William Le Queux

Name: The Stretton Street Affair — Prologue
Author: William Le Queux

The Stretton Street Affair — Prologue (1922)

Summary

“The Stretton Street Affair — Prologue”, published in 1922, is a work by William Le Queux. It explores elements such as firm, bachelor and London.

Quotes from The Stretton Street Affair — Prologue (William Le Queux)

William Le Queux, The Stretton Street Affair — Prologue (1922)

“ Next day I went to the office in Great George Street and reported upon the business I had done in York—and good business it was, too, with the Municipal Electric Supply—and in the evening I returned across Hammersmith Bridge at about six o’clock.
At seven our buxom “Kaiserin” put our meal upon the table—a roast, a sweet, and a wedge of Cheshire cheese. The mind of the dear old soul, who had so many relations, never rose above the butcher’s joint and apple tart. Alas! that cooking is an art still unknown in our dear old England. ”

[↩︎]

Source: Wikisource

William Le Queux, The Stretton Street Affair — Prologue (1922)

“ I found myself, without seeking adventure, one of the chief actors in a drama which was perhaps one of the strangest and most astounding of this our twentieth century.
I almost hesitate to set down the true facts, so utterly amazing are they. Indeed, as I sit in the silence of this old brown room in a low-built and timbered Surrey farmhouse, with pen and paper before me, I feel that it is only by a miracle that I have been spared to narrate one of the most complex and ingenious plots which the human mind, with malice aforethought, ever conceived. ”

[↩︎]

Source: Wikisource

William Le Queux, The Stretton Street Affair — Prologue (1922)

“ The bachelor’s housekeeper is always a fifteen puzzle—twelve for herself and the remaining three for her employer. As sure as rain comes in winter, so does the smug and sedate female who keeps house for the unfortunate unattached male place the onus of housekeeping bills upon him and reap the desserts of life for herself.
On that particular evening I felt very tired, for in the five days of my absence many business matters had accumulated, and I had had much to attend to. ”

[↩︎]

Source: Wikisource

William Le Queux, The Stretton Street Affair — Prologue (1922)

“ Like every other young man of my age I had, of course, had several little affairs of the heart, all of which had, however, died within a few short weeks.
Now it happened that on the evening of the day prior to the opening of this strange series of adventures which befell me, I was in the city of York, whither I had gone on business for the firm, and as my old-fashioned employers allowed first-class travelling expenses, I entered an empty first-class compartment of the London express which left York at six-twenty-three, and was due at King’s Cross at ten-thirty. ”

[↩︎]

Source: Wikisource

William Le Queux, The Stretton Street Affair — Prologue (1922)

“ On most evenings we were out, but sometimes, before we turned in, we would sit and smoke and laugh over our stirring adventures and humorous incidents in the war, and the “scraps” we had been safely through.
Since his demobilization Harry had fallen deeply in love with an extremely pretty girl named Norah Peyton, who lived in a house overlooking the Terrace Gardens at Richmond, and whose father was partner in a firm of well-known importers in Mincing Lane. As for myself, I was “unattached.” ”

[↩︎]

Source: Wikisource

William Le Queux, The Stretton Street Affair — Prologue (1922)

“ Therefore it was no surprise to me when he told me that, as an official at the head office of the Crédit Lyonnais in Paris, it was his duty sometimes to visit their correspondents in the chief commercial centres of Great Britain.
“I am on my way from Glasgow back to Paris,” he said. “But I had to break my journey in York this morning. I shall leave London for Paris to-morrow. I shall travel by the air-route,” he added; “it is so much quicker, and far less fatiguing. ”

[↩︎]

Source: Wikisource

William Le Queux, The Stretton Street Affair — Prologue (1922)

“ We met again after the Armistice and set up housekeeping together, our female “Kaiserin” being a sharp-featured, grey-haired young lady of about fifty-five, who “looked after us” very well, and though she possessed many idiosyncrasies, did not rob us quite so openly as do most housekeepers of the London bachelor’s home.
Harry was one of the best of good fellows. ”

William Le Queux

Summary

Quotes from The Stretton Street Affair — Prologue (William Le Queux)

Common terms

Similar works

Get perspective with Kwize: daily news enlightened by great literature