blossom. “We were hunting in the woods one day. Hidden, waiting for game,” I whisper. “You and your father?” he whispers back. 81 “No, my friend Gale. Suddenly all the birds stopped singing at once. Except one. As if it were giving a warning call. And then we saw her. I’m

The Call of the Wild.txt

led away by the little weazened man. That was the last he saw of the man in the red sweater, and as Curly and he looked at receding Seattle from the deck of the Narwhal, it was the last he saw of the warm Southland. Curly and he were taken below by Perrault and turned over to a black-faced giant called Francois. Perrault was a French-Canadian, and swarthy; but Francois was a French-Canadian half-breed, and twice as swarthy. They were a new kind of men to Buck (of which he was destined to see many more), and while he developed no affection for them, he none the less grew honestly to respect them. He speedily learned that Perrault and Francois were fair men, calm and impartial in administering justice, and too wise in the way of dogs to be fooled by dogs. In the 'tween-decks of the Narwhal, Buck and Curly joined two other dogs. One of them was a big, snow-white fellow from Spitzbergen who had been brought away by a whaling captain, and who had later accompanied a Geological Survey into the Barrens. He was friendly, in a treacherous sort of way, smiling into one's face the while he meditated some underhand trick, as, for instance, when he stole from Buck's food at the first meal. As Buck sprang to punish him, the lash of Francois's whip sang through the air, reaching the culprit first; and nothing remained to Buck but to recover the bone. That was fair of Francois, he decided, and the half-breed began his rise in Buck's estimation. The other dog made no advances, nor received any; also, he did not attempt to steal from the newcomers. He was a gloomy, morose fellow, and he showed Curly plainly that all he desired was to be left alone, and further, that there would be trouble if he were not left alone. "Dave" he was called, and he ate and slept, or yawned between times, and took interest in nothing, not even when the Narwhal crossed Queen Charlotte Sound and rolled and pitched and bucked like a thing possessed. When Buck and Curly grew excited, half wild with fear, he raised his head as though annoyed, favored them with an incurious glance, yawned, and went to sleep again. Day and night the ship throbbed to the tireless pulse of the propeller, and though one day was very like another, it was apparent to Buck that the weather was steadily growing colder. At last, one morning, the propeller was quiet, and the Narwhal was pervaded with an atmosphere of excitement. He felt it, as did the other dogs, and knew that a change was at hand. Francois leashed them and brought them on deck. At the first step upon the cold surface, Buck's feet sank into a white mushy something very like mud. He sprang back with a snort. More of this white stuff was falling through the air. He shook himself, but more of it fell upon him. He sniffed it curiously, then licked some up on his tongue.

A Day of Fallen Night.txt

‘Go to her.’ Thrit gripped Wulf by the shoulder. ‘Wulf, get her inside.’ ‘Don’t die on this moor. Swear it, Thrit.’ ‘Sworn.’ Thrit gave him a shove. ‘Go, Wulf, now.’ Wulf ran. The world was a blur. Halfway there, he grabbed the reins of a riderless horse and threw himself across its saddle. ‘Glorian!’ She heard. Across the bloody, smoking battlefield, their gazes clapped. That was when Glorian Shieldheart did something even her father might have thought was a tad reckless. Wulf saw the decision on her face – and then she spurred her own mount. Her mare came galloping towards him, clearing a line of fire with a whinny. Panic erupted in her wake, and Lady Gladwin bellowed new orders at the archers. Wulf rode all the faster, heart almost pounding out of his chest, his only thought to reach her side. When they met, Glorian pressed their child into his arms. ‘What are you doing?’ Wulf asked over the din. ‘Glorian—’ ‘Take her. Take her away from here,’ Glorian cut in, breathing hard. ‘Go south over the river. Follow the drovers’ path until you find the hill like an upended bowl, the tomb of the Inyscan princess. Take her to it, Wulf, to the barrow. Wait inside until it’s safe.’ ‘Glorian.’ Wulf stared from her to their wailing bairn. ‘I can’t.’ ‘Hollow Crag is lost. Fýredel will come for me. See her safe, Wulf. Someone will find you both.’ She bent to kiss the child, and Sabran screamed. ‘She is the chain upon him now.’ Cupping her with one hand, Wulf reached for Glorian with the other, grasping her arm. ‘Come with us,’ he urged. She shook her head. ‘Glorian, you’ll die here. Everyone will die on Cenning Moor.’ ‘So be it. I have done my duty. I would gladly give my life in battle, as my father would have. I am free to do as I choose. I choose to die with courage.’ She held his cheek and smiled, looking straight into his eyes. ‘Live, Wulfert Glenn, my dearest friend. I will see you in Halgalant.’ She wheeled her horse, and charged to war. 96 East Muysima lay close to Uramyesi, the city built where Snow Maiden was said to have sung her lament. This late in the evening, the island for exiles was hard to see. No lighthouses ever burned on that forsaken shore. Furtia flew with seven other dragons, tiny stars twinkling in the seams where her scales met. Dumai watched the streets of Uramyesi, finding glimmers of light between its rooftops – pyres, for those who had died of the sickness, each one creating sleepless ghosts. Her grandfather must been brought to this city. A boat must have taken him to his end. Uramyesi ended in a sheer drop. There, the black waters of the Abyss shattered against a wall of cliffs, each of monstrous height. The highest leaned some way over the water, an arrowhead pointing at the island, threatening any exile who dared to dream of home. The last glow of sunset reddened the

The Silmarillion.txt

75 Maiar Ainur of lesser degree than the Valar (singular Maia). 11, 23-6, 30, 57, 61, 83, 91, 105, 108, 111, 114, 229, 289, 292, 322, 353 Malach Son of Marach; given the Elvish name Aradan. 171, 177 Malduin A tributary of the Teiglin; the name probably means 'Yellow River'. 251 Malinalda 'Tree of Gold', a name of Laurelin. 33 Mandos The place of the dwelling in Aman of the Vala properly called Nmo, the Judge, though this name was seldom used, and he himself was usually referred to as Mandos. Named as Vala: 18, 21-3,47, 52, 70, 73, 77-8, 87, 98, 113, 118, 121, 129-30, 154, 227, 308, 316. Named as the place of his dwelling (including Halls of Mandos; also Halls of Awaiting, Houses of the Dead): 22, 38, 42, 52, 61, 68-9, 73, 99, 121, 125, 227, 289. With reference to the Doom of the Noldor and the Curse of Mandos: 150, 154-5, 166, 169, 201, 205, 213, 297 Manw The chief of the Valar, called also Slimo, the Elder King, the Ruler of Arda. Passim; see especially 11, 18-9, 35, 70, 129 Marach Leader of the third host of Men to enter Beleriand, ancestor of Hador Lrindol. 171-2, 180 March of Maedhros The open lands to the north of the headwaters of the river Gelion, held by Maedhros and his brothers against attack on East Beleriand; also called the eastern March. 131-2, 147 Mardil Called the Faithful; the first Ruling Steward of Gondor. 369 Mar-nu-Falmar 'The Land under the Waves', name of Nmenor after the Downfall. 347 Melian A Maia, who left Valinor and came to Middle-earth; afterwards the Queen of King Thingol in Doriath, about which she set a girdle of enchantment, the Girdle of Melian; mother of Lthien, and foremother of Elrond and Elros. 24-5, 57-8, 61, 103-6, 109, 110-1, 121, 130, 135, 144-5, 151-4, 158, 172, 176, 182, Chapter XIX passim, 229-30, Chapters XXI, XXII passim, 315, 322 Melkor The Quenya name for the great rebellious Vala, the beginning of evil, in his origin the mightiest of the Ainur; afterwards named Morgoth, Bauglir, the Dark Lord, the Enemy, etc. The meaning of Melkor was 'He who arises in Might'; the Sindarin form was Belegur, but it was never used, save in a deliberately altered form Belegurth 'Great Death'. Passim (after the rape of the Silmarils usually called Morgoth); see especially 4-5, 8, 25, 50, 51, 70-1, 90-2, 117, 251, 320 Men See especially 37-8, 74,119-21,167-70, 178, 319-20, 326-7; and see also Atani, Children of Ilvatar, Easterlings. Menegroth 'The Thousand Caves', the hidden halls of Thingol and Melian on the river Esgalduin in Doriath; see especially 58, 106-8, 111-2, 125, 130, 134, 145, 155, 200, 203, 208, 217, 222-6, 229, 243-7, 252, 267, 269, 286-91 Meneldil Son of Anrion, King of Gondor. 368 Menelmacar 'Swordsman of the Sky', the constellation Orion. 48 Meneltarma 'Pillar of Heaven', the mountain in the midst of Nmenor, upon whose summit was the Hallow of Eru Ilvatar. 322-4, 329, 332-3, 336, 343, 345, 348 Meres of Twilight See Aelin-uial. Mereth Aderthad

