Joseph Smith Fletcher: 53 books

The very beginning of this affair, which involved me, before I was aware of it, in as much villainy and wickedness as ever man heard of, was, of course, that spring evening, now ten years ago, whereon I looked out of my mother's front parlour window in the main street of Berwick-upon-Tweed and saw, standing...

pubOne.info thank you for your continued support and wish to present you this new edition. Hathelsborough market-place lies in the middle of the town – a long, somewhat narrow parallelogram, enclosed on its longer side by old gabled houses; shut in on its western end by the massive bulk of the great...

John Horbury, manager of Chestermarke's bank, in the old-world English village of Scarnham, vanishes overnight. The task of finding him taxes the skill of one of Scotland Yard's best men.

  “But whose head hath he broken?” asked Jasper.   “Mine, sir,” whined Peter Pipe. “God ha’ mercy!—it sings like Benjamin Good’s bees when they are hiving.”   “And why did he break thy head?”   “Let him say,” said the sailor. “Aye, let him say.”  ...

Excerpt: "Every Monday morning, when the clock of the old parish church in Scarnham Market-Place struck eight, Wallington Neale asked himself why on earth he had chosen to be a bank clerk. On all the other mornings of the week this question never occurred to him: on Sunday he never allowed a...

Excerpt: "That's just what I was going to suggest, he said. "There's no good to be done hanging about here. Let's get on to the scene of operations. If Miss Lennard's maid has stolen her jewels, she's probably had some hand in the theft from my cousin. We must find her. Now, then, let me...

Blackmail, murder and the secret of an ancient quarry go to make a very exciting yarn.

Marshall Allerdyke is driving through the night from London to Hull in response to an urgent telegram from his cousin. As he nears Hull, a beautiful woman stops his car to ask for directions to Scotland. Odd time to be traveling so far and in such a hurry, but Allerdyke’s mind is elsewhere. When...

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When the great actor, Bassett Oliver, who was a martinet for punctuality, failed to turn up to a rehearsal which he himself had called, his business manager guessed that something had happened. It had. But it took more than one set of brains to discover the truth, and another set of very curious circumstances...

An elderly man called Deane is murdered in an English town. Inspector Mellapont thinks it's a simple robbery, but others disagree, and Deane's business partner, an attractive young girl named Miss Pretty, offers a reward for information. No fewer than three rogues decide to improve their own prospects...

Excerpt: "That's just what I was going to suggest, he said. "There's no good to be done hanging about here. Let's get on to the scene of operations. If Miss Lennard's maid has stolen her jewels, she's probably had some hand in the theft from my cousin. We must find her. Now, then, let me...