Checkmate

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"The match is over, and you may rise now and say Checkmate."
Walter Longcluse is a mysterious figure, a drifter and self-made man whose travels throughout France, Austria, and England resulted in a large personal fortune. Being personable, he is quickly accepted into the Arden family, former aristocrats whose once ascendant star has lately waned with unpaid debts and the shadow of a murder. As Longcluse courts Alice Arden, brother Richard becomes fast friends with Longcluse. A visit to a gambling club one night brings them face to face with Monsieur Lebas, a brute who seems to recognize Longcluse but is almost immediately found murdered. The story unfolds, to thrilling conclusion, with a surprising plot twist right at the end.
Checkmate is a chillingly atmospheric tale of betrayal as only Le Fanu could create.

Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu was the leading Gothic horror writer during the nineteenth century. Born in Ireland in 1814, he grew up in a literary family and began writing for the Dublin University Magazine in 1838. He published his first ghost story, "The Ghost and the Bone-Setter," in 1838. His most notable work, Carmilla, published in 1872, was the inspiration for Bram Stoker's Dracula. Le Fanu's other notable works include The House by the Churchyard (1863), Wylder's Hand (1864), Uncle Silas: A Tale of Bartram-Haugh (1864), Guy Deverell (1865), and In a Glass Darkly (1871). Le Fanu is widely considered to be the father of the English ghost story. He died in 1873, one year after his most prolific work, Carmilla, was published. It is rumored that he "died of fright."