Tess of the d'Urbervilles.txt

rather than the touch as yet. There was not a human soul near. Sad October and her sadder self seemed the only two existences haunting that lane. As she walked, however, some footsteps approached behind her, the footsteps of a man; and owing to the briskness of his advance he was close at her heels and had said "Good morning" before she had been long aware of his propinquity. He appeared to be an artisan of some sort, and carried a tin pot of red paint in his hand. He asked in a business-like manner if he should take her basket, which she permitted him to do, walking beside him. "It is early to be astir this Sabbath morn!" he said cheerfully. "Yes," said Tess. "When most people are at rest from their week's work." She also assented to this. "Though I do more real work today than all the week besides." "Do you?" "All the week I work for the glory of man, and on Sunday for the glory of God. That's more real than the other--hey? I have a little to do here at this stile." The man turned as he spoke to an opening at the roadside leading into a pasture. "If you'll wait a moment," he added, "I shall not be long." As he had her basket she could not well do otherwise; and she waited, observing him. He set down her basket and the tin pot, and stirring the paint with the brush that was in it began painting large square letters on the middle board of the three composing the stile, placing a comma after each word, as if to give pause while that word was driven well home to the reader's heart-- THY, DAMNATION, SLUMBERETH, NOT. 2 Pet. ii. 3. Against the peaceful landscape, the pale, decaying tints of the copses, the blue air of the horizon and the lichened stileboards, these staring vermilion words shone forth. They seemed to shout themselves out and make the atmosphere ring. Some people might have cried "Alas, poor Theology!" at the hideous defacement--the last grotesque phase of a creed which had served mankind well in its time. But the words entered Tess with accusatory horror. It was as if this man had known her recent history; yet he was a total stranger. Having finished his text he picked up her basket, and she mechanically resumed her walk beside him. "Do you believe what you paint?" she asked in low tones. "Believe that tex? Do I believe in my own existence!" "But," said she tremulously, "suppose your sin was not of your own seeking?" He shook his head. "I cannot split hairs on that burning query," he said. "I have walked hundreds of miles this past summer, painting these texes on every wall, gate, and stile the length and breadth of this district. I leave their application to the hearts of the people who read 'em." "I think they are horrible," said Tess. "Crushing! killing!" "That's what they are meant to be!" he replied in a trade voice. "But

Ulysses.txt

You're very simple, I don't think. He was. --Well now I am, he mused. I looked so simple in the cradle they christened me simple Simon. --You must have been a doaty, miss Douce made answer. And what did the doctor order today? --Well now, he mused, whatever you say yourself. I think I'll trouble you for some fresh water and a half glass of whisky. Jingle. --With the greatest alacrity, miss Douce agreed. With grace of alacrity towards the mirror gilt Cantrell and Cochrane's she turned herself. With grace she tapped a measure of gold whisky from her crystal keg. Forth from the skirt of his coat Mr Dedalus brought pouch and pipe. Alacrity she served. He blew through the flue two husky fifenotes. --By Jove, he mused, I often wanted to see the Mourne mountains. Must be a great tonic in the air down there. But a long threatening comes at last, they say. Yes. Yes. Yes. He fingered shreds of hair, her maidenhair, her mermaid's, into the bowl. Chips. Shreds. Musing. Mute. None nought said nothing. Yes. Gaily miss Douce polished a tumbler, trilling: --O, IDOLORES, QUEEN OF THE EASTERN SEAS! --Was Mr Lidwell in today? In came Lenehan. Round him peered Lenehan. Mr Bloom reached Essex bridge. Yes, Mr Bloom crossed bridge of Yessex. To Martha I must write. Buy paper. Daly's. Girl there civil. Bloom. Old Bloom. Blue bloom is on the rye. --He was in at lunchtime, miss Douce said. Lenehan came forward. --Was Mr Boylan looking for me? He asked. She answered: --Miss Kennedy, was Mr Boylan in while I was upstairs? She asked. Miss voice of Kennedy answered, a second teacup poised, her gaze upon a page: --No. He was not. Miss gaze of Kennedy, heard, not seen, read on. Lenehan round the sandwichbell wound his round body round. --Peep! Who's in the corner? No glance of Kennedy rewarding him he yet made overtures. To mind her stops. To read only the black ones: round o and crooked ess. Jingle jaunty jingle. Girlgold she read and did not glance. Take no notice. She took no notice while he read by rote a solfa fable for her, plappering flatly: --Ah fox met ah stork. Said thee fox too thee stork: Will you put your bill down inn my troath and pull upp ah bone? He droned in vain. Miss Douce turned to her tea aside. He sighed aside: --Ah me! O my! He greeted Mr Dedalus and got a nod. --Greetings from the famous son of a famous father. --Who may he be? Mr Dedalus asked. Lenehan opened most genial arms. Who? --Who may he be? he asked. Can you ask? Stephen, the youthful bard. Dry. Mr Dedalus, famous father, laid by his dry filled pipe. --I see, he said. I didn't recognise him for the moment. I hear he is keeping very select company. Have you seen him lately? He had. --I quaffed the nectarbowl with him this very day, said Lenehan. In Mooney's EN VILLE and in Mooney's SUR MER. He had received

