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Page[0]=new Array("LINKS","Listed below are sites of information or merchandise that are (hopefully) of interest to all of you.","We will be adding more links to this page as time goes by.","Suggestions for other links that we might consider for inclusion should be sent to:","linkspage@thenostalgialeague.com","The Astounding B Monster (Forrest J.","Ackerman)","Forrest J.","Ackerman speaks from his own internet site.","Lots of good things to look at here.","The Gene Autry Western Heritage Museum","The Home Page of the Gene Autry Western Heritage Museum in Los Angeles, California.","Lists what is going on at the museum as well as what is on sale in their store.","Edgar Rice Burroughs: Collectibles Emporium","Although from the name of the site one would think this was a store, it is not.","The owner, Bill Hillman, is involved in an ongoing project to create a virtual museum of artwork featuring the characters created by Edgar Rice Burroughs.","Not only are book, magazine, and comic covers included, but also trading cards and premiums.","The opening page will also take you to ERBzin-e, Hillman's weekly ERB fanzine.","NOTE:The Burroughs Emporium seems to have closed its site.","We are looking into it.","The Captain Midnight Sound Vault","The Captain Midnight Sound Vault allows you to either listen or download classic episodes of Ovaltine's great radio hero at will.","Simple uncomplicated site.","All files are in the Real Audio format.","Fading Shadows, Inc.","Fading Shadows is a site devoted to pulp magazines with a twist, since the majority of the material available from them are newly written stories done in the pulp style which, in a many cases, feature classic pulp characters in new stories.","Subscriptions are available and single issues can also be purchased.","They also have an excellent pulp character reprint index, which you can view online.","Flash Gordon","A neat site put together by Tony LoBue.","Here you will find most everything concerning the Flash Gordon serials.","Music, sound bites, and photos are included, as well as extensive filmographies and biographies of the cast members.","The Herb Jeffries Website","The amazing b-western "Bronze Buckaroo" and Duke Ellington vocalist hosts a site devoted to his most interesting life and continuing career.","The Official Hopalong Cassidy Website","The "official" Hopalong Cassidy website with information on all his westerns and memorabilia for fans of this famous cowboy.","MacFarland Publishing","MacFarland is one of the more prolific publishers of material on the serial genre.","They take a very scholarly approach.","Mercury Theatre on the Air","This site is devoted to Orson Welles and The Mercury Theatre of the Air.","They claim to have all the surviving Mercury Theatre shows available for listening or download, as well as, 25 episodes of Campbell Playhouse and the 7 part adaption of Les Miserables.","Most files are in Real Audio with some also available in MP3.","Also some historical infomation.","The Monster Cellar","If you are looking for almost any model that has every appeared, this is the place for you.","The Monster Cellar also has comics and rare toys.","The Old Corral","The Old Corral has tons of information about the B-Movie cowboy heroes and more links to other Western sites than you could ever hope to visit.","Richard Orsak's Western Trails","Richard Orsak's present website where he lists what he currently has available in the world of serials and "B" westerns.","One of the best secondary market dealers.","Radio Days","The main entrance for the site that contains the Captain Midnight site mentioned above.","Many shows are available for listening, some for downloading and there is quite a bit of historical information about Old Time Radio.","All programs are in the Real Audio format.","The Rocketpage","If you like Commando Cody or Rocketman, this is the site for you to visit.","The Roy Rogers and Dale Evans Website","The "real" Roy and Dale website as run by the family.","Good place to visit.","The Shadow PDF Files","If you enjoy the pulp adventures of The Shadow, then this is the site for you.","Currently, the site features the complete text to 28 Shadow novels that are available for reading on this site or are downloadable for later perusal: all absolutely FREE! Each novel is in the Adobe Acrobat format and is laid out in the format of a pulp magazine page including the pulp cover that originally appeared with the novel and interior illustrations.","There is also a cover gallery at the site.","A beautiful job.","The Super-Hero Hype Site","Want to hear all the gossip about the latest movies featuring your favorite heroes? This site has it all with a lot of great animated gifs and pix from Nostalgia Leaguer Chris Mason.","Swap Sale","If you like "Space Stuff" and tv sci-fi from the 50's and 60's, you'll want to blast off to this site.","Lots of Space Patrol kine/copies available.","The "Official" 3 Stooges Web Site","Hey, Moe, if the headbanging antics of the Stooges are your thing, here is the place to go.","Merchandise, games, puzzles, and even downloadable video.","Nyuck, nyuck, nyuck","University of Oklahoma Press","Generally recognized as the foremost publisher of books on the American Indian, not to mention the West, Oklahoma Press has also been active in the field of popular culture with its biographies of Hollywood performers and its studies of serials, Westerns, and musicals.","View the View the View the","AMC","Schedule TCM","Schedule Encore Western","Schedule","Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Nostalgia League","E-Mail: headquarters@thenostalgialeague.com","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","The name "The Nostalgia League" and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com"","are owned and © 1999 by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","The Nostalgia League-Links","http://thenostalgialeague.com/links.html","10.7","5 Aug 2004");
Page[1]=new Array("WELCOME TO THE NOSTALGIA LEAGUE!!","Founded July 21st, 1999.","B-Movies, Serials, Old Time Radio, Westerns, Comics, Railroads (real and model), Collecting .","we are interested in all of them.","There's even room for other memories too.","We hope you will join us as we attempt to make this site fun for one and all.","Scroll on down the page and see what's what!","The","Short Fiction","Book Reviews', CAPTION, 'The Library', CENTER);" ONMOUSEOUT="return nd();"","Library","DC Archives Overview","HUH? (Curiosities)","The News Stand","Comic/Book Reviews","Related Links","', CAPTION, 'The Comics Rack', RIGHT);" ONMOUSEOUT="return nd();"","Comics","Rack The Bookshelf - Novels","Fantasy Gallery","Horror Gallery","Science Fiction Gallery","Reviews and Articles","Related Links', CAPTION, 'Fantasy & Adventure', LEFT);" ONMOUSEOUT="return nd();"","Fantasy","&","Adventure","TNL","Comics Q and A","with Snugs Baxter","The Corner Barbershop","Final Bows","The Quiz Page', CAPTION, 'TNL Treasures', CENTER);" ONMOUSEOUT="return nd();"","Treasures","Related Glass Links', CAPTION, 'Glass Treasures', CENTER);" ONMOUSEOUT="return nd();"","Glass","Treasures","Whistle","Stop","Regular chat times posted at the room', CAPTION, 'The Chat Room', CENTER);" ONMOUSEOUT="return nd();"","New and Improved!', CAPTION, 'TNL Search Engine', RIGHT);" ONMOUSEOUT="return nd();" Links to AMC, TCM, and the Western Channel Schedule pages', CAPTION, 'The Links Page', CENTER);" ONMOUSEOUT="return nd();"","Links","Publisher:","Raymond William Stedman","Assoc.","Publisher:","John DiMezzes","Editors:","Tony Bolton","Willard Fong","Editor/Webmaster:","Clark Savage, Jr.","TGA","Editor Emeritus:","Tom Mason","1934-2003","Be sure to bookmark this page and check back often!","COME JOIN US AND WATCH US GROW!","Chat Room | Comics Rack | Expedition | Fantasy & Adventure | The Gallery | Glass Treasures","| The Library | Links | Message Board | Search | TNL Treasures | Whistle Stop","The Nostalgia League","E-Mail: headquarters@thenostalgialeague.com","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","The name "The Nostalgia League" and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com"","are owned and © 1999 by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","Captain Marvel, Shazam, Green Lantern, Batman,","Jimmy Olsen, Plastic Man and Superman are TM and © by DC comics.","Last Updated","For site questions, contact: webmaster","Site Designed and Maintained by Desktop Webworks","Additional Site Design and Graphics by Harbinger Design","The Nostalgia League- Old Time Radio, B-Movies, Westerns, Comics, Railroading, both real and model, and Nostalgia","http://thenostalgialeague.com/index.html","14.4","12 May 2004");
Page[2]=new Array("WELCOME TO THE NOSTALGIA LEAGUE CHAT ROOM!!","Chats are held every other Tuesday at","9 PM Eastern","6PM Pacific","For chat schedules and topics, please consult the Message Board, or the Home Page.","The Chat Room may take a few seconds to load and you must have a Java enabled browser to use it.","You do not need to register to use the Chat Room and there are no passwords.","Simply enter your name (15 characters max.) and go!","Ads may pop up from time to time while using the Chat Room.","You can close the ads without closing the Chat Room.","The","MESSAGE BOARDS Return to","THE NOSTALGIA LEAGUE","The Nostalgia League","E-Mail: headquarters@thenostalgialeague.com","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","The name "The Nostalgia League" and the domain",""thenostalgialeague.com"","are owned and © 1999 by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","Captain Marvel, and Superman are TM and © by DC comics.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","The Nostalgia League Chat Room","http://thenostalgialeague.com/chat.html","3.6","17 Dec 2003");
Page[3]=new Array("TABLE OF CONTENTS","FEATURE ARTICLES","The Amazing Talented Herb Jeffries.....by John DiMezzes","A look at the many faceted career of the Bronze Buckaroo","And A Little Child Shall Lead Them.....by Raymond William Stedman","An overview of Little Orphan Annie on radio.","Battlestar Galactica Memories.....by Tom Mason","Once again, Tom gives us a unique view of a fondly remembered television show.","Backstage Memories Of ABC-TVPart One: The Page Staff and Guest Relations.....by Tom Mason","Tom shares memories and anecdotes of his early days working at ABC.","Bela Lugosi's Last Serial.....by Raymond William Stedman","A look at Lugosi's work in The Phantom Creeps","The Clayton Moore Memorial Service.....by Tom and Chris Mason","A report, with pictures, on the Memorial Service held for Clayton Moore on Sunday, January 16, 2000 at the Gene Autry Museum of Western Heritage in Los Angeles.","The DC Archives Series.....by Tom Mason","An overview of the DC Archives reprint books, including a list of titles and contents.","Updated through December, 2003.","The Green Hornet Strikes Again.....by Raymond William Stedman","An overview of the serial of the same name.","The Nickelodeons.....by Joseph Medill Patterson","An article about that new entertainment craze that is sweeping the nation....the Nickelodeon.","Taken from the November 23, 1907 issue of The Saturday Evening Post.","Space Patrol Memories- Pt.","1.....by Tom Mason","Tom takes you on a guided tour of the ins and outs of the television show Space Patrol, both as a fan and an insider.","Part 1 of 2.","Space Patrol Memories- Pt.","2.....by Tom Mason","Tom continues his guided tour of the ins and outs of the television show Space Patrol, both as a fan and an insider.","Part 2 of 2.","Tom Mix: The Curley Bradley Years.....by Tom Mason","A remembrance of the radio show and its premiums.","Were you a Straight Shooter?","Weird Wonder Tales.....by Bob Gay","An overview of the 70s Marvel reprint title, with emphasis on the art that made the title one of the best of its type.","SHORT FICTION","The Adventure of the Two Collaborators.....by Sir James Barrie","In bringing to a close the adventures of my friend Sherlock Holmes I am perforce reminded...","An Ancient Ghost Story.....by Pliny the Younger","Athenodorus looked round and saw the apparition exactly as it had been described...","Climax For A Ghost Story.....by I.","Ireland","A short short story with a long afterword.","How Santa Claus Came to Simpson's Bar.....by Bret Harte","Simpson's Bar, on the eve of Christmas Day, 1862, clung like a swallow's nest to the rocky entablature and splintered capitals of Table Mountain...","The Jameson Satellite.....by Neil R.","Jones","In the depths of space, some twenty thousand miles from the earth, the body of Professor Jameson within its rocket container cruised upon an endless journey...","Murder On The Limited.....by Howard Finney","The section of his white pajamas from just below the shoulder blades to the small of the back was a dark, moist red that glistened like jelly...","The Molemen Want Your Eyes.....by Frederick C.","Davis","Out of the bowels of the earth they came, old and lank and blind.","And their cold, dead hands sought warm, fresh youth...","The Signalman.....by Charles Dickens","To change that signal, to trim those lights, and to turn this iron handle now and then, was all he had to do...","The Thing in the Cellar.....by David H.","Keller","It was a large cellar, entirely out of proportion to the house above it...","The Trailor Murder Mystery.....by Abraham Lincoln","In the year 1841, there resided, at different points in the State of Illinois, three brothers...","The True History of The Hare and The Tortoise.....by Lord Dunsany","...and it was decided that the Hare and the Tortoise should run a race...","The Zayat Kiss.....by Sax Rohmer","Sir Crichton died, with nothing to show the cause of death but a little mark upon the neck, face, or limb...the 'Zayat Kiss.'","SHORT FICTION THAT BECAME MOVIES","The Beast With Five Fingers.....by W.","Harvey","The story, I suppose, begins with Adrian Borlsover, whom I met when I was a little boy...","Filmed as The Beast with Five Fingers in 1946.","Director: Robert Florey.","The Caballero's Way.....by O.","Henry","The Kid was twenty-five, looked twenty; and a careful insurance company would have estimated the probable time of his demise at, say, twentysix.","First filmed as The Caballero's Way in 1914.","Director: Webster Cullison","Farewell to the Master Part 1.....by Harry Bates (Part 2 Part 3)","From his perch high on the ladder above the museum floor, Cliff Sutherland studied carefully each line and shadow of the great robot...","Filmed as The Day the Earth Stood Still in 1951.","Director: Robert Wise.","COMPLETE NOVELS","Bar-20.....by Clarence E.","Mulford","The first novel to feature Hopalong Cassidy.","With an introduction by Raymond William Stedman.","Gulliver of Mars.....by Edwin L.","Arnold","The full text of the 1905 novel that preceded the creation of John Carter.","Was this Burrough's inspiration? Introduction by G.","Edward Kymala.","A Princess of Mars.....by Edgar Rice Burroughs","The first novel in the John Carter series, written by the creator of Tarzan.","Introduction by G.","Edward Kymala.","SERIALIZED NOVELS","The Insidious Dr.","Fu Manchu.....by Sax Rohmer","The novel that introduced Fu Manchu to the world.","Introduction by Bob Gay.","PICTURE GALLERIES","General","Items from all eras and interests.","Clark's Closet","Items from the collection of Clark Savage, Jr.","TGA","Destination: Closet!","Fantasy & Adventure","The history of popular fiction told through covers and commentary.","The Complete Avon Fantasy Reader","The Whistle Stop Gallery","Images devoted to the world of railroading.","UP #3985","DEPARTMENTS","Book Notes","In a Door, Into a Fight, Out a Door, Into a Chase","The autobiographical memoir by William Witney.","Reviewed by Raymond William Stedman.","Bar-20: The Life of Clarence E.","Mulford, Creator of Hopalong Cassidy","A look at Hopalong Cassidy and his creator by Francis M.","Nevins.","Reviewed by Raymond William Stedman.","The Cracker Barrel","Tom Mason comments on the state of the comic book industry in 2003.","Film Foot Notes","#1 Nellie and Bert Grace","Reference","Serial Features.....by Rich Wannen","An overview of the odd hybrid known as the serial feature.","Rich has also included an extensive list of known titles.","Reviews","The Unabashed Plug Dept......by Clark Savage, Jr.","TGA","Reviews of comics and graphic novels that originally appeared on The News Stand.","Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Comics Rack","The Message Boards","The Whistle Stop","TNL Treasures","Expedition","Fantasy & Adventure","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","The Library - Table of Contents","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/index_olm.htm","27.6","13 Oct 2004");
Page[4]=new Array("In a Door, Into a Fight, Out a Door, Into a Chase","by William Witney","(Jefferson, North Carolina, McFarland & Company, 1996)","A Book Review","by Raymond William Stedman","Some books receive far less attention at the time of release than they deserve.","William Witney’s memoir of serial-making days is one of those neglected gems.","It belongs in the library of every serial lover—not only for its undeniable historical value but also for its incredible warmth.","William Witney, of course, was the pre-eminent chapter play director of the sound era, serving his apprenticeship during the rough-and-tumble days of Mascot Pictures and subsequently at Republic, where he guided (solo or with a partner) that studio’s greatest chapter plays, including Daredevils of the Red Circle, Zorro’s Fighting Legion, Drums of FuManchu, The Adventures of Captain Marvel, Jungle Girl, Spy Smasher, The Perils of Nyoka, and three of the Dick Tracy episoders.","Working often with talented co-director John English, Witney set the standard for quality during what came to be known as the Golden Age of Serials.","Although he is often credited with introducing "choreography" to movie fight scenes, Witney’s contributions went far beyond that.","In a medium in which all aspects of a serial’s production were carefully laid out in advance of production, Witney (like English) always enhanced what he was given.","Action sequences gained intensity.","Sets and special effects looked more convincing.","Performers, whatever their talent levels, consistently exceeded what might have been expected of them.","While serials were very much a team effort, Witney, who enjoyed consulting with the various artisans during pre-production, made the team work better.","Witney’s book begins with the future-director’s initial encounter with picture-making as a vacation-time cowboy extra in a Johnny Mack Brown serial for Mascot called Fighting with Kit Carson.","The author’s narrative of a day on location amid wranglers and stunt men may be the best description of no-frills production at places like the fabled Iverson Ranch ever captured in print.","It is as revealing and informative as it is amusing.","Any reader who watches that old cliffhanger after reading the Witney recollection will surely see things by no means apparent before, and also identify with the young Witney, who was gathering knowledge with every command of "Action!" When Witney later entered the film business full time, his desire to learn merely grew, even if his first duties fell in the mimeograph room of Mascot.","Here again, Witney’s evocation of day-to-day life at a small studio can sharpen a reader’s insight into moviemaking.","As Witney learns, so does the person holding his book.","By the time the 21-year-old Witney was pressed into emergency service as a director in order that The Painted Stallion (1937) could be completed, he was fully ready to take on regular helming duties, as he soon proved with SOS Coast Guard.","It is hard to believe that Republic’s memorable The Lone Ranger was only Witney’s fourth serial directing assignment, and that it was followed in 1938 by The Fighting Devil Dogs, Dick Tracy Returns, and Hawk of the Wilderness (all with English).","Author Witney takes the reader behind the scenes with absorbing, sometimes pithy, comments about these and many other serials.","The heroes, heroines, villains, and production staffers become real people.","Witney, by the way, liked most of them—but is not afraid to reveal his annoyance with a handful of individuals.","(Generally, his dislikes were shared by others on the set, though a few of the targets for disdain may find defenders among readers.)Throughout the book, the author shares colorful recollections of shooting locales long part of the film memory of many serial fans.","Into a Door .","is filled with serial history, justification enough for writing, or reading, the book.","But after one has reluctantly turned the final page, and the book has been placed upon that special shelf reserved for treasures, it may be the engaging vignettes that cling strongest to memory: the evening horseback ride with a young woman who, to Witney’s surprise, turns out to be the daughter of Buck Jones; the quiet departures of those who had worked on serials for decades and suddenly are gone; the winsome moments treasured by the author, as when, during breaks for lunch, Jungle Girl Frances Gifford would climb atop Bunny, her elephant friend, to frolic in the waters of Lake Sherwood; the off-camera misfortunes that are part of film making, from Robert Livingston’s serious accident while diving to the still adolescent Kay Aldridge’s mid-Nyoka breaking-out in measles.","Witney’ courtship of his longtime wife, actress Maxine Doyle, is there too, as are the ups and downs of ordinary family life.","The book ends as William Witney begins his World War II service in the military—offering the possibility of a sequel.","In a Door .","., however, is in itself all that a grateful reader could ask for.","©1998 by Raymond William Stedman.","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","William Witney’s In a Door, Into a Fight, Out a Door, Into a Chase","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/witney.htm","7.6","29 Sep 2003");
Page[5]=new Array("Bar-20: The Life of Clarence E.","Mulford, Creator of Hopalong Cassidy","by Francis M.","Nevins","(Jefferson, North Carolina, McFarland & Company, 1993)","A Book Review","by Raymond William Stedman","If you are one of those enjoying the current series of Hopalong Cassidy films on Encore's Western Channel--or are a Hoppy fan from way back--you will find a valuable resource in Francis M.","Nevins' Bar-20: The Life of Clarence E.","Mulford, Creator of Hopalong Cassidy.","In addition to the interesting biographical material, the book also includes seven of the original short stories featuring Bill Cassidy and his Bar-20 pals.","Among them is the one that tells how Hopalong got his nickname.","As an added attraction, Nevins includes a detailed listing of the books, stories, and articles by the colorful Mulford, plus a filmography, with credits, of the Cassidy movies and the two silent Westerns based upon Mulford's The Orphan.","(The 1924 version of that novel, The Deadwood Coach, starred Tom Mix.)","As the well-constructed biographical narrative progresses, law professor and mystery writer Nevins pauses at each Mulford tale to present a careful summary of its plot before returning to the triumphs and trials of Mulford's life.","In these summaries readers can recognize the inspirations for several of the characters who would appear in the popular film series.","Author Mulford died in 1956, having profited substantially from the Hoppy films--even those not based upon his novels--but not entirely happy with how Hollywood had modified his roughhewn cowboy character, and taken away his limp.","At the end of the book, Nevins gives us a bit of background on the last days on the screen Hoppy, William Boyd, and others involved in the memorable Cassidy films.","McFarland published the illustrated 264-page Bar-20 in 1993 and it is still in print.","Price for the library binding is $37.50.","The phone number for ordering is 1-800-253-2187.","©1999 by Raymond William Stedman","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","Bar-20: The Life of Clarence E. Mulford, Creator of Hopalong Cassidy","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/hoppy.htm","4.4","29 Sep 2003");
