On the eve of the First World War, Von Bork, a German agent, is getting ready to leave England with his vast collection of intelligence, gathered over a four-year period. His wife and household have already left Harwich for Flushing in the Netherlands, leaving only him and his elderly housekeeper. Von Bork and his diplomat friend Baron von Herling disparage their British hosts, having judged them rather negatively. Von Herling is impressed at his friend''s collection of vital British military secrets, and tells Von Bork that he will be received in Berlin as a hero. Von Bork indicates that he is waiting for one last transaction with his Irish-American informant Altamont, who will arrive shortly. The treasure will prove rich, Von Bork thinks: naval signals. Von Herling leaves and Von Bork gets to work packing the contents of his safe. He then hears another car arriving. It is Altamont. By this time, the old housekeeper has turned her light off and retired. Von Bork greets Altamont, and Altamont shows him the package that he has brought. Altamont proceeds to disparage Von Bork''s safe, but Von Bork proudly says that nothing can cut through the metal, and that it has a double combination lock. He even tells Altamont the combination: “August 1914”. Altamont then insinuates that German agents get rid of their informants when they are finished with them, naming several who have ended up in prison. Von Bork is left to make excuses for these events. Altamont''s mistrust of Von Bork is evident in his refusal to hand over the package before he gets his cheque. Von Bork, for his part, claims the right to examine the document before handing Altamont the cheque which he has written. Altamont hands him the package, and upon opening it, it turns out to be a book called Practical Handbook of Bee Culture, hardly what he expected. Even less expected is the chloroform-soaked rag that was held in his face by Altamont a moment later. Altamont, it turns out, is none other than Sherlock Holmes, and the chauffeur who brought him is, of course, Dr. Watson. Now much older than in their heyday, they have nonetheless not only caught several spies (Holmes is actually responsible for the imprisoned agents, of course) in their return from retirement, but fed the Germans some thoroughly untrustworthy intelligence. Holmes has been on this case for two years, and it has taken him to Chicago, Buffalo, and Ireland, where he learnt to play the part of a bitter Irish-American, even gaining the credentials of a member of a secret society. He then identified the security leak through which British secrets were reaching the Germans. The housekeeper was part of the plot, too. The light that she switched off was the signal to Holmes and Watson that the coast was clear. They remove Von Bork and all the evidence, and drive him to Scotland Yard, where his welcome will not be as triumphant as the one that was awaiting him in Berlin. After the story has concluded, it is revealed that Holmes has retired from active detective work. He spends his days beekeeping in the countryside and writing his definitive work on investigation. The story is the last chronological instalment of the series, though yet another collection (The Case Book of Sherlock Holmes), set before the story, was published four years later. In reference to the impending World War I, Holmes concludes, :"There''s an east wind coming, Watson." :"I think not, Holmes. It is very warm." :"Good old Watson! You are the one fixed point in a changing age. There''s an east wind coming all the same, such a wind as never blew on England yet. It will be cold and bitter, Watson, and a good many of us may wither before its blast. But it''s God''s own wind none the less, and a cleaner, better, stronger land will lie in the sunshine when the storm has cleared." The patriotic sentiment of the above passage has been widely quoted, and was later used in the final scene of the Basil Rathbone film Sherlock Holmes and the Voice of Terror (1942), set in World War II although it is presented as if Holmes were quoting Churchill.