The Mysteries of Udolpho.txt

countenance and manners would have won him the acquaintance of St. Aubert, who was very apt to trust to the intelligence of his own eyes, with respect to countenances, he would not have accepted these, as sufficient introductions to that of his daughter. The breakfast was almost as silent as the supper of the preceding night; but their musing was at length interrupted by the sound of the carriage wheels, which were to bear away St. Aubert and Emily. Valancourt started from his chair, and went to the window; it was indeed the carriage, and he returned to his seat without speaking. The moment was now come when they must part. St. Aubert told Valancourt, that he hoped he would never pass La Vallee without favouring him with a visit; and Valancourt, eagerly thanking him, assured him that he never would; as he said which he looked timidly at Emily, who tried to smile away the seriousness of her spirits. They passed a few minutes in interesting conversation, and St. Aubert then led the way to the carriage, Emily and Valancourt following in silence. The latter lingered at the door several minutes after they were seated, and none of the party seemed to have courage enough to say--Farewell. At length, St. Aubert pronounced the melancholy word, which Emily passed to Valancourt, who returned it, with a dejected smile, and the carriage drove on. The travellers remained, for some time, in a state of tranquil pensiveness, which is not unpleasing. St. Aubert interrupted it by observing, 'This is a very promising young man; it is many years since I have been so much pleased with any person, on so short an acquaintance. He brings back to my memory the days of my youth, when every scene was new and delightful!' St. Aubert sighed, and sunk again into a reverie; and, as Emily looked back upon the road they had passed, Valancourt was seen, at the door of the little inn, following them with his eyes. Her perceived her, and waved his hand; and she returned the adieu, till the winding road shut her from his sight. 'I remember when I was about his age,' resumed St. Aubert, 'and I thought, and felt exactly as he does. The world was opening upon me then, now--it is closing.' 'My dear sir, do not think so gloomily,' said Emily in a trembling voice, 'I hope you have many, many years to live--for your own sake-- for MY sake.' 'Ah, my Emily!' replied St. Aubert, 'for thy sake! Well- I hope it is so.' He wiped away a tear, that was stealing down his cheek, threw a smile upon his countenance, and said in a cheering voice, 'there is something in the ardour and ingenuousness of youth, which is particularly pleasing to the contemplation of an old man, if his feelings have not been entirely corroded by the world. It is cheering and reviving, like the view of spring to a sick person; his mind catches somewhat of the spirit of the season, and his eyes are

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer.txt

give it up and turn in? A noise fell upon his ear. He was all attention in an instant. The alley door closed softly. He sprang to the corner of the brick store. The next moment two men brushed by him, and one seemed to have something under his arm. It must be that box! So they were going to remove the treasure. Why call Tom now? It would be absurd -- the --------------------------------------------------------- -265- men would get away with the box and never be found again. No, he would stick to their wake and follow them; he would trust to the darkness for security from discovery. So communing with himself, Huck stepped out and glided along behind the men, cat-like, with bare feet, allowing them to keep just far enough ahead not to be invisible. They moved up the river street three blocks, then turned to the left up a cross-street. They went straight ahead, then, until they came to the path that led up Cardiff Hill; this they took. They passed by the old Welshman's house, half-way up the hill, without hesitating, and still climbed upward. Good, thought Huck, they will bury it in the old quarry. But they never stopped at the quarry. They passed on, up the summit. They plunged into the narrow path between the tall sumach bushes, and were at once hidden in the gloom. Huck closed up and shortened his distance, now, for they would never be able to see him. He trotted along awhile; then slackened his pace, fearing he was gaining too fast; moved on a piece, then stopped altogether; listened; no sound; none, save that he seemed to hear the beating of his own heart. The hooting of an owl came over the hill -- ominous sound! But no footsteps. Heavens, was everything lost! He was about to spring with winged feet, when a man cleared his throat not four feet from him! Huck's heart shot into his throat, but he swallowed it again; and then he stood there --------------------------------------------------------- -266- shaking as if a dozen agues had taken charge of him at once, and so weak that he thought he must surely fall to the ground. He knew where he was. He knew he was within five steps of the stile leading into Widow Douglas' grounds. Very well, he thought, let them bury it there; it won't be hard to find. Now there was a voice -- a very low voice -- Injun Joe's: "Damn her, maybe she's got company -- there's lights, late as it is." "I can't see any." This was that stranger's voice -- the stranger of the haunted house. A deadly chill went to Huck's heart -- this, then, was the "revenge" job! His thought was, to fly. Then he remembered that the Widow Douglas had been kind to him more than once, and maybe these men were going to murder her. He wished he dared venture to warn her; but he knew he didn't dare -- they might come and catch him. He thought all this

Talia-Hibbert-Highly-Suspicious.txt

groan at the reminder because I am very mature, but I do wrinkle my nose down at the dingy brown carpet. “I know what you’re thinking”—Mum laughs like she can see my expression—“but he’s a good boy, and he’s more cautious than you. Take care of each other. Especially while your wrist is still healing!” Yeah…about that “wearing a cast for six to eight weeks” thing? Apparently, it’s eight weeks for me. I’ll be free next Monday, a week after this expedition. Bradley’s fault. Obviously. “I mean it, Celine,” Mum says, turning stern. “I guarantee Maria is telling him the same thing.” Not bloody likely. When we stepped off the coach twenty minutes ago, Bradley was already surrounded by people as always, grinning and relaxed, because he managed to make friends during the coach ride while I sat on my own listening to Frank Ocean’s Blonde and texting Michaela. I bet he’s chatting away to his little ginger roommate right now. My roommate is glued to her phone with an expression that suggests she’s either Googling How to kill your BEP roomie and get away with it or reading really great fanfic. “I’ll be good, Mummy.” By which I mean: I’ll try my best not to get killed in the night. “I have to go now, okay?” “Okay, baby. I love you.” “Love you too.” Laura/Aura/Rory glances up as I put the phone down and mumbles, “Five minutes till we meet outside.” I blink. “Are you watching the time for us?” She shrinks into her gray hoodie. “Um…” So she’s not a murderer; she’s just shy. Now I feel bad. “That’s…nice,” I clarify awkwardly. Her smile has a lot in common with a wince. The BEP has been a whirlwind so far. We hopped on a coach this morning, it took us basically up the road to Sherwood Forest, we were introduced to our supervisors (Zion is an Energizer Bunny with locs, and Holly is basically Kourtney Kardashian), and then we were told to pair off and given fifteen minutes to stow our stuff in our bedrooms and report for duty. I’m not sure how I ended up with Laura/Aura/Rory, but it probably has something to do with her being shy and me being…mutinously silent. In a very confident way. Obviously. I try to make more conversation and, annoyingly, I find myself thinking of what Bradley would say. Something obnoxious, probably. But what comes out of my mouth is, “Cute nails.” She examines the chipped purple polish, and her razor-sharp nose flushes pink. “Oh. I can never make it stay….” “Well, who can?” I allow. “But it’s a nice color.” Her nose blushes pinker. She smiles with a bit more warmth and a bit less terror. Success! I am practically a social butterfly. “My name’s Celine, by the way,” I say, even though I already told her. I’m hoping she’ll reintroduce herself, and— Yep. She sits up straighter on her own rickety bed, despite the heavy-looking purple duffel bag planted in her lap, and says, “I’m…Rora.” Pretty sure I still did not

