«The Sign of the Broken Sword» is a short story by G. K. Chesterton featuring his famous characters Father Brown and former criminal Flambeau. In the centre of a story is a mysterious death of General Sir Arthur St. Clare, who was hanged on a tree with his broken sword hung round his neck. It is a detective story and throughout it Father Brown reveals to us the mystery of General St. Clare.
The plot starts with Father Brown’s question: “Where does a wise man hide a pebble?”. The story about general is more «chaotic» and it is not told in chronological order: the narrator often returns to preceding events, revealing the reasons why St. Clare did such a horrible thing, which is, though, typical for detective stories.
