The Bronze Hand

In post–John Brown raid Baltimore, a young lodger is drawn into a mystery that begins with beauty and ends in political terror. Fascinated by the secretive Miss Calhoun, he hears a cry from her room, sees a fleeing man, and is pulled into her confidence when she demands help recovering a stolen ring—one she insists is tied to a far larger danger than theft alone. Her instructions send him to Dr. Merriam's shabby office, where he must watch for a bronze hand in an ordinary-looking box and stop a crucial ring from being placed upon it. Inside the tense waiting room, he studies the other visitors, suspects deception, and outwits a pale young woman who seems to be guarding the object. But the trail leads deeper, through a questionable district to a strange establishment marked "MADAME," where incense, fear, and reverence gather around an imposing woman who speaks in prophetic, trance-like warnings of betrayal and doom. As he uncovers hidden hands, disguised motives, and whispered vengeance, he realizes he has stumbled into a dangerous conspiracy of love, loss, and deadly intrigue. This edition has been fully restored with modern typesetting, custom cover design.