Things Fall Apart.txt

I go home?" When Okonkwo heard that he would not eat any food he came into the hut with a big stick in his hand and stood over him while he swallowed his yams, trembling. A few moments later he went behind the hut and began to vomit painfully. Nwoye's mother went to him and placed her hands on his chest and on his back. He was ill for three market weeks, and when he recovered he seemed to have overcome his great fear and sadness. He was by nature a very lively boy and he gradually became popular in Okonkwo's household, especially with the children. Okonkwo's son, Nwoye, who was two years younger, became quite inseparable from him because he seemed to know everything. He could fashion out flutes from bamboo stems and even from the elephant grass. He knew the names of all the birds and could set clever traps for the little bush rodents. And he knew which trees made the strongest bows. Even Okonkwo himself became very fond of the boy - inwardly of course. Okonkwo never showed any emotion openly, unless it be the emotion of anger. To show affection was a sign of weakness,-the only thing worth demonstrating was strength. He therefore treated Ikemefuna as he treated everybody else - with a heavy hand. But there was no doubt that he liked the boy. Sometimes when he went to big village meetings or communal ancestral feasts he allowed Ikemefuna to accompany him, like a son, carrying his stool and his goatskin bag. And, indeed, Ikemefuna called him father. Ikemefuna came to Umuofia at the end of the carefree season between harvest and planting. In fact he recovered from his illness only a few days before the Week of Peace began. And that was also the year Okonkwo broke the peace, and was punished, as was the custom, by Ezeani, the priest of the earth goddess. Okonkwo was provoked to justifiable anger by his youngest wife, who went to plait her hair at her friend's house and did not return early enough to cook the afternoon meal. Okonkwo did not know at first that she was not at home. After waiting in vain for her dish he went to her hut to see what she was doing. There was nobody in the hut and the fireplace was cold. "Where is Ojiugo?" he asked his second wife, who came out of her hut to draw water from a gigantic pot in the shade of a small tree in the middle of the compound. "She has gone to plait her hair." Okonkwo bit his lips as anger welled up within him. "Where are her children? Did she take them?" he asked with unusual coolness and restraint. "They are here," answered his first wife, Nwoye's mother. Okonkwo bent down and looked into her hut. Ojiugo's children were eating with the children of his first wife. "Did she ask you to feed them before she went?" "Yes," lied Nwoye's mother, trying to minimise Ojiugo's thoughtlessness. Okonkwo knew she was not speaking

What-Dreams-May-Come.txt

nonsense before he went his whole life thinking he wasn’t worth anything. Olivia had told her a little about the businesses the last Lord Calloway had acquired over the years, but Lucy hadn’t realized until this moment how much that inheritance weighed on Simon. No wonder he found it so difficult to smile. But what could she do? She knew nothing about the responsibilities of a lord, and she had given him absolutely no reason to trust her yet. Besides, the carriage came to a stop, which meant they had reached the village and Lucy was out of time. Her panic returned tenfold, though she did her best to hide it. “We will be at the modiste,” Olivia said as soon as Nick had helped her out of the carriage, and she slipped her arm through Lucy’s, almost as if she knew Lucy was considering how easily she could run. That didn’t stop Lucy from planting her feet, however, hoping to delay as long as possible. “You men are not allowed to come with us,” Olivia added. To Lucy’s surprise, Simon immediately argued against that pronouncement. “You expect me to leave you on your own?” he said with some alarm. “Don’t be absurd.” And for some reason, he looked right at Lucy. Her cheeks burned hot, and she ducked her head before anyone noticed her blush. She had no reason to blush because the likes of Lord Calloway looked in her direction. She was being ridiculous, and she needed to stay focused. “I hardly think you want to spend your day in a dressmaker’s shop, Calloway,” Nick said with laughter in his voice. “Come, I have a mind to convince you to purchase me a new watch fob.” Simon seemed as reluctant to leave this spot as Lucy was, even though Nick had put a hand on his arm. He just stood there, his eyes locked on her, yet another new expression on his face that kept her transfixed. He was searching for something, and though Lucy had no idea what he was trying to find in her eyes, she was tempted to let him have it. The man had so much in his life, but she had a feeling he had nothing of what he truly needed. She hardly had anything to give him, but she wished she did. She wished she could help him see what she had seen that first time they’d met in the library: a man of power, conviction, and strength. The kind of man who looked after his family and would stop at nothing to see them taken care of. The kind of man who would lead to Lucy’s ruin if he chose. It had never been a matter of if she would fall to the truth but when. “Come along, Lucy,” Olivia said, giving her a little tug that pulled Lucy’s eyes away from the one man she had no business staring at. “We’ll have you a new wardrobe in no time. Mrs. Bradley is a wonder with fabric and thread, and I can just

The House of the Seven Gables.txt

which he can mould into whatever shape he likes. So it was with Holgrave. He could talk sagely about the world's old age, but never actually believed what he said; he was a young man still, and therefore looked upon the world--that gray-bearded and wrinkled profligate, decrepit, without being venerable--as a tender stripling, capable of being improved into all that it ought to be, but scarcely yet had shown the remotest promise of becoming. He had that sense, or inward prophecy, --which a young man had better never have been born than not to have, and a mature man had better die at once than utterly to relinquish,--that we are not doomed to creep on forever in the old bad way, but that, this very now, there are the harbingers abroad of a golden era, to be accomplished in his own lifetime. It seemed to Holgrave,--as doubtless it has seemed to the hopeful of every century since the epoch of Adam's grandchildren,--that in this age, more than ever before, the moss-grown and rotten Past is to be torn down, and lifeless institutions to be thrust out of the way, and their dead corpses buried, and everything to begin anew. As to the main point,--may we never live to doubt it!--as to the better centuries that are coming, the artist was surely right. His error lay in supposing that this age, more than any past or future one, is destined to see the tattered garments of Antiquity exchanged for a new suit, instead of gradually renewing themselves by patchwork; in applying his own little life-span as the measure of an interminable achievement; and, more than all, in fancying that it mattered anything to the great end in view whether he himself should contend for it or against it. Yet it was well for him to think so. This enthusiasm, infusing itself through the calmness of his character, and thus taking an aspect of settled thought and wisdom, would serve to keep his youth pure, and make his aspirations high. And when, with the years settling down more weightily upon him, his early faith should be modified by inevitable experience, it would be with no harsh and sudden revolution of his sentiments. He would still have faith in man's brightening destiny, and perhaps love him all the better, as he should recognize his helplessness in his own behalf; and the haughty faith, with which he began life, would be well bartered for a far humbler one at its close, in discerning that man's best directed effort accomplishes a kind of dream, while God is the sole worker of realities. Holgrave had read very little, and that little in passing through the thoroughfare of life, where the mystic language of his books was necessarily mixed up with the babble of the multitude, so that both one and the other were apt to lose any sense that might have been properly their own. He considered himself a thinker, and was certainly of a thoughtful turn, but, with his own path to discover, had perhaps hardly yet

