Alfred Edward Mason: The Summons, Kartoniert / Broschiert

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isanovelpublishedin1920. Setdur ing the Great War, it follows Martin Hillyard, a secret service agent, and his friend Harry Luttrell, an army officer determined to restore his regi ment's tarnished honor. Their parallel missions intertwine with romance, espionage, and tragedy when Luttrell falls for Joan Whitworth, who be comes entangled with a suspected German spy. A mysterious death threat enstodestroyreputationsandfuturesinthisadventuredrawnfromMason's ownwartime experiences. ntheentranceofHardiman'spartyawrinklewassmoothedawayfrom the forehead of a maitre d'hotel. "So! You have come!" he cried. "I began to despair." "You have kept mytable?" Sir Charles insisted. "Yes, but with what an effort of diplomacy!"; and the maitre d'hotel led his guests to the very edge of the great balcony. Here the table was set endwise to thebalustrade, commandingthecrowdedvisitors, yettakingthecoolness of the night. Hardiman was contented with his choice of its position. But when he saw his guests reading the cards which assigned them their places, he was not so contented with the order of their seating. "If Ihadknownanhourbefore!"hesaidtohimself, andtheastoundingidea crept into his mind that perhaps it was, after all, a waste to spend so much time on the disposition of a dinner-table and the ordering of food. However, the harm was done now. There was Luttrell already seated at the end against the balustrade. He had the noise of a Babelof tongues and the glitter of a thousand lights upon his lefthand; uponhisright, thestarsburn ing bright in a cool gloom of deepestpurple, andfarbelowtheriding-lamps of theyachts tossing on the water like yellow flowers in agarden; whilstnext to him, midway between the fragrant darkness and the hard glitter, reveal ing, as she always did, a kinship with each of them, sat Stella Croyle. "I should have separated them," Hardiman reflected uneasily as he raised and drank his cocktail. "But how the deuce could I without making every body stare? This party wasn't got up to separate people. All the same--" The hushed wonder of a summer night. The gaiety of a bright thronged restaurant! In either setting Stella Croyle was a formidable antagonist. But combinethesettingsandshetooktoherself, atoncebynature, theseduction of both