His Last Bow

The first chapter "The Deadlock" is a brief description of the causes and events of World War I leading up to the year 1917. It details the military plans of the year by the French, British and German High Commands with considerable references to the diaries and official histories of the commanders and countries involved, the press, journalists, historians and political figures. There are several maps and photographic plates of the battlefields in the book. While Third Battle of Ypres is synonymous with mud, death, futility of battles and horrible conditions of warfare, the writings do not play on these experiences of the soldier in the field too much, but instead gives the reader a somewhat unbiased view of what was really occurring at the very top of the commands: the British Prime Minister of the day, Lloyd George, Sir Douglas Haig, Sir William Robertson, Robert Nivelle, Ferdinand Foch and others. There are short quotes from newspapers of the day and soldiers at the front, with brief but vivid sketches of the actual battlefield, while comparing this with the views at Headquarters (none of the commanders of the armies seems to have ever visited the front or even seen it through field glasses and could not relate to the conditions of the battlefield and the struggles of the men through the unrelenting mud, and thus assessed the situations incorrectly, especially Haig). Sir Douglas Haig is shown to make large assumptions without proper intelligence about the German defences, enemy resources of men and guns, or the conditions of the battlefield. Leon Wolff does not say these things specifically, but gives the readers the facts as presented in official minutes of meetings with Lloyd George and the War Cabinet and diaries of high officers and leaves the reader to unequivocally reach his own conclusion of the characters involved. The book also details all the battles of 1917, from Nivelle''s offensive and the French Army Mutinies (1917), Messines Ridge, Poelcapelle, Menin Road, the village of Passchendaele (fought by the Canadian Corps) and Ypres. It ends appropriately with a sequel of the end of the careers, and life after of Sir William Robertson, Sir Douglas Haig and David Lloyd George, quoting a line of Siegfried Sassoon''s "On Passing the New Menin Gate" and ending finally with a passage of Sartor Resartus by Thomas Carlyle which seems to truly explain the cause and reasoning of a war as horrible as World War I, if not all wars:

In Flanders Fields. The 1917 Campaign

Wynter Chelsea introduces two families that have been fighting supernatural beings for generations. Depicted as The Wynter Chelsea Legacy, they are the greatest human threat to the evil that walks the earth. Amanda Chelsea belongs to the new generation of fighters and is consequently the only female to ever be born in the legacy. She is shielded from the battles at a young age, therefore growing up with little knowledge of the outside forces that her family faces. The new generation of Wynters and Chelseas acquired gifts at the age of ten. Jack Chelsea has the ability to conjure items out of thin air; Dustin Wynter has the ability of telepathy; Trevor Wynter has the ability of precognition; and Amanda Chelsea has the ability to feel other people''s emotions. Amanda''s empathic gift has been the source of much turmoil in her life, but her curiosity and need to be in the legacy is the true catalyst. After Amanda rebelliously shoots a supernatural force, her parents mysteriously go missing. The four young adults set out on a journey in an Oldsmobile 442 desperately searching for their parents. Along the way Amanda uncovers secrets that have been buried in her family since she was born. And they all face the danger that their parents may have been taken by the one supernatural being that no Wynter or Chelsea could ever destroy - The Marathaca.

Wynter Chelsea

Action (in both the novel and the zarzuela) takes place in colonial Cuba about 1830. The young and beautiful light skinned mulatta, Cecilia Valdés, is the illegitimate daughter of powerful land magnate and slave trader, Candido de Gamboa. Leonardo de Gamboa is his legitimate son. Leonardo falls in love with Cecilia not realizing that she is his own half-sister, and they become lovers. At the same time, hopelessly in love with Cecilia is also another man, the poor black musician, José Dolores Pimienta. His advances Cecilia rejects; and she conceives Leonardo''s son. Love between Leonardo and Cecilia does not last, however. He abandons her and becomes betrothed to a white upper class woman, a certain Isabel Ilincheta. Cecilia turns to the faithful Pimienta to plan revenge. On the day of his wedding he is assassinated on the steps of the cathedral by Pimienta who acts on the instigation of Cecilia. He is executed, and she is thrown in prison. Cecilia Valdés reveals the intricate problems of race relations in Cuba. There are the elite social circles of Spanish-born and creole whites; the growing number of mulattos, of which Cecilia is one, and the blacks, some slaves, some freed men. The blacks are also divided between those who were born in Africa and those who were born in Cuba, those who worked on the sugar plantation and those who worked in the households of the wealthy in Havana. Cecilia Valdés is a canvas displaying the sexual, social, and racial interaction of the Cubans of the day.