Page[6]=new Array("Space Patrol Memories Pt.","By Tom Mason","SPACE PATROL!","HIGH ADVENTURE IN THE WILD REACHES OF SPACE…","MISSIONS OF DARING IN THE NAME OF INTERPLANETARY JUSTICE!","TRAVEL INTO THE FUTURE WITH BUZZ CORRY…","COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF OF…","THE SPACE PATROL!","How many of us remember these words of introduction uttered by announcer Jack Narz, at the opening of each episode to prepare us for the exciting adventures ahead of us?","Part 1: The History","I became an instant fan of Space Patrol (the space opera that was initially broadcast Mon-Fri locally on KECA-TV Channel 7 in Los Angeles) from the first night it aired on my 12-inch black and white Packard Bell television set.","It was fascinating.","It started out as a 15-minute daily serial in 1950.","Within nine months it graduated to a weekend half-hour show on the full ABC Network.","It also generated a radio show version, but television was it’s forte.","Later, Space Patrol was the first regular live West Coast morning network program beamed to the East Coast.","Today we take things like that for granted with the advent of satellites and cable, but at that time it took an intricate network of cable and relay stations.","Space Patrol was the brainchild of creator Mike Moser, an ex-U.S.","Navy Air force veteran in WW II.","He conceived the program as a way to bring the same sort of vision he has experienced as a youth reading Buck Rogers and Flash Gordon.","His first choice for the lead in the show was Glen Denning, playing Kit Corry, and he did not work out well.","He played Kit as a stern taskmaster to his new Cadet.","He constantly flubbed his lines and according to Nina Bara (Tonga) he even fell asleep on camera one time.","So a plot device was created where Kit called in his brother Buzz on the Space-O-Phone inviting him to come to Terra.","(Terra was a man-made planet that was created as the capitol of the United Planets so no one world could claim an advantage of the capitol being situated on their planet.","It also served as the headquarters for the Space Patrol.)","Denning even flubbed this bit, calling himself Buzz and his brother Kit over the Space-O-Phone.","Kit subsequently left on a mysterious mission, never to return.","Space Patrol would be taken over by his brother Buzz Corry, but who to play the part? Moser called for auditions.","One of the actors auditioned was Ed Kemmer who had flown over 48 missions over Germany during the war before being shot down.","He was eminently qualified to play the part, a good actor and ruggedly handsome with just the right touch of humor to make the character work.","Lynn Osborn, a former WW II radioman, was to play his Cadet Happy.","Both Kemmer and Osborn had attended acting school at the famed Pasadena Playhouse and it is said that Osborn contacted Kemmer about the possibility of the part opening up due to Denning’s miscasting in the part of Kit.","As soon as Kemmer read for the part, Moser and his staff knew they had the perfect lead for their Space Patrol series.","Premiums in outer space…","Coming aboard, Ralston Purina got into the act as a sponsor and started offering mail-in premiums.","They had been the most prolific purveyors of premiums on radio with Tom Mix and his Ralston Straight Shooters, and they made the crossover from radio to television in grand style.","What you could do with a few small coins and a Chex box top! There were cardboard mock-ups of the spaceport Terra City, Rocket Ships, Toy Space- a-phones, Ray Guns, magnifying goggles, official belt buckles with decoders built in, and the belts to affix them to.","On top of that there was an official Top Secret Space Patrol United Planets Treasury Dept.","Diplomatic pouch filled with all kinds of paper goods, and my favorite: the Cosmic Smoke Gun.","It was always the policy of Space Patrol to utilize the premiums as part of the storyline of the show.","If the Space Patrol gang was using it, it just fueled the fire for all us Space Cadets out there to have ours too.","We became participants.","The “Cosmic Smoke Gun” supposedly shot a puff of sleep inducing “smoke” (actually talcum powder), and Commander Buzz Corry actually used it on the show.","Everyone in the Space Patrol gang seemed to be using one.","Major Robbie Robertson got into a fight with one of the show’s villains and lost his cosmic smoke gun to him.","Poof! The villain fired at Robbie, who was supposed to be engulfed with the smoke that was emitted from the weapon.","In actuality, someone must have loaded too much talcum into the magazine and out shot this big lump of white powder and affixed itself to Robbie’s cheek.","But Major Robinson knew he had been gassed and coughed just as the script called for and passed out.","No retakes here, it was live TV.","I had to have one of these marvelous weapons.","I sent in my money and box top and began my vigil at my mailbox daily.","When I had waited the usual eternity for its arrival, it showed up in a cardboard box.","It looked like it had been run over by a truck.","My long awaited Cosmic Smoke Gun package made a suspicious rattling noise, and upon opening it, I discovered my gun was in two pieces: destroyed in transit.","I immediately shot off a letter to the merchandisers and resigned myself for another long wait.","The Ralston folks sent me a replacement in a few weeks.","A few days after the gun arrived, another one showed up.","This was pretty good, now I had two.","In about another week another one arrived.","A few days later, a new version showed up that had a longer, redesigned barrel.","All in all, I ended up with about six of the darned things.","I had them in their traditional red-orange coloring and there was even a green version.","What could be better than this? I had an entire arsenal.","In 1952, Ralston projected sales of Space Patrol merchandise at $40 million dollars.","The youth of America was eating a lot of Ralston Cereal.","Soon Nestle’s Quik and Nestle candy bars got into the act as an alternating sponsor.","Announcer Roger Barclay appeared in full Space Patrol regalia and hawked the premiums.","Sometimes he appeared solo and other times with a young boy or Buzz and Happy.","The absolute capper of premiums was a nationwide contest launched with one of the most unusual grand prizes ever awarded.","The contest was dubbed “Name That Planet”.","The winner received a 35 foot, 1 ton replica “playhouse” of the Terra V rocketship along with a motor truck to pull it and $1500 dollars in cash.","I often wonder what the parents of the Grand Prizewinner thought when that Rocketship mounted on its carrier truck arrived at their home.","After that, there were 250 “First Prizes” that consisted of all sorts of Space Patrol gear.","The “Second Prize” group of 750 each got a Schwinn Varsity bicycle, a collector’s item in itself by today’s standards.","Space Patrol merchandise was not just offered over the radio and TV.","There were many Space Patrol items in stores.","A great deal of the Ralston merchandise was sold in grocery stores for immediate purchase.","Often times the plastic toys appeared in different color schemes or there might be a subtle design change.","The official Space Patrol dart/ray-gun was molded in bright red plastic and looked so real, they even used it on the air with appropriate zapping sound effects added.","Clothing items were widely sold in major department stores.","This was significant as few radio or television shows managed to get beyond mail-in premiums.","Ziff-Davis published full color Space Patrol comic books.","No artist is credited, but Norman Saunders painted the covers and famed comic artist Kreigstein of EC fame did the interior artwork.","Two issues were published.","They are rare collector’s items and if you could find a mint copy of number one, it would be worth over $700 dollars now.","Issue number two demands about $500 dollars.","Somewhere, there was a free giveaway comic entitled Space Patrol’s Special Mission; it was black and white and is valued today at over $500 in mint condition.","For a long time after her departure from the show, Nina Bara, “Tonga the Lady of Diamonds”, was advertising copies of the comic for sale in various film magazines and I regret not ever buying them, as her price was considerably lower than previously quoted.","Alas, she has since passed on and where her stockpile of comics went is anybody’s guess.","All in all, Space Patrol generated more mail in premiums than any other TV show I can remember and it certainly was my favorite even into my early years in college.","Space Patrol was fun.","Tom Corbett was too talky and did not do much moving from its basic sets.","Live television had its limitations, but Space Patrol had use of the big stages at ABC Television Center and made good use of them.","Space Patrol, at its height, was churning out over 82,000 words per week to feed the television and radio shows ABC had on the air.","Cue card “cheat sheets” were taped on the walls out of the camera’s view to help the actors “remember” their lines.","An interesting note to serial fans, in publicity photos from the earliest shows, you can still see Major Robbie Robertson wearing an old tunic from Tom Tyler’s Republic serial The Adventures of Captain Marvel.","Both Tom Tyler’s tunic and the slightly smaller one that David Sharpe used while doubling Tyler showed up time and again on various characters.","The Kryptonian fashions from the Columbia serial Superman were in evidence more than once.","A female villain wore one of Emperor Ming’s royal guard uniforms from the serial Flash Gordon in another early episode.","The evil Prince Baccaratti sported a familiar black leather aviator’s jacket with a falcon emblazoned on it and adopted the nickname of “The Black Falcon&#148.","That leather jacket came from the 1939 serial Flying G-Men where it had been worn by a masked character who oddly was called “The Black Falcon”.","Had the writers seen that serial? Other actors sported costumes from a wide variety of the old serials.","This was due to the fact that Space Patrol did not have a large wardrobe budget in those early days so they went to the largest movie costume facility, Western Costume, and made do with what they could find.","Space suits were “borrowed” from the movie Destination Moon.","Later, when the show was a success, new fancy uniforms were designed for the leads and only occasionally did we see recycled movie costumes on the villains and extras.","Coming up next, I go to work at ABC and search out bits of lore from the actual people who had helped make Space Patrol a reality on television.","©2000 by Tom Mason","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","Space Patrol Memories - Pt. 1","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/sp1.htm","14.3","29 Sep 2003");
Page[7]=new Array("The Caballero's Way","by O.","Henry","The Cisco Kid is one of the more familiar characters in American popular culture, and a rare Mexican American hero.","But is the Robin Hood of the West seen in the movies anything like the original "caballero" of the short story that follows? The Kid's creator, William Sydney Porter (1862-1910), used the pen name O.","Henry for his many fine stories, often anchored in irony.","In this instance the greatest irony may have come after the story went to Hollywood.","THE Cisco Kid had killed six men in more or less fair scrimmages, had murdered twice as many (mostly Mexicans), and had winged a larger number whom he modestly forbore to count.","Therefore a woman loved him.","The Kid was twenty-five, looked twenty; and a careful insurance company would have estimated the probable time of his demise at, say, twenty-six.","His habitat was anywhere between the Frio and the Rio Grande.","He killed for the love of it—because he was quick-tempered—to avoid arrest—for his own amusement—any reason that came to his mind would suffice.","He had escaped capture because he could shoot five-sixths of a second sooner than any sheriff or ranger in the service, and because he rode a speckled roan horse that knew every cowpath in the mesquite and pear thickets from San Antonio to Matamoras.","Tonia Perez, the girl who loved the Cisco Kid, was half Carmen, half Madonna, and the rest—oh, yes, a woman who is half Carmen and half Madonna can always be something more—the rest, let us say, was humming-bird.","She lived in a grass-roofed jacal near a little Mexican settlement at the Lone Wolf Crossing of the Frio.","With her lived a father or grandfather, a lineal Aztec, somewhat less than a thousand years old, who herded a hundred goats and lived in a continuous drunken dream from drinking mescal.","Back of the jacal a tremendous forest of bristling pear, twenty feet high at its worst, crowded almost to its door.","It was along the bewildering maze of this spinous thicket that the speckled roan would bring the Kid to see his girl.","And once, clinging like a lizard to the ridge-pole, high up under the peaked grass roof, he had heard Tonia, with her Madonna face and Carmen beauty and humming-bird soul, parley with the sheriff's posse, denying knowledge of her man in her soft mélange of Spanish and English.","One day the adjutant-general of the State, who is, ex officio, commander of the ranger forces, wrote some sarcastic lines to Captain Duval of Company X, stationed at Laredo, relative to the serene and undisturbed existence led by murderers and desperadoes in the said captain's territory.","The captain turned the color of brick dust under his tan, and forwarded the letter, after adding a few comments, per ranger Private Bill Adamson, to ranger Lieutenant Sandridge, camped at a water hole on the Nueces with a squad of five men in preservation of law and order.","Lieutenant Sandridge turned a beautiful couleur de rose through his ordinary strawberry complexion, tucked the letter in his hip pocket, and chewed off the end of his gamboge moustache.","The next morning he saddled his horse and rode alone to the Mexican settlement at the Lone Wolf Crossing of the Frio, twenty miles away.","Six feet two, blond as a Viking, quiet as a deacon, dangerous as a machine gun, Sandridge moved, among the Jacales, patiently seeking news of the Cisco Kid.","Far more than the law, the Mexicans dreaded the cold and certain vengeance of the lone rider that the ranger sought.","It had been one of the Kid's pastimes to shoot Mexicans "to see them kick": if he demanded from them moribund Terpsichorean feats, simply that he might be entertained, what terrible and extreme penalties would be certain to follow should they anger him! One and all they lounged with upturned palms and shrugging shoulders, filling the air with "quién sabes" and denials of the Kid's acquaintance.","But there was a man named Fink who kept a store at the Crossing—a man of many nationalities, tongues, interests, and ways of thinking.",""No use to ask them Mexicans," he said to Sandridge.",""They're afraid to tell.","This hombre they call the Kid—Goodall is his name, ain't it?—he's been in my store once or twice.","I have an idea you might run across him at—but I guess I don't keer to say, myself.","I'm two seconds later in pulling a gun than I used to be and the difference is worth thinking about.","But this Kid's got a half-Mexican girl at the Crossing that he comes to see.","She lives in that jacal a hundred yards down the arroyo at the edge of the pear.","Maybe she—no, I don't suppose she would, but that jacal would be a good place to watch, anyway."","Sandridge rode down to the jacal of Perez.","The sun was low, and the broad shade of the great pear thicket already covered the grass-thatched hut.","The goats were enclosed for the night in a brush corral near by.","A few kids walked the top of it, nibbling the chaparral leaves.","The old Mexican lay upon a blanket on the grass, already in a stupor from his mescal, and dreaming, perhaps, of the nights when he and Pizarro touched glasses to their New World fortunes—so old his wrinkled face seemed to proclaim him to be.","And in the door of the jacal stood Tonia.","And Lieutenant Sandridge sat in his saddle staring at her like a gannet agape at a sailorman.","The Cisco Kid was a vain person, as all eminent and successful assassins are, and his bosom would have been ruffled had he known that at a simple exchange of glances two persons, in whose minds lie had been looming large, suddenly abandoned (at least for the time) all thought of him.","Never before had Tonia seen such a man as this.","He seemed to be made of sunshine and blood-red tissue and clear weather.","He seemed to illuminate the shadow of the pear when he smiled, as though the sun were rising again.","The men she had known had been small and dark.","Even the Kid, in spite of his achievements, was a stripling no larger than herself, with black straight hair and a cold marble face that chilled the noonday.","As for Tonia, though she sends description to the poorhouse, let her make a millionaire of your fancy.","Her blue-black hair, smoothly divided in the middle and bound close to her head, and her large eyes full of the Latin melancholy, gave her the Madonna touch.","Her motions and air spoke of the concealed fire and the desire to charm that she had inherited from the gitanas of the Basque province.","As for the humming-bird part of her, that dwelt in her heart; you could not perceive it unless her bright red skirt and dark blue blouse gave you a symbolic hint of the vagarious bird","The newly lighted sungod asked for a drink of water.","Tonia brought it from the red jar hanging under the brush shelter.","Sandridge considered it necessary to dismount so as to lessen the trouble of her ministrations.","I play no spy; nor do I assume to master the thoughts of any human heart; but I assert, by the chronicler's right, that before a quarter of an hour had sped, Sandridge was teaching her how to plait a six-strand rawhide stake-rope, and Tonia had explained to him that were it not for her little English book that the peripatetic padre had given her and the little crippled chivo, that she fed from a bottle, she would be very, very lonely indeed.","Which leads to a suspicion that the Kid's fences needed repairing, and that the adjutant-general's sarcasm had fallen upon unproductive soil.","In his camp by the water hole Lieutenant Sandridge announced and reiterated his intention of either causing the Cisco Kid to nibble the black loam of the Frio country prairies or of haling him before a judge and jury.","That sounded business-like.","Twice a week he rode over to the Lone Wolf Crossing of the Frio, and directed Tonia's slim, slightly lemon-tinted fingers among the intricacies of the slowly growing lariata.","A six-strand plait is hard to learn and easy to teach.","The ranger knew that he might find the Kid there at any visit.","He kept his armament ready, and had a frequent eye for the pear thicket at the rear of the jacal.","Thus he might bring down the kite and the humming-bird with one stone.","While the sunny-haired ornithologist was pursuing his studies the Cisco Kid was also attending to his professional duties.","He moodily shot up a saloon, in a small cow village on Quintana Creek, killed the town marshal (plugging him neatly in the centre of his tin badge), and then rode away, morose and unsatisfied.","No true artist is uplifted by shooting an aged man carrying an old-style .38 bulldog.","On his way the Kid suddenly experienced the yearning that all men feel when wrong-doing loses its keen edge of delight.","He yearned for the woman he loved to reassure him that she was his in spite of it.","He wanted her to call his bloodthirstiness bravery and his cruelty devotion.","He wanted Tonia to bring him water from the red jug under the brush shelter, and tell him how the chivo was thriving on the bottle.","The Kid turned the speckled roan's head up the ten-mile pear flat that stretches along the Arroyo Hondo until it ends at the Lone Wolf Crossing of the Frio.","The roan whickered; for he had a sense of locality and direction equal to that of a belt-line street-car horse; and he knew he would soon be nibbling the rich mesquite grass at the end of a forty-foot stake rope while Ulysses rested his head in Circe's straw-roofed hut.","More weird and lonesome than the journey of an Amazonian explorer is the ride of one through a Texas pear flat.","With dismal monotony and startling variety the uncanny and multiform shapes of the cacti lift their twisted trunks and fat, bristly hands to encumber the way.","The demon plant, appearing to live without soil or rain, seems to taunt the parched traveler with its lush gray greenness.","It warps itself a thousand times about what look to be open and inviting paths, only to lure the rider into blind and impassable spine-defended "bottoms of the bag," leaving him to retreat, if he can, with the points of the compass whirling in his head.","To be lost in the pear is to die almost the death of the thief on the cross, pierced by nails and with grotesque shapes of all the fiends hovering about.","But it was not so with the Kid and his mount.","Winding, twisting, circling, tracing the most fantastic and bewildering trail ever picked out, the good roan lessened the distance to the Lone Wolf Crossing with every coil and turn that he made.","While they fared the Kid sang.","He knew but one tune and he sang it, as he knew but one code and lived it, and but one girl and loved her.","He was a single-minded man of conventional ideas.","He had a voice like a coyote with bronchitis, but whenever he chose to sing his song he sang it.","It was a conventional song of the camps and trail, running at its beginning as near as may be to these words:","Don't you monkey with my Lulu girl","Or I'll tell you what I'll do—","and so on.","The roan was inured to it, and did not mind.","But even the poorest singer will, after a certain time, gain his own consent to refrain from contributing to the world's noises.","So the Kid, by the time he was within a mile or two of Tonia's jacal, had reluctantly allowed his song to die away—not because his vocal performance had become less charming to his own ears, but because his laryngeal muscles were aweary.","As though he were in a circus ring the speckled roan wheeled and danced through the labyrinth of pear until at length his rider knew by certain landmarks that the Lone Wolf Crossing was close at hand.","Then, where the pear was thinner, he caught sight of the grass roof of the jacal and the hackberry tree on the edge of the arroyo.","A few yards farther the Kid stopped the roan and gazed intently through the prickly openings.","Then he dismounted, dropped the roan's reins, and proceeded on foot, stooping and silent, like an Indian.","The roan, knowing his part, stood still, making no sound.","The Kid crept noiselessly to the very edge of the pear thicket and reconnoitered between the leaves of a clump of cactus.","Ten yards from his hiding-place, in the shade of the jacal, sat his Tonia calmly plaiting a raw-hide lariat.","So far she might surely escape condemnation; women have been known, from time to time, to engage in more mischievous occupations.","But if all must be told, there is to be added that her head reposed against the broad and comfortable chest of a tall red-and-yellow man, and that his arm was about her, guiding her nimble small fingers that required so many lessons at the intricate six-strand plait.","Sandridge glanced quickly at the dark mass of pear when he heard a slight squeaking sound that was not altogether unfamiliar.","A gun-scabbard will make that sound when one grasps the handle of a six-shooter suddenly.","But the sound was not repeated; and Tonia's fingers needed close attention.","And then, in the shadow of death, they began to talk of their love; and in the still July afternoon every word they uttered reached the ears of the Kid.",""Remember, then," said Tonia, "you must not come again until I send for you.","Soon he will be here.","A vaquero at the tienda said to-day he saw him on the Guadalupe three days ago.","When he is that near he always comes.","If he comes and finds you here he will kill you.","So, for my sake, you must come no more until I send you the word."",""All right," said the ranger.",""And then what?"",""And then," said the girl, "you must bring your men here and kill him.","If not, he will kill you."",""He ain't a man to surrender, that's sure," said Sandridge.",""It's kill or be killed for the officer that goes up against Mr.","Cisco Kid."",""He must die," said the girl.",""Otherwise there will not be any peace in the world for thee and me.","He has killed many.","Let him so die.","Bring your men, and give him no chance to escape."",""You used to think right much of him," said Sandridge.","Tonia dropped the lariat, twisted herself around, and curved a lemon-tinted arm over the ranger's shoulder.",""But then," she murmured in liquid Spanish, "I had not beheld thee, thou great, red mountain of a man! And thou art kind and good, as well as strong.","Could one choose him, knowing thee? Let him die; for then I will not be filled with fear by day and night lest he hurt thee or me."",""How can I know when he comes?" asked Sandridge.",""When he comes," said Tonia, "he remains two days, sometimes three.","Gregorio, the small son of old Luisa, the lavandera, has a swift pony.","I will write a letter to thee and send it by him, saying how it will be best to come upon him.","By Gregorio will the letter come.","And bring many men with thee, and have much care, oh, dear red one, for the rattlesnake is not quicker to strike than is 'El Chivato,' as they call him, to send a ball from his pistola."",""The Kid's handy with his gun, sure enough," admitted Sandridge, "but when I come for him I shall come alone.","I'll get him by myself or not at all.","The Cap wrote one or two things to me that make me want to do the trick without any help.","You let me know when Mr.","Kid arrives, and I'll do the rest."",""I will send you the message by the boy Gregorio," said the girl.",""I knew you were braver than that small slayer of men who never smiles.","How could I ever have thought I cared for him?"","It was time for the ranger to ride back to his camp on the water hole.","Before he mounted his horse he raised the slight form of Tonia with one arm high from the earth for a parting salute.","The drowsy stillness of the torpid summer air still lay thick upon the dreaming afternoon.","The smoke from the fire in the jacal, where the frijoles blubbered in the iron pot, rose straight as a plumb-line above the clay-daubed chimney.","No sound or movement disturbed the serenity of the dense pear thicket ten yards away.","When the form of Sandridge had disappeared, loping his big dun down the steep banks of the Frio crossing, the Kid crept back to his own horse, mounted him, and rode back along the tortuous trail he had come.","But not far.","He stopped and waited in the silent depths of the pear until half an hour had passed.","And then Tonia heard the high, untrue notes of his un-musical singing coming nearer and nearer; and she ran to the edge of the pear to meet him.","The Kid seldom smiled; but he smiled and waved his hat when he saw her.","He dismounted, and his girl sprang into his arms.","The Kid looked at her fondly.","His thick black hair clung to his head like a wrinkled mat.","The meeting brought a slight ripple of some undercurrent of feeling to his smooth, dark face that was usually as motionless as a clay mask.",""How's my girl?" he asked, holding her close.",""Sick of waiting so long for you, dear one," she answered.",""My eyes are dim with always gazing into that devil's pincushion through which you come.","And I can see into it such a little way, too.","But you are here, beloved one, and I will not scold.","Qué mal muchacho! not to come to see your alma more often.","Go in and rest, and let me water your horse and stake him with the long rope.","There is cool water in the jar for you."","The Kid kissed her affectionately.",""Not if the court knows itself do I let a lady stake my horse for me," Said he.",""But if you'll run in, chica, and throw a pot of coffee together while I attend to the caballo, I'll be a good deal obliged."","Besides his marksmanship the Kid had another attribute for which he admired himself greatly.","He was muy caballero, as the Mexicans express it, where the ladies were concerned.","For them he had always gentle words and consideration.","He could not have spoken a harsh word to a woman.","He might ruthlessly slay their husbands and brothers, but he could not have laid the weight of a finger in anger upon a woman.","Wherefore many of that interesting division of humanity who had come under the spell of his politeness declared their disbelief in the stories circulated about Mr.","Kid.","One shouldn't believe everything one heard, they said.","When confronted by their indignant men folk with proof of the caballero's deeds of infamy, they said maybe he had been driven to it, and that he knew how to treat a lady, anyhow.","Considering this extremely courteous idiosyncrasy of the Kid and the pride that lie took in it, one can perceive that the solution of the problem that was presented to him by what he saw and heard from his hiding-place in the pear that afternoon (at least as to one of the actors) must have been obscured by difficulties.","And yet one could not think of the Kid overlooking little matters of that kind.","At the end of the short twilight they gathered around a supper of frijoles, goat steaks, canned peaches, and coffee, by