The Foxglove King.txt

back to Lore. “It doesn’t make sense,” he said finally. “The simplest answer is usually the right one, and the simplest answer is that Kirythea is doing this, somehow. Trying to start a war so they can finally take over Auverraine, too.” “Everything is always going to come back to Kirythea with you.” Bastian tapped his fingers on the glass. “Perhaps you’re not the most impartial party to evaluate this, Remaut.” The Presque Mort’s hands tightened into fists. He took a step closer to the table. “Gabe,” Malcolm cautioned. The sound of his name from his old friend was enough to make Gabe’s shoulders soften, just slightly. He looked away from Bastian, ran a weary hand over his face. “I haven’t been able to raise a body other than the one Anton and August chose,” Lore said quietly. “And they didn’t want me to be present when they started asking questions. Maybe the point wasn’t the questions, but the raising. Maybe they tampered with it somehow. How, I don’t know.” She cut her hand toward the book under the glass. “But it seems there’s a lot we don’t know.” “Then the solution is to find a body they haven’t chosen for you.” Bastian looked at the floor, lips twisted thoughtfully. “One of the ones they’ve hidden away somewhere.” “Exactly.” Lore slid a glance to Gabe, still quiet, still looming. “So, essentially, we’re back at where we started.” “With the added bonus of a slowly dying King, it seems,” Malcolm added. With a sigh, he sat at the table. “Apparently I’m in this now, and seeing as I have no desire for an extended stay on the Isles, I’m going to make myself useful and read this damn book.” He raised a brow at Gabe. “You crossreference the Compendiums on the table over there. It’ll keep you occupied, and it might turn up something new. I’ve stared at them until the words run together.” “What should I do?” Bastian asked brightly. “I wouldn’t dare give orders to a prince.” “Come on, Malcolm, are you salty about the Burnt Isles threat? I understand, but my hands are tied, here. Pardon the poor choice of words.” Malcolm’s dark eyes rolled to the ceiling, as if beseeching Apollius for a moment of peace. “You look through the lecture notes. See if you can find anything.” Everyone fell to their tasks with quiet focus. Lore hadn’t been given a job, and didn’t necessarily want to ask for one, so she drifted over to Gabe, taking a seat next to him at the other long table. “I’m sorry,” she said, because she didn’t know what else to say. “For what?” He didn’t look at her, eye fixed to a glass-protected page, but he wasn’t reading. Just staring. “I don’t know.” A sigh, and she folded her hands on the table, rested her head on them. “You’re right that August and Anton wouldn’t bring me here to find out the truth if they already knew it, and I can’t think of another reason why they’d want me in the

After Death.txt

He opens a cabinet door and drops to his knees and tucks the candy behind bottles of whatever, farther back than anything the embalmers and cosmeticians might need for the work that currently awaits them. He circles the gurney on which the approximate shape of a man lies under a sheet. He hasn’t seen this customer, and he wants to be able to describe the deceased to Gifford, as absolute proof that he didn’t just plant the Hershey’s Kiss and hastily retreat. He’s seen many dead people, of course, mostly in their open coffins after they have been spruced up and dressed for Heaven. For the most part, he doesn’t find cadavers scary, but instead boring. It’s an unusual situation, however, this being Halloween and the body freshly dead and Durand alone with it, so that the skin on the nape of his neck crawls, and his throat feels tight. Three times, young Durand pinches the sheet between his thumb and forefinger, intending to peel it back and reveal the face of the corpse. Again and again and again, he releases the shroud without fulfilling his intention. He grips the pull on one of the morgue drawers. But he has previously seen the two deceased who came in during the late afternoon. Describing them to Gifford will only reveal that, in spite of having come this far with the Hershey’s Kiss, he lacks the courage to confront, one to one, the corpse for whom no drawer is available. He’s embarrassed by his fear. He has never before been alone with the dead here in the basement at such a late hour, only in viewing rooms on the main floor. This is somehow different. Maybe because here they are underground. That’s where the dead go when they are done with life. Underground. It’s their territory. Especially from midnight to dawn. Durand is trembling. His dread angers him. Other kids his age, even older kids, treat him with respect, almost with awe, all because he lives with dead people, sleeps upstairs untroubled while in the basement dead people are doing who knows what. Some kids are even a little scared of him. They’re eager to hear his latest stories about living with corpses, although after an unusually weird or gruesome anecdote, he can see they regard him with some trepidation. He enjoys being respected, and being feared is even better. Just seven, he already understands that being feared is a source of power, and that people who are fearful can more often be made to do what he wants rather than what they want. Fear is for the weak. His fear infuriates him, and he is shamed by the rapid, frosty exhalations that plume from him. At last he flips the sheet back, revealing a deader that is, at first, no more to be feared than any other. The head is crowned with a thin tangle of white hair, and the forehead is mostly smooth except for a purplish cut above the left eye, which he might have sustained by falling against something when

Hound of the Baskervilles.txt

"Did the boy deliver it into your own hands?" asked Sir Henry. Barrymore looked surprised, and considered for a little time. "No," said he, "I was in the box-room at the time, and my wife brought it up to me." "Did you answer it yourself?" "No; I told my wife what to answer and she went down to write it." In the evening he recurred to the subject of his own accord. "I could not quite understand the object of your questions this morning, Sir Henry," said he. "I trust that they do not mean that I have done anything to forfeit your confidence?" Sir Henry had to assure him that it was not so and pacify him by giving him a considerable part of his old wardrobe, the London outfit having now all arrived. Mrs. Barrymore is of interest to me. She is a heavy, solid person, very limited, intensely respectable, and inclined to be puritanical. You could hardly conceive a less emotional subject. Yet I have told you how, on the first night here, I heard her sobbing bitterly, and since then I have more than once observed traces of tears upon her face. Some deep sorrow gnaws ever at her heart. Sometimes I wonder if she has a guilty memory which haunts her, and sometimes I suspect Barrymore of being a domestic tyrant. I have always felt that there was something singular and questionable in this man's character, but the adven- ture of last night brings all my suspicions to a head. And yet it may seem a small matter in itself. You are aware that I am not a very sound sleeper, and since I have been on guard in this house my slumbers have been lighter than ever. Last night, about two in the morning, I was aroused by a stealthy step passing my room. I rose, opened my door, and peeped out. A long black shadow was trailing down the corridor. It was thrown by a man who walked softly down the passage with a candle held in his hand. He was in shirt and trousers, with no covering to his feet. I could merely see the outline, but his height told me that it was Barrymore. He walked very slowly and circumspectly, and there was something indescribably guilty and furtive in his whole appearance. I have told you that the corridor is broken by the balcony which runs round the hall, but that it is resumed upon the farther side. I waited until he had passed out of sight and then I followed him. When I came round the balcony he had reached the end of the farther corridor, and I could see from the glimmer of light through an open door that he had entered one of the rooms. Now, all these rooms are unfurnished and unoccupied so that his expedition became more mysterious than ever. The light shone steadily as if he were standing motionless. I crept down the passage as noiselessly as I could and peeped round the corner of the door.

