A name you know. A mood you’re in. Ten minutes to yourself. Start anywhere.
The narrator’s attitude toward the story.
On a dangerous night ride, a cavalry officer finds a missing trooper standing beside a fallen horse.
On a freezing Civil War night, soldiers borrow a blanket from an unidentified dead sergeant.
A shopkeeper keeps selling goods after his funeral, and the whole village comes to see him.
A widower notices that his wife's body has changed position after its long journey home.
An abandoned Missouri farmhouse draws crowds when the vine covering it starts to move without wind.
A fugitive meets a silent figure in a dark forest and follows him back toward the jail.
A minister meets a silent peddler on a misty bridge, then returns to learn why the man was there.
A rancher claims he killed his Chinese worker over a simple task, but a local witness tells another story.
An isolated house rumored to hide a fortune draws visitors after its secretive owner dies.
Two men agree to fight with knives in a house said to be haunted.
A man meets a hypnotist he distrusts, then sees his fiancée arrive in town without warning.
A missing farmer is seen miles from home just as his son becomes the chief murder suspect.
A Union soldier returns to the Tennessee home he left after a bitter family split.
After a private is executed for striking an officer, a battlefield roll call receives an answer no one expects.
A police superintendent’s idea of justice changes each time a biting dog seems to belong to someone more powerful.
A newly married couple’s perfect evening at a country station ends when an unexpected trainload recognizes them.
A Russian landowner insults his silent English governess while fishing, certain that language protects him from judgment.
Penniless after a hospital stay, a nightclub dancer visits an old admirer and finds that ordinary clothes have changed their acquaintance.
A practical railway guard hires a matchmaker and explains, in exact detail, the wife required for his future happiness.
A tipsy bridegroom regales a railway compartment with his philosophy of happiness while searching for the coach where his new wife waits.
A young man hides declarations of love inside the roar of a sled ride, leaving a frightened girl unsure whether hope or the wind is speaking.
A wealthy lover tries to settle an adulterous triangle with cash, only to discover that affection cannot be bought.
A magistrate questions a peasant who cannot understand why taking one railway nut for a fishing weight is a crime.
An unknown name on a civil councillor’s visitor list turns a small puzzle into a consuming spiritualist obsession.