the light of a lantern in the jacal.","Afterward, the ancestor, his flock corralled, smoked a cigarette and became a mummy in a gray blanket.","Tonia washed the few dishes while the Kid dried them with the flour-sacking towel.","Her eyes shone; she chatted volubly of the inconsequent happenings of her small world since the Kid's last visit; it was as all his other home-comings had been.","Then outside Tonia swung in a grass hammock with her guitar and sang sad canciones de amor.",""Do you love me Just the same, old girl?" asked the Kid, hunting for his cigarette papers.",""Always the same, little one," said Tonia, her dark eyes lingering upon him.",""I must go over to Fink's," said the Kid, rising, "for some tobacco.","I thought I had another sack in my coat.","I'll be back in a quarter of an hour."",""Hasten," said Tonia, "and tell me—how long shall I call you my own this time? Will you be gone again to-morrow, leaving me to grieve, or will you be longer with your Tonia?"",""Oh, I might stay two or three days this trip," said the Kid, yawning.",""I've been on the dodge for a month, and I'd like to rest up."","He was gone half an hour for his tobacco.","When he returned Tonia was still lying in the hammock.",""It's funny," said the Kid, "how I feel.","I feel like there was somebody lying behind every bush and tree waiting to shoot me...","I never had mullygrubs like them before.","Maybe it's one of them presumptions I've got half a notion to light out in the morning before day.","The Guadalupe country is burning up about that old Dutchman I plugged down there."",""You are not afraid—no one could make my brave little one fear."",""Well, I haven't been usually regarded as a jack-rabbit when it comes to scrapping; but I don't want a posse smoking me out when I'm in your jacal.","Somebody might get hurt that oughtn't to."",""Remain with your Tonia; no one will find you here."","The Kid looked keenly into the shadows up and down the arroyo and toward the dim lights of the Mexican village.",""I'll see how it looks later on," was his decision.","At midnight a horseman rode into the rangers' camp, blazing his way by noisy "halloes" to indicate a pacific mission.","Sandridge and one or two others turned out to investigate the row.","The rider announced himself to be Domingo Sales, from the Lone Wolf Crossing.","He bore a letter for Senor Sandridge.","Old Luisa, the lavandera, had persuaded him to bring it, he said, her son Gregorio being too ill of a fever to ride.","Sandridge lighted the camp lantern and read the letter.","These were its words:","DEAR ONE:","He has come.","Hardly had you ridden away when he came out of the pear.","When he first talked he said he would stay three days or more.","Then as it grew later he was like a wolf or a fox, and walked about without rest, looking and listening.","Soon he said he must leave before daylight when it is dark and stillest.","And then he seemed to suspect that I be not true to him.","He looked at me so strange that I am frightened.","I swear to him that I love him, his own Tonia.","Last of all he said I must prove to him I am true.","He thinks that even now men are waiting to kill him as he rides from my house.","To escape he says he will dress in my clothes, my red skirt and the blue waist I wear and the brown mantilla over the head, and thus ride away.","But before that he says that I must put on his clothes, his pantalones and camisa and hat, and ride away on his horse from the jacal as far as the big road beyond the crossing and back again.","This before he goes, so he can tell if I am true and if men are hidden to shoot him.","It is a terrible thing.","An hour before daybreak this is to be.","Come, my dear one, and kill this man and take me for your Tonia.","Do not try to take hold of him alive, but kill him quickly.","Knowing all, you should do that.","You must come long before the time and hide yourself in the little shed near the jacal where the wagon and saddles are kept.","It is dark in there.","He will wear my red skirt and blue waist and brown mantilla.","I send you a hundred kisses.","Come surely and shoot quickly and straight.","THINE OWN TONIA.","Sandridge quickly explained to his men the official part of the missive.","The rangers protested against his going alone.",""I'll get him easy enough," said the lieutenant.",""The girl's got him trapped.","And don't even think he'll get the drop on me."","Sandridge saddled his horse and rode to the Lone Wolf Crossing.","He tied his big dun in a clump of brush on the arroyo, took his Winchester from its scabbard, and carefully approached the Perez jacal.","There was only the half of a high moon drifted over by ragged, milk-white gulf clouds.","The wagon-shed was an excellent place for ambush; and the ranger got inside it safely.","In the black shadow of the brush shelter in front of the jacal he could see a horse tied and hear him impatiently pawing the hard-trodden earth.","He waited almost an hour before two figures came out of the jacal.","One, in man's clothes, quickly mounted the horse and galloped past the wagon-shed toward the crossing and village.","And then the other figure, in skirt, waist, and mantilla over its head, stepped out into the faint moonlight, gazing after the rider.","Sandridge thought he would take his chance then before Tonia rode back.","He fancied she might not care to see it.",""Throw up your hands," he ordered, loudly, stepping out of the wagon-shed with his Winchester at his shoulder.","There was a quick turn of the figure, but no movement to obey, so the ranger pumped in the bullets—one—two—three—and then twice more; for you never could be too sure of bringing down the Cisco Kid.","There was no danger of missing at ten paces, even in that half moonlight.","The old ancestor, asleep on his blanket, was awakened by the shots.","Listening further, he heard a great cry from some man in mortal distress or anguish, and rose up grumbling at the disturbing ways of moderns.","The tall, red ghost of a man burst into the jacal, reaching one hand, shaking like a tule reed, for the lantern hanging on its nail.","The other spread a letter on the table.",""Look at this letter, Perez" cried the man.",""Who wrote it?"",""Ah, Dios! it is Senor Sandridge," mumbled the old man, approaching.",""Pues, senor, that letter was written by 'El Chivato,' as he is called—by the man of Tonia.","They say he is a bad man; I do not know.","While Tonia slept he wrote the letter and sent it by this old hand of mine to Domingo Sales to be brought to you.","Is there anything wrong in the letter? I am very old; and I did not know.","Valgame Dios! it is a very foolish world; and there is nothing in the house to drink—nothing to drink."","Just then all that Sandridge could think of to do was to go outside and throw himself face downward in the dust by the side of his humming-bird, of whom not a feather fluttered.","He was not a caballero by instinct, and he could not understand the niceties of revenge.","A mile away the rider who had ridden past the wagon-shed struck up a harsh, untuneful song, the words of which began:","Don't you monkey with my Lulu girl","Or I'll tell you what I'll do—","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","The Caballero's Way","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/cisco.html","31.5","29 Sep 2003");
Page[8]=new Array("BACKSTAGE MEMORIES OF ABC-TV","PART ONE: THE PAGE STAFF AND GUEST RELATIONS","by Tom Mason","I came to ABC HOLLYWOOD shortly after my graduation from UCLA (Theater Arts/Radio TV Division).","After graduation, I had attended a radio school to secure a FCC Radiotelephone Operator’s First Class License that was very valuable in securing a job in the industry.","Starting out in the television industry is difficult.","I had a series of interviews with radio and TV stations and most all of them were in the "sticks" for no money.","Fortunately, I had a close friend from UCLA who had secured employment with ABC as a page in their guest relations department.","I signed on as a part-time page and was on my way.","I believe my starting wage was $1.60 an hour.","The behind the scene stories started in the page staff.","Here are just a few of those behind the scenes moments.","I was assigned to a daily kiddie birthday show called Chucko the Clown.","Two birthday children, their parents and guests would gather at an extremely early hour in the morning under the guidance of another page/partner and myself.","We would get them all to the rest room and guide them, and their party to seating in the studio.","After that, they were in the hands of Chucko, a marvelous performer who was great with children.","The children were treated to fresh orange juice and tons of Birthday cake, along with balloons.","It was a fun time for them.","One memory that remains with me was a time when we were lining up the children outside the restrooms in preparation for going into studio A.","The mother of one of the birthday children raised her hand and said she had to get her little girl "dressed." There, in front of everyone outside she stripped her little girl naked and completely redressed her in front of everyone in the chilled morning air, the little girl was just one big goose bump.","This accomplished; we then went into the studio.","Our Chucko on-air announcer was a famous personality who was nearing the end of his career in broadcasting.","He drank a bit: heck; he drank a whole lot.","Even plastered, the guy was a pro, but that was only if he showed up in the booth.","A young announcer, Mark Lawrence, started his career at KABC by just being around to sub for the missing announcer and later on went on to be a staff weatherman with the station for many years.","Next door to Chucko on Stage B was the new soap at the network, General Hospital.","Each morning the technical director sneaked onto our set so he could scrounge his breakfast of orange juice and birthday cake.","General Hospital was one of the first shows to use body pack wireless microphones.","At that time we were using industrial units and the microphones were large lavaliere mics about twice the bulk of your thumb and hidden under their hospital gowns.","We soon found that the mics did not like rubbing against the nylon doctor gowns; they created a static electric charge and a swishing noise.","We finally ended up wrapping the mics in Teflon tape to remedy that.","Due to the size of the hidden mics there were some drawbacks.","Once, the lead, Dr.","Hardy, leaned over to kiss his current love, a nurse, and their microphones collided on camera.","It sounded like two tanks crashing into each other.","Later on, with the the advances in design of small lapel microphones, the embarrassing technical problems were eliminated.","Many entertaining moments were provided to the engineering staff as the actors would often go into the restrooms with their mics still turned on…aside from the obvious, there were conversations that covered everything from their latest plastic surgeries to their love lives.","The engineers always prayed that no actor would accidentally drop a transmitter pack into the toilets, as the acids present immediately attack the circuit boards and there would be a scramble to attach a new unit and make adjustments for different frequencies.","One of the big shows of the sixties was Queen For A Day starring Jack Bailey.","ABC telecast this show from the former Errol Carrol’s Vanities Theater on Sunset Boulevard.","in the midst of Hollywood.","It was a cattle call.","Hundreds of women would line up for hours in the hope of being chosen as a candidate for "Queen" where they might win kitchen appliances etc.","As a page, keeping people contained in the lines was a real job.","I once encountered a pregnant young lady in the beginning throes of labor who refused to even sit down as she thought she might lose her place in line.","One family in line had come directly from the funeral of one of their children who had been burned to death in a fire that had destroyed their home.","The lady of the house was proudly announcing to all in the line that she would be “QUEEN FOR A DAY” as nobody had as sad a story as hers.","One thing she did not know was that the series was basically an entertainment show and such genuine tragedy did not play well on camera.","The show producers were aware of her presence and warned us all to keep an eye on her table when she was led in.","All audience members were seated at tables and were "allowed" to buy themselves lunch.","A more nasty fare was never put before people.","We got our lunch free and were all warned that only one meal was edible and we always picked that one.","Back to the show…sure enough, as the contestants were announced, our fire victim was not among them.","A gasp escaped her and she stood up and began to rush the stage and the host Jack Bailey.","Fortunately, we caught her and managed to remove her, sobbing, along with her embarrassed family from the premises.","I asked off this show as soon as possible, even Chucko the Clown was preferable.","One of the most desirable shows to work was The Soupy Sales Show.","Soupy was taped late at night with no audience.","The funny moments that happened on that show were often the completely un- predictable ones that were off-camera.","Soupy lived in his house with his puppet dogs "White Fang and Black Tooth" and a little Lion puppet "Pookie" that was always getting him into trouble.","Soupy often was hit in the face with a pie.","I would watch Bobby, the prop man generously fill small pie crusts with shaving cream.","Upon impact, the sound effect engineer would fire a live .38 blank pistol to punctuate the pie hitting Soupy.","The big gimmick was that somebody would knock on Soupy’s door, he would open it and a comedy bit would insue.","The audience at home never saw who was at the door, as the talented Clyde Adler (who supplied voices for the dogs and the lion) did all the voices behind the door as well.","Soupy often times was unaware of what was going to happen.","A case in point would be when the knock came to the door and Soupy answered it and there was a completely naked woman with balloons and music being supplied by David Rose’s recording of “The Stripper”.","Soupy had to adlib himself out of that one fast, but she kept coming to the door and knocking repeatedly during the show.","Another time, the door knock came, and Soupy went to the door where there was a live cow … Clyde once again supplied the voice of the cow.","The bit was that the cow asked Soupy if he would like to hear his "horn" and supposedly jazz trumpet sounds would issue forth from the cow’s real horns.","Well, the complication came from the fact that stagehands were pushing the cow to keep her in the doorway.","All of a sudden, she got a call to nature and let loose all over the floor, causing the two stage hands to slip in the mess and fall on their behinds into the big gift the cow had given them.","The entire studio was in an uproar, but Soupy had to recover in such a way that he kept the show going for the audience at home, who saw none of this.","He did so with great success.","Soupy always said that he never did a show for kiddies, and he was right.","It just looked like a kids show.","One time Soupy edged up to the camera and told the kids to go into their parents bedroom when they were asleep and remove from their wallets and purses those "little green pieces of paper" and then send them to him at the station.","Lots of dollar bills were sent to Soupy to the station’s embarrassment.","Soupy got called into the office for that one.","Soupy stories at the station are legend.","Roy Rogers and Dale Evans did a comedy variety show from ABC in 1963 and it was a real revelation to us all.","Roy was just the friendliest down-to-earth guy around.","He loved to talk with the stagehands, as some of them had been actors in a few of his Westerns before television killed the B-Westerns.","He would hide out backstage with the behind-the-scenes people until he was missed.","Now, Dale Evans was another matter, she pretty much told Roy what to do and many of us thought that while Roy may have ridden into the studio on Trigger, we all knew that Dale had ridden in on a broom.","To Roy’s credit, he never had a bad word to say about anyone and dearly loved Dale and it showed on and off-camera.","One time Roy had as guests on his show Cliff Arquette and Martha Raye…during their rehearsals, they turned the air blue with their sexual innuendoes and Roy and Dale beat a path to their dressing rooms.","If the rehearsals had ever been taped they would have to have been rated “X”.","The night of the taping of that show, Cliff alerted the page staff to watch the visitors lining up as he was expecting a "special guest".","Sure enough there was a "lady" in line telling everyone that she was to be Cliff’s guest.","She looked like the personification of a hooker.","We informed Cliff jokingly about her and he told us to immediately show her to his dressing room.","The lady must have had talent, but somehow she never made it out of his dressing room.","I began to move up in the page staff.","I became a cue-card person.","It got me out of the gaudy uniform and permitted me a degree of status.","I did cues on Lawrence Welk’s live TV show (more about the Welk Show in another article) and game shows such as Seven Keys with Jack Narz.","Jack Narz had started as a staff announcer at KABC in the 1950s.","He did commercials on Space Patrol, pushing Ralston cereals, Nestle’s Quik and told us often to send in our boxtops for those great premiums.",";He was a master of reading cue cards.","The first time I held cards for the wonderland of prizes on Seven Keys, a big game show in the 60s, I was shaking like a leaf.","Jack had no difficulty reading my shaking cards expertly and came over during a commercial break and congratulated me for my first time under fire.","He was a nice man, well liked, and very professional.","One evening the senior cue card page on the show arrived wearing white pants.","He was going over some last minute changes on the cards and leaned across the table where the large marker pens were and instantly there were two big black dots in the crotch area of his new white pants.","He would not go on camera that way and went to clean the area.","He flooded it with ink remover and got the annoying spots out, but he also soaked his genital area with the remover.","It soaked through his clothing to his bare skin underneath.","The ink remover was naptha based and could burn sensitive areas.","As he stood holding cards for Jack, the naphtha made it to his bare skin and he was on fire.","He stood at the side of the camera doing a little dance while he changed cards as professionally as he could.","Jack was trying to conceal his amusement at seeing this weird behavior, but he carried on as usual.","When he found out what had caused the cue card dance, he got an even bigger laugh out of it.","My friend failed to see the humor.","Pinky Lee did a kiddy show for a period of time at ABC and his history as a baggy pants comedian in burlesque and as a foil in B-Westerns had never quite left him.","Like many performers, he sort of worked on two levels…the jokes were there and the kids loved him, but there were also a lot of inside jokes contained in his material that were played to the crew.","One day on set, it was his birthday and a hooker arrived from some friend who thought it would be a great gag-gift.","Pinky accepted the “gift” and disappeared with her into his dressing room.","He did an especially funny show that day for the children.","After toiling in the page staff for about eight months, I was called into the chief engineer’s office to be interviewed and was accepted into engineering.","At at the end of the summer season, I was made a permanent staff member at the network.","I was finally on my way into the technical side of the business that I loved.","I would not trade my experiences in the page staff for anything, but I was glad to get out of there and into what I had trained for.","Even more funny occurrences happened in engineering.","Those stories will be shared at another time…stay tuned.","Copyright Tom Mason 2001","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","Backstage Memories Of ABC-TV Part One: The Page Staff And Guest Relations","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/abc1.html","17","29 Sep 2003");
Page[9]=new Array("Tom Mix: The Curley Bradley Years","by Tom Mason","I was too young, at the time, to know the real and legendary Tom Mix of silent movie fame.","He had only made one talkie serial and I had not seen it.","I found Tom Mix through the magic of radio.","I was even too young to know that more than one actor had actually “impersonated” him over the airwaves.","I started listening to the Ralston Straight Shooters in the mid 1940s.","The radio show had debuted in 1933, a year before I was born.","The first actor to play him was Artells Dickson, he was followed by Jack Holden, then Russell Thorson, and finally; Joseph “Curley” Bradley who lasted until the show was cancelled in 1950.","Curley Bradley had actually been one of the stuntmen who had worked in the movies on the real Tom Mix movies.","He sang with a group called The Ranch Boys Trio.","He played the part of “Pecos” on the Tom Mix radio show and sang often.","He had a nice light, baritone voice and it stood him in good stead when he took over the part of Tom Mix when Russell Thorson left the show.","He sang out for Ralston Cereal at the beginning of the show to the tune of “When It’s Round-up Time In Texas”:","Hot Ralston for your breakfast, start the day off shining bright.","Gives you lots of cowboy energy, with a flavor that’s just right.","Made of golden western wheat.","So take a tip from Tom,","go and tell your Mom,","hot Ralston can’t be beat!","Who could resist, especially when we needed those box-tops for the wonderful TM-Bar premiums from “Checkerboard Square”?","Checkerboard Square was the address where we mailed those box-tops and our coins to secure wonderful premiums that helped us relive Tom Mix&#146s adventures in the wild west.","It is a fact that the premiums lasted over a year beyond the cancellation of the show in 1950.","I always thought Captain Midnight was the king of the premiums, I certainly drank enough Ovaltine to make it seem so.","The truth is, Tom Mix was really the king.","Over his years on radio he made almost 150 offers of western gear, guns, compasses, watch fobs, spinner charms, a movie make-up kit, magnifiers, rings, arrowheads, comics, caps, bandanas, identification bracelets, paper face masks, telephone sets, telegraph sets, lassos, spurs, belts, spyglasses, badges and even a live baby turtle was offered in a newspaper ad for two box-tops (or one box-top and a thin dime).","If you were unsure of what was there to order, Ralston offered a Premium Catalog from 1936 through 1940.","There were so many premiums waiting in the wings, that they continued for at least another year after the show was cancelled.","One of the premiums that remains in my memory, was the compass- magnifier combination.","It started out plain, with nothing to tell us it was a TM-Bar product, but then it changed.","It added a few western touches and that TM-Bar brand, ten years later it became a glow-in- the-dark plastic arrowhead that housed the compass and magnifier.","That was the one I got.","I wish I still had mine.","The success of that arrowhead gave rise to another called “The Signal Arrowhead”.","It was made of clear lucite plastic, it had a magniying lens, a “smallifying lens” (it reduced things in size) , a whirling siren whistle and a set of musical pipes built into it.","Oddly enough, it did not glow in the dark.","There were badges declaring you a Straight Shooter.","There was even a decoder that made me wonder if Captain Midnight had passed his overflow onto Tom.","By far, one of the worst premiums offered by ole Tom was “The Wooden Six-shooter”.","It sounded great over the radio, but when it arrived, it was just a piece of wood cut out to look like a western pistol.","There were no moving parts.","It did nothing but take up space.","I could have carved one out at least as good myself.","I thought to myself, “what a gyp!” Tom had first offered one of these in 1933, but that model at least opened and the cylinder spun around.","I was born too late.","So I would sit at the radio, pencil poised waiting for that latest offer, knowing full well I would have to promise Mom that I would really eat the cereal this time if she bought it for me.","The most difficult promise to keep was the one where I said I would eat all the Hot Ralston cereal.","It was tasteless and I had to find a way to make it palatable.","I found that if I sprinkled chocolate flavored Ovaltine over it, it wasn’t too bad.","I didn’t think Captain Midnight would mind.","By the fifties, Tom just did not have the spark to carry on and Ralston dropped him to pick up Buzz Corry, Major Robbie Robertson, Cadet Happy, Carol, Tonga, Dr.","Ryland Scarno and the evil Prince Bacharatti…all of SPACE PATROL! And best of all, we could see them every day and on weekends on that new thing: television (eventually Space Patrol crossed back to radio as an added treat).","So now I rode a sleek space ship called Terra V instead of a horse.","Tony had been put out to pasture.","The anticipation of what Ralston might have waiting out there among the United Planets was almost too much to bear.","I started saving box-tops.","Ralston did not disappoint me and if you want to know what gems were out there in space, tune in next time.","It’s quite a story.","(see Tom's Space Patrol article in this issue)","© 2000 by Tom Mason","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","Tom Mix:  The Curley Bradley Years","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/tommix.htm","8.2","29 Sep 2003");