Love Theoretically.txt

head. “The good thing is, Adam has grants. We’re hoping that whatever institution wants me will take a look at the money and decide that we can be a package deal. But if they don’t . . .” She shrugs. “We might have to negotiate a spousal hire.” I smile. “Then you’ll set a date?” She leans closer with a surreptitious expression. Her skin is 90 percent freckles, and I’ve known her for five minutes, but I want to be her friend. “I’ve set it already. We’re getting married in April. During spring break. Adam just doesn’t know it yet.” “How does that work?” “So, he’s into nature. Hiking, that stuff. I’m taking him to Yosemite, where a park ranger will marry us in a quick and painless ceremony. Then it’s just going to be the two of us for a week. And the bears, I guess. Oh God, I hope the bears don’t eat us.” She shrugs the thought away. “Anyway, Adam doesn’t love people, and we can always have a party later, but this . . . I think this is the kind of wedding he wants. The one we’re meant to have.” I picture Olive and Adam, alone, trekking hand in hand under the ponderosa pines. It’s not difficult. “Why don’t you just tell him?” “I should, right?” She laughs softly. “I just . . . I was in a pretty bad place when I met him. He did so much—still does, always taking care of me, and I . . . I want to take care of him for once, you know? Make him feel like I’ve got him.” I nod and then stare down at my empty palms. When I really let go, I imagine that you let me take care of you, too. “Have you and Jack been together for a while?” Olive asks, and I look up at her. I can tell that the Elsie she wants would say yes. That she loves Jack very much and likes the thought of someone who’ll take care of him. But. Honesty. For a second, I picture myself blurting out the entire story: how I fakedated Greg, then met Jack, then met Jonathan. But I doubt Olive is familiar with the concept of fake dating, so I sanitize my version. “This is the first time, actually.” It feels weird to say the opposite of what someone wants. And it feels downright horrible when Olive’s response is a disappointed “Oh.” I swallow. “I’m sorry—” “No, no.” She smiles, reassuring. “I’m sorry about earlier. Asking if you’re getting married.” I shake my head. “We’re just . . . getting to know each other.” “That’s great. It’s nice to hear that he’s over his I Don’t Date, Let Me Set Boundaries and Make It Clear That This Is Just About Sex phase.” Her impression of Jack sounds more like Vin Diesel, but it has me thinking: I have no idea what Jack wants from me. Olive is the second person to mention how important boundaries are to him. He hasn’t set

Costanza-Casati-Clytemnestra.txt

on the shoulder. An odd gesture. Clytemnestra drinks and cools her forehead. She must check on Iphigenia: the wedding will take place in a few hours. “I have to go back now,” she says, smiling at Odysseus. “Help my daughter get ready.” She waits for his face to break into another of his mischievous smiles, for the lines around his eyes to appear. But Odysseus’s face remains blank. He opens his mouth to speak, then something shifts in his eyes. “It is time,” he says coldly. Before Clytemnestra can understand, his men jump up and draw their swords. Instinctively, she snatches for her own, but her hand comes up empty: she has left it in the tent. Leon pushes her behind him, his grip tight on his short dagger. “Go back to the tent, my queen,” he says. She turns to do as he says, slowly, before the men can move— But the door is blocked. The three guards who were sleeping outside are wide awake now, blocking the entrance. They must have been pretending before. She turns to Odysseus, shocked. He is looking at her. “There are two ways in which we can do this,” he says, and his voice is suddenly emptied of any warmth. “Give up your weapon and stay here—” “Where is Iphigenia?” she asks. “Or I am afraid I will have to knock you out.” “Where is she?” she repeats. “Tell me, or I swear I will cut you down.” “You have no blade,” Odysseus says matter-of-factly. Leon lets his dagger fly. It sinks into one man’s knee while the other throws him against the table. There is a loud crash and the wood smashes, Leon collapsing on the ground with it. Clytemnestra jumps aside and yanks the sword from the wounded man. The guards are behind her, and Odysseus is in front, unarmed. On her right, his man and Leon are thrashing, moving together on the ground. Leon is choking, kicking the floor. “Let him go,” Clytemnestra says. The men behind her attack. Their swords close in around her. Clytemnestra keeps them off, swinging hers, but they are too many. She feels the blade of one cutting her leg and she stumbles. They take her down while she shouts, still waving the sword. Someone’s blood spurts on her face. They tie her hands and feet with thick rope. When they try to gag her, she bites their hands and they scream. But soon even her mouth is tied, the knot so tight her head throbs. She can’t see Leon. In front of her, the figures of Odysseus’s men waver before they walk away, outside the tent. She sees Odysseus’s serious face as he kneels in front of her and waits for him to speak, but he says nothing. He places a hand on her knee as though he were soothing a dog, then he leaves too. She is alone. * * * The rope cuts into her wrists, and her arms are numb. They must have tied her to the chair, because however she moves, she

USS-Lincoln.txt

my voice tight with suppressed anxiety. “Sorry … we’re almost there, Cap,” Grimes said. “Slowing … it’ll take a bit of time to bring Adams alongside Lincoln.” We all took in the spectacle before us. USS Lincoln, her sleek SpaceWing design giving the impression she was gliding through space, even though she was hobbled there within the gravity pull of a nearby, small moon–sized asteroid. Adams responded to Grime’s helmsmanship, slowing, slowing, then easing to a full stop. I said, “Okay, easy now, Mr. Grimes. Bring us alongside … amidship to amidship.” Deck plates rattled; overhead crystal chandeliers tinkled as aft and port side thrusters engaged. Grimes maneuvered the dreadnought with a level of finesse and grace I hadn’t thought possible for such a behemoth ship. As if reading my mind, Akari switched the halo display into logistical mode, the larger of the asteroids a yellow ball, both Adams and Lincoln now green icon representations, and too many Liquilid dragonflies smaller red dots, which clearly were almost upon us. Akari’s voice cut through the chaos. “Dragonflies are closing in. I’ve done all I can with rail spikes and Phazon Pulsars. Changing tactics … Ah! There you are, little dragonflies … Why don’t you say hello to our EMP pulse emitters?” The bridge vibrated with each EMP emission. Wave after wave, more red dots on the display flickered out. Bosun Polk, looking anxious, said, “Crew Member Grimes, do you have us in position yet? I have to get moving, get to the lower decks.” The helmsman, deep in concentration, didn’t answer. Then the ship jerked to a stop. “Yes, Bosun, Adams is in position … three cargo hatches are aligned with their Lincoln counterparts. Perfectly, I might add,” he said with a confident smirk. Chen’s raised voice caught my attention. “What’s the issue, Mr. Chen?” He rolled his eyes. “I’ll give you one guess, Captain.” “Hardy?” “Hardy.” “Let me hear the channel,” I said. “… hold your horses; I’m a tad busy right now.” Hardy’s Boston-accented voice filled the bridge. “What’s the problem, Hardy?” I scolded. “Cap! Didn’t know you were—” “What are you doing that’s so important you can’t follow my orders?” I actually didn’t know for sure Hardy wasn’t following orders, but odds were he was up to something. Chen cut in, “Bosun Polk has this process all worked out. We’ll need a crew member at each of the cargo airlock hatchways on Lincoln’s side. We have Wanda midship, Grip forward, and Hardy is supposed to be there aft, ready to open that hatch on her command.” I looked back and saw Bosun Polk’s empty seat. A loud metallic drumming emanated over the channel—the sound of a thousand-pound ChronoBot running. “I’m on my way; it’s not like we’re all just standing around over here with our thumbs up our respective keisters.” I noticed Akari had gone still, and ominously quiet. “Lieutenant?” She literally grimaced. “Uh, I just thought of something.” “Spit it out. Whatever it is, we’ll deal with it.” She tapped at her board, bringing the halo display back to