Cecilia Valdés

Sandow is jolted from his wealthy, indolent lifestyle by a series of messages, each accompanied by a picture of one of a number of people once important to him, and all dead for many years. Sandow realizes the pictures could be fake, and he has other obligations, one of which is responding to a call for help from a friend, Ruth Laris. In the course of investigating her disappearance, he receives another message that he will find all his friends "on the Isle of the Dead". The message is in Pei''an, addressed to Shimbo (the name of the Pei''an god connected with Sandow) and signed by Belion (Shimbo''s traditional enemy in Pei''an mythology). Sandow soon learns that somebody has been stealing the memory records and tissue samples of people who died on Earth. These things are required of everyone who lives on Earth, so they can be recalled to life should the need arise. The six missing sets are of the people whose photos Sandow received. Visiting his Pei''an mentor Marling, who is dying, Sandow learns that his tormentor is Gringrin, another Pei''an who was denied communion with a deity despite passing almost all the tests. Gringrin vowed revenge on the other worldscapers, starting with Sandow. Somehow Gringrin has been able to unite himself with Belion. Sandow helps his mentor end his life with the glitten root ceremony, in which two telepaths take the hallucinogenic root and have a shared dream, from which only one returns alive. This is also used for duelling between telepaths, which is what Sandow must do when he finds Gringrin. After the funeral, Sandow sets out for Illyria, the world he made which has the Isle of the Dead. Landing by stealth, and armed to the teeth, he sets out to walk the remaining distance to the Isle of the Dead. He now believes that Gringrin intended him to be lured there, and slowly humiliated before all the people who ever mattered to him. He is sure Gringrin has made a major mistake by staging this on a world Sandow made. All the forces on the planet will be allied with Sandow; he is the world''s God. He comes upon Gringrin himself, alive but injured. Things have gone badly wrong. One of the recalled persons is Mike Shandon, a con man who is also a telepath, and a deadly enemy of Sandow''s. He has persuaded the god Belion to abandon Gringrin and go to him. Apparently the Pei''an gods are real and Gringrin, attempting to ordain himself independently, asked for a creative spirit to come to him, but instead was chosen by Belion. Now, Belion''s abandoned him and gone to Shandon. Gringrin wants to flee, but Sandow is determined to rescue as many of his friends as possible. As the two cross the river to the island they meet more of Sandow''s revived enemies and friends. From one of them, a feisty dwarf named Nick, Sandow learns that his recalled wife Kathy is having an affair with Shandon. Sandow decides to buy Shandon off, which he is well-equipped to do. As the two negotiate and link minds to confirm the deal, the gods assert themselves and a battle begins in which Shimbo''s air and water battle Belion''s earth and fire. A storm rages as the ground shakes and splits. Both Sandow and Shandon are consumed by their godgame, until Sandow sees Nick try to help Kathy, only to fall with her into a fissure. Both die, and at the same moment Shimbo deserts him. Shandon/Belion continues attacking, and Sandow goes down under a pile of rocks, breaking his leg. Sandow has one last trick - a laser weapon surgically implanted in his middle finger. In a supremely ironic gesture, he "gives Shandon the finger", killing him and ending the battle. Sandow crawls away to find a "power-pull" energy nexus, so he can use its energies to summon his orbiting ship. On the way he meets Gringrin, mortally wounded. Gringrin begs him to perform the glitten rite with him. In a psychedelic trance, Sandow faces Death in the shape of the Valley of Shadows. But he sees all the worlds he has made, and realizes that as long as he can create life, casting worlds like "jewels in the darkness", he has a purpose. Gringrin in turn loses his dread of death, and walks happily into the Valley. Waking, Sandow crawls on and encounters his last revived friend, Lady Karle, alive but entombed in a cave. Sandow bitterly dismisses her cries and goes on, but once reunited with his ship he goes back for her. They hobble to the ship together.