Page[10]=new Array("BATTLESTAR GALACTICA MEMORIES","by Tom Mason","The year was 1978…Star Wars was hot in the memories of science fiction fans.","John Dykstra had done the special effects for that film and when news got around that he had partnered with Glen Larson to do an outer space series of TV movies for the ABC Television Network, anticipation grew.","I was at KABC-TV in Hollywood, working in engineering and was assigned to a screening of the pilot episode of Battlestar Galactica for the network’s affiliates and some of the press.","We had forgone the small screening rooms and taken over our largest studio stage and installed large screens and stadium seating for the viewers to watch this much anticipated show.","The lights were dimmed and the tape rolled…","Nobody was disappointed.","It was the first time I had ever seen an audience of industry people react to a screening like they did.","There was applause and cheering, even I was surprised at what we were viewing.","The network was hoping for a favorable reaction but they had not expected the enthusiastic response and they realized they had a hit here.","Larson and Dykstra had conceived of Battlestar Galactica as a series of "movie specials" to be aired periodically on the network.","But ABC wanted more of what they knew would be a ratings winner.","They proposed a three-hour premiere on the network and then a weekly one-hour show thereafter.","Against Dykstra’s protests, an edited feature version of the proposed 3-hour pilot was released to theaters.","Dykstra had shot the effects with the small TV screen in mind and that allowed him to cut a few corners technically.","He knew that the slight imperfections in the effects would glaringly show up on the big screen.","However, it was released in Canada and proved a success, and shortly after, it played in the United States to packed houses eager for more Star Wars type action.","On the 17th of September 1978, Battlestar Galactica premiered on the full ABC Television Network.","It was a hit.","Again, against Dykstra’s protests, Larson finally agreed to a weekly one hour series Sunday nights on the network.","Episodes that were originally planned to air in movie-length slots were edited into two one-hour episodes that would air on consecutive Sunday nights.","Broad edits were made that left many key elements lying on the cutting room floor.","As Larson went through the footage already shot, he was pushed to get enough product to fill the whole weekly season.","Some scripts were way below par and at times they were shooting at night on the Universal lot.","The pace could not be sustained and gradually the series began to burn itself out.","The network was of no great help.","They wanted ratings.","They were not getting them any longer.","After twenty-one airings, it was cancelled.","What had happened to this once exciting show? What could be done to save the show? ABC had the answer: fool with the format and lose all sight of what it initially was trying to do.","Battlestar Galactica 1980 was about to be foisted upon us.","Ten new airings were attempted and ended with “The Return of Starbuck,” one of the better episodes, but it was too late.","Battlestar Galactica passed into the graveyard of cancelled TV series.","Battlestar Galactica has spawned a whole network of fans and there are many Internet sites devoted to its memory and eventual resurrection.","A movement to revive the show in either a movie or TV format is quite actively being pursued by Richard Hatch, one of the leading actors in the series.","Hatch has always taken his participation in Battlestar quite seriously and has a high regard for the project.","Battlestar was the subject for a comic book series that was published by Marvel Comics some years ago.","The past few years have seen new comic material released in at least two new series from independent publishers and one is current right now.","The music on the show was written by Glen Larson and Stu Phillips and is still available today on a soundtrack CD as well as a labor-of-love project deluxe set recorded in Germany with the majority of the “lost” music themes preserved on it.","Battlestar never generated premiums from the show like Space Patrol did, but it marketed an extensive line of toys, Books, videos, recordings and clothing.","That is a subject to pursue another time, as the list is quite extensive.","VISITING THE GALACTICA SET","A friend of mine was doing special effects on the show at the Universal lot.","He often invited me to the set to look around and watch some of the filming going on for Battlestar.","I was shown the hanger where all the viper ships were supposed to launch from.","I believe I recall seeing two actual ships constructed with a diorama behind them with a forced perspective painting of the rest of the fleet, thus giving the effect of many ships lined up ready to go.","A bit of movie trickery and a cost cutter as the budget on the series was fairly large for a TV show.","I am a firm believer that the most useful tool to moviemakers is the hot glue gun.","They use it everywhere.","Looking at all those flashing lights and control boards is a real experience, but when you look behind the facade, they are a jumble of wires jury-rigged as needed with no plan or organization, an absolute twisted mess, but they look good on camera.","Most all the miniatures and shooting of them were done at John Dykstra’s Apogee facility off the Universal lot.","Dykstra had constructed the main hand prop prototypes and then given them to Universal for duplication.","His people designed one of the most complicated, and to my mind, the most unique of handguns; the blaster pistol used by the forces of the Galactica.","It was molded of heavy plastic and sported an intricate design on its surface, due mainly to all the assorted model parts affixed to it.","There were pieces from tank and airplane models glued to it.","The nosepiece was made from a kitchen faucet handle that had been turned on a lathe.","Inside the nose was an airplane strobe light that was powered by a very high voltage battery.","A wire was plugged into the base of the gun’s grips and concealed by running it down the actor’s sleeve and clothing to the battery.","Depressing a microswitch “trigger” on the gun fired the strobe.","This strobe effect was used in postproduction to mark where the rotoscoped laser blast would appear on the frames of film and give the effect of coming from the gun.","In all, I was told that there were six actual working guns of this type in existence and the rest were dummy vacuformed props given to lesser characters.","Velcro was used extensively in fastening the tunics and clothing.","The bullet-like cartridges were nothing more than ink markers that had been sprayed a metallic color.","The Cylons were one of the costume designs of Jean-Pierre Dorleac and effectively menacing.","The helmets with their moving eye were made to work effectively by Michael Lantieri (an Oscar winner in later years for Jurassic Park).","He utilized electronic techniques and dozens of “grain of wheat” bulbs in the visor that were triggered into one smooth movement.","All this was powered by a battery of course.","Being a Cylon meant that you fell down and ran into things a lot.","As effective as the look of the helmet was, seeing out of it was another matter.","A series of tiny holes that would not show up on camera were drilled in their helmets where the actor’s eyes should be.","Seeing out of them was another matter.","It was almost impossible and many takes were needed so they would not be seen stumbling into doors and falling over after tripping on small objects that would not bother us normally.","An effort was made in one episode to have them ride horses and that was scrapped after they repeatedly fell off them.","(Want to see more Cylons? Click Here.)","The creation of the pet Muffit Two (a mechanical droid daggit) manufactured for the young orphan boy Boxey in the show was a logistical headache.","They placed a trained chimpanzee into the costume.","Many of the actors on the show thought he and his trainer were getting more money than they were earning.","Getting Muffit to hit his marks on cue was a bit of a problem at times.","The money created for the show was one place they did not skimp.","The unit was called a “cubit” and was cast from durable metal in a gold-like finish.","There were several styles made.","There must have been quite a few of them manufactured for the show as they turn up regularly at conventions and at the Ebay auction site on line.","I have several of them in my collection.","Pieces of high tech equipment were scavenged from everywhere, the medical communicator was actually an old 4 track stereo indicator that was mounted into a very scientific looking vacuformed plastic hand held device activated by a microswitch button and powered by a 9V battery.","A trade deal was struck with the Tektronix Company for working units of scopes and monitors to be incorporated into the control area of the Galactica.","It gave a genuine high tech look to the show and allowed them to play tapes on the monitors and show readings on the scopes.","This was a giant step forward over something like Star Trek, which had faked screens and scopes that were often with just representations of displays pasted on the facade screens.","Nobody could dispute that Galactica looked real.","What is fascinating about Battlestar Galactica is that it still lives on in the memories of its fans and creates a demand for new material.","A look on Ebay brings up upwards of 400 items for auction ranging from comic books, videos, toys and actual props from the show…some of them are really genuine, while many are faked reproductions.","Talks continue to this day for a new feature film based on the series.","Galactica may one day live again to continue its journey searching for its home planet Earth.","Want to see some more Galactica pictures? Click here.","©2001 by Tom Mason","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","Battlestar Galactica Memories","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/bsg.html","13.6","29 Sep 2003");
Page[11]=new Array("THE NICKELODEONS","by Joseph Medill Patterson","We are so accustomed to thinking of the tiny nickelodeons as things of the past we seldom realize that at one time they were such novelties that many Americans had not stepped inside one.","That's why The Saturday Evening Post saw fit to devote a detailed article to describing those curious storefront amusement centers just off Main Street.","The author, Joseph Medill Patterson, would become a major figure in journalism when, after serving in World War I, he established New York's famed tabloid, the Daily News.","Captain Patterson's cousin, incidentally, was Colonel Robert McCormick, publisher of the Chicago Tribune.","As the years went by the Tribune-News syndicate introduced some of the country's most durable comic strips, from The Gumps and Gasoline Alley to Little Orphan Annie and Dick Tracy.","Here is Patterson's portrait of the nickelodeons as it appeared in the Post issue of November 23, 1907.","-RWS","THREE YEARS AGO there was not a nickelodeon, or five-cent theatre devoted to moving-picture shows, in America.","To-day there are between four and five thousand running and solvent, and the number is still increasing rapidly.","This is the boom time in the moving-picture business.","Everybody is making money—manufacturers, renters, jobbers, exhibitors.","Over-production looms up as a certainty of the near future; but now, as one press-agent said enthusiastically, "this line is a Klondike."","The nickelodeon is tapping an entirely new stratum of people, is developing into theatregoers a section of population that formerly knew and cared little about the drama as a fact in life.","That is why "this line is a Klondike" just at present.","Incredible as it may seem, over two million people on the average attend the nickelodeons every day of the year, and a third of these are children.","Let us prove up this estimate.","The agent for the biggest firm of film renters in the country told me that the average expense of running a nickelodeon was from $175 to $200 a week, divided as follows:","Wage of manager $25","Wage of operator 20","Wage of doorman 15","Wage of porter or musician 12","Rent of films (two reels changed twice a week) 50","Rent of projecting machine 10","Rent of building 40","Music, printing, "campaign contributions," etc.","Total $190","Merely to meet expenses, then, the average nickelodeon must have a weekly attendance of 4000.","This gives all the nickelodeons 16,000,000 a week, or over 2,000,000 a day.","Two million people a day are needed before profits can begin, and the two million are forthcoming.","It is a big thing, this new enterprise.","The nickelodeon is usually a tiny theatre, containing 199 seats, giving from twelve to eighteen performances a day, seven days a week.","Its walls are painted red.","The seats are ordinary kitchen chairs, not fastened.","The only break in the red color scheme is made by half a dozen signs, in black and white,","and sometimes, but not always,","The spectatorium is one story high, twenty-five feet wide and about seventy feet deep.","Last year or the year before it was probably a second-hand clothier's, a pawnshop or cigar store.","Now, the counter has been ripped out, there is a ticket-seller's booth where the show-window was, an automatic musical barker somewhere up in the air thunders its noise down on the passersby, and the little store has been converted into a theatrelet.","Not a theatre, mind you, for theatres must take out theatrical licenses at $500 a year.","Theatres seat two hundred or more people.","Nickelodeons seat 199, and take out amusement licenses.","This is the general rule.","But sometimes nickelodeon proprietors in favorable locations take out theatrical licenses and put in 800 or 1000 seats.","In Philadelphia there is, perhaps, the largest nickelodeon in America.","It is said to pay not only the theatrical license, but also $30,000 a year ground rent and a handsome profit.","To-day there is cutthroat competition between the little nickelodeon owners, and they are beginning to compete each other out of existence.","Already consolidation has set in.","Film-renting firms are quietly beginning to pick up, here and there, a few nickelodeons of their own; presumably they will make better rates and give prompter service to their own theatrelets than to those belonging to outsiders.","The tendency is clearly toward fewer, bigger, cleaner five-cent theatres and more expensive shows.","Hard as this may be on the little showman who is forced out, it is good for the public, who will, in consequence, get more for their money.","The character of the attendance varies with the locality, but, whatever the locality, children make up about thirty-three per cent of the crowds.","For some reason, young women from sixteen to thirty years old are rarely in evidence, but many middle-aged and old women are steady patrons, who never, when a new film is to be shown, miss the opening.","In cosmopolitan city districts the foreigners attend in larger proportion than the English-speakers.","This is doubtless because the foreigners, shut out as they are by their alien tongues from much of the life about them, can yet perfectly understand the pantomime of the moving pictures.","As might be expected, the Latin races patronize the shows more consistently than Jews, Irish or Americans.","Sailors of all races are devotees.","Most of the shows have musical accompaniments.","The enterprising manager usually engages a human pianist with instructions to play Eliza-crossing-the-ice when the scene is shuddery, and fast ragtime in a comic kid chase.","Where there is little competition, however, the manager merely presses the button and starts the automatic going, which is as apt as not to bellow out, I'd Rather Two-Step Than Waltz, Bill, just as the angel rises from the brave little hero-cripple's corpse.","The moving pictures were used as chasers in vaudeville houses for several years before the advent of the nickelodeon.","The cinematograph or vitagraph or biograph or kinetoscope (there are seventy-odd names for the same machine) was invented in 1888-1889.","Mr.","Edison is said to have contributed most toward it, though several other inventors claim part of the credit.","The first very successful pictures were those of the Corbett-Fitzsimmons fight at Carson City, Nevada, in 1897.","These films were shown all over the country to immense crowds and an enormous sum of money was made by the exhibitors.","The Jeffries-Sharkey fight of twenty-five rounds at Coney Island, in November, 1899, was another popular success.","The contest being at night, artificial light was necessary, and 500 arc lamps were placed above the ring.","Four cameras were used.","While one was snapping the fighters, a second was being focused at them, a third was being reloaded, and a fourth was held in reserve in case of breakdown.","Over seven miles of film were exposed and 198,000 pictures, each 2 by 3 inches, were taken.","This fight was taken at the rate of thirty pictures to the second.","The 500 arc lamps above the ring generated a temperature of about 115 degrees for the gladiators to fight in.","When the event was concluded, Mr.","Jeffries was overheard to remark that for no amount of money would he ever again in his life fight in such heat, pictures or no pictures.","And he never has.","Since that mighty fight, manufacturers have learned a good deal about cheapening their process.","Pictures instead of being 2 by 3 inches are now 5/8 by 1 1/8 inches, and are taken sixteen instead of thirty to the second, for the illusion to the eye of continuous motion is as perfect at one rate as the other.","By means of a ratchet each separate picture is made to pause a twentieth of a second before the magic-lantern lens, throwing an enlargement to life size upon the screen.","Then, while the revolving shutter obscures the lens, one picture is dropped and another substituted, to make in turn its twentieth of a second display.","The films are, as a rule, exhibited at the rate at which they are taken, though chase scenes are usually thrown faster, and horse races, fire-engines and fast-moving automobiles slower, than the life-speed.","Within the past year an automatic process to color films has been discovered by a French firm.","The pigments are applied by means of a four- color machine stencil.","Beyond this bare fact, the process remains a secret of the inventors.","The stencil must do its work with extraordinary accuracy, for any minute error in the application of color to outline made upon the 5/8 by 1 1/8 inches print is magnified 200 times when thrown upon the screen by the magnifying lens.","The remarkable thing about this automatic colorer is that it applies the pigment in slightly different outline to each successive print of a film 700 feet long.","Colored films sell for about fifty per cent more than black and whites.","Tinted films— browns, blues, oranges, violets, greens and so forth—are made by washing, and sell at but one per cent over the straight price.","The films are obtained in various ways.",""Straight" shows, where the interest depends on the dramatist's imagination and the setting, are merely playlets acted out before the rapid-fire camera.","Each manufacturing firm owns a studio with property-room, dressing-rooms and a completely-equipped stage.","The actors are experienced professionals of just below the first rank, who are content to make from $18 to $25 a week.","In France a class of moving-picture specialists has grown up who work only for the cameras, but in this country most of the artists who play in the film studios in the daytime play also behind the footlights at night.","The studio manager orders rehearsals continued until his people have their parts "face-perfect," then he gives the word, the lens is focused, the cast works rapidly for twenty minutes while the long strip of celluloid whirs through the camera, and the performance is preserved in living, dynamic embalmment (if the phrase may be permitted) for decades to come.","Eccentric scenes, such as a chalk marking the outlines of a coat upon a piece of cloth, the scissors cutting to the lines, the needle sewing, all automatically without human help, often require a week to take.","The process is ingenious.","First the scissors and chalk are laid upon the edge of the cloth.","The picture is taken.","The camera is stopped, the scissors are moved a quarter of an inch into the cloth, the chalk is drawn a quarter of an inch over the cloth.","The camera is opened again and another picture is taken showing the quarter-inch cut and quarter-inch mark.","The camera is closed, another quarter inch is cut and chalked; another exposure is made.","When these pictures so slowly obtained are run off rapidly, the illusion of fast self-action on the part of the scissors, chalk and needle is produced.","Sometimes in a nickelodeon you can see on the screen a building completely wrecked in five minutes.","Such a film was obtained by focusing a camera at the building, and taking every salient move of the wreckers for the space, perhaps, of a fortnight.","When these separate prints, obtained at varying intervals, some of them perhaps a whole day apart, are run together continuously, the appearance is of a mighty stone building being pulled to pieces like a house of blocks.","Such eccentric pictures were in high demand a couple of years ago, but now the straight-story show is running them out.","The plots are improving every year in dramatic technique.","Manufacturing firms pay from $5 to $25 for good stories suitable for film presentation, and it is astonishing how many sound dramatic ideas are submitted by people of insufficient education to render their thoughts into English suitable for the legitimate stage.","The moving-picture actors are becoming excellent pantomimists, which is natural, for they cannot rely on the playwright's lines to make their meanings.","I remember particularly a performance I saw near Spring Street on the Bowery, where the pantomime seemed to me in nowise inferior to that of Mademoiselle Pilar-Morin, the French pantomimist.","The nickelodeon spectators readily distinguish between good and bad acting, though they do not mark their pleasure or displeasure audibly, except very rarely, in a comedy scene, by a suppressed giggle.","During the excellent show of which I have spoken, the men, women and children maintained a steady stare of fascination at the changing figures on the scene, and toward the climax, when forgiveness was cruelly denied, lips were parted and eyes filled with tears.","It was as much a tribute to the actors as the loudest bravos ever shouted in the Metropolitan Opera House.","To-day a consistent plot is demanded.","There must be, as in the drama, exposition, development, climax and denouement.","The most popular films run from fifteen to twenty minutes and are from five hundred to eight hundred feet long.","One studio manager said: "The people want a story.","We run to comics generally; they seem to take best.","So-and-so, however, lean more to melodrama.","When we started, we used to give just flashes—an engine chasing to a fire, a base-runner sliding home, a charge of cavalry.","Now, for instance, if we want to work in a horse race it has to be as a scene in the life of the jockey, who is the hero of the piece—we've got to give them a story; they won't take anything else—a story with plenty of action.","You can't show large conversation, you know, on the screen.","More story, larger story, better story with plenty of action—that is our tendency."","Civilization, all through the history of mankind, has been chiefly the property of the upper classes, but during the past century civilization has been permeating steadily downward.","The leaders of this democratic movement have been general education, universal suffrage, cheap periodicals and cheap travel.","To-day the moving-picture machine cannot be overlooked as an effective protagonist of democracy.","For through it the drama, always a big fact in the lives of the people at the top, is now becoming a big fact in the lives of the people at the bottom.","Two million of them a day have so found a new interest in life.","The prosperous Westerners, who take their week or fortnight, fall and spring, in New York, pay two dollars and a half for a seat at a problem play, a melodrama, a comedy or a show-girl show in a Broadway theatre.","The stokers who have driven the Deutschland or the Lusitania from Europe pay five cents for a seat at a problem play, a melodrama, a comedy or a show-girl show in a Bowery nickelodeon.","What is the difference?","The stokers, sitting on the hard, wooden chairs of the nickelodeon, experience the same emotional flux and counter-flux (more intense is their experience, for they are not as blase) as the prosperous Westerners in their red plush orchestra chairs, uptown.","The sentient life of the half-civilized beings at the bottom has been enlarged and altered, by the introduction of the dramatic motif, to resemble more closely the sentient life of the civilized beings at the top.","Take an analogous case.","Is aimless travel "beneficial" or not? It is amusing, certainly; and, therefore, the aristocrats who could afford it have always traveled aimlessly.","But now, says the Democratic Movement, the grand tour shall no longer be restricted to the aristocracy.","Jump on the rural trolley-car, Mr.","Workingman, and make a grand tour yourself.","Don't care, Mr.","Workingman, whether it is "beneficial" or not.","Do it because it is amusing; just as the aristocrats do.","The film makers cover the whole gamut of dramatic attractions.","The extremes in the film world are as far apart as the extremes in the theatrical world—as far apart, let us say, as The Master Builder and The Gay White Way.","If you look up the moving-picture advertisements in any vaudeville trade paper you cannot help being struck with this fact.","For instance, in a current number, one firm offers the following variety of attractions:","Romany's Revenge (very dramatic) 300 feet","Johnny's Run (comic kid chase) 300 "","Roof to Cellar (absorbing comedy) 782 "","Wizard's World (fantastic comedy) 350 "","Sailor's Return (highly dramatic) 535 "","A Mother's Sin (beautiful, dramatic and moral) 392 "","Knight Errant (old historical drama) 421 "","Village Fire Brigade (big laugh) 325 "","Catch the Kid (a scream) 270 "","The Coroner's Mistake (comic ghost story) 430 "","Fatal Hand (dramatic) 432 "","Another firm advertises in huge type, in the trade papers:","LIFE AND PASSION OF CHRIST","Five Parts, Thirty-nine Pictures,","3114 feet .","Price, $373.68","Extra for coloring .","125.10","The presentation by the picture machines of the Passion Play in this country was undertaken with considerable hesitation.","The films had been shown in France to huge crowds, but here, so little were even professional students of American lower-class taste able to gauge it in advance, that the presenters feared the Passion Play might be boycotted, if not, indeed, in some places, mobbed.","On the contrary, it has been the biggest success ever known to the business.","Last year incidents leading up to the murder of Stanford White were shown, succeeded enormously for a very few weeks, then flattened out completely and were withdrawn.","Film people are as much at sea about what their crowds will like as the managers in the "legitimate."","Although the gourdlike growth of the nickelodeon business as a factor in the conscious life of Americans is not yet appreciated, already a good many people are disturbed by what they do know of the thing.","Those who are "interested in the poor" are wondering whether the five-cent theatre is a good influence, and asking themselves gravely whether it should be encouraged or checked (with the help of the police).","Is the theatre a "good" or a "bad" influence? The adjectives don't fit the case.","Neither do they fit the case of the nickelodeon, which is merely the theatre democratized.","Take the case of the Passion Play, for instance.","Is it irreverent to portray the Passion, Crucifixion, Resurrection and Ascension in a vaudeville theatre over a darkened stage where half an hour before a couple of painted, short-skirted girls were doing a "sister-act"? What is the motive which draws crowds of poor people to nickelodeons to see the Birth in the Manger flashed magic-lanternwise upon a white cloth? Curiosity? Mere mocking curiosity, perhaps? I cannot answer.","Neither could I say what it is that, every fifth year, draws our plutocrats to Oberammergau, where at the cost, from first to last, of thousands of dollars and days of time, they view a similar spectacle presented in a sunny Bavarian setting.","It is reasonable, however, to believe that the same feelings, whatever they are, which drew our rich to Oberammergau draw our poor to the nickelodeons.","Whether the powerful emotional reactions produced in the spectator by the Passion Play are "beneficial" or not is as far beyond decision as the question whether a man or an oyster is happier.","The man is more, feels more, than the oyster.","The beholder of the Passion Play is more, feels more, than the non-beholder.","Whether for weal or woe, humanity has ceaselessly striven to complicate life, to diversify and make subtle the emotions, to create and gratify the new and artificial spiritual wants, to know more and feel more both of good and evil, to attain a greater degree of self-consciousness; just as the one fundamental instinct of the youth, which most systems of education have been vainly organized to eradicate, is to find out what the man knows.","In this eternal struggle for more self-consciousness, the moving-picture machine, uncouth instrument though it be, has enlisted itself on especial behalf of the least enlightened, those who are below the reach even of the yellow journals.","For although in the prosperous vaudeville houses the machine is but a toy, a "chaser," in the nickelodeons it is the central, absorbing fact, which strengthens, widens, vivifies subjective life; which teaches living other than living through the senses alone.","Already, perhaps, touching him at the psychological moment, it has awakened to bis first, groping, necessary discontent the spirit of an artist of the future, who otherwise would have remained mute and motionless.","The nickelodeons are merely an extension course in civilization, teaching both its "badness" and its "goodness." They have come in obedience to the law of supply and demand; and they will stay as long as the slums stay, for in the slums they are the finest and must survive.","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","THE NICKELODEONS by Joseph Medill Patterson","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/nickel.htm","26.6","1 Oct 2003");