Divine Rivals.txt

you,” he began. “I’ll take you back to the field to look for Kitt. But we can’t go beyond it; we can’t stray into the town. It’s too dangerous. And after we search the field, you will agree to let me take you somewhere safe. You’ll follow me home.” Iris was silent, but her mind was reeling. “Do you agree to my terms, Iris?” Forest prompted. She nodded. She had every faith Roman was still in the field, waiting for her to come to him. “Yes. Take me there. Now.” They reached the field by evening. Forest had been right; Dacre’s forces now ruled Avalon Bluff. Iris crouched in the grass, staring at the town. Fires were lit and music was pouring like a stream. Smoke still rose from the ashes, but Dacre was celebrating. His white flag with the red eithral eye was raised, flapping in the wind. The gas was long gone by now. As if it had never been. “We’ll have to crawl through the grass,” Forest said, his words clipped with tension. “It looks like Dacre isn’t expecting any retaliation from Enva’s forces. I don’t see any sentries, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t stationed as snipers. So move very slowly, and stay down. Do you hear me?” She nodded. She didn’t spare her brother a glance. She was too focused on the sway of the grass as the wind raked over it. On the place she believed Roman to be. She and Forest crawled side by side through the field. She moved gentle but swift, as he instructed. She didn’t wince when the stalks cut her hands, and it felt like a year passed before she reached the place where she had fought her brother, hours ago. She recognized it easily. The grass was broken here, trampled by their boots. She swallowed the temptation to call for Roman. She remained low, crawling on her belly. The stars were beginning to wink overhead. The music from Avalon Bluff continued to echo, a fierce beating of drums. The light was almost gone. Iris strained her eyes, looking for him amongst the flax. Roman! Her breaths were shallow and painful. Perspiration dripped from her brow, even as the temperature dropped. She searched for him, knowing this had been the spot. She searched, but there was no trace of him. Only his blood, staining the grass. “We need to go, Iris,” Forest whispered. “Wait,” she pleaded. “I know he has to be here.” “He’s not. Look.” Her brother pointed at something. She frowned, studying it. There was a ring drawn in the dirt. It encircled them both as they paused, still lying low. “What is this, Forest?” she asked, finding more of Roman’s blood on the ground. It looked like spilled ink in the dusky light. “We need to go. Now,” he hissed, grabbing her wrist. She didn’t want him touching her, and she lurched away. Her hand still ached, as did her neck. All due to him. “Just a minute longer, Forest,” she begged. “Please.” “He’s not here, Iris. You

Robyn-Harding-The-Drowning-Woman.txt

away. I couldn’t speak. Couldn’t move. I was in shock. “I know Lee,” Jesse said. “She won’t go into your house just for money. We need to make her pity you. To think she’s saving you.” I stood taller, found my voice. “Benjamin would never hit me in the face.” “Lee doesn’t know that.” He reached out to wipe my tears, but I flinched away from his touch. The sudden violence had rattled me. And the ease with which he had hit me hurt more than the physical pain. “Pull yourself together, Hazel.” His voice was calm, controlled. “I know what I’m doing.” I nodded, blinked away the tears, and I left. When I was outside his building, I puked into the dry, brittle grass. But it worked. When I removed my sunglasses in the spa parking lot, Lee was horrified by my injured face, my traumatized demeanor. When I asked her to come into my house, to set me free, she agreed. The money and the new identification were secondary. She was scared for me. She felt compelled to save me. And in return, I would send her to jail for a murder she hadn’t committed. But it was the only way I could be free of one man to start over with another. A man who would do anything for me. Even kill for me. The same man who had just punched me in the face. 35 LATER THAT NIGHT, MY HANDS pressed into the cool marble countertop as I leaned close to the bathroom mirror. The bruise was a deep navy blue, almost black. A small blood vessel had popped in my eye, leaving a red spot on the white surface. It no longer hurt, but it was hideous. I turned and lifted my shirt. The bruises on my back were fading, the skin an ugly shade of green and yellow. I looked at myself clinically and dispassionately. Who was this pitiful creature, so beaten and battered? How had she let it come to this? I turned away from the stranger staring back at me and focused on the plan. Slipping out of the house that night was easy enough. While Benjamin controlled the surveillance cameras with an app on his phone, I simply angled the one over the back door to face the wall. Benjamin might notice, but he’d blame the wind. And by the time he got home from work he’d forget to adjust it. Tomorrow, Jesse would climb the steep, overgrown trail from the beach, creep through the forested backyard, and let himself in through this door. My husband didn’t consider it a vulnerable part of the house. But he’d always underestimated me. I scrambled down to the beach and walked around the rocky point. The late spring sun still hung lazily in the sky, though it was almost nine. I clamored to the spot where Lee had often parked her car. It wasn’t there, of course. She was spending the night at Jesse’s. It was all part of the plan. And she’d be eager to

Quietly-Hostile.txt

make me sad. QUIETLY HOSTILE is how I would describe my public personality; I am mild-mannered and super polite, but just beneath the surface of my skin, my blood is electrified and I am one inconsiderate driver away from a full Falling Down–style emotional collapse. I don’t know how to teach a child not to seethe and instead to develop a healthy coping and communication style, because I do not know how to do that for myself. Are these all just words that describe…me? One hundred percent yes, and they describe my illiterate, toothless mother as well, which is how I know with absolute certainty that this is what any one of the millions of unfertilized eggs I’ve reabsorbed into my body would have evolved into had ol’ enlarged prostate and I ever foolishly attempted to procreate “back in the day.” When I was an actual kid growing up on welfare with a sick mom and expired Tuna Helper from the dollar store, the future and its infinite possibilities stretched before me like a sumptuous buffet I couldn’t afford to go to, one I’d be forced to watch other people enjoy from where I stood: outside, pressing my sebum into the glass and drooling. Even at nine years old I knew there was no way I was gonna ruin my chance to fill my adult life with overpriced candles and designer lip balms by giving birth to a baby with a bad personality whose needs I’d be legally required to place above my own for eighteen-plus interminable years. I have never been pregnant. I’m not saying to brag but to let you know I would wrap a dick in plutonium if I could, just to make sure there’s no earthly way a human child could wriggle its way through any protective barrier and swim past all my sluggish organs to implant its rapidly multiplying cells in my inhospitable uterine lining. I had an ablation five years ago and thank God it worked, so even if I accidentally slipped and fell on an ejaculating penis, all those spermies are gonna find at the end of their .18-meter relay is an empty haunted house overtaken by gooey floating cobwebs. Honestly, you should thank God too that you don’t have to watch Me and Me Junior trying to put each other in a headlock in the middle of Saks to determine which one of us was gonna get the one small bottle of Jo Malone Me could afford! Or hearing about Me seething watching Me Junior get the one good entrée at the steak place while I make do with the sides! Me Junior wearing shoes with holes in the soles because Me couldn’t resist the siren song of a perfect deep coral blush from Pat McGrath! We got a pandemic dog because our local SPCA really turned up the advertising juice with everybody stuck at home looking for a reason to get even three lousy minutes of fresh (masked) air. One morning my lady logged onto Facebook for her daily dose of Russian disinformation