Isle of the Dead

Bike messenger Jace Damon attempts to live under the radar in Los Angeles with his younger brother (Tyler, who has an IQ of 168). The two are raised by their mother, who does her best to remain anonymous. When she falls ill Jace takes her to the hospital, making sure that he is not associated with her. The mother dies, and her children cannot claim her body. Instead, Jace takes his brother to find a new place, deciding that the Chinese community would be the best for them; eventually an elderly Chinese businesswoman (Madame Chen) takes a liking to the pair of boys and gives Jace a part-time job and a place to stay. He also takes a job as a bike messenger, since he can be paid in cash for it. One night, Jace accepts a delivery just as he is about to go off-duty; it is a pickup from the office of one of L.A.''s sleaziest defense attorneys, Lenny Lowell. He is not happy about the late delivery since it is a wet miserable night, but the dispatcher tells him that everyone else has gone off duty, and he is the only one available. Lowell is extremely (despite his reputation) nice to Jace, giving him a good tip. When Jace approaches the delivery address, he finds an empty lot which makes him nervous, so he decides to abort the delivery. Before he can get away, a large black car comes racing towards him to run him down. He barely survives the collision and is forced to abandon his bike. On foot, he is able to elude his pursuer, but loses his delivery bag (but retains the package). Jace returns to the scene of the collision and is relieved to discover that he will only have to replace the wheel. He returns to Lowell''s office, only to find it crawling with police; he learns that Lowell has been murdered. Jace does not trust police, so he leaves the scene. In a city fueled by money, celebrity and sensationalism, the slaying of a bottom-feeder like Lowell won''t make headlines. So when LAPD''s elite show up, homicide detective Kev Parker (assigned to Lowell''s case) wants to know why. Parker begins a search for answers that will lead him to a killer--or to the end of his career. Because if there''s one lesson Parker has learned over the years, it''s that in a town built on fame and fantasy, delivering the truth can be murder.

Kill the Messenger

"Dracula''s Guest" follows an Englishman (whose name is never mentioned but is presumed to be Jonathan Harker) on a visit to Munich before leaving for Transylvania. It is Walpurgis Night, and in spite of the hotelier''s warning to not be late back, the young man later leaves his carriage and wanders toward the direction of an abandoned "unholy" village. As the carriage departs with the frightened and superstitious driver, a tall and thin stranger scares the horses at the crest of a hill. Upon reaching a desolate valley after a few hours, it begins to snow and as a dark storm gathers intensity, the Englishman takes shelter in a grove of cypress and yew trees. The Englishman''s location is soon illuminated by moonlight to be a cemetery, and he finds himself before a marble tomb with a large iron stake driven through the roof, the inscription reads: Countess Dolingen of Gratz / in Styria / sought and found death / 1801. Inscribed on the back of the tomb "graven in great Russian letters" is: The dead travel fast. The Englishman is disturbed to be in such a place on such a night and as the storm breaks anew, he is forced by hail to shelter in the doorway of the tomb. As the Englishman avoids the pelting hail, the bronze door of the tomb opens under his weight and a flash of forked lightning shows the interior - and a "beautiful woman with rounded cheeks and red lips, seemingly sleeping on a bier". The force of the following thunder peal throws the Englishman from the doorway (experienced as "being grasped as by the hand of a giant") as another lightning bolt strikes the iron spike, destroying the tomb and the now screaming woman inside. The Englishman''s troubles are not quite over, as he painfully regains his senses from the ordeal, he is repulsed by a feeling of loathing which he connects to a warm feeling in his chest and a licking at this throat. the Englishman summons courage to peek through his eyelashes and discovers a gigantic wolf with flaming eyes is attending him. Military horsemen are the next to wake the semi-conscious man, chasing the wolf away with torches and guns. Some horsemen return to the main party and Harker after the chase, reporting that they had not found ''him'' and that the Englishman''s animal is: "A wolf - and yet not a wolf". They also note that blood is on the ruined tomb yet the Englishman''s neck is un-bloodied, "See comrades, the wolf has been lying on him and keeping his blood warm". Later, the Englishman finds his neck pained when a horseman comments on it. When the Englishman is taken back to his hotel by the men, he is informed that it is none other than his expectant host Dracula that has alerted his employees, the horsemen, of "dangers from snow and wolves and night" in a telegram received by the hotel in the time the Englishman was away.

Dracula''s Guest

César is a man of peasant origins from the Touraine region. At the start of the novel, in 1819, he owns a successful perfume shop, La Reine des Roses, he has been elected deputy mayor of his arrondissement in Paris, and he has been awarded the Legion of Honour. During the revolution he took part in the Royalist 13 Vendémiaire uprising against the Republic, at one stage confronting Napoleon Bonaparte himself, and he mentions this often in conversation. He is married to Constance and has a daughter Cesarine. He plans to throw a ball at his home, and make renovations to his home for the ball. He also becomes involved in property speculation with borrowed money, through his notary Roguin. He also plans to expand his business with a new hair oil product, with his assistant Anselme Popinot (who is in love with Cesarine) as his business partner. However all of these plans have caused him to run up large debts. What he does not realise is that Roguin has money problems of his own, and that César''s former shop assistant Ferdinand du Tillet, now a banker, is manipulating Roguin in order to have revenge against César. His financial situation becomes a crisis when Roguin absconds and leaves César with debts that he is not able to pay. His attempts to get financial assistance from various bankers such as Nucingen, the Keller brothers and Gigonnet (all recurring characters in La Comédie humaine) fail, since all are friends of du Tillet and acting on his instructions. This leads him to declare bankruptcy, sell La Reine des Roses to his assistant Celestin Crevel and retire from business. Eventually César pays off all of his debts when his business venture with Popinot succeeds. He then dies suddenly, but happy that his honour has been restored.

César Birotteau

In Dar es Salaam in the late 1980s, a retired school teacher named Pius Fernandes is given an English language diary by one of his former students, now a shopkeeper. The diary entries, written between 1913 and 1914, are an account written by Alfred Corbin, Assistant District Commissioner, a low ranking colonial official sent to the small town of Kikono. While there, Corbin becomes intrigued by a young woman named Mariamu whom he saves from an exorcism. Before she is married, Mariamu also briefly nurses Corbin when he is stricken with blackwater fever. After her marriage, Mariamu''s husband, believing that Mariamu is not a virgin, accuses Corbin of sleeping with her. The narrative then shifts to Mariamu''s husband Pipa. Initially enraged at the thought that Mariamu was not a virgin when they married, he gradually grows to accept and love her. When their son Ali Akber Ali is born and has fair skin and grey eyes, their marriage becomes strained again. Meanwhile, World War I has reached the small town of Kikono and Pipa is enlisted as a messenger, first by Corbin on behalf of the English and later by the Germans. After being arrested by the English as a messenger for the Germans Pipa returns home only to find that Mariamu has been raped and murdered. After her death Pipa discovers that she had stolen Corbin''s diary. Pipa believes that the diary holds the secret to Ali''s paternity, but since he cannot speak English, and is illiterate, he is unable to read its secrets. After a time, Pipa remarries a woman named Remti. As a consequence of this marriage his son is sent to live with his maternal grandparents in Moshi. While living with them he encounters Alfred Corbin and his wife Anne. After this encounter Corbin visits Khanoum, Ali''s grandmother, and offers to pay for Ali''s education. Khanoum refuses and contact between Corbin and Ali is dropped. Eventually, Khanoum falls into poverty and Ali goes to live with Pipa, Remti and their two daughters. Living with Ali once more, Pipa begins to obsess over Mariamu. He builds a private shrine to her within his shop where he keeps Corbin''s diary. Through his son, Pipa is eventually able to learn to spell and read the word Mariamu, and is able to read this word in Corbin''s diary. Though he questions Mariamu''s spirit about the true paternity of their son he is never able to obtain a direct answer. The narrative shifts once more, to a young Pius Fernandes. Immigrating from India to Dar es Salaam in the early 1950s, Fernandes teaches at a boy''s school. Eventually, he is forced to also teach at the inferior girls school where he becomes infatuated with a teenager named Rita. Ali, now a successful married man in his thirties, also falls in love with teenage Rita. He begins sending her notes and when she eventually responds he convinces her to run away with him to London. Ali eventually becomes successful in London and briefly encounters Corbin. However, letters left to Fernandes by a colleague and friend who corresponded with Corbin''s wife, reveal that Corbin and Ali met several times though whether Ali''s paternity was revealed is remained hidden. In the present, Rita, now divorced from Ali, returns to Dar to reclaim the diary on behalf of her former husband. Fernandes willingly relinquishes both the diary and his research notes to Rita.

The Book of Secrets

Once the unquestioned master of countless solar systems, the Empire is tottering on the brink of total collapse. Once commanding and invincible armada of Star Destroyers, its fleet has been reduced to a skeleton force. Day by day, neutral systems are rushing to join the New Republic coalition. But with the end of the war in sight, the New Republic has fallen victim to its own success. An unwieldy alliance of races and traditions, the confederation new finds itself riven by age-old animosities. Princess Leia struggles against all odds to hold the New Republic together. But she has powerful enemies. An ambitious Moff Disra leads a conspiracy to divide the uneasy coalition with an ingenious plot to blame the Bothans for a heinous crime that could lead to genocide and civil war. At the same time, Luke Skywalker, along with a mysterious group of pirate ships whose crews consist of clones. And then comes the most startling news of all: Grand Admiral Thrawn--believed to be dead for ten years--is alive. The most cunning and ruthless warlord in an Imperial history has seemingly returned to lead the Empire to triumph. As Han and Leia try to prevent the unraveling of New Republic in the face of this fearful and inexplicable threat from the past, Luke sets out to track down the rogue pirate ships. To do so, he will team up with Mara Jade, with whom he will share his growing mastery of the Force and the ever- present threat of the dark side. All the while, lurking in the shadows is the enigmatic Major Tierce, a disciple of Emperor Palpatine, sharing his long-dead master''s lust for power, schooled in the devious stratagems of Thrawn himself, and armed with his own dark plans for the New Republic and the Empire.

Specter of the Past

Private investigator Philip Marlowe is called to the home of wealthy, elderly General Sternwood. He wants Marlowe to deal with a blackmail attempt by a bookseller named Arthur Geiger on his wild young daughter Carmen. She had previously been blackmailed by a Joe Brody. Sternwood mentions his other, older daughter Vivian, who is in a loveless marriage with a man named Rusty Regan, who has disappeared. On Marlowe''s way out, Vivian wonders if he was hired to find Regan, but Marlowe won’t say. Marlowe investigates Geiger’s bookstore and determines it is a pornography lending library. He follows Geiger home, stakes out his house, and sees Carmen Sternwood enter. Later, he hears a scream followed by gunshots and two cars speeding away. He rushes in to find Geiger dead and Carmen drugged and naked in front of an empty camera. He takes her home, but when he returns, Geiger’s body is gone and he quickly leaves. The next day, the police call him and let him know the Sternwoods'' car was found driven off a pier with their chauffeur dead inside. It appears that he was hit before the car entered the water. The police also ask if Marlowe is looking for Regan. Marlowe stakes out the bookstore and sees its inventory being moved to Joe Brody’s home. Vivian comes to his office and says Carmen is now being blackmailed with the nude photos from last night. She also mentions going gambling at the casino of Eddie Mars, and volunteers that Eddie''s wife Mona ran off with Rusty. Marlowe revisits Geiger’s house and finds Carmen trying to get in. They look for the photos but she plays dumb about the night before. Eddie Mars suddenly enters; he says he is Geiger’s landlord and is looking for him. Mars demands to know why Marlowe is there, but Marlowe is unfazed and states he is no threat to Mars. Marlowe goes to Brody’s home and finds him with Agnes, the bookstore''s clerk. He tells them he knows they are taking over the lending library and blackmailing Carmen with the nude photos. Carmen forces her way in with a gun and demands the photos, but Marlowe takes her gun and makes her leave. Marlowe interrogates Brody further and pieces together the full story: Geiger was blackmailing Carmen and the family driver didn’t like it, so he sneaked in, killed him, and took the film of Carmen. Brody was staking out the house too and pursued the driver, stole the film, and hit him and possibly pushed the car off the pier. Suddenly the doorbell rings and Brody is shot dead; Marlowe gives chase and catches Geiger’s male lover, who shot Brody thinking he killed Geiger. He had also hidden Geiger’s body so he could remove his own belongings before the police could get wind of the murder. The case is now over, but Marlowe is nagged by Regan''s disappearance. The police accept that he simply ran off with Mona Mars, since she is also missing and Eddie Mars wouldn''t risk committing a murder where he''d be the obvious suspect. Mars calls Marlowe to his casino, and seems to be nonchalant about everything. Vivian is also there, and Marlowe senses something between her and Mars. He drives her home and she tries to seduce him, but he rejects her advances. When he gets home, he finds Carmen has sneaked into his bed, and he rejects her, too. A man named Harry Jones, who is Agnes''s new partner, approaches Marlowe and offers to sell him the location of Mona Mars. Marlowe plans to meet him later, but Mars''s deadly henchman Canino is suspicious of Jones and Agnes''s intentions and kills Jones first. Marlowe manages to meet Agnes anyway and receive the information. He goes to the location, a repair shop with home in back, but Canino jumps him and knocks him out. When he awakens, he is tied up and Mona Mars is there with him. She says she hasn''t seen Rusty in months; she only hid out to help Eddie, and insists he didn''t kill Rusty. She frees him and he shoots and kills Canino. The next day, Marlowe visits General Sternwood, who is still curious about Rusty''s whereabouts. On the way out, Marlowe returns Carmen''s gun to her, and she asks him to teach her how to shoot. They go to an abandoned field, where she tries to kill him, but he has loaded the gun with blanks. Marlowe brings her back and tells Vivian he has guessed the truth: Carmen came on to Rusty and he refused her, so she killed him. Eddie Mars, who had been backing Geiger, helped Vivian conceal it by inventing a story about his wife running off with Rusty, and then began blackmailing her himself. Vivian says she did it to protect her father, and promises to have Carmen institutionalized.

The Big Sleep

One evening, at the home of the cobbler old Bob and his washerwoman wife Joan, there is a knock at the door. Bob opens the door and sees a little boy in a torn and stained page''s uniform. When asked "who are you?", the boy replies "I was a rat". Bob and Joan have no children and they take care of the boy by providing food and a bed. The boy was unable to eat with a spoon, and during his first evening he tore his sheets and blankets into strips. However, Bob and Joan were patient and the boy was a quick learner who, wanting to please them, carefully followed their instructions. When he spots a photograph of Princess Aurelia, the prince''s fiancée, in the newspaper, he appears to recognise her as ''Mary Jane''. Joan calls the boy "Roger", the name Bob and Joan would have used for their son. Bob and Joan take Roger to the City Hall to find how to return Roger to his proper home. An official declares that there are no lost children in the city, then notices that Roger has eaten a pencil belonging to the City Council. Bob and Joan take Roger to the orphanage, the police station, and the hospital, but no one can help locate Roger''s home. The Philosopher Royal learns about Roger and his belief that he was a rat, and takes Roger to the palace for tests. Roger announces that he has "been here before", and states that the Prince will marry Mary Jane, only to be told that the Prince will marry Aurelia. When confronted by a cat, Roger runs away from the palace and undergoes adventures as people exploit his ability to eat almost anything, and to wriggle through small openings. Roger escapes and lives in the sewers, but is discovered by the local paper, The Daily Scourge, who exploit Roger again by writing about "the monster of the sewers". After a publicity campaign, Roger is captured and declared a menace whose fate is to be determined by a tribunal. Bob and Joan learn that the tribunal may declare Roger to be a non-human monster that must be exterminated. Joan notices a picture of Princess Aurelia who by now has married the Prince. Joan remembers that Roger had mentioned Mary Jane, so in desperation Bob and Joan contact the Princess. When hearing about Roger and the name "Mary Jane" she announces that she will help. Due to her intervention, Roger is saved and is adopted by Bob and Joan. The Princess had been a girl who worked in the kitchen and kept a pet rat. Her wish to attend a ball at the palace was granted, and her rat was turned into a page boy as her attendant – a "Cinderella story".

Over 8000 Takeaways For Your Brain!

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His Last Bow

By Arthur Conan Doyle

In Flanders Fields. The 1917 Campaign

No Author Listed

Wynter Chelsea

No Author Listed

Cecilia Valdés

By Cirilo Villaverde

Isle of the Dead

By Roger Zelazny

Kill the Messenger

By Tami Hoag

Dracula's Guest

By Bram Stoker

César Birotteau

By Honoré de Balzac

The Book of Secrets

No Author Listed

Specter of the Past

By Timothy Zahn

The Big Sleep

By Raymond Chandler

I was a Rat! or The Scarlet Slippers

By Philip Pullman