Page[12]=new Array("THE CRACKER BARREL",""A DYING BREED?"","by The Crimson Collector","Do you collect comics? Are you over the age of 35 or even into your 60s? Comics used to be for kids.","Nowadays kids shun them.","They have computer games, the Internet and Pokemon.","I remember when we went to our local comic shop in anticipation of what would arrive delivery day.","Often the comics were stacked on the floor two feet high and we would devour them.","We bought multiple copies and put them away just for the heck of it.","Heck, comics were cheap.","Then comics appeared with a 12 cent price tag.","Next they were 15 cents, 20 cents, 50 cents, 75 cents, a dollar, and now they are anywhere from 2 dollars to almost 6 dollars each, and we are not talking about special editions and trade paperbacks that can eat your wallet.","The independent explosion that spawned Image, Pacific Comics, Kitchen Sink Comix, Eclipse, Gladstone, Blackthorne, Atlas, Valiant, Now and many others created a new breed of comic collectors for the brief time they were up there.","Comics now came in variants: special gold, silver, bronze, copper covered editions were printed.","Dealers were obliged to buy "X" amount of regular issues to "qualify" to buy the variants.","No wonder these books became instant collectors' items.","Dealers bagged and boarded them and attached outlandish price stickers to these "hot books." How many of these companies exist today? Very few and they are just holding on by the skin of their teeth.","Just as an example, Marvel changed hands and fell into the banker's greed to boost their stocks for profit.","They followed suit, multiple covers and gimmicks arose.","Somewhere along the line, they forgot about their audience.","The artwork fell into the hands of "fan artists" who had no grasp of anatomy but knew how to draw weapons and enlarged muscles in places where there should be none.","The X-Men came out with FIVE different covers for number one ...","gotta have 'em.","Then the bottom fell out.","Marvel, which had risen on the strengths of Jack Kirby and Stan Lee and other talented people began to show signs of fatique.","Where its creators once had bragged about their sales over the rival DC, those sales had wilted.","No longer do we see shelves weighed down with multiple copies of the latest copies.","A dealer now thinks a prestige book is one that sells more than ten copies ...","twenty is a big hit.","We old timers preorder our comics a month in advance from a catalog.","We comb the pages looking for those classic reprints from DC, AC Comics and sometimes Marvel.","The hardbound archive editions with golden age material are our delight.","Comic shops are closing down, the owners overextended on credit to the distributors.","Those that continue to exist have diversified into other related fields like old toys and models ...","some even have gone into (gasp) POKEMON.","Kids no longer haunt comic shops and sit crosslegged on the floor reading the latest Superman adventure.","So, are we a dying breed?","©2000 by Tom Mason","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","The Cracker Barrel-A Dying Breed?","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/barrel.htm","5.4","29 Sep 2003");
Page[13]=new Array("The Signal-Man","by Charles Dickens",""Halloa! Below there!"","When he heard a voice thus calling to him, he was standing at the door of his box, with a flag in his hand, furled round its short pole.","One would have thought, considering the nature of the ground, that he could not have doubted from what quarter the voice came; but instead of looking up to where I stood on the top of the steep cutting nearly over his head, he turned himself about, and looked down the Line.","There was something remarkable in his manner of doing so, though I could not have said for my life what.","But I know it was remarkable enough to attract my notice, even though his figure was foreshortened and shadowed, down in the deep trench, and mine was high above him, so steeped in the glow of an angry sunset, that I had shaded my eyes with my hand before I saw him at all.",""Halloa! Below!"","From looking down the Line, he turned himself about again, and, raising his eyes, saw my figure high above him.",""Is there any path by which I can come down and speak to you?"","He looked up at me without replying, and I looked down at him without pressing him too soon with a repetition of my idle question.","Just then there came a vague vibration in the earth and air, quickly changing into a violent pulsation, and an oncoming rush that caused me to start back, as though it had force to draw me down.","When such vapour as rose to my height from this rapid train had passed me, and was skimming away over the landscape, I looked down again, and saw him refurling the flag he had shown while the train went by.","I repeated my inquiry.","After a pause, during which he seemed to regard me with fixed attention, he motioned with his rolled-up flag towards a point on my level, some two or three hundred yards distant.","I called down to him, "All right!" and made for that point.","There, by dint of looking closely about me, I found a rough zigzag descending path notched out, which I followed.","The cutting was extremely deep and unusually precipitous.","It was made through a clammy stone, that became oozier and wetter as I went down.","For these reasons, I found the way long enough to give me time to recall a singular air of reluctance or compulsion with which he had pointed out the path.","When I came down low enough upon the zigzag descent to see him again, I saw that he was standing between the rails on the way by which the train had lately passed, in an attitude as if he were waiting for me to appear.","He had his left hand at his chin, and that left elbow rested on his right hand, crossed over his breast.","His attitude was one of such expectation and watchfulness that I stopped a moment, wondering at it.","I resumed my downward way, and stepping out upon the level of the railroad, and drawing nearer to him, saw that he was a dark, sallow man, with a dark beard and rather heavy eyebrows.","His post was in as solitary and dismal a place as ever I saw.","On either side a dripping-wet wall of jagged stone, excluding all view but a strip of sky; the perspective one way only a crooked prolongation of this great dungeon; the shorter perspective in the other direction terminating in a gloomy red light, and the gloomier entrance to a black tunnel, in whose massive architecture there was a barbarous, depressing, and forbidding air.","So little sunlight ever found its way to this spot that it had an earthy, deadly smell; and so much cold wind rushed through it that it struck chill to me, as if I had left the natural world.","Before he stirred, I was near enough to him to have touched him.","Not even then removing his eyes from mine, he stepped back one step, and lifted his hand.","This was a lonesome post to occupy (I said), and it had riveted my attention when I looked down from up yonder.","A visitor was a rarity, I should suppose; not an unwelcome rarity, I hoped? In me he merely saw a man who had been shut up within narrow limits all his life, and who, being at last set free, had a newly-awakened interest in these great works.","To such purpose I spoke to him; but I am far from sure of the terms I used, for, besides that I am not happy in opening any conversation, there was something in the man that daunted me.","He directed a most curious look towards the red light near the tunnel's mouth, and looked all about it, as if something were missing from it, and then looked at me.","That light was part of his charge, was it not?","He answered in a low voice, "Don't you know it is?"","The monstrous thought came into my mind, as I perused the fixed eyes and the saturnine face, that this was a spirit, not a man.","I have speculated since whether there may have been infection in his mind.","In my turn I stepped back.","But in making the action, I detected in his eyes some latent fear of me.","This put the monstrous thought to flight.",""You look at me," I said, forcing a smile, "as if you had a dread of me."",""I was doubtful," he returned, "whether I had seen you before."",""Where?"","He pointed to the red light he had looked at.",""There?" I said.","Intently watchful of me, he replied (but without sound), "Yes."",""My good fellow, what should I do there? However, be that as it may, I never was there, you may swear."",""I think I may," he rejoined.",""Yes; I am sure I may."","His manner cleared, like my own.","He replied to my remarks with readiness, and in well-chosen words.","Had he much to do there? Yes, that was to say, he had enough responsibility to bear, but exactness and watchfulness were what was required of him, and of actual work, manual labour, he had next to none.","To change that signal, to trim those lights, and to turn this iron handle now and then, was all he had to do under that head.","Regarding those many long and lonely hours of which I seemed to make so much, he could only say that the routine of his life had shaped itself into that form, and he had grown used to it.","He had taught himself a language down here, if only to know it by sight, and to have formed his own crude ideas of its pronunciation, could be called learning it.","He had also worked at fractions and decimals, and tried a little algebra; but he was, and had been as a boy, a poor hand at figures.","Was it necessary for him when on duty always to remain in that channel of damp air, and could he never rise into the sunshine from between those high stone walls? Why that depended upon times and circumstances.","Under some conditions there would be less upon the Line than under others; and the same held good as to certain hours of the day and night.","In bright weather, he did choose occasions for getting a little above these lower shadows; but, being at all times liable to be called by his electric bell, and at such times listening for it with redoubled anxiety, the relief was less than I would suppose.","He took me into his box, where there was a fire, a desk for an official book in which he had to make certain entries, a telegraphic instrument with its dial, face, and needles, and the little bell of which he had spoken.","On my trusting that he would excuse the remark that he had been well educated, and (I hoped I might say without offence) perhaps educated above that station, he observed that instances of slight incongruity in such wise would rarely be found wanting among large bodies of men; that he had heard it was so in workhouses, in the police force, even in that last desperate resource the army; and that he knew it was so, more or less, in any great railway staff.","He had been, when young (if I could believe it, sitting in that hut, he scarcely could), a student of natural philosophy, and had attended lectures; but he had run wild, misused his opportunities, gone down, and never risen again.","He had no complaint to offer about that.","He had made his bed, and he lay upon it.","It was far too late to make another.","All that I have here condensed he said in a quiet manner, with his grave dark regards divided between me and the fire.","He threw in the word "Sir" from time to time, and especially when he referred to his youth—as though to request me to understand that he claimed to be nothing but what I found him.","He was several times interrupted by the little bell, and had to read off messages, and send replies.","Once he had to stand without the door, and display a flag as a train passed, and make some verbal communication to the driver.","In the discharge of his duties, I observed him to be remarkably exact and vigilant, breaking off his discourse at a syllable, and remaining silent until what he had to do was done.","In a word, I should have set this man down as one of the safest of men to be employed in that capacity, but for the circumstance that while he was speaking to me he twice broke off with a fallen colour, turned his face towards the little bell when it did NOT ring, opened the door of the hut (which was kept shut to exclude the unhealthy damp), and looked out towards the red light near the mouth of the tunnel.","On both of those occasions, he came back to the fire with the inexplicable air upon him which I had remarked, without being able to define, when we were so far asunder.","Said I, when I rose to leave him, "You almost make me think that I have met with a contented man."(I am afraid I must acknowledge that I said it to lead him on.)",""I believe I used to be so," he rejoined, in the low voice in which he had first spoken; "but I am troubled, sir, I am troubled."","He would have recalled the words if he could.","He had said them, however, and I took them up quickly.",""With what? What is your trouble?"",""It is very difficult to impart, sir.","It is very, very difficult to speak of.","If ever you make me another visit, I will try to tell you."",""But I expressly intend to make you another visit.","Say, when shall it be?"",""I go off early in the morning, and I shall be on again at ten tomorrow night, sir."",""I will come at eleven."","He thanked me, and went out at the door with me.",""I'll show my white light, sir," he said, in his peculiar low voice, "till you have found the way up.","When you have found it, don't call out! And when you are at the top, don't call out!"","His manner seemed to make the place strike colder to me, but I said no more than, "Very well."",""And when you come down to-morrow night, don't call out! Let me ask you a parting question.","What made you cry, 'Halloa! Below there!' to-night?"",""Heaven knows," said I.",""I cried something to that effect!"",""Not to that effect, sir.","Those were the very words.","I know them well."",""Admit those were the very words.","I said them, no doubt, because I saw you below."",""For no other reason?"",""What other reason could I possibly have?"",""You had no feeling that they were conveyed to you in any supernatural way?"",""No."","He wished me good-night, and held up his light.","I walked by the side of the down Line of rails (with a very disagreeable sensation of a train coming behind me) until I found the path.","It was easier to mount than to descend, and I got back to my inn without any adventure.","Punctual to my appointment, I placed my foot on the first notch of the zigzag next night, as the distant clocks were striking eleven.","He was waiting for me at the bottom, with his white light on.",""I have not called out," I said, when we came close together, "may I speak now?" "By all means, sir." "Good-night, then, and here's my hand." "Good-night, sir, and here's mine." With that we walked side by side to his box, entered it, closed the door, and sat down by the fire.",""I have made up my mind, sir," he began, bending forward as soon as we were seated, and speaking in a tone but a little above a whisper, "that you shall not have to ask me twice what troubles me.","I took you for some one else yesterday evening.","That troubles me."",""That mistake?"",""No.","That Some one else."",""Who is it?"",""I don't know."",""Like me?"",""I don't know.","I never saw the face.","The left arm is across the face, and the right arm is waved-violently waved.","This way."","I followed his action with my eyes, and it was the action of an arm gesticulating, with the utmost passion and vehemence, "For God's sake, clear the way!"",""One moonlight night," said the man, "I was sitting here, when I heard a voice cry, 'Halloa! Below there!' I started up, looked from that door, and saw this Some one else standing by the red light near the tunnel, waving as I just now showed you.","The voice seemed hoarse with shouting, and it cried, 'Look out! Look out!' And then again, 'Halloa! Below there! Look out!' I caught up my lamp, turned it on red, and ran towards the figure, calling, 'What's wrong? What has happened? Where?' It stood just outside the blackness of the tunnel.","I advanced so close upon it that I wondered at its keeping the sleeve across its eyes.","I ran right up at it, and had my hand stretched out to pull the sleeve away, when it was gone."",""Into the tunnel?" said I.",""No.","I ran on into the tunnel, five hundred yards.","I stopped, and held my lamp above my head, and saw the figures of the measured distance, and saw the wet stains stealing down the walls and trickling through the arch.","I ran out again faster than I had run in (for I had a mortal abhorrence of the place upon me), and I looked all round the red light with my own red light, and I went up the iron ladder to the gallery atop of it, and I came down again, and ran back here.","I telegraphed both ways, 'An alarm has been given.","Is anything wrong?' The answer came back, both ways, 'All well.'"","Resisting the slow touch of a frozen finger tracing out my spine, I showed him how that this figure must be a deception of his sense of sight; and how that figures, originating in disease of the delicate nerves that minister to the functions of the eye, were known to have often troubled patients, some of whom had become conscious of the nature of their affliction, and had even proved it by experiments upon themselves.",""As to an imaginary cry," said I, "do but listen for a moment to the wind in this unnatural valley while we speak so low, and to the wild harp it makes of the telegraph wires."","That was all very well, he returned, after we had sat listening for a while, and he ought to know something of the wind and the wires, he who so often passed long winter nights there, alone and watching.","But he would beg to remark that he had not finished.","I asked his pardon, and he slowly added these words, touching my arm—",""Within six hours after the Appearance, the memorable accident on this Line happened, and within ten hours the dead and wounded were brought along through the tunnel over the spot where the figure had stood."","A disagreeable shudder crept over me, but I did my best against it.","It was not to be denied, I rejoined, that this was a remarkable coincidence, calculated deeply to impress his mind.","But it was unquestionable that remarkable coincidences did continually occur, and they must be taken into account in dealing with such a subject.","Though to be sure I must admit, I added (for I thought I saw that he was going to bring the objection to bear upon me), men of common sense did not allow much for coincidences in making the ordinary calculations of life.","He again begged to remark that he had not finished.","I again begged his pardon for being betrayed into interruptions.",""This," he said, again laying his hand upon my arm, and glancing over his shoulder with hollow eyes, "was just a year ago.","Six or seven months passed, and I had recovered from the surprise and shock, when one morning, as the day was breaking, I, standing at the door, looked towards the red light, and saw the spectre again." He stopped, with a fixed look at me.",""Did it cry out?"",""No.","It was silent."",""Did it wave its arm?"",""No.","It leaned against the shaft of the light, with both hands before the face.","Like this."","Once more I followed his action with my eyes.","It was an action of mourning.","I have seen such an attitude in stone figures on tombs.",""Did you go up to it?"",""I came in and sat down, partly to collect my thoughts, partly because it had turned me faint.","When I went to the door again, daylight was above me, and the ghost was gone."",""But nothing followed? Nothing came of this?"","He touched me on the arm with his forefinger twice or thrice, giving a ghastly nod each time:—",""That very day, as a train came out of the tunnel, I noticed, at a carriage window on my side, what looked like a confusion of hands and heads, and something waved.","I saw it just in time to signal the driver, Stop! He shut off, and put his brake on; but the train drifted past here a hundred and fifty yards or more.","I ran after it, and, as I went along, heard terrible screams and cries.","A beautiful young lady had died instantaneously in one of the compartments, and was brought in here, and laid down on this floor between us."","Involuntarily I pushed my chair back, as I looked from the boards at which he pointed to himself.",""True, sir.","True.","Precisely as it happened, so I tell it you."","I could think of nothing to say, to any purpose, and my mouth was very dry.","The wind and the wires took up the story with a long lamenting wail.","He resumed.",""Now, sir, mark this, and judge how my mind is troubled.","The spectre came back a week ago.","Ever since, it has been there, now and again, by fits and starts."",""At the light?"",""At the Danger-light."",""What does it seem to do?"","He repeated, if possible with increased passion and vehemence, that former gesticulation of, "For God's sake, clear the way!"","Then he went on: "I have no peace or rest for it.","It calls to me, for many minutes together, in an agonized manner, 'Below there! Look out! Look out!' It stands waving to me.","It rings my little bell—"","I caught at that.",""Did it ring your bell yesterday evening when I was here, and you went to the door?"",""Twice."",""Why, see," said I, "how your imagination misleads you.","My eyes were on the bell, and my ears were open to the bell, and if I am a living man, it did NOT ring at those times.","No, nor at any other time, except when it was rung in the natural course of physical things by the station communicating with you."","He shook his head.",""I have never made a mistake as to that yet, sir.","I have never confused the spectre's ring with the man's.","The ghost's ring is a strange vibration in the bell that it derives from nothing else, and I have not asserted that the bell stirs to the eye.","I don't wonder that you failed to hear it.","But I heard it."",""And did the spectre seem to be there when you looked out?"",""It WAS there."",""Both times?"","He repeated firmly, "Both times."",""Will you come to the door with me and look for it now?"","He bit his under lip, as though he were somewhat unwilling, but arose.","I opened the door, and stood on the step, while he stood in the doorway.","There was the Danger-light.","There was the dismal mouth of the tunnel.","There were the high, wet stone walls of the cutting.","There were the stars above them.",""Do you see it?" I asked him, taking particular note of his face.","His eyes were prominent and strained, but not very much more so, perhaps, than my own had been when I had directed them earnestly towards the same spot.",""No," he answered.",""It is not there."",""Agreed," said I.","We went in again, shut the door, and resumed our seats.","I was thinking how best to improve this advantage, if it might be called one, when he took up the conversation in such a matter-of-course way, so assuming that there could be no serious question of fact between us, that I felt myself placed in the weakest of positions.",""By this time you will fully understand, sir," he said, "that what troubles me so dreadfully is the question.","What does the spectre mean?"","I was not sure, I told him, that I did fully understand.",""What is its warning against?" he said, ruminating, with his eyes on the fire, and only by times turning them on me.",""What is the danger? Where is the danger? There is danger overhanging somewhere on the Line.","Some dreadful calamity will happen.","It is not to be doubted this third time, after what has gone before.","But surely this is a cruel haunting of me.","What can I do?"","He pulled out his handkerchief, and wiped the drops from his heated forehead.",""If I telegraph Danger, on either side of me, or on both, I can give no reason for it," he went on, wiping the palms of his hands.",""I should get into trouble, and do no good.","They would think I was mad.","This is the way it would