Showing results by author "Alice Duer Miller" in All Categories

Geoffrey Holland stood up and for the second time surveyed the restaurant in search of other members of his party, two fingers in the pocket of his waistcoat, as if they had just relinquished his watch. He was tall enough to be conspicuous and well bred enough to be indifferent to the fact, good looking, in a bronzed, blond clean-shaven way, and branded in the popular imagination as a young and active millionaire.

When Mr. Burton Crane leases a house in the country, he expects it to be fully staffed. Except—it isn’t. Mr. Crane enlists the help of his friend, Mrs. Falkener, to interview his prospective cook, butler, housemaid, and general helper. She, however, doesn’t like them—but Mr. Crane is especially drawn to the cook and overrules his friend. But was Mrs. Falkener right to be suspicious? Who are these servants, really? Soon the helper, the housemaid, and the butler are dismissed, leaving only the cook—a most improper scenario!

Lewis Vickers, a young American languishing in South America because he is “wanted” for a crime that was the result of an accident, comes across another American—Hobart Lee who greatly resembles him. That man dies and Vickers, to get back to the United States, decides to impersonate him. He is taken to the family group upon his arrival in New York City and soon finds himself embroiled in a situation he cannot just walk away from—no matter how badly he wants to. Who was this “Bob” Lee and why does his cousin seem to hate him so?

It was a particularly calm spring evening. The river and harbor were already gray; a gray haze hung over the lower part of the city. Above it the tops of the monstrous buildings reflected enough of the sunset in the western sky to blend dimly with the eastern.