The Project Gutenberg EBook of Witching Hill, by E. W. Hornung

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Title: Witching Hill

Author: E. W. Hornung

Release Date: September 23, 2010 [EBook #33971]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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WITCHING HILL

BY E. W. HORNUNG

AUTHOR OF "RAFFLES"

HODDER AND STOUGHTON
LONDON NEW YORK TORONTO

_Reprinted, 1914._

[Illustration: "You won't improve his chances by keeping anything
back."]

CONTENTS

UNHALLOWED GROUND

THE HOUSE WITH RED BLINDS

A VICIOUS CIRCLE

THE LOCAL COLOUR

THE ANGEL OF LIFE

UNDER ARMS

THE LOCKED ROOM

THE TEMPLE OF BACCHUS

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

"YOU WON'T IMPROVE HIS CHANCES BY KEEPING ANYTHING BACK."

I SAW A BEDIZENED BEAUTY GO MAD BEFORE MY EYES.

I DROVE DELAVOYE BEFORE ME.

A HANDSOME, SINISTER CREATURE, IN A BROWN FLOWING WIG AND RAIMENT AS
FINE AS ANY ON THE WALLS.

TRYING TO TUG THE FIERCE MOUSTACHE OUT OF HIS MILD FACE.

A HEAVY BLACKTHORN HELD IN MURDEROUS POISE.

HIS THIN ARMS LOCKED ROUND THE NECK OF THE YOUNG NURSE.

DELAVOYE FIRED OVER MY HEAD.

CHAPTER I

Unhallowed Ground

The Witching Hill Estate Office was as new as the Queen Anne houses it
had to let, and about as worthy of its name. It was just a wooden box
with a veneer of rough-cast and a corrugated iron lid. Inside there was
a vast of varnish on three of the walls; but the one opposite my counter
consisted of plate-glass worth the rest of the structure put together.
It afforded a fine prospect of Witching Hill Road, from the level
crossing by the station to the second lamp-post round the curve.

Framed and glazed in the great window, this was not a picture calculated
to inspire a very young man; and yet there was little to distract a
brooding eye from its raw grass-plots and crude red bricks and