The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Mystery of the Clasped Hands, by Guy Boothby

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Title: The Mystery of the Clasped Hands

A Novel

Author: Guy Boothby

Release Date: May 25, 2013 [eBook #42807]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1

***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MYSTERY OF THE CLASPED HANDS***

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THE MYSTERY OF THE

CLASPED HANDS

GUY BOOTHBY'S NOVELS.

Each, 12mo, cloth, $1.00; paper, 50 cents.

D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, NEW YORK.

THE MYSTERY OF THE

CLASPED HANDS

A NOVEL

BY

GUY BOOTHBY

AUTHOR OF DR. NIKOLA's EXPERIMENT

PHAROS, THE EGYPTIAN

MY INDIAN QUEEN, ETC.

NEW YORK

D. APPLETON AND COMPANY

1901

Copyright, 1901,

By D. APPLETON AND COMPANY.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I

"I never knew such a fellow as you are for ferreting out these low, foreign eating-houses," said Godfrey Henderson to his friend, Victor Fensden, as they turned from Oxford Street into one of the narrow thoroughfares in the neighbourhood of Soho. "Why you should take such trouble, and at the same time do your digestion such irreparable injury, I can not imagine. There are any number of places where you can get a chop or steak, free of garlic, in a decent quarter of the Town, to say nothing of being waited upon by a man who does look as if he had been brave enough to face the dangers of washing once or twice within five years."

His companion only laughed.

"Go on, my friend, go on," he said, blowing a cloud of cigarette smoke. "You pretend to be a cosmopolitan of cosmopolitans, but you will remain insular to the day of your death. To you, a man who does not happen to be an Englishman must of necessity be dirty, and be possessed of a willingness to sever your jugular within the first few minutes of your acquaintance. With regard to the accusation you bring against me, I am willing to declare, in self-defence, that I like burrowing about among the small restaurants in this quarter, for the simple reason that I meet men who are useful to me in my work, besides affording me food for reflection."

The taller man grunted scornfully.

"Conspirators to a man," he answered. "Nihilists, Anarchists, members of the Mafia, the Camorristi, and the Carbonari. Some day you will enter into an argument with one of them and a knife thrust between your ribs will be the result."

"It may be so," returned Victor Fensden, with a shrug of his narrow shoulders. "Better that, however, than a life of stolid British priggishness. How