On a Saturday morning in early August in 1969, a series of bizarre and inexplicable events occurred aboard the fifty-five-thousand-ton luxury liner S.S. Bretagne as it was preparing to sail from the Port of New York to Le Havre. Claude Dessard, chief purser of the Bretagne, a capable and meticulous man, ran, as he was fond of saying, a "tight ship". In the fifteen years Dessard had served aboard the Bretagne, he had never encountered a situation he had not been able to deal with efficiently and discreetly. Considering that the S.S. Bretagne was a French ship, this was high tribute, indeed. H　

　　I ignored the questions in the eyes of the groom as I lowered the grisly parcel and turned the horse in for care and maintenance. My cloak could not really conceal the nature of its contents as I slung the guts over my shoulder and stamped off toward the rear entrance to the palace. Hell would soon be demanding its paycheck.　I skirted the exercise area and made my way to the trail that led toward the southern end of the palace gardens. Fewer eyes along that route. I would still be spotted, but it would be a lot less awkward than going in the front way, where things are always busy. Damn....　

　　 In the Court of the Fountain the sun of March shone through young leaves of ash and elm, and water leapt and fell through shadow and clear light. About that roofless court stood four high walls of stone. Behind those were rooms and courts, passages, corridors, towers, and at last the heavy outmost walls of the Great House of Roke, which would stand any assault of war or earthquake or the sea itself, being built not only of stone, but of incontestable magic. For Roke is the Isle of the Wise, where the art magic is taught; and the Great House is the school and central place of wizardry; and 　

A TALE OF THE TONTLAWALDLong, long ago there stood in the midst of a country covered withlakes a vast stretch of moorland called the Tontlawald, on whichno man ever dared set foot. From time to time a few bold spiritshad been drawn by curiosity to its borders, and on their returnhad reported that they had caught a glimpse of a ruined house ina grove of thick trees, and round about it were a crowd of beingsresembling men, swarming over the grass like bees. The men wereas dirty and ragged as gipsies, and there were besides a quantityof old women and half-naked children....　

THE COMPLEAT ANGLERTHE COMPLEATANGLERIZAAK WALTON1- Page 2-THE COMPLEAT ANGLERTo the Right worshipfulJohn Offleyof Madeley Manor, in the County of Stafford Esquire, My mosthonoured FriendSir, I have made so ill use of your former favours, as by them to beencouraged to entreat, that they may be enlarged to the patronage and...　

MISS CIVILIZATIONMISS CIVILIZATIONA COMEDY IN ONE ACT1- Page 2-MISS CIVILIZATIONPEOPLE IN THE PLAYALICE GARDNER: Daughter of James K. Gardner, President ofthe L.I. & W. Railroad"UNCLE" JOSEPH HATCH: Alias "Gentleman Joe""BRICK" MEAKIN: Alias "Reddy, the Kid"HARRY HAYES: Alias "Grand Stand" HarryCAPTAIN LUCAS: Chief of Police...　

PADRE IGNACIO Or The Song of TemptationPADRE IGNACIO OrThe Song of TemptationBY OWEN WISTER1- Page 2-PADRE IGNACIO Or The Song of TemptationIAt Santa Ysabel del Mar the season was at one of those momentswhen the air rests quiet over land and sea. The old breezes were gone; thenew ones were not yet risen. The flowers in the mission garden opened...　

Study of the King James BibleStudy of the King JamesBibleBY CLELAND BOYD McAFEE, D.D.1- Page 2-Study of the King James BiblePREFACETHE lectures included in this volume were prepared at the request ofthe Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences, and were delivered in theearly part of 1912, under its auspices. They were suggested by the...　

THE DESIRE OF AGESby ELLEN G.WHITEPREFACEIN THE HEARTS OF ALL MANKIND, OF WHATEVER RACE OR STATION IN LIFE, THERE ARE INEXPRESSIBLE LONGINGS FOR SOMETHING THEY DO NOT NOW POSSESS. THIS LONGING IS IMPLANTED IN THE VERY CONSTITUTION OF MAN BY A MERCIFUL GOD, THAT MAN MAY NOT BE SATISFIED WITH HIS PRESENT CONDITIONS OR ATTAINMENTS, WHETHER BAD, OR GOOD, OR BETTER. GOD DESIRES THAT THE HUMAN SHALL SEEK THE BEST, AND FIND IT TO THE ETERNAL BLESSING OF HIS SOUL.SATAN, BY WILY SCHEME AND CRAFT, HAS PERVERTED THESE LONGINGS OF THE HUMAN HEART. HE MAKES MEN BELIEVE THAT THIS DESIRE MAY BE SATISFIED BY　

THE COMPARISON OF SERTORIUS WITH EUMENESby Plutarchtranslated by John DrydenTHESE are the most remarkable passages that are come to ourknowledge concerning Eumenes and Sertorius. In comparing theirlives, we may observe that this was common to them both; that beingaliens, strangers, and banished men, they came to be commanders ofpowerful forces, and had the leading of numerous and warlike armies,made up of divers nations. This was peculiar to Sertorius, that thechief command was, by his whole party, freely yielded to him, as to...　

Anecdotes of the late Samuel Johnsonby Hesther Lynch PiozziINTRODUCTIONMrs. Piozzi, by her second marriage, was by her first marriage the Mrs. Thrale in whose house at Streatham Doctor Johnson was, after the year of his first introduction, 1765, in days of infirmity, an honoured and a cherished friend. The year of the beginning of the friendship was the year in which Johnson, fifty-six years old, obtained his degree of LL.D. from Dublin, andthough he never called himself Doctorwas thenceforth called Doctor by all his friends.Before her marriage Mrs. Piozzi had been Miss Hesther Lynch Salusbu　

Chapter 1 A Sunny Day in Londontown 3Chapter 2 Cops and Royals 14Chapter 3 Flowers and Families 37Chapter 4 Players 53Chapter 5 Perqs and Plots 67Chapter 6 Trials and Troubles 80Chapter 7 Speedbird Home 101Chapter 8 Information 115Chapter 9 A Day for Celebration 130Chapter 10 Plans and Threats 146Chapter 11 Warnings 156Chapter 12 Homeing 172Chapter 13 Visitors 187Chapter 14 Second Chances 198Chapter 15 Shock and Trauma 221Chapter 16 Objectives and Patriots 233Chapter 17 Recriminations and Decisions 245Chapter 18 Lights 257Chapter 19 Tests and Passing Grades 268...　

　　　It was Jackstraw who heard it first-it was always Jackstraw, whose hearing was an even match for his phenomenal eyesight, who heard things first. Tired of having my exposed hands alternately frozen, I had dropped my book, zipped my sleeping-bag up to the chin and was drowsily watching him carving figurines from a length of inferior narwhal tusk when his hands suddenly fell still and he sat quite motionless. Then, unhurriedly as always, he dropped the piece of bone into the coffee-pan that simmered gently by the side of our oil-burner stove-curio collectors paid fancy prices for what they i　

　　1　　 mander James D. Swanson of the U.S. Navy was short, plump and crowding forty. He had jet-black hair topping a pink, cherubic face, and with the deep permanent creases of laughter lines radiating from his eyes and curving around his mouth, he was a dead ringer for the cheerful, happy-golucky extrovert who is the life and soul of the party where the guests park their brains along with their hats and coats. That, anyway, was how he struck me at first glance, but on the reasonable assumption that I might very likely find some other qualities in the man picked to mand the latest and most pow　

　　Captain Sir Horatio Hornblower sat in his bath, regarding with distaste his legs dangling over the end. They were thin and hairy, and recalled to his mind the legs of the spiders he had seen in Central America. It was hard to think about anything except his legs, seeing how much they were forced upon his attention by their position under his nose as he sat in this ridiculous bath; they hung out at one end while his body protruded from the water at the other. It was only the middle portion of him, from his waist to above his knees, which was submerged, and that was bent almost double. Hornbl　

　Douglas Preston dedicates this book to Stuart Woods.　　Acknowledgments　Lincoln Child wishes to thank Bruce Swanson, Bry Benjamin, M.D., Lee Suckno, M.D., Irene Soderlund, Mary Ellen Mix, Bob Wincott, Sergio and Mila Nepomuceno, Jim Cush, Chris Yango, Jim Jenkins, Mark Mendel, Juliette Kvernland, Hartley Clark, and Denis Kelly, for their friendship and their assistance, both technical and otherwise. Thanks also to my wife, Luchie, for her love and unstinting support. And I would especially like to acknowledge as an inspiration my grandmother Nora Kubie. Artist, novelist, archaeologist, indepen