work:—Message: 'Danger! Take care!' Answer: 'What Danger? Where?' Message: 'Don't know.","But, for God's sake, take care!' They would displace me.","What else could they do?"","His pain of mind was most pitiable to see.","It was the mental torture of a conscientious man, oppressed beyond endurance by an unintelligible responsibility involving life.",""When it first stood under the Danger-light," he went on, putting his dark hair back from his head, and drawing his hands outward across his temples in an extremity of feverish distress, "why not tell me where that accident was to happen-if it must happen? Why not tell me how it could be averted—if it could have been averted? When on its second coming it hid its face, why not tell me, instead, 'She is going to die.","Let them keep her at home'? If it came, on those two occasions, only to show me that its warnings were true, and so to prepare me for the third, why not warn me plainly now? And I, Lord help me! A mere poor signal-man on this solitary station! Why not go to somebody with credit to be believed, and power to act?"","When I saw him in this state, I saw that for the poor man's sake, as well as for the public safety, what I had to do for the time was to compose his mind.","Therefore, setting aside all question of reality or unreality between us, I represented to him that whoever thoroughly discharged his duty must do well, and that at least it was his comfort that he understood his duty, though he did not understand these confounding Appearances.","In this effort I succeeded far better than in the attempt to reason him out of his conviction.","He became calm; the occupations incidental to his post as the night advanced began to make larger demands on his attention; and I left him at two in the morning.","I had offered to stay through the night, but he would not hear of it.","That I more than once looked back at the red light as I ascended the pathway, that I did not like the red light, and that I should have slept but poorly if my bed had been under it, I see no reason to conceal.","Nor did I like the two sequences of the accident and the dead girl.","I see no reason to conceal that either.","But what ran most in my thoughts was the consideration how ought I to act, having become the recipient of this disclosure? I had proved the man to be intelligent, vigilant, painstaking, and exact; but how long might he remain so, in his state of mind? Though in a subordinate position, still he held a most important trust; and would I (for instance) like to stake my own life on the chances of his continuing to execute it with precision?","Unable to overcome a feeling that there would be something treacherous in my communicating what he had told me to his superiors in the Company, without first being plain with himself and proposing a middle course to him, I ultimately resolved to offer to accompany him (otherwise keeping his secret for the present) to the wisest medical practitioner we could hear of in those parts, and to take his opinion.","A change in his time of duty would come round next night, he had apprised me, and he would be off an hour or two after sunrise, and on again soon after sunset.","I had appointed to return accordingly.","Next evening was a lovely evening, and I walked out early to enjoy it.","The sun was not yet quite down when I traversed the field-path near the top of the deep cutting.","I would extend my walk for an hour, I said to myself, half an hour on and half an hour back, and it would then be time to go to my signal-man's box.","Before pursuing my stroll, I stepped to the brink, and mechanically looked down from the point from which I had first seen him.","I cannot describe the thrill that seized upon me when, close at the mouth of the tunnel, I saw the appearance of a man, with his left sleeve across his eyes, passionately waving his right arm.","The nameless horror that oppressed me passed in a moment, for in a moment I saw that this appearance of a man was a man indeed, and that there was a little group of other men, standing at a short distance, to whom he seemed to be rehearsing the gesture he made.","The Danger-light was not yet lighted.","Against its shaft, a little low hut, entirely new to me, had been made of some wooden supports and tarpaulin.","It looked no bigger than a bed.","With an irresistible sense that something was wrong—with a flashing self-reproachful fear that fatal mischief had come of my leaving the man there, and causing no one to be sent to overlook or correct what he did—I descended the notched path with all the speed I could make.",""What is the matter?" I asked the men.",""Signal-man killed this morning, sir."",""Not the man belonging to that box?"",""Yes, sir."",""Not the man I know?"",""You will recognize him, sir, if you knew him," said the man who spoke for the others, solemnly uncovering his own head, and raising an end of the tarpaulin, "for his face is quite composed."",""Oh, how did this happen-how did this happen?" I asked, turning from one to another as the hut closed in again.",""He was cut down by an engine, sir.","No man in England knew his work better.","But somehow he was not clear of the outer rail.","It was just at broad day.","He had struck the light, and had the lamp in his hand.","As the engine came out of the tunnel, his back was towards her, and she cut him down.","That man drove her, and was showing how it happened.",""Show the gentleman, Tom."","The man who wore a rough dark dress, stepped back to his former place at the mouth of the tunnel.",""Coming round the curve in the tunnel, sir," he said, "I saw him at the end, like as if I saw him down a perspective-glass.","There was no time to check speed, and I knew him to be very careful.","As he didn't seem to take heed of the whistle, I shut it off when we were running down upon him, and called to him as loud as I could call."",""What did you say?"",""I said, 'Below there! Look out! Look out! For God's sake, clear the way!'"","I started.",""Ah! it was a dreadful time, sir.","I never left off calling to him.","I put this arm before my eyes not to see, and I waved this arm to the last; but it was no use."","Without prolonging the narrative to dwell on any one of its curious circumstances more than on any other, I may, in closing it, point out the coincidence that the warning of the Engine-Driver included, not only the words which the unfortunate Signal-man had repeated to me as haunting him, but also the words which I myself—not he—had attached, and that only in my own mind, to the gesticulation he had imitated.","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","The Signal-Man","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/signal.htm","34.6","29 Sep 2003");
Page[14]=new Array("Space Patrol Memories Pt.","By Tom Mason","ABC Television Center Memories","When I went to work at ABC-TV in the 1960s, I got to meet many of the original crew members and engineers who worked the show.","One of the technical directors of the show Bob Trachinger had become the chief engineer for the West Coast and hired me into engineering.","Another TD, Irwin Stanton was technical director on the live Lawrence Welk show at the time I arrived.","Many of the engineers who had worked that show were around and eager to tell stories of the fun that had gone into putting that show on the air “Live”.","They could still point out existing reminders of what had been Space Patrol.","High up in the catwalks of stage E, where Lawrence Welk did his live telecasts, were sections of the walls still painted to resemble the stone walls of the evil villain Prince Baccaratti’s castle hideout.","Visits to the prop room’s attic revealed a few dusty, leftover, props and miniatures from the show.","I became friends with Marvin Jacobs, a technical engineer who specialized in optics, and he told me stories of how he had gone to local army surplus stores and bought great electronic “junk” to trick up Corry’s Terra V spaceship.","He assembled most of those evil inventions for the villains to manipulate in their quest to take over the United Planets from good old WW II army surplus bargain tables…anything he thought might look sci-fi high tech.","He bought old bombsights, scopes and anything that could be disguised as something from the future.","Later when the show went national and the local 15 minute show was just a memory, a special effects team was hired and the budget of the show escalated to the figure of $25,000, a far cry from what Marv had to work with in the early days of the show.","Three brothers; Oscar, Paul and Franz Dallons handled the effects.","They went on to movies and even did the effects on Captain Midnight’s TV episodes.","I was astounded to learn that in the beginning, the lead actors Buzz and Happy made approximately $8 per 15-minute episode and had to hold down second jobs to make ends meet.","Their hope was that the show would go full network.","It did that in June of 1951.","Eventually, by 1955, the leads were making at least $45,000 per year.","Their gamble on the show eventually going network had paid off.","They made personal appearances all over the country in a mock-up of the Terra V (similar to the Oscar Mayer Weinermobile).","Space Patrol, being live television, generated many on-camera fluffs.","Once when Buzz and Happy were flying through space in their space ship Terra V, the TV camera was viewing them through the cockpit window and a classic blooper occurred.","As we looked in on them, on the other side of the far cockpit portal a stage carpenter walked by.","He was completely oblivious to the fact the show was on the air.","How did that guy live in outer space and walk where there was nothing to stand on? It did not effect Buzz and Happy’s performance in the least; they had to save the world.","The sets were paper-thin and had a bad habit of falling over during action scenes.","Many times the actors had to rush to prop up a wall with their bodies while delivering their lines at the same time.","Often Buzz and Happy were required to appear in a live commercial for Ralston or Nestles and would have to rush from a scene, sit down and appear to be very calm and while delivering their lines for the sponsor’s product.","This could require some fast footwork as sometimes they were high up in the catwalks of stage “E” and they had to hastily climb down the ladders to the main stage floor and go off to a corner where the commercial was set up.","Many times commercials for Nestle’s Quik or Ralston’s cereals were recited by an out of breath Buzz or Happy.","In addition, since all the fight scenes were live, sometimes punches that were supposed to miss connected and the blood was real, but that was not sufficient reason to miss doing the commercial.","In 1953 KECA-TV aired one of the first trials of a three-dimensional broadcast featuring Space Patrol.","It was not a great success.","The blurry pictures on their screens did not entertain viewers.","So much for a 3-D version of Space Patrol.","Space Patrol faded from the airwaves in 1955 after Ralston and Nestle withdrew their sponsorship.","Space Patrol’s creator, Mike Moser had died and ABC attempted to buy the rights to the series from his widow.","She would not sell.","Reruns ended up in syndication in some places as Satellite Police.","Today, you can buy many different collections on video.","The Nostalgia Merchant originally released some in 1981 and then again in 1990 Rhino Home Video released virtually the same tapes with different artwork on the boxes.","Newly discovered old “kinescope recordings” have surfaced and are available on the collector’s secondary market.","My favorite premium, the Cosmic Smoke Gun, sells regularly on E-bay for many hundreds of dollars.","All the Space Patrol good “junk” has become prized collector’s items.","And so, Space Patrol lives on in memory, cherished by us “Pre-Star Wars” space opera junkies.","Recently I had the chance to talk with a writer, Jean-Noel Bassior.","She called in conjunction with a book she is writing: the defining book on Space Patrol.","She had just toured the ABC Hollywood lot and my name was given to her by a manager who knew of my passion for the show.","We spoke of the old KECA-TV days and of the people and things that made Space Patrol what it was.","When this book is published, I will be first in line to buy a copy.","Look for it.","I have often wished aloud in these pages that I still had my Cosmic Smoke Gun and Space Patrol Rocket Dart pistols to place on the shelf alongside my Buck Rogers Atomic Pistol and other assorted ray guns…Just recently I have acquired both guns through constant searching of the internet.","They will go up with their companion pieces in places of honor.","As Cadet Happy so often exclaimed, “Smokin’ Rockets!”","To see these premiums in all their glory, click the picture.","© Tom Mason 2000","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","Space Patrol Memories - Pt. 2","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/sp2.html","9.6","29 Sep 2003");
Page[15]=new Array("THE CRACKER BARREL",""A DYING BREED 2001"","by Tom Mason","It has been over a year since I wrote on the comics and collectors as a dying breed.","Let's take a look at the hobby a year later.","What has changed? Marvel seems to be pulling themselves out of the mud somewhat.","They have tried all sorts of ideas; some have failed like their "Backpack Comics." Other attempts to revive some of their characters have brought up their sales.","Interest is high again on Spider-Man with the anticipation for the big-screen motion picture coming up next spring.","Many projects are in the works for more major films utilizing their characters and that can only serve to give sales a shot in the arm.","Overall, sales are still not what they used to be and Marvel, the once monster seller that it was, has lost a lot of ground to DC comics.","DC comics, on the other hand, seems to be doing well.","They have revived the Green Arrow with great success and even a new version of Brave and the Bold is in the planning stages.","The newly designed Justice League and Justice Society books are selling well.","Other older characters like Deadman, are being featured again and John Byrne has a limited series Superman/Batman Generations II that is a feast for the eyes.","Their series of DC Archives hardback books come out regularly with prime golden age material that is grabbed up by the old collectors.","This is something that Marvel, with its almost endless inventory of Timely Comics classics will not do.","Superman has been redesigned via the use of Japanese Manga (ugh!) art and the sales must justify it, although it has driven some of the older collectors, like me, away from the book.","Getting Will Eisner into the DC stable has been a plus, as publication of his early Spirit work in Archives is the best reproduction and coloring of that material I have ever seen.","So, I remain, for the most part, a DC fan of many of their books.","Comics shops seem to be continuing to close, and even ones that remain open have diversified into other fields like models, toys and gaming.","My favorite shop dropped comics altogether after multiple problems with the sole comic distributor Diamond.","Discounts seem to be falling by the wayside and many stores cannot compete with what books sell for on the deeply discounted Internet sites.","The Pokemon craze seems to have died and a few shops that specialized in Pokemon and its trading cards have shut their doors.","So are things any better? I don't think so.","I was in a comic shop yesterday and my grand purchase was two comic books, a far cry from the stack I used to buy.","My interest in Marvel has waned and I am slowly selling off my prime Marvel material on the Internet.","A contributing factor to most of the problem is the monopolistic Diamond Publishing, which has sole distribution rights to all the comics.","They are inept at best, fouling up orders from the comic shop owners.","This in turn loses the shops customers when they cannot deliver what was ordered in a timely fashion.","The comics shops have no alternative source to turn to and must suffer with bad management and indifferent customer service.","The youngsters have not returned to the hobby, the only people I see in the specialty shops are older collectors, still holding onto their hope that things will get better...I doubt it.","Thank God for reprints.","Tom Mason","Sept.","2001","For the commentary Tom made on the comic book industry last year, click here.","A Dying Breed","©2002 by Tom Mason","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","The Cracker Barrel-A Dying Breed 2001","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/barrel2.html","6.2","29 Sep 2003");
Page[16]=new Array("To return to Space Patrol Memories, click here.","Space Patrol Premiums","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/sp2_prem.html","0.4","25 Aug 2000");
Page[17]=new Array("SERIAL FEATURES","By Rich Wannen","Feature versions of serials are the odd offspring of a union of the serial and the B-feature motion picture formats.","They are B-films in length and intended audience, serials in source of filmed content and plot development.","Unfortunately, as such, they have historically been all but disowned by (or, at least, ostensibly in the interest of) fans of both formats.","Serial authorities will, at best, simply note in passing that "oh, by the way, a feature version was also released," and if you're lucky, you may get the title, year of release, distributor and/or running time.","Meanwhile, writers on the feature film will, if not ignore them completely, similarly acknowledge their existence with a terse "but this was just a cut-down serial." In fact, I think this is unreasonable and unfair -- to film history, to the makers of these features, and to the film fans who come across them in the course of their hobbying.","Serial feature versions are, really, a unique form of filmmaking, involving the taking of an already completed film product and substantially altering it -- largely thru editing -- in order to produce a new, if not dissimilar, product with a still-coherent plotline.","In some cases, new material has even been written and filmed, to bridge otherwise-unavoidable continuity losses and, in some rare cases, to create a substantially new story.","But unlike the old 8mm "home movies," none of them were intended as nostalgic highlights of the serial, but as a finished film which could be shown in theaters (or on TV stations), communities, and countries in which the serial itself would not play, and to audiences not interested in seeing a film in serialized format! This would, of course, also bring in revenues additional to the serial itself, to the extent that the serial producer also made the feature (which explains why the independents seem to almost always have had a feature version available, while the bigger Studios were more occasional in their feature output).","In more recent decades, with many serials falling into public domain, the editing may have come to constitute the 'artistic contribution' necessary to allow the featurizer to inveigle a new copyright and obtain the ensuing profits from the merchandising of 'his' new creation.","In any case, both the film historian and the film fan is ill-served by 'experts' who simply blow off the serial feature version.","The stories behind the creation of some may be as interesting as of the serial itself; in all cases, the critical appraisal of the feature is essential, since the editing process alone is bound to affect the quality of the film involved, and not always for the worse, thus allowing for 'informed consent' for those who may wish to purchase the feature versions.","Finally, theatrical feature versions will invariably have their own advertising campaigns and materials for the collector, while non-theatrical versions will have none whatsoever.","But no enhanced awareness will come to be if we don't first try to establish an accurate listing of the feature versions which have been made.","This is what follows.","Additions and corrections from others are gratefully welcomed.","So here's a list of all the featurized serials known to me, listed by source serial.","I'm including all which bear the same title as the source serial , year the feature was released, whether it was:","(T)- a theatrical film;","(TV)- a made-for-TV feature (tho some of these may have been shown in theatres outside the US, or in US theatres equipped with 16mm equipment);","(NT)- a non-theatrical feature, but I'm not sure if it was cut for TV, 16mm sales or video.","Most of these have a distinctly amateurish look, e.g.","main titles are just from the serial ("A ___ Serial in ___ episodes" under the title).","Then follows the release source of the feature (if known) and running time (if known); and occasional notes, as applicable.","Check the IMDb (Internet Movie Database, at www.imdb.com) for additional data on the features marked (T) or (NT), most of which I've ensured are installed there as the separate feature films they in fact are.","All set? Here goes:","ACE DRUMMOND","Squadron Of Doom (1950s) (TV) Motion Pictures for Television, 80 min.","ADVENTURES OF THE FLYING CADETS","Adventures Of The Flying Cadets (19??) (NT) Unknown Source, 115 min.","ADVENTURES OF SMILIN' JACK, THE","Adventures Of Smilin' Jack, The (19??) (NT) Unknown Source, 90 min.","AMAZING EXPLOITS OF THE CLUTCHING HAND","Amazing Exploits Of The Clutching Hand (1936) (T), Stage & Screen, 65 min.","BLACK WIDOW, THE","Sombra The Spider Woman (1966) (TV) NTA, c.100 min.","BLACK COIN, THE","Black Coin, The (19??) (NT) Unknown Source, 120 min.","BLAKE OF SCOTLAND YARD","Blake Of Scotland Yard (1936) (T) Victory, 69 min.","BUCK ROGERS","Planet Outlaws (1953) (T) Goodwill Pictures, 71 min.","[added framing narrative scenes].","Destination Saturn (1965) (TV) Heart Ent., 91 min.","Buck Rogers (1977) (T) Crystal Pictures, c.100 min.","BURN 'EM UP BARNES","Burn 'Em Up Barnes (1934) (T) Mascot, 68 min.","CALL OF THE SAVAGE, THE","Savage Fury (1956) (T) Premier Pictures, 70 min.","CANADIAN MOUNTIES VS.","ATOMIC INVADERS","Missile Base At Taniak (1966) (TV) NTA, c.100 min.","CAPTAIN VIDEO","Captain Video (19??) (NT) Unknown source.","91 min.","[May be one of several features reportedly created by Leo Gutman in the late 70s or early 80s from Columbia serials for TV syndication].","CRIMSON GHOST, THE","Cyclotrode X (1966) (TV) NTA, c.100 min.","CUSTER'S LAST STAND","Custer's Last Stand (1936) (T) Stage & Screen, 90 min.","DANGERS OF THE CANADIAN MOUNTED","R.C.M.P.","And The Treasure Of Genghis Khan (1966) (TV) NTA, c.100 min.","DARKEST AFRICA","Darkest Africa (1936) (T) Republic, 73 min.","DEVIL HORSE","Devil Horse (19??) (NT) Source Unknown, ??min.","DICK TRACY","Dick Tracy (1937) (T) Republic.","73 Min.","[per the works of Jack Mathis].","DICK TRACY","Dick Tracy (1985) (TV) NTA-Republic, 102 min.","DICK TRACY RETURNS","Dick Tracy Returns (1985) (TV) NTA-Republic, 107 min.","DICK TRACY VS.","CRIME INC.","Dick Tracy Vs.","Crime Inc.","(1985) (TV) NTA- Republic, 103 min.","DICK TRACY'S G-MEN","Dick Tracy's G-Men (1985) (TV) NTA-Republic, c.100 min.","DRUMS OF FU MANCHU","Drums Of Fu Manchu (1943) (T) Republic, 69 min.","FEDERAL AGENTS VS.","UNDERWORLD INC.","Golden Hands Of Kurigal (1966) (TV) NTA, c.100 min.","FEDERAL OPERATOR 99","FBI-99 (1966) (TV) NTA, c.100 min.","FIGHTING DEVIL DOGS, THE","Fighting Devil Dogs, The (1943) (T) Republic, 69 min.","FIGHTING DEVIL DOGS","Torpedo Of Doom (1966) (TV) NTA, 99 min.","FLAMING FRONTIERS","Flaming Frontiers (19??) (NT) Unknown Source, Unknown runtime [seen on "Matinee At The Bijou", edited to under one hour].","FLASH GORDON","Flash Gordon (1936) (T) Universal, 72 min.","[reissued as ATOMIC ROCKETSHIP and/or ROCKET SHIP].","Spaceship To The Unknown (1965) (TV) Hearst Ent., 90 min.","FLASH GORDON CONQUERS THE UNIVERSE","The Purple Death From Outer Space (1965) (TV), Hearst Ent., 90 min.","[from Chs.","1-6 only].","Peril From Planet Mongo (1965) (TV), Hearst Ent., 91 min.","[from Chs.","7-12 only].","Space Soldiers Conquer The Universe (19??) (NT) 96 min.","[from whole serial - advertised usually as FLASH GORDON CONQUERS THE UNIVERSE despite on-screen title]","FLASH GORDON'S TRIP TO MARS","Mars Attacks The World (1938) (T) Universal, 69 min.","[premiered on Times Square 7 days after the Orson Welles "War Of The Worlds" broadcast].","The Deadly Ray From Mars (1965) (TV) Hearst Ent., 99 min.","FLYING DISC MAN FROM MARS","Missile Monsters (1958) (T) Republic, 75 min.","G-MEN NEVER FORGET","Code 645 (1966) (TV) NTA, c.100 min.","G-MEN VS.","THE BLACK DRAGON","Black Dragon Of Manzanar (1966) (TV) NTA, c.100 min.","GALLOPING GHOST, THE","Galloping Ghost, The (19??) (NT) Unknown Source, 113 min.","GANGBUSTERS","Gangbusters (19??) (NT) Unknown Source, 119 min.","GHOST OF ZORRO","Ghost Of Zorro (1959) (T) Republic, 69 min.","GREEN ARCHER, THE","Green Archer, The (19??) (NT) Source Unknown, 121 min.","GREEN HORNET, THE","Green Hornet, The (1990) (NT) Film Shows Inc.","99 min.","[starts after the cliffhanger resolution in Ch.8 to the end of the serial in Ch.13.]","HAUNTED HARBOR","Pirates Harbor (prob.","1999) (NT) Unknown Source.","114 min.","[Briefly sold by Earl Hagen, was clearly edited nonprofessionally on VCR, without even control for color-bursts, from TV/tape source bearing the serial's reissue title.","Was advertised, however, with title "Haunted Harbor".]","HAWK OF THE WILDERNESS","Lost Island Of Kioga (1966) (TV) NTA, c.100 min.","HURRICANE EXPRESS","Hurricane Express, (19??) (NT) Source Unknown, c.90 min.","INVISIBLE MONSTER, THE","Slaves Of The Invisible Monster (1966) (TV) NTA, c.100 min.","JUNGLE DRUMS OF AFRICA","U-238 And The Witch Doctor (1966) (TV) NTA, 100 min.","JUNGLE QUEEN","Jungle Safari (1956) (T) Premier Pictures, c.70 min.","JUNIOR G-MEN","Junior G-Men (19??) (NT) Source Unknown, 121 min.","KING OF THE ROYAL MOUNTED","Yukon Patrol (1942) (T) Republic, 70 min.","KING OF THE ROCKET MEN","Lost Planet Airmen (1951) (T) Republic, 65 min.","LAST FRONTIER, THE","Black Ghost, The (1932) (T) RKO-Pathe, 65 min.","LIGHTNING WARRIOR, THE","Lightning Warrior, The (19??) (NT) Unknown Source, 118 min.","LONE RANGER, THE","Hi-Yo Silver (1940) (T) Republic, 69 min.","[with added sequences].","LOST CITY, THE","Lost City, The (1935) (T) Super-Serial Dist., c.70 min.","[from Chs.","1-4 only, with added wrap-up scenes]","Lost City, The (1935) (T) Regal Distributing, 78 min.","[from entire serial].","City Of Lost Men (c.1940) (T) Goodwill Pictures, c.100 mins.","[1st feature with added material from Ch.","12].","LOST JUNGLE, THE","Lost Jungle, The (1934) (T) Mascot, 68 min.","[40% new material altering character relationships and an entirely new ending].","MANHUNT OF MYSTERY ISLAND","Captain Mephisto And The Transformation Machine (1966) (TV) NTA, c.100 min.","MASKED MARVEL","Sakima And The Masked