Tarzan of the Apes.txt

grisly had been the work of the mutineers of the Fuwalda, and through it all John Clayton had stood leaning carelessly beside the companionway puffing meditatively upon his pipe as though he had been but watching an indifferent cricket match. As the last officer went down he thought it was time that he returned to his wife lest some members of the crew find her alone below. Though outwardly calm and indifferent, Clayton was inwardly apprehensive and wrought up, for he feared for his wife's safety at the hands of these ignorant, half-brutes into whose hands fate had so remorselessly thrown them. As he turned to descend the ladder he was surprised to see his wife standing on the steps almost at his side. "How long have you been here, Alice?" "Since the beginning," she replied. "How awful, John. Oh, how awful! What can we hope for at the hands of such as those?" "Breakfast, I hope," he answered, smiling bravely in an attempt to allay her fears. "At least," he added, "I'm going to ask them. Come with me, Alice. We must not let them think we expect any but courteous treatment." The men had by this time surrounded the dead and wounded officers, and without either partiality or compassion proceeded to throw both living and dead over the sides of the vessel. With equal heartlessness they disposed of their own dead and dying. Presently one of the crew spied the approaching Claytons, and with a cry of: "Here's two more for the fishes," rushed toward them with uplifted ax. But Black Michael was even quicker, so that the fellow went down with a bullet in his back before he had taken a half dozen steps. Chapter 2 14 With a loud roar, Black Michael attracted the attention of the others, and, pointing to Lord and Lady Greystoke, cried: "These here are my friends, and they are to be left alone. D'ye understand? "I'm captain of this ship now, an' what I says goes," he added, turning to Clayton. "Just keep to yourselves, and nobody'll harm ye," and he looked threateningly on his fellows. The Claytons heeded Black Michael's instructions so well that they saw but little of the crew and knew nothing of the plans the men were making. Occasionally they heard faint echoes of brawls and quarreling among the mutineers, and on two occasions the vicious bark of firearms rang out on the still air. But Black Michael was a fit leader for this band of cutthroats, and, withal held them in fair subjection to his rule. On the fifth day following the murder of the ship's officers, land was sighted by the lookout. Whether island or mainland, Black Michael did not know, but he announced to Clayton that if investigation showed that the place was habitable he and Lady Greystoke were to be put ashore with their belongings. "You'll be all right there for a few months," he explained, "and by that time we'll have been able to make an inhabited coast somewhere and scatter a bit. Then

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.txt

The Cat's head began fading away the moment he was gone, and, by the time he had come back with the Dutchess, it had entirely disappeared; so the King and the executioner ran wildly up and down looking for it, while the rest of the party went back to the game. CHAPTER IX The Mock Turtle's Story `You can't think how glad I am to see you again, you dear old thing!' said the Duchess, as she tucked her arm affectionately into Alice's, and they walked off together. Alice was very glad to find her in such a pleasant temper, and thought to herself that perhaps it was only the pepper that had made her so savage when they met in the kitchen. `When I'M a Duchess,' she said to herself, (not in a very hopeful tone though), `I won't have any pepper in my kitchen AT ALL. Soup does very well without--Maybe it's always pepper that makes people hot-tempered,' she went on, very much pleased at having found out a new kind of rule, `and vinegar that makes them sour--and camomile that makes them bitter--and--and barley-sugar and such things that make children sweet-tempered. I only wish people knew that: then they wouldn't be so stingy about it, you know--' She had quite forgotten the Duchess by this time, and was a little startled when she heard her voice close to her ear. `You're thinking about something, my dear, and that makes you forget to talk. I can't tell you just now what the moral of that is, but I shall remember it in a bit.' `Perhaps it hasn't one,' Alice ventured to remark. `Tut, tut, child!' said the Duchess. `Everything's got a moral, if only you can find it.' And she squeezed herself up closer to Alice's side as she spoke. Alice did not much like keeping so close to her: first, because the Duchess was VERY ugly; and secondly, because she was exactly the right height to rest her chin upon Alice's shoulder, and it was an uncomfortably sharp chin. However, she did not like to be rude, so she bore it as well as she could. `The game's going on rather better now,' she said, by way of keeping up the conversation a little. `'Tis so,' said the Duchess: `and the moral of that is--"Oh, 'tis love, 'tis love, that makes the world go round!"' `Somebody said,' Alice whispered, `that it's done by everybody minding their own business!' `Ah, well! It means much the same thing,' said the Duchess, digging her sharp little chin into Alice's shoulder as she added, `and the moral of THAT is--"Take care of the sense, and the sounds will take care of themselves."' `How fond she is of finding morals in things!' Alice thought to herself. `I dare say you're wondering why I don't put my arm round your waist,' the Duchess said after a pause: `the reason is, that I'm doubtful about the temper of your flamingo. Shall I try the experiment?' `HE might bite,' Alice cautiously replied, not feeling at all anxious

The Picture of Dorian Gray.txt

behind a screen, you can't care much abut it." Dorian Gray passed his hand over his forehead. There were beads of perspiration there. He felt that he was on the brink of a horrible danger. "You told me a month ago that you would never exhibit it," he said. "Why have you changed your mind? You people who go in for being consistent have just as many moods as others. The only difference is that your moods are rather meaningless. You can't have forgotten that you assured me most solemnly that nothing in the world would induce you to send it to any exhibition. You told Harry exactly the same thing." He stopped suddenly, and a gleam of light came into his eyes. He remembered that Lord Henry had said to him once, half seriously and half in jest, "If you want to have an interesting quarter of an hour, get Basil to tell you why he won't exhibit your picture. He told me why he wouldn't, and it was a revelation to me." Yes, perhaps Basil, too, had his secret. He would ask him and try. "Basil," he said, coming over quite close, and looking him straight in the face, "we have each of us a secret. Let me know yours, and I will tell you mine. What was your reason for refusing to exhibit my picture?" Hallward shuddered in spite of himself. "Dorian, if I told you, you might like me less than you do, and you would certainly laugh at me. I could not bear your doing either of those two things. If you wish me never to look at your picture again, I am content. I have always you to look at. If you wish the best work I have ever done to be hidden from the world, I am satisfied. Your friendship is dearer to me than any fame or reputation." "No, Basil, you must tell me," murmured Dorian Gray. "I think I have a right to know." His feeling of terror had passed away, and curiosity had taken its place. He was determined to find out Basil Hallward's mystery. "Let us sit down, Dorian," said Hallward, looking pale and pained. "Let us sit down. I will sit in the shadow, and you shall sit in the sunlight. Our lives are like that. Just answer me one question. Have you noticed in the picture something that you did not like?-- something that probably at first did not strike you, but that revealed itself to you suddenly?" "Basil!" cried the lad, clutching the arms of his chair with trembling hands, and gazing at him with wild, startled eyes. "I see you did. Don't speak. Wait till you hear what I have to say. It is quite true that I have worshipped you with far more romance of feeling than a man usually gives to a friend. Somehow, I had never loved a woman. I suppose I never had time. Perhaps, as [57] Harry says, a really 'grande passion' is the privilege of those who have nothing to do,