This mystery story is concerned with the disappearance of Absalom, a little Christian boy, who is the assistant and the pet of a wealthy Burman, Mhtoon Pah, the keeper of a curio shop in Paradise Street, Mangadone. Besides Mhtoon’s former friend, but now sworn enemy, Leh Shin, who is suspected regarding the boy’s disappearance, there are several people belonging to the English colony, all of whom more or less are interested in solving the mystery. The intricate skein which envelops the boy’s fate is very skilfully worked out in this most unusual and enthralling detective story, the Burmese background contributing to its interest and fascination.
Brown Amber
By W. E. NORRIS
Author of “Proud Peter” (4th Edition)
The brown amber which gives the title to the story is a bead of that somewhat unusual shade, reputed to have the gift of bringing a large measure of either good or ill fortune to its holder. In the opening chapter it is acquired from an itinerant vendor at Cairo by the hero, a young officer. By him it is bestowed upon a young lady who has lately become a widow, and with whom he has been upon terms which make him feel that he is bound in honour to marry her, should she expect what he himself has quite ceased to desire. This lady has other designs; yet she is not disposed to give the young man his liberty, and still less so when she discovers that he has fallen in love with a girl whom he cannot ask to marry him until he is set free. The story has the above situation for its pivot, and only reaches a satisfactory termination by means of divers events. In the course of these the amber passes through many vicissitudes, conferring good luck or the reverse by turns, until it finally finds its way back into the possession of the original purchaser.
Magpie
By BARONESS VON HUTTEN
Author of “Sharrow,” “Pam,” etc.
No living novelist has written such charming stories of children as the Baroness von Hutten. Who is there that, once having made the acquaintance in her pages of Pam, will deny her the most completely sympathetic knowledge of childhood, with its own strange and wistful outlook on the world. In the present book she tells the story of the child Mag Pye, the daughter of a gentleman, broken in fortune by his own failings, who has married a pantomime girl. How the child grows up in the Chelsea Workmen’s Dwellings and how she fares, with her joys and sorrows, under her unworthy father’s vicissitudes, is related in the author’s most characteristic manner.
A Puller of Strings