Marvel (1966) (TV) NTA, c.100 min.","MYSTERIOUS DR.","SATAN","Dr.","Satan's Robot (1966) (TV) NTA, c.100 min.","MYSTERIOUS ISLAND","Mysterious Island (19??) (NT) Unknown Source.","88 min.","[Possibly another Gutman TV featurization].","MYSTERY SQUADRON","Mystery Squadron (19??) (NT) Unknown Source, 122 min.","NEW ADVENTURES OF TARZAN, THE","New Adventures Of Tarzan, The (1935) (T) Burroughs-Tarzan, c.70 min.","[Ch.1 + cliffhanger wrapup in Ch.2 + new ending.","Edited in UK after WWII by New Realm to 59 min., which is the version currently available].","Tarzan And The Green Goddess (1938) (T) Burroughs-Tarzan, 72 min.","[from Chs.3-12].","PAINTED STALLION","Painted Stallion (1938) (T) Republic.","67 min.","[per the latest works of Jack Mathis].","PANTHER GIRL OF THE KONGO","Claw Monsters, The (1966) (TV) NTA, c.100 min.","PERILS OF NYOKA","Nyoka And The Lost Secrets Of Hippocrates (1966) (TV) NTA, c.100 min.","PHANTOM CREEPS, THE","Phantom Creeps, The (1960s) (TV) Unknown Source, 69 min.","PHANTOM EMPIRE, THE","Radio Ranch (1940) (T) Nat Levine, 70 min.","[released via 'states rights' distributors; in New York, retitled MEN WITH STEEL FACES].","Phantom Empire, The (1980s) (TV) Unknown Source, c.100 min.","PURPLE MONSTER STRIKES, THE","D-Day On Mars (1966) (TV) NTA, c.100 min.","QUEEN OF THE JUNGLE","Queen Of The Jungle (1935) (T) Screen Attractions, 60 min.","RADAR MEN FROM THE MOON","Retik, The Moon Menace (1966) (TV) NTA, c.100 min.","RADIO PATROL","Radio Patrol (19??) (NT) Unknown Source, 121 min.","RETURN OF CHANDU, THE","Return Of Chandu, The (1934) (T) Principal, 65 min.","[from Chs.1-4 only].","Chandu On The Magic Island (1935) (T) Principal, 69 min.","[from Chs.5-12 only].","ROBINSON CRUSOE OF CLIPPER ISLAND","Robinson Crusoe of Clipper Island (1937) (T) Republic.","71 min.","[per the latest works of Jack Mathis].","ROBINSON CRUSOE OF CLIPPER ISLAND","Robinson Crusoe Of Mystery Island (1966) (TV) NTA, c.100 min.","S.O.S.","COAST GUARD","S.O.S.","Coast Guard (1942) (T) Republic, 69 min.","[with added shots to cover continuity gaps].","SEA RAIDERS","Sea Raiders (19??) (NT) Unknown Source, 113 min.","SECRET SERVICE IN DARKEST AFRICA","Baron's African War, The (1966) (TV) NTA, c.100 min.","SHADOW OF THE EAGLE, THE","Shadow Of The Eagle, The (19??) (NT) Unknown Source, c.100 min.","SHADOW OF CHINATOWN","Shadow Of Chinatown (1936) (T) Victory, 65 min.","[one source says this was originally titled YELLOW PHANTOM].","SIGN OF THE WOLF","Lone Trail, The (1932) (T) Metropolitan, 55 min.","SPY SMASHER","Spy Smasher Returns (1966) (TV) NTA, c.100 min.","SUPERMAN","Superman (1950s-60s) (?TV) ?Columbia, 88 min.","TARZAN THE FEARLESS","Tarzan The Fearless (1933) (T) Principal, 61 min.","[Chs.1-4 only with partial wrapup scene.","Was intended to be shown only as a long first episode, followed by the other 8, but some theatres booked it alone].","Tarzan The Fearless (1950s) (TV) Unknown Source, 89 min.","[from UK print - Wardour Pictures Ltd.","- which may have been the source of the feature, i.e.","a UK theatrical feature shown only on TV in the US].","THREE MUSKETEERS","Desert Command (1948) (T) Favorite Film Corp., 70 min.","TIGER WOMAN","Jungle Gold (1966) (TV) NTA, c.100 min.","TRADER TOM OF THE CHINA SEAS","Target: Sea Of China (1966) (TV) NTA, c.100 min.","UNDERSEA KINGDOM","Sharad Of Atlantis (1966) (TV) NTA, c.100 min.","VIGILANTES ARE COMING, THE","Vigilantes Are Coming, The (19??) (NT) Unknown Source, 83 min.","WHISPERING SHADOW, THE","Whispering Shadow, The (19??) (NT) Unknown Source, 115 min.","ZOMBIES OF THE STRATOSPHERE","Satan's Satellites (1958) (T) Republic, 70 min.","ZORRO'S FIGHTING LEGION","Zorro's Fighting Legion (19??) (NT) Unknown Source, 89 min.","ZORRO RIDES AGAIN","Zorro Rides Again (1938) (T) Republic.","68 min.","[per the latest works of Jack Mathis].","Zorro Rides Again (1959) (T) Republic.","68 min.","[Mathis states this is just a reissue of the 1938 feature.","However, credits show a contemporary - 1959 - editor at the helm, so this release was clearly cut anew.","However, it is possible that it followed the continuity of the earlier version, given the identical running times and certain internal evidence beyond the scope of this article].","© 2000 Rich Wannen","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","Serial Features","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/serfeat.html","21","29 Sep 2003");
Page[18]=new Array("Farewell to the Master","Part 3","by Harry Bates","At four o'clock, much refreshed and with an infrared viewing magnifier slung over his shoulder, Cliff passed through the cordon and entered the door of the wing.","He had been expected and there was no trouble.","As his eyes fell on Gnut, an odd feeling went through him, and for some obscure reason he was almost sorry for the giant robot.","Gnut stood exactly as he had always stood, the right foot advanced a little, and the same brooding expression on his face; but now there was something more.","He was solidly encased in a huge block of transparent glasstex.","From the floor on which he stood to the top of his full eight feet, and from there on up for an equal distance, and for about eight feet to the left, right, back, and front.","He was immured in a water-clear prison which confined every inch of his surface and would prevent the slightest twitch of even his amazing muscles.","It was absurd, no doubt, to feel sorry for a robot, a man-made mechanism, but Cliff had come to think of him as being really alive, as a human is alive.","He showed purpose and will; he performed complicated and resourceful acts; his face had twice clearly shown the emotion of sadness, and several times what appeared to be deep thought; he had been ruthless with the gorilla, and gentle with the mockingbird and the other two bodies, and he had twice refrained from crushing Cliff when there seemed every reason that he might.","Cliff did not doubt for a minute that he was still alive, whatever that "alive" might mean.","But outside were waiting the radio and television men; he had work to do.","He turned and went to them and all got busy.","An hour later Cliff sat alone about fifteen feet above the ground in a big tree which, located just across the walk from the building, commanded through a window a clear view of the upper part of Gnut's body.","Strapped to the limbs about him were three instruments — his infrared viewing magnifier, a radio mike, and an infrared television eye with sound pickup.","The first, the viewing magnifier, would allow him to see in the dark with his own eyes, as if by daylight, a magnified image of the robot, and the others would pick up any sights and sounds, including his own remarks, and transmit them to the several broadcast studios which would fling them millions of miles in all directions through space.","Never before had a picture man had such an important assignment, probably — certainly not one who forgot to take pictures.","But now that was forgotten, and Cliff was quite proud, and ready.","Far back in a great circle stood a multitude of the curious — and the fearful.","Would the plastic glasstex hold Gnut? If it did not, would he come out thirsting for revenge? Would unimaginable beings come out of the traveler and release him, and perhaps exact revenge? Millions at their receivers were jittery; those in the distance hoped nothing awful would happen, yet they hoped something would, and they were prepared to run.","In carefully selected spots not far from Cliff on all sides were mobile ray batteries manned by army units, and in a hollow in back of him, well to his right, there was stationed a huge tank with a large gun.","Every weapon was trained on the door of the wing.","A row of smaller, faster tanks stood ready fifty yards directly north.","Their ray projectors were aimed at the door, but not their guns.","The grounds about the building contained only one spot — the hollow where the great tank was — where, by close calculation, a shell directed at the doorway would not cause damage and loss of life to some part of the sprawling capital.","Dusk fell; out streamed the last of the army officers, politicians and other privileged ones; the great metal doors of the wing clanged to and were locked for the night.","Soon Cliff was alone, except for the watchers at their weapons scattered around him.","Hours passed.","The moon came out.","From time to time Cliff reported to the studio crew that all was quiet.","His unaided eyes could now see nothing of Gnut but the two faint red points of his eyes, but through the magnifier he stood out as clearly as if in daylight from an apparent distance of only ten feet.","Except for his eyes, there was no evidence that he was anything but dead and unfunctionable metal.","Another hour passed.","Now and again Cliff thumbed the levers of his tiny radio-television watch — only a few seconds at a time because of its limited battery.","The air was full of Gnut and his own face and his own name, and once the tiny screen showed the tree in which he was then sitting and even, minutely, himself.","Powerful infrared long-distance television pickups were even then focused on him from nearby points of vantage.","It gave him a funny feeling.","Then, suddenly, Cliff saw something and quickly bent his eye to the viewing magnifier.","Gnut's eyes were moving; at least the intensity of the light emanating from them varied.","It was as if two tiny red flashlights were turned from side to side, their beams at each motion crossing Cliff's eyes.","Thrillingly, Cliff signaled the studios, cut in his pickups, and described the phenomenon.","Millions resonated to the excitement in his voice.","Could Gnut conceivably break out of that terrible prison?","Minutes passed, the eye flashes continued, but Cliff could discern no movement or attempted movement of the robot's body.","In brief snatches he described what he saw.","Gnut was clearly alive; there could be no doubt he was straining against the transparent prison in which he had at last been locked fast; but unless he could crack it, no motion should show.","Cliff took his eye from the magnifier — and started.","His unaided eye, looking at Gnut shrouded in darkness, saw an astounding thing not yet visible through his instrument.","A faint red glow was spreading over the robot's body.","With trembling fingers he readjusted the lens of the television eye, but even as he did so the glow grew in intensity.","It looked as if Gnut's body was being heated to incandescence!","He described it in excited fragments, for it took most of his attention to keep correcting the lens.","Gnut passed from a figure of dull red to one brighter and brighter, clearly glowing now even through the magnifier.","And then he moved!","Unmistakably he moved!","He had within himself somehow the means to raise his own body temperature, and was exploiting the one limitation of the plastic in which he was locked.","For glasstex, Cliff now remembered, was a thermoplastic material, one that set by cooling and conversely would soften again with heat.","Gnut was melting his way out!","In three-word snatches, Cliff described this.","The robot became cherry-red, the sharp edges of the icelike block rounded, and the whole structure began to sag.","The process accelerated.","The robot's body moved more widely.","The plastic lowered to the crown of his head, then to his neck, then his waist, which was as far as Cliff could see.","His body was free! And then, still cherry-red, he moved forward out of sight!","Cliff strained eyes and ears, but caught nothing but the distant roar of the watchers beyond the police lines and a few low, sharp commands from the batteries posted around him.","They, too, had heard, and perhaps seen by telescreen, and were waiting.","Several minutes passed.","There was a sharp, ringing crack; the great metal doors of the wing flew open, and out stepped the metal giant, glowing no longer.","He stood stock-still, and his red eyes pierced from side to side through the darkness.","Voices out in the dark barked orders and in a twinkling Gnut was bathed in narrow crisscrossing rays of sizzling, colored light.","Behind him the metal doors began to melt, but his great green body showed no change at all.","Then the world seemed to come to and end; there was a deafening roar, everything before Cliff seemed to explode in smoke and chaos, his tree whipped to one side so that he was nearly thrown out.","Pieces of debris rained down.","The tank gun had spoken, and Gnut, he was sure, had been hit.","Cliff held on tight and peered into the haze.","As it cleared he made out a stirring among the debris at the door, and then dimly but unmistakably he saw the great form of Gnut rise to his feet.","He got up slowly, turned toward the tank, and suddenly darted toward it in a wide arc.","The big gun swung in an attempt to cover him, but the robot sidestepped and then was upon it.","As the crew scattered, he destroyed its breech with one blow of his fist, and then he turned and looked right at Cliff.","He moved toward him, and in a moment was under the tree.","Cliff climbed higher.","Gnut put his two arms around the tree and gave a lifting push, and the tree tore out at the roots and fell crashing to its side.","Before Cliff could scramble away, the robot had lifted him in his metal hands.","Cliff thought his time had come, but strange things were yet in store for him that night.","Gnut did not hurt him.","He looked at him from arm's length for a moment, then lifted him to a sitting position on his shoulders, legs straddling his neck.","Then, holding one ankle, he turned and without hesitation started down the path which led westward away from the building.","Cliff rode helpless.","Out over the lawns he saw the muzzles of the scattered field pieces move as he moved, Gnut — and himself — their one focus.","But they did not fire.","Gnut, by placing him on his shoulders, had secured himself against that — Cliff hoped.","The robot bore straight toward the Tidal Basin.","Most of the field pieces throbbed slowly after.","Far back, Cliff saw a dark tide of confusion roll into the cleared area — the police lines had broken.","Ahead, the ring thinned rapidly off to the sides; then, from all directions but the front, the tide rolled in until individual shouts and cries could be made out.","It came to a stop about fifty yards off, and few people ventured nearer.","Gnut paid them no attention, and he no more noticed his burden than he might a fly.","His neck and shoulders made Cliff a seat hard as steel, but with the difference that their underlying muscles with each movement flexed, just as would those of a human being.","To Cliff, this metal musculature became a vivid wonder.","Straight as the flight of a bee, over paths, across lawns and through thin rows of trees Gnut bore the young man, the roar of thousands of people following close.","Above droned copters and darting planes, among them police cars with their nerve-shattering sirens.","Just ahead lay the still waters of the Tidal Basin, and in its midst the simple marble tomb of the slain ambassador, Klaatu, gleaming black and cold in the light of the dozen searchlights always trained on it at night.","Was this a rendezvous with the dead?","Without an instant's hesitation, Gnut strode down the bank and entered the water.","It rose to his knees, then waist, until Cliff's feet were under.","Straight through the dark waters for the tomb of Klaatu the robot made his inevitable way.","The dark square mass of gleaming marble rose higher as they neared it.","Gnut's body began emerging from the water as the bottom shelved upward, until his dripping feet took the first of the rising pyramid of steps.","In a moment they were at the top, on the narrow platform in the middle of which rested the simple oblong tomb.","Stark in the blinding searchlights, the giant robot walked once around it, then, bending, he braced himself and gave a mighty push against the top.","The marble cracked; the thick cover slipped askew and broke with a loud noise on the far side.","Gnut went to his knees and looked within, bringing Cliff well up over the edge.","Inside, in sharp shadow against the converging light beams, lay a transparent plastic coffin, thick–walled and sealed against the centuries, and containing all that was mortal of Klaatu, unspoken visitor from the great Unknown.","He lay as if asleep, on his face the look of godlike nobility that had caused some of the ignorant to believe him divine.","He wore the robe he had arrived in.","There were no faded flowers, no jewelry, no ornaments; they would have seemed profane.","At the foot of the coffin lay the small sealed box, also of transparent plastic, which contained all of Earth's records of his visit — a description of the events attending his arrival, pictures of Gnut and the traveler, and the little roll of sight–and–sound film which had caught for all time his few brief moments and words.","Cliff sat very still, wishing he could see the face of the robot.","Gnut, too, did not move from his position of reverent contemplation — not for a long time.","There on the brilliantly lighted pyramid, under the eyes of a fearful, tumultuous multitude, Gnut paid final respect to his beautiful and adored master.","Suddenly, then, it was over.","Gnut reached out and took the little box of records, rose to his feet and started down the steps.","Back through the water, straight back to the building, across lawns and paths as before, he made his irresistible way.","Before him the chaotic ring of people melted away, behind they followed as close as they dared, trampling each other in their efforts to keep him in sight.","There are no television records of his return.","Every pickup was damaged on the way to the tomb.","As they drew near the building, Cliff saw that the tank's projectile had made a hole twenty feet wide extending from the roof to the ground.","The door still stood open, and Gnut, hardly varying his almost jerkless rhythm, made his way over the debris and went straight for the port end of the ship.","Cliff wondered if he would be set free.","He was.","The robot set him down and pointed toward the door; then, turning, he made the sounds that opened the ship.","The ramp slid down and he entered.","Then Cliff did the mad, courageous thing which made him famous for a generation.","Just as the ramp started sliding back in he skipped over it and himself entered the ship.","The port closed.","It was pitch dark, and the silence was absolute.","Cliff did not move.","He felt that Gnut was close, just ahead, and it was so.","His hard metal hand took him by the waist, pulled him against his cold side, and carried him somewhere ahead.","Hidden lamps suddenly bathed the surroundings with bluish light.","He set Cliff down and stood looking at him.","The young man already regretted his rash action, but the robot, except for his always unfathomable eyes, did not seem angry.","He pointed to a stool in one corner of the room.","Cliff quickly obeyed this time and sat meekly, for a while not even venturing to look around.","He saw he was in a small laboratory of some kind.","Complicated metal and plastic apparatus lined the walls and filled several small tables; he could not recognize or guess the function of a single piece.","Dominating the center of the room was a long metal table on whose top lay a large box, much like a coffin on the outside, connected by many wires to a complicated apparatus at the far end.","From close above spread a cone of bright light from a many-tubed lamp.","One thing, half covered on a nearby table, did look familiar — and very much out of place.","From where he sat it seemed to be a briefcase — an ordinary Earthman's briefcase.","He wondered.","Gnut paid him no attention, but at once, with the narrow edge of a thick tool, sliced the lid off the little box of records.","He lifted out the strip of sight-and-sound film and spent fully half an hour adjusting it within the apparatus at the end of the big table.","Cliff watched, fascinated, wondering at the skill with which the robot used his tough metal fingers.","This done, Gnut worked for a long time over some accessory apparatus on an adjoining table.","Then he paused thoughtfully a moment and pushed inward a long rod.","A voice came out of the coffinlike box — the voice of the slain ambassador.",""I am Klaatu," it said, "and this is Gnut."","From the recording! — flashed through Cliff's mind.","The first and only words the ambassador had spoken.","But, then, in the very next second he saw that it was not so.","There was a man in the box! The man stirred and sat up, and Cliff saw the living face of Klaatu!","Klaatu appeared somewhat surprised and spoke quickly in an unknown tongue to Gnut — and Gnut, for the first time in Cliff's experience, spoke himself in answer.","The robot's syllables tumbled out as if born of human emotion, and the expression on Klaatu's face changed from surprise to wonder.","They talked for several minutes.","Klaatu, apparently fatigued, then began to lie down, but stopped midway, for he saw Cliff.","Gnut spoke again, at length.","Klaatu beckoned Cliff with his hand, and he went to him.",""Gnut has told me everything," he said in a low, gentle voice, then looked at Cliff for a moment in silence, on his face a faint, tired smile.","Cliff had a hundred questions to ask, but for a moment hardly dared open his mouth.",""But you," he began at last — very respectfully, but with an escaping excitement — "you are not the Klaatu that was in the tomb?"","The man's smile faded and he shook his head.",""No."","He turned to the towering Gnut and said something in his own tongue, and at his words the metal features of the robot twisted as if with pain.","Then he turned back to Cliff.",""I am dying," he announced simply, as if repeating his words for the Earthman.","Again to his face came the faint, tired smile.","Cliff's tongue was locked.","He just stared, hoping for light.","Klaatu seemed to read his mind.",""I see you don't understand," he said.",""Although unlike us, Gnut has great powers.","When the wing was built and the lectures began, there came to him a striking inspiration.","Acting on it at once, in the night, he assembled this apparatus ...","and now he has made me again, from my voice, as recorded by your people.","As you must know, a given body makes a characteristic sound.","He constructed an apparatus which reversed the recording process, and from the given sound made the characteristic body."","Cliff gasped.","So that was it!",""But you needn't die!" Cliff exclaimed suddenly, eagerly.",""Your voice recording was taken when you stepped out of the ship, while you were well! You must let me take you to a hospital! Our doctors are very skillful!"","Hardly perceptibly, Klaatu shook his head.",""You still don't understand," he said slowly and more faintly.",""Your recording had imperfections.","Perhaps very slight ones, but they doom the product.","All of Gnut's experiments died in a few minutes, he tells me ...","and so must I."","Suddenly, then, Cliff understood the origin of the "experiments." He remembered that on the day the wing was opened a Smithsonian official had lost a briefcase containing filmstrips recording the speech of various world fauna.","There, on the table, was a briefcase! And the Stillwells must have been made from strips kept in the table drawer!","But his heart was heavy.","He did not want this stranger to die.","Slowly there dawned on him an important idea.","He explained it with growing excitement.",""You say the recording was imperfect, and of course it was.","But the cause of that lay in the use of an imperfect recording apparatus.","So if Gnut, in his reversal of the process, had used exactly the same pieces of apparatus that your voice was recorded with, the imperfections could be studied, canceled out, and you'd live, and not die!"","As the last words left his lips, Gnut whipped around like a cat and gripped him tight.","A truly human excitement was shining in the metal muscles of his face.",""Get me that apparatus!" he ordered — in clear and perfect English! He started pushing Cliff toward the door, but Klaatu raised his hand.",""There is no hurry," Klaatu said gently; "it is too late for me.","What is your name, young man?"","Cliff told him.",""Stay with me to the end," he asked.","Klaatu closed his eyes and rested; then, smiling just a little, but not opening his eyes, he added: "And don't be sad, for I shall now perhaps live again ...","and it will be due to you.","There is no pain —" His voice was rapidly growing weaker.","Cliff, for all the questions he had, could only look on, dumb.","Again Klaatu seemed to be aware of his thoughts.",""I know," he said feebly, "I know.","We have so much to ask each other.","About your civilization ...","and Gnut's —"",""And yours," said Cliff.",""And Gnut's," said the gentle voice again.",""Perhaps ...","someday ...","perhaps I will be back —"","He lay without moving.","He lay so for a long time, and at last Cliff knew that he was dead.","Tears came to his eyes; in only these few minutes he had come to love this man.","He looked at Gnut.","The robot knew, too, that he was dead, but no tears filled his red-lighted eyes; they were fixed on Cliff, and for once the young man knew what was in his mind.",""Gnut," he announced earnestly, as if taking a sacred oath, "I'll get the original apparatus.","I'll get it.","Every piece of it, the exact same things." Without a word, Gnut conducted him to the port.","He made the sounds that unlocked it.","As it opened, a noisy crowd of Earthmen outside trampled each other in a sudden scramble to get out of the building.","The wing was lighted.","Cliff stepped down the ramp.","The next two hours always in Cliff's memory had a dreamlike quality.","It was as if that mysterious laboratory with the peacefully sleeping dead man was the real and central part of his life, and his scene with the noisy men with whom he talked a gross and barbaric interlude.","He stood not far from the ramp.","He told only part of his story.","He was believed.","He waited quietly while all the pressure which the highest officials in the land could exert was directed toward obtaining for him the apparatus the robot had demanded.","When it arrived, he carried it to the floor of the little vestibule behind the port.","Gnut was there, as if waiting.","In his arms he held the slender body of the second Klaatu.","Tenderly he passed him out to Cliff, who took him without a word, as if all this had been arranged.","It seemed to be the parting.","Of all the things Cliff had wanted to say to Klaatu, one remained imperatively present in his mind.","Now, as the green metal robot stood framed in the great green ship, he seized his chance.",""Gnut," he said earnestly, holding carefully the limp body in his arms, "you must do one thing for me.","Listen carefully.","I want you to tell your master — the master yet to come — that what happened to the first Klaatu was an accident, for which all Earth is immeasurably sorry.","Will you do that?"",""I have known it," the robot answered gently.",""But will you promise to tell your master — just those words — as soon as he is arrived?"",""You misunderstand," said Gnut, still gently, and quietly spoke four more words.","As Cliff heard them a mist passed over his eyes and his body went numb.","As he recovered and his eyes came back to focus he saw the great ship disappear.","It just suddenly was not there anymore.","He fell back a step or two.","In his ears, like great bells, rang Gnut's last words.","Never, never was he to disclose them til the day he came to die.",""You misunderstand," the mighty robot had said.",""I am the master."","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/bates3.html","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/bates3.html","28.4","2 Jun 2004");
Page[19]=new Array("The Molemen Want Your Eyes","by Frederick C.","Davis","One sub-genre that enjoyed popularity during the height of the pulp magazine era was the "weird menace", or "shudder", pulp.","The stories in these pulps followed a fairly predictable format: something horrifying appears on the scene and menaces someone, usually a beautiful girl who manages to lose her clothing during the course of the story and the menace is finally vanquished by the stalwart hero.","What made this formula different from the straight horror pulps (such as Weird Tales) is that the menace in the shudder pulps was never supernatural, but was shown, by the end of the story, to be the result of a very human madman doing his best to get revenge on a world that didn't recognize his genius (in the same style as the "old dark house" films of the 30s, or, to make a more contemporary analogy, the cartoon show, Scooby Doo.).","Twists on the formula involved multiple beautiful girls who lose their clothes and multiple madmen.","What makes The Molemen Want Your Eyes stand out from the other stories of the period, aside from the catchy title, is the sheer brutality and sexual imagery that Frederick Davis brings to the story.","Davis was no stranger to the pulps.","During his career, he wrote numerous hard-boiled detective stories and is best remembered for the series of stories featuring his super-heroish creation, The Moon Man, who wore a frosted bubble over his head when fighting crime.","Always a competent writer, Davis rarely strayed from the detective pulps and was never seen in the slick magazines.","Yet Davis' work on Molemen is a bit to the extreme.","There is a savagery in this story that is not seen in his other writings, or very often in the pulps.","Without giving away any of the plot, there are events in this story that are very graphic and can easily make one queasy and unsettled.","Unlike many of the weird menace stories, however, the end of the story doesn't tie up all the loose ends.","The "why" of some of the events is never fully explained.","Possibly, that is why The Molemen Want Your Eyes has enjoyed a life far beyond the pulps that spawned it.","While most of the pulp stories of this genre leave the reader with a happy ending, there is an undercurrent of horror in Molemen that goes beyond the "shudder" that made the weird menace pulps famous.","Editor's note: The Molemen Want Your Eyes was originally published in the April/May issue of Horror Stories in 1938.","There is no record of copyright renewal and we used the 1976 Shroud edition for the text.","We have tried to mimic a pulp layout for this edition and have included the original title page art, which was, again, obtained from the Shroud edition.","To read online: With Adobe 4.0 or above integrated into your browser, left click on the story title and Adobe will do the rest.","To save for later reading:","Netscape: Right click on the story title and, using the sub-menu, select "Save Link As".","IE: Right click on the story title and, using the sub-menu, select "Save Target As".","The Molemen Want Your Eyes","by Frederick C.","Davis","This version of the story is © 2002 by The Nostalgia League","Introduction is © 2002 by Bob Gay","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","The Molemen Want Your Eyes","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/molemen.htm","7","29 Sep 2003");
Page[20]=new Array("Climax For A Ghost Story","by I.","Ireland",""How eerie!" said the girl, advancing cautiously.",""--And what a heavy door!" She touched it as she spoke and it suddenly swung to with a click.","Good Lord!" said the man.",""I don't believe there's a handle inside.","Why, you've locked us both in!"",""Not both of us.","Only one of us," said the girl, and before his eyes she passed straight through the door, and vanished.","Afterword","I first encountered "Climax for a Ghost Story" on the last page of the first issue of Avon Fantasy Reader.","No information is given about the author in the issue and there is no copyright notice for the story in the indicia.","This led me to believe that either the story was in the public domain in 1947, or that I.","Ireland was a pseudonym (possibly of Wollheim) and that the copyright notice had been accidentally left off while trying to protect the author's true identity.","After checking the usual references, the best that could be discovered was a date of 1919 attached to the story with no further publication data.","About the time I was ready to give up the ghost (no pun intended), I stumbled across an Italian SF/Fantasy site which lists a story entitled "Finale per un racconto fantastico" written by I.","Ireland that appears in an Italian anthology Antologia della Letteratura Fantastica edited by Luis Borges.","This same book was available in English as The Book of Fantasy and therein is found the only known biographical material on I.","Ireland:","Ireland, English savant born in Hanley in 1871.","He claimed descent from the infamous impostor William H.","Ireland, who had invented an ancestor, William Henrye Irlaunde, to whom Shakespeare had allegedly bequeathed his manuscripts.","He published A Brief History of Nightmares (1899), Spanish Literature (1900), The Tenth Book of Annals of Tacitus, newly done into English (1911)","So, there you have it.","Ireland was a real person, or at least in the eyes Luis Borges, and that's good enough for me.","We also assume the work to be in the public domain.","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","Climax for a Ghost Story","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/climax.html","4.6","29 Sep 2003");
Page[21]=new Array("An Ancient Ghost Story","by Pliny the Younger","We tend to think of the written horror tale as a relatively recent phenomenon.","But in fact the first hand circulated ghost stories date back at least two thousand years.","This one was related by several ancient authors, the historian Tacitus among them.","The version here, however, is by the Roman letter-writer Pliny the Younger (A.D.61-115).","In it are the staples of the horror tale: the restless corpse, the rattling of chains, the beckoning finger.","There's even a ghost breaker or exorcist for later writers or film makers to build upon.","The translation is that of William Melmoth (1746), as slightly revised, with proper deference to the Latin original, by R.","Stedman.","There was in Athens a house, spacious and open, but with an infamous reputation, as if filled with pestilence.","For in the dead of night, a noise like the clashing of iron could be heard.","And if one listened carefully, it sounded like the rattling of chains.","At first the noise seemed to be at a distance, but then it would approach, nearer, nearer, nearer.","Suddenly a phantom would appear, an old man, pale and emaciated, with a long beard, and hair that appeared driven by the wind.","The fetters on his feet and hands rattled as he moved them.","Any dwellers in the house passed sleepless nights under the most dismal terrors imaginable.","The nights without rest led them to a kind of madness, and as the horrors in their minds increased, onto a path toward death.","Even in the daytime--when the phantom did not appear--the memory of the nightmare was so strong that it still passed before their eyes.","The terror remained when the cause of it was gone.","Damned as uninhabitable, the house was at last deserted, left to the spectral monster.","But in hope that some tenant might be found who was unaware of the malevolence within it, the house was posted for rent or sale.","It happened that a philosopher named Athenodorus came to Athens at that time.","Reading the posted bill, he discovered the dwelling's price.","The extraordinary cheapness raised his suspicion, yet when he heard the whole story, he was not in the least put off.","Indeed, he was eager to take the place.","And did so immediately.","As evening drew near, Athenodorus had a couch prepared for him in the front section of the house.","He asked for a light and his writing materials, then dismissed his retainers.","To keep his mind from being distracted by vain terrors of imaginary noises and apparitions, he directed all his energy toward his writing.","For a time the night was silent.","Then came the rattling of fetters.","Athenodorus neither lifted up his eyes, nor laid down his pen.","Instead he closed his ears by concentrating on his work.","But the noise increased and advanced closer till it seemed to be at the door, and at last in the very chamber.","Athenodorus looked round and saw the apparition exactly as it had been described to him.","It stood before him, beckoning with one finger.","Athenodorus made a sign with his hand that the visitor should wait a little, and bent over his work.","The ghost, however, shook the chains over the philosopher's head, beckoning as before.","Athenodorus now took up his lamp and followed.","The ghost moved slowly, as if held back by his chains.","Once it reached the courtyard, it suddenly vanished.","Athenodorus, now deserted, carefully marked the spot with a handful of grass and leaves.","The next day he asked the magistrate to have the spot dug up.","There they found--intertwined with chains--the bones that were all that remained of a body that had long lain in the ground.","Carefully, the skeletal relics were collected and given proper burial, at public expense.","The tortured ancient was at rest.","And the house in Athens was haunted no more.","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","An Ancient Ghost Story","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/ghost_story.htm","8.2","29 Sep 2003");
Page[22]=new Array("THE CRACKER BARREL",""Comics Face The New Year 2003"","by Tom Mason","In this new year of 2003, what's up with comics?","What has changed? Marvel seems to be riding high with the immense success of the Spider Man movie helping to spur sales on the many Spider Man themed books.","They are trying to add to the mythos of Captain America with a new series on how blacks were experimented on with the super-serum pre-Steve Rogers.","You can read my comments on this ground-breaking idea in the News Stand as more issues in this series come out, each more outlandish than the previous one.","Marvel continues to reprint their Marvel Masterworks from the past, but have no plans to do any new material for the Masterworks.","As far as any reprinting of classic Timely or Atlas material, the have no interest in that area at all and are very vocal about it.","With the upcoming release of the new Daredevil and Hulk movies, you will probably see new interest in their respective titles and of course, the inevitable juggernaut of toy merchandising comes with it.","Buy that Daredevil or Hulk lunch box now!","Overall Marvel's sales have improved somewhat for them, but they are still not what they used to be.","In fact, the comics sales of both of the majors DC and Marvel are nowhere near those of the silver or bronze age.","The once proud independent lines are just barely managing to keep their heads above water.","Todd MacFarlane has lost a major lawsuit over creator rights to some of the major characters in his line and that is a chunk of change out of his pocket.","Big Bang Comics, once a fun retro tribute to the comics of the Golden and Silver Ages seems unable to maintain any sort of regular schedule at all.","DC comics, seems to be holding its own.","Some books have failed, the Spectre revival has gone by the wayside.","Supergirl's book is also cancelled.","The Green Arrow book is still on the schedule although Kevin Smith has departed.","Dead Man is dead.again.","The promised new Brave and the Bold series seems to be in limbo.","The newly designed Justice League Adventures on the Cartoon Network is doing quite well with well thought-out stories and has spawned a comic based on its cartoon style (Batman's ears are longer than ever!) and is a favorite of mine.","A promised new series, Teen Titans, is being hinted at also for the Cartoon Network.","John Byrne has a third limited series, Superman/Batman Generations III.","This time it is in regular format and goes for 12 issues.","The DC Archives series remains one of my favorites and DC has continued the complete series of Will Eisner's The Spirit Archives that show up about quarterly during the year.","DC has even gone out of house to present the acclaimed Tower Comics series by Wally Wood, The T.H.U.N.D.E.R.","Agents, in the archives series with a hint that a new ongoing regular series may follow if sales warrant.","Batman has been given new life with Jim Lee taking over the main book and giving his special touch to the artwork.","How long that will last is anyone's guess.","The atrocious Japanese Manga-art look that had been bestowed on Superman has been abandoned with promises to return to the traditional Superman "look".","Just what does DC consider "traditional?" I doubt we will ever see the likes of Shuster, Boring, or Swan's style used.","As for toys, Hasbro has lost the rights to the DC line of characters to Mattel and DC Direct is forging ahead with plans for figures of their own but certainly not in the five to six dollar figures we are used to.","Now you pay twelve to thirty-nine dollars for figures and sets.","They are beautiful and sculpted in great detail, but you pay the price.","Marvel is releasing many of their classic characters in new sculptures that are quite detailed and priced reasonably though their Toy Biz line.","Praying Mantis is in the middle of releasing many classic Batman models and new model kits featuring the Batmobile etc.","Evidently, the revival of Captain Action with all his various comic book personas has faded into the background.","No new costumes are being issued and bargains galore can be found on the internet of previously released product.","Today, most of my comic buying is severely curtailed and I confine myself mainly to DC comics and Bill Black's AC Comics reprints from the golden age.","Sadly, the trend of comics shops closing continues on and there seems to be no great revival of comics popularity coming up due to all the other media sources kids have nowadays.","The best buys today on high ticket items would seem to be on the internet as most comic shops cannot afford to discount product to customers.","A fifty dollar Archives edition can often be bought for as little as twenty dollars or less bidding on eBay.","Comic shops just cannot compete with those sorts of discounts...they say.","So with 2003 are things looking up? It depends on your point of view.","Marvel says things could not be any better and would like us to swallow that line.","Even their staunchest supporter and hype guy Stan Lee is suing them for monies he thinks are owed to him.","Diamond Publishing still controls most all distribution and has even raised prices on the Previews catalog each month, all this with no improvement of service that I can see.","The publishers have still failed to attract the youngsters that used to buy the inexpensive ten cent comics in the Golden Age.","Today, I walk into a comics shop and only mature adults are in there, oftentimes just browsing and hoping for something to appear that is readable.","With prices of comics starting at $2.50 or more, who can afford them? Kids have video games, cable, satellite, and that ole computer available to them.","Why spend the money on comics?","Is there a miracle around the corner for comics to be revitalized? I still doubt it.","As I have said in the past: "THANK GOD FOR REPRINTS."","Tom Mason Feb.","2003","For the commentary Tom made on the comic book industry last year, click here.","A Dying Breed 2001","©2003 by Tom Mason","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","The Cracker Barrel-Comics Face the Year 2003","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/barrel3.html","8.9","29 Sep 2003");
Page[23]=new Array("And A Little Child Shall Lead Them","by Raymond William Stedman","Daytime cliffhanging began April 6, 1931, on the Blue Network of NBC.","By coincidence -- as it was with the pioneer movie serials -- the afternoon radio genre had as its first principal character a female, and an underage one at that.","Well, not much underage, for she had made her debut in Harold Grey's comic strip in 1924, and she then looked to be nine or ten years old.","When she reached the airwaves seven years later, Little Orphan Annie seemed not a day older.","It must have been disconcerting to Jack Armstrong, Tom Mix, Don Winslow, and the gang that a little child had led them, but that's the way it was.","As a matter of fact, she didn't have a single late afternoon competitor for more than a year-- and when he arrived, he too was a child -- Bobby Benson.","Unlike most of the evening thrillers of the time, the juvenile dramas like Annie’s were continued stories, divided into fifteen-minute time segments stretching from Monday through Friday.","(For a few years they ran into Saturdays, too.) These daytime thrillers were not episodic serials in the mode of nighttime adventures but were open-ended, having suspenseful closings for each daily installment.","Only when an adventure that had occupied the regular characters for weeks or months was at last wrapped up might an individual program end on a note of resolution.","More often, however, a new mystery was introduced during the same episode in which the old one concluded.","This revolving-plot technique was, of course, designed to draw the juvenile listeners to the next installment.","Women’s serials also employed the device, but soap-opera writers used many more episodes to sneak in the new plot and rarely ended one on the high note of suspense that marked the serials for children.","There is a possibility of confusion on the part of some who recall the Little Orphan Annie series, because it was really two, or perhaps three, different programs.","First of all, because of the imperfections in network connections in 1931, it was necessary to maintain two complete casts for the dramas, one in Chicago and one in San Francisco.","Thus, until 1933, when the network lines were complete and available, listeners in the East and the Middle West heard the Shirley Bell (pictured at left) company enacting the dramas, while those on the Pacific Coast heard a company with Floy Hughes in the title role.","The scripts, fortunately, were identical, so the distinction amounted to having the same things happen to different-sounding people on the same days.","This variation in aural images in the days before the Chicago cast took over coast to coast may or may not have affected the way the early Orphan Annie program is remembered by those of different areas.","The real dichotomy in Annie's radio existence, however, was chronological, not geographical.","She had, if I may give them names, her Ovaltine period and her Puffed Wheat Sparkies period.","The former was the longer (1931-40) and the more distinguished.","Moreover, it was only in the earlier Ovaltine years that her listeners heard both words and melody of the Orphan Annie song, which began:","Who's that little chatterbox,","The one with pretty auburn locks ...","Many of the later Orphan Annie fans had no idea that there were lyrics to go with the tune that was played on the organ at the beginning and end of each episode.","No doubt they would have choked had they been confronted by the interjectional:","" Arf! " says Sandy.","The adventures themselves initially corresponded to the kinds of things that went on in the Annie comic strip -- and thus beggar description.","Not that they were excessively exotic; in the earlier days they took place mostly in Tompkins Corners or Sunfield and were sprinkled with some American Gothic characters, including Mr.","and Mrs.","Silo and Annie's little pal Joe Corntassel.","But there were those other people, notably Oliver Warbucks, the war profiteer's war profiteer, the capitalist's capitalist, who never had to take the law into his own hands because he had a law of his own.","Violators faced dispatch at the hands of the giant Punjab or, worse yet, the silent Asp, Warbuck's favorite executioner.","Although Daddy Warbucks was not always around to help Annie, at those times when he was, villains could expect quick liquidation without the fuss of arrest and trial.","When Annie and Joe were on their own, the radio adventures were not so much bizarre as improbable, primarily because the two youngsters did things that real kids could only dream of doing.","(For example, explore the logical aspects of, "Follow that cab!" when placed in the mouth of a ten-year-old.) Because the adventures represented wonderful wish fulfillment for a child – just as Warbucks represented the child's concept of the all-powerful adult -- Little Orphan Annie caught on quickly with younger children and remained their thriller when others came along.","Announcer Pierre André, not incidentally, has to be considered an important factor in the show's appeal to that age group; he had the youngsters hanging upon every word, whether it was about the day's adventure or the Wander Company's nourishing Ovaltine (whose premium offers are part of another story).","Wander should have erected a monument to André (and to Blackett-Sample-Hummert, the advertising agency which packaged the show) atop one of the Swiss mountains whence the idea for Ovaltine supposedly came.","For a larger view of the code book,","click here.","Sometime around the beginning of World War II the makers of Orphan Annie's very own drink decided that they had milked her series for all it was worth and dropped it for Captain Midnight.","Annie staggered along on the energy she had stored while drinking Ovaltine, but her producers, faced with the choice of canceling the program or selling Annie's soul, chose the sellout.","Deserting Joe Corntassel, Annie became the camp follower of Captain Sparks, an aviator who took the first part of his name from the figure he was imitating, Captain Midnight, and the second part from the sponsor's product, Puffed Wheat Sparkies.","Such a hero had no chance of success, and poor Annie had no place at a combat pilot's elbow.","Some razzle-dazzle with secret codes and an unusual giveaway of an Orphan Annie Cockpit stirred interest for a while, but the revised series was left behind by shows which could do the sky-spy job better.","Even the cereal couldn’t make it and went back to being plain old Puffed Wheat.","By then, Annie’s song was only a distant echo:","Always wears a sunny smile,","Now wouldn’t it be worth your while","If you could be","Like little Orphan Annie?","Little Orphan Annie","Principal Players","Annie / Shirley Bell, Floy Hughes, Janice Gilbert","Daddy Warbucks / Henry Saxe, Stanley Andrews, Boris Aplon","Joe Corntassel / Allan Baruck","Mr.","Silo / Jerry O’Mera","Mrs.","Silo / Henrietta Tedro","Aha, the cook / Olan Soule","Sandy * / Brad Barker","*(also occasionally performed by the announcer or another actor)","Announcer / Pierre André","Adapted from The Serials: Suspense and Drama by Installment,","© 1971, 1977 by Raymond William Stedman","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","And a Little Child Shall Lead Them-Little Orphan Annie on Radio","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/annie.htm","10.7","29 Sep 2003");
Page[24]=new Array("The Jameson Satellite","by Neil R.","Jones","The quest for immortality has long been a theme in genre fiction.","From the earliest writings to today, the desire to live forever, and the consequences of fulfilling that dream, has fascinated authors, whether they are writing in the fields of horror, fantasy, or science fiction.","The selling of souls, the ray device, the vampire's bite, transplantation, or one's own genetic code are the usual ways one may attain immortality, yet Neil R.","Jones came up with a novel twist on this theme and, in doing so, granted his character immortality and gained a form of immortality himself.","Neil R.","Jones (1909-1988) was was an American author who worked for the state of New York in some capacity, apparently for the Department of Labor.","Never a prolific author, Jones' work was quite remarkable for being ground–breaking, at least in terms of SF.","His first published story, "The Death's Head Meteor" appeared in Air Wonder Stories in 1930 and was the first time the word "astronaut" was used in an SF story.","Nearly all of his fiction ties into a loose "future history" of the type one associates with Robert Heinlein or Cordwainer Smith, long before inter–connected universes were in vogue.","Of course, these accomplishments have been forgotten over time and Jones might have been forgotten as well, if not for his most popular creation.","Rating not even a cover mention, "The Jameson Satellite" appeared in the July 1931 issue of Amazing Stories and immediately captured the imagination of the readers of the time.","The central figure of these interplanetary tales was Professor Jameson, the last Earthman who, as you will see in the story reprinted below, became immortal through the science of the Zoromes.","Never sleeping, not needing food, water or breathable air, the good Professor and his companions explored the mysteries of time and space in 21 adventures that were published between 1931 and 1951, at which time Jones stopped writing.","Why he did this is not documented anywhere that I can find and the fact that Jones still had 9 stories that were unpublished at the time makes this cessation all the more mysterious.","Most likely, Professor Jameson and the Zoromes would have been relegated to the realm of fond memories had Ace Books not reprinted a large portion of the Jameson canon in the late 60s.","Editor Donald Wollheim put together 5 volumes that encompassed 16 of the stories, including 2 that had been previously unpublished.","Although presented as novels, these paperbacks acquainted a new generation of readers with the Jameson adventures and helped to secure Jones' place in the annals of science fiction.","NOