The Beetle
- Downloads
- Under 100
- First published
- 1897
- Pages
- 294
Listen to The Beetle Audiobook Free
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01 - Outside
14:20 -
02 - Inside
17:25 -
03 - The Man in the Bed
12:40 -
04 - A Lonely Vigil
14:26 -
05 - An Instruction to Commit Murder
22:36 -
06 - A Singular Felony
19:28 -
07 - The Great Paul Lessingham
19:22 -
08 - The Man in the Street
5:11 -
09 - The Contents of the Packet
12:03 -
10 - Rejected
12:39 -
11 - A Midnight Episode
14:06 -
12 - A Morning Visitor
11:36 -
13 - The Picture
25:22 -
14 - The Duchess' Ball
18:40 -
15 - Mr Lessingham Speaks
15:09 -
16 - Atherton's Magic Vapour
18:49 -
17 - Magic?--Or Miracle?
5:23 -
18 - The Apotheosis of the Beetle
34:33 -
19 - The Lady Rages
10:25 -
20 - A Heavy Father
10:34 -
21 - The Terror in the Night
26:24 -
22 - The Haunted Man
27:58 -
23 - The Way He Told Her
14:40 -
24 - A Woman's View
9:30 -
25 - The Man in the Street
11:17 -
26 - A Father's No
9:16 -
27 - The Terror by Night
18:03 -
28 - The Strange Story of the Man in the Street
27:43 -
29 - The House on the Road From the Workhouse
30:15 -
30 - The Singular Behavior of Mr Holt
6:03 -
31 - The Terror by Day
12:25 -
32 - A New Client
6:23 -
33 - What Came From Looking Through a Lattice
21:18 -
34 - After Twenty Years
16:29 -
35 - A Bringer of Tidings
5:04 -
36 - What the Tidings Were
9:47 -
37 - What Was Hidden Under the Floor
12:52 -
38 - The Rest of the Find
9:03 -
39 - Miss Louisa Coleman
19:35 -
40 - What Miss Coleman Saw Through the Window
11:02 -
41 - The Constable,--His Clue,--And the Cab
14:57 -
42 - The Quarry Doubles
10:38 -
43 - The Murder at Mrs. 'Enderson's
22:22 -
44 - The Man Who Was Murdered
12:52 -
45 - All That Mrs. 'Enderson Knew
6:40 -
46 - The Sudden Stopping
15:24 -
47 - The Contents of the Third-Class Carriage
5:22 -
48 - The Conclusion of the Matter
7:45
The Beetle (1897) is a public domain work.
The audio edition streams in the page. There is no audio file to download.
About this book
Published in 1897, the same year as Dracula, Richard Marsh's shocker actually outsold Stoker's novel for a time. A monstrous, shape-shifting creature out of ancient Egypt, a servant of the cult of Isis, arrives in London bent on revenge against the rising politician Paul Lessingham, whose past conceals a terrible secret. Working through hypnotic power and sheer dread, the being ensnares a string of helpless victims, and the story unfolds through four narrators whose accounts circle the same nightmarish events from different angles. Marsh blends supernatural horror, detective mystery, and Victorian anxieties about desire, race, and empire into a fast, feverish read that has enjoyed a well-earned rediscovery.
From the opening pages
The House with the Open Window
The surprising narration of Robert Holt.
He banged the door in my face.
That was the final blow.
To have tramped about all day looking for work; to have begged even for a job which would give me money enough to buy a little food; and to have tramped and to have begged in vain—that was bad. But, sick at heart, depressed in mind and in body, exhausted by hunger and fatigue, to have been compelled to pocket any little pride I might have left, and solicit, as the penniless, homeless tramp which indeed I was, a night’s lodging in the casual ward—and to solicit it in vain!—that was worse. Much worse. About as bad as bad could be.
I stared, stupidly, at the door which had just been banged in my face. I could scarcely believe that the thing was possible. I had hardly expected to figure as a tramp; but, supposing it conceivable that I could become a tramp, that I should be refused admission to that abode of all ignominy, the tramp’s ward, was to have attained a depth of misery of which never even in nightmares I had dreamed.
As I stood wondering what I should do, a man slouched towards me out of the shadow of the wall.
“Won’t ’e let yer in?”
“He says it’s full.”
“Says it’s full, does ’e? That’s the lay at Fulham—they always says it’s full. They wants to keep the number down.”
I looked at the man askance. His head hung forward; his hands were in his trouser pockets; his clothes were rags; his tone was husky.
“Do you mean that they say it’s full when it isn’t—that they won’t let me in although there’s room?”
“That’s it—bloke’s a-kiddin’ yer.”
“But, if there’s room, aren’t they bound to let me in?”
Contents
About the author
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Public domain book This work is in the public domain and free of copyright. Anyone may read, download and share it.
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Book facts
- Author
- Richard Marsh
- First published
- 1897
- Reading time
- About 8 hours
- Pages
- 294
- Language
- English
- Genre
- Gothic Horror
- Formats
- PDF, EPUB, Read online, Audiobook