Anna Katharine Green

> Miss Amelia Butterworth prides herself on being an observer of human nature, especially of the people she sees every day from her usual spot at her front window—that is, until she witnesses the prelude to a ghastly murder. Late at night, two people enter her neighbor's home, but only one leaves. The next morning a young woman is found dead, crushed beyond recognition beneath a cabinet. But her death was no accident—it soon comes to light that she was stabbed by a seemingly innocuous item: a hat pin. >Rife with social tension and mistaken identity, the messy case is assigned to veteran Detective Ebenezer Gryce. He expects Miss Butterworth to demurely return home, but she was there at the beginning of this case and she intends to see it through to the end. Miss Butterworth is determined to solve the mystery before the detective, but what begins as a battle of the sexes soon turns into a fight for the ever-elusive truth. >Anna Katharine Green is credited as the "mother of the detective novel," and the classic That Affair Next Door proves that the intrigue of a well-crafted mystery is timeless.

The dance was over. From the great house on the hill the guests had all departed and only the musicians remained. As they filed out through the ample doorway, on their way home, the first faint streak of early dawn became visible in the east. One of them, a lank, plain-featured young man of ungainly aspect but penetrating eye, called the attention of the others to it.

The mandarin's pearl ; The blue sequin / R. Austin Freeman -- The Chicago heiress / Clifford Ashdown -- The case of Mr. Geldard's elopement ; The case of the Ward Lane tabernacle / Arthur Morrison -- The Liverpool mystery ; The Case of Miss Eliot / Baroness Orczy -- The little old man of Batignolle / Emile Gaborieau -- The secret of the fox delight / Anna Katherine Green -- The adventure of the naval treaty / Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

Horatio Leavenworth is a New York merchant whose material wealth is matched by his eminence in the community and reputation for good works. He is also the guardian of two striking nieces who share his Fifth Avenue mansion. Mary, her uncle's favorite, is to inherit his fortune at his death. As this mystery opens, that lamentable event has just occurred. Leavenworth has been shot to death and circumstances point to one of his young wards. Circumstantial evidence points in one direction; but is that the trail to follow? Not to give anything away, but Yale University used this book in its law school to demonstrate the fallability of such evidence.

It was not my husband speaking, but some passerby. However, I looked up at George with a smile, and found him looking down at me with much the same humour. We had often spoken of the odd phrases one hears in the street, and how interesting it would be sometimes to hear a little more of the conversation.

I was, perhaps, the plainest girl in the room that night. I was also the happiest - up to one o'clock. Then my whole world crumbled, or, at least, suffered an eclipse. Why and how, I am about to relate.

The oblong box / Edgar Allan Poe ; narrated by Mauro Hantman -- The stolen white elephant / Mark Twain ; narrated by Mauro Hantman -- An heiress from Redhorse / Ambrose Bierce ; narrated by Angela Brazil -- Tracked to doom; or, The mystery of the Rue de Peychaud / O. Henry ; narrated by Simon Vance -- Her letters / Kate Chopin ; narrated by Angela Brazil and Stephen R. Thorne -- The stolen cigar case / Bret Harte ; narrated by Mauro Hantman -- [The adventure of the three students]( / Sir Arthur Conan Doyle ; narrated by Simon Vance -- Problem of the superfluous finger / Jacques Futrelle ; narrated by Stephen R. Thorne -- Arsène Lupin in prison / Maurice Leblanc ; narrated by Simon Vance -- The blue sequin / R. Austin Freeman ; narrated by Simon Vance -- The Fenchurch Street mystery / Baroness Orczy ; narrated by Davina Porter -- The honour of Israel Gow / G.K. Chesterton ; narrated by Simon Vance -- The Doomdorf mystery / Melville Davisson Post ; narrated by Stephen R. Thorne -- An intangible clue / Anna Katharine Green ; narrated by Angela Brazil.

[The purloined letter]( / by Edgar Allan Poe -- Hunted down / by Charles Dickens -- [Silver blaze]( / by Arthur Conan Doyle ; -- The blue cross / by G.K. Chesterton -- The second bullet / by Anna Katherine Green -- Naboth's vineyard / by Melville Davisson Post -- Cheating the gallows / by Israel Zangwill -- My first experience with the great logician / by Jacques Futrelle -- The queen's necklace / Maurice Leblanc -- The York mystery / by Baroness Orczy -- The detective detector / by O. Henry -- The Giaconda smile by Aldous Huxley.