{"product_id":"2940013081215","title":"THE HAND IN THE DARK","description":"CHAPTER I\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSeen in the sad glamour of an English twilight, the old moat-house,\u003cbr\u003eemerging from the thin mists which veiled the green flats in which it\u003cbr\u003estood, conveyed the impression of a habitation falling into senility,\u003cbr\u003etired with centuries of existence. Houses grow old like the race of men;\u003cbr\u003ethe process is not less inevitable, though slower; in both, decay is\u003cbr\u003ehastened by events as well as by the passage of Time.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe moat-house was not so old as English country-houses go, but it had\u003cbr\u003eaged quickly because of its past. There was a weird and bloody history\u003cbr\u003eattached to the place: an historical record of murders and stabbings and\u003cbr\u003equarrels dating back to Saxon days, when a castle had stood on the spot,\u003cbr\u003eand every inch of the flat land had been drenched in the blood of serfs\u003cbr\u003efighting under a Saxon tyrant against a Norman tyrant for the sacred\u003cbr\u003ecatchword of Liberty.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe victorious Norman tyrant had killed the Saxon, taken his castle, and\u003cbr\u003etyrannized over the serfs during his little day, until the greater\u003cbr\u003etyrant, Death, had taught him his first--and last--lesson of humility.\u003cbr\u003eAfter his death some fresh usurper had pulled down his stolen castle,\u003cbr\u003eand built a moat-house on the site. During the next few hundred years\u003cbr\u003ethere had been more fighting for restless ambition, invariably connected\u003cbr\u003ewith the making and unmaking of tyrants, until an English king lost his\u003cbr\u003ehead in the cause of Liberty, and the moat-house was destroyed by fire\u003cbr\u003efor the same glorious principle.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt was rebuilt by the freebooter who had burnt it down; one Philip\u003cbr\u003eHeredith, a descendant of Philip Here-Deith, whose name is inscribed in\u003cbr\u003ethe Domesday Book as one of the knights of the army of Duke William\u003cbr\u003ewhich had assembled at Dives for the conquest of England.","brand":"SAP","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47069655236848,"sku":"2940013081215","price":0.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940013081215_p0.jpg?v=1763576546","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940013081215","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}