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(Book titles are subject to change)

A Royal Engineer in the Low Countries

A Cavalry Surgeon at Waterloo

With the Third Guards during the Peninsular War

The First and Last Campaigns of the Great War

Supernatural and Weird Fiction of Vincent O'Sullivan

Supernatural and Weird Fiction of Algernon Blackwood

Narratives of the Anglo-Zulu War

and many others

Chesterton’s Mysteries: 4

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Chesterton’s Mysteries: 4
Leonaur Original
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Author(s): G. K. Chesterton
Date Published: 2009/09
Page Count: 376
Softcover ISBN-13: 978-1-84677-807-0
Hardcover ISBN-13: 978-1-84677-808-7

Father Brown returns Chesterton's fourth volume of great mystery fiction

Gilbert Keith Chesterton was one of the most influential English writers of the twentieth century. He put his mind and pen to a broad spectrum of subjects including theology, poetry, biography, journalism and philosophy. Great writers have no influence over those parts of their work which posterity decides is most significant or will be best remembered, in Chesterton's case—in the minds of many—he will forever be remembered as the creator of the little Roman Catholic priest-detective, Father Brown. The vitality of that character has endured, evergreen, never losing its charm. Chesterton, was a lover of detective and mystery fiction and his own contribution to the genre extends far beyond the Father Brown stories. Leonaur has collected Chesterton's fabulous, intriguing and entertaining mysteries—in order of original book publication—into six substantial volumes to enable his many aficionados to own and read them in either softcover or hardback with dust jacket for collectors. This collection is the ideal way to possess these essential books of crime, mystery and detection and no enthusiast's library will be complete without them.

In volume four of this special collection, Chesterton's perennially popular Father Brown—in company of the reformed criminal Flambeau—steps out again for two more highly entertaining outings into the darker side of human nature. Here are 'The Incredulity of Father Brown' and 'The Secret of Father Brown' two enchanting collections—comprising in total 18 essential tales in this book for detective and crime fiction enthusiasts to enjoy over again.

‘Stop! Stop!’ cried Snaith the journalist; ‘something’s up! I swear I saw him move.’ <br>
He went racing up the steps and rushed to the coffin, while the mob below swayed with indescribable frenzies. The next moment he had turned a face of amazement over his shoulder and made a signal with his finger to Dr Calderon, who hastened forward to confer with him. When the two men stepped away again from the coffin, all could see that the position of the head had altered. A roar of excitement rose from the crowd and seemed to stop suddenly, as if cut off in mid-air; for the priest in the coffin gave a groan and raised himself on one elbow, looking with bleared and blinking eyes at the crowd.<br>
John Adams Race, who had hitherto known only miracles of science, never found himself able in after-years to describe the topsy-turvydom of the next few days. He seemed to have burst out of the world of time and space, and to be living in the impossible. In half an hour the whole of that town and district had been transformed into something never known for a thousand years; a medieval people turned to a mob of monks by a staggering miracle; a Greek city where the god had descended among men. Thousands prostrated themselves in the road; hundreds took vows on the spot; and even the outsiders, like the two Americans, were able to think and speak of nothing but the prodigy. Alvarez himself was shaken, as well he might be; and sat down, with his head upon his hands.<br>
And in the midst of all this tornado of beatitude was a little man struggling to be heard. His voice was small and faint, and the noise was deafening. He made weak little gestures that seemed more those of irritation than anything else. He came to the edge of the parapet above the crowd, waving it to be quiet, with movements rather like the flap of the short wings of a penguin. There was something a little more like a lull in the noise; and then Father Brown for the first time reached the utmost stretch of the indignation that he could launch against his children.<br>
‘Oh, you silly people,’ he said in a high and quavering voice; ‘Oh, you silly, silly people.’<br>
Then he suddenly seemed to pull himself together, made a bolt for the steps with his more normal gait, and began hurriedly to descend.<br>
‘Where are you going, Father?’ said Mendoza, with more than his usual veneration.<br>
‘To the telegraph office,’ said Father Brown hastily. ‘What? No; of course it’s not a miracle. Why should there be a miracle? Miracles are not so cheap as all that.’<br>
And he came tumbling down the steps, the people flinging themselves before him to implore his blessing.<br>
‘Bless you, bless you,’ said Father Brown hastily. ‘God bless you all and give you more sense.’<br>
And he scuttled away with extraordinary rapidity to the telegraph office, where he wired to his Bishop’s secretary: ‘There is some mad story about a miracle here; hope his lordship not give authority. Nothing in it.’<br>
As he turned away from his effort, he tottered a little with the reaction, and John Race caught him by the arm.<br>
‘Let me see you home,’ he said; ‘you deserve more than these people are giving you.’<br>
John Race and the priest were seated in the presbytery; the table was still piled up with the papers with which the latter had been wrestling the day before; the bottle of wine and the emptied wine-glass still stood where he had left them.<br>
‘And now,’ said Father Brown almost grimly, ‘I can begin to think.’<br>
‘I shouldn’t think too hard just yet,’ said the American. ‘You must be wanting a rest. Besides, what are you going to think about?’<br>
‘I have pretty often had the task of investigating murders, as it happens,’ said Father Brown. ‘Now I have got to investigate my own murder.’
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