THE JUDGMENT HOUSE

CONTENTS

I THE JASMINE FLOWER
II THE UNDERGROUND WORLD
III A DAUGHTER OF TYRE
IV THE PARTNERS MEET
V A WOMAN TELLS HER STORY
VI WITHIN THE POWER-HOUSE
VII THREE YEARS LATER
VIII "HE SHALL NOT TREAT ME SO"
IX THE APPIAN WAY
X AN ARROW FINDS A BREAST
XI IN WALES, WHERE JIGGER PLAYS HIS PART
XII THE KEY IN THE LOCK
XIII "I WILL NOT SING"
XIV THE BAAS
XV THE WORLD WELL LOST
XVI THE COMING OF THE BAAS
XVII IS THERE NO HELP FOR THESE THINGS?
XVIII LANDRASSY'S LAST STROKE
XIX TO-MORROW ... PREPARE!
XX THE FURNACE DOOR
XXI THE BURNING FIERY FURNACE
XXII IN WHICH FELLOWES GOES A JOURNEY
XXIII "MORE WAS LOST AT MOHACKSFIELD"
XXIV ONE WHO CAME SEARCHING
XXV WHEREIN THE LOST IS FOUND
XXVI JASMINE'S LETTER
XXVII KROOL
XXVIII "THE BATTLE CRY OF FREEDOM"
XXIX THE MENACE OF THE MOUNTAIN
XXX "AND NEVER THE TWAIN SHALL MEET!"
XXXI THE GREY HORSE AND ITS RIDER
XXXII THE WORLD'S FOUNDLING
XXXIII "ALAMACHTIG!"
XXXIV "THE ALPINE FELLOW"
XXXV AT BRINKWORT'S FARM
XXXVI SPRINGS OF HEALING
XXXVII UNDER THE GUN
XXXVIII "PHEIDIPPIDES"
XXXIX "THE ROAD IS CLEAR"

CHAPTER I

THE JASMINE FLOWER


The music throbbed in a voice of singular and delicate power; the air
was resonant with melody, love and pain. The meanest Italian in the
gallery far up beneath the ceiling, the most exalted of the land in the
boxes and the stalls, leaned indulgently forward, to be swept by this
sweet storm of song. They yielded themselves utterly to the power of
the triumphant debutante who was making "Manassa" the musical feast of
the year, renewing to Covent Garden a reputation which recent lack of
enterprise had somewhat forfeited.

Yet, apparently, not all the vast audience were hypnotized by the
unknown and unheralded singer, whose stage name was Al'mah. At the
moment of the opera's supreme appeal the eyes of three people at least
were not in the thraldom of the singer. Seated at the end of the first
row of the stalls was a fair, slim, graciously attired man of about
thirty, who, turning in his seat so that nearly the whole house was in
his circle of vision, stroked his golden moustache, and ran his eyes
over the thousands of faces with a smile of pride and satisfaction
which in a less handsome man would have been almost a leer. His name
was Adrian Fellowes.

Either the opera and the singer had no charms for Adrian Fellowes, or
else he had heard both so often that, without doing violence to his
musical sense, he could afford to study the effect of this wonderful
effort upon the mob of London, mastered by the radiant being on the
stage. Very sleek, handsome, and material he looked; of happy colour,
and, apparently, with a mind and soul in which no conflicts ever
raged--to the advantage of his attractive exterior. Only at the summit
of the applause did he turn to the stage again. Then it was with the
gloating look of the gambler who swings from the roulette-table with
the winnings of a great coup, cynical joy in his eyes that he has
beaten the Bank, conquered the dark spirit which has tricked him so
often. Now the cold-blue eyes caught, for a second, the dark-brown eyes
of the Celtic singer, which laughed at him gaily, victoriously,
eagerly, and then again drank in the light and the joy of the myriad
faces before her.