The House of Evil

The House of Evil by William Le Queux

The House of Evil follows the Honourable Hugh Craig, a young diplomat, and his devoted friend Leonard Lydon through a web of hidden identity and international crime. While vacationing at Nice, Craig secretly courts Elise Makris, ostensibly a merchant's daughter, only to discover through a private inquiry agent that she and her mother are professional decoys for a gang of blackmailers and jewel thieves. On the eve of the friends' departure, Craig shoots Elise and then himself, leaving Lydon a posthumous letter explaining the betrayal and hinting that blackmail, not mere heartbreak, drove him to violence. Elise survives her wound and vanishes with her mother before Lydon can confront her. Grieving, Lydon turns his attention to Gloria Stormont, a charming, athletic girl he meets again at Brighton and later at Effington Hall, the lavish Surrey estate of her uncle, Howard Stormont, a rubicund self-styled "financier." Stormont proves generous and encouraging of the match, even confiding that his fortune is illusory—he spends as fast as he earns—and borrowing a thousand pounds from Lydon under pressure of debt. Despite misgivings about Stormont's evasiveness regarding his business and his unexplained knowledge of other people's private affairs, Lydon becomes engaged to Gloria, reassured that her prudent banker father, Jasper Stormont (Howard's estranged brother, living in China), will ensure she is not left destitute. Suspicion crystallizes when Lydon recognizes, on a visit to Effington, that a glamorous guest, Zillah Mayhew—niece of Stormont's taciturn associate Whitehouse—bears the same neck scar and rare sapphire pendant he had seen on Elise Makris. Convinced Zillah and Elise are one person, and that Stormont is entangled in her criminal network, Lydon intercepts a note from Stormont instructing "Zillah" to await orders in Paris from a man named Edwards, and enlists the solicitor Shelford's recommended detective, Grewgus, to investigate. Disguised, Lydon accompanies Grewgus to Paris, where they confirm Zillah's identity (via her mother's presence) and observe her cultivating an elderly, wealthy jeweller, Léon Calliard, who carries valuable gem samples. The watchers are outwitted when Zillah, Edwards, and Calliard's circle abruptly scatter; Calliard is later found murdered near Brussels, robbed of his samples, in a killing dressed up as suicide. Grewgus concludes the pair are part of a highly organized international gang using Zillah as a decoy to target wealthy travelers, with Stormont's letter implicating him as an organizer, though proof sufficient for prosecution is lacking. Meanwhile, domestic tensions deepen at Effington: a shabby, half-drunk Australian acquaintance named Tom Newcombe arrives claiming old friendship with Stormont, plainly extracting hush money and rattling the household—evidence, to Lydon, that Stormont himself is being blackmailed over some disreputable episode in his past. Gloria's parents, Jasper and his wife, arrive unexpectedly from China, and Jasper's candor with Lydon paints a portrait of two brothers on opposite paths: Howard, brilliant but reckless, morally compromised, and living beyond his means; Jasper, disciplined, honest, and determined that Gloria will inherit a modest but real fortune regardless of her uncle's fate. Lydon, torn between loyalty to his fiancée's family and his drive to avenge Hugh Craig, withholds his findings from the police to protect Gloria and her innocent relatives, while Grewgus continues quietly shadowing Whitehouse and Zillah Mayhew, certain that Howard Stormont's outward respectability as a country squire conceals his central role in a ruthless criminal organization.

By William Le Queux · First published 1927 · Genre: Mystery/Detective Fiction, Crime Fiction, Thriller · 24 chapters · 90,368 words

First lines

"Hugh, old man, you're growing as close as an oyster. This is twice this week you have dined out, leaving me solitary, and refused to tell me what you are up to. I wonder what it is you have got up your sleeve?"

Two young men were strolling down the lovely Promenade des Anglais at Nice. The elder, the Honourable Hugh Craig, was twenty-seven; Leonard Lydon, his companion, about six months younger.

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The House of Evil is listed on Textopian as a novel by William Le Queux, dated 1927 CE.

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Genres

Tags

mystery · crime fiction · detective story · thriller · suspense · British fiction · early twentieth century · secret society · conspiracy · murder · investigation · espionage

Contents

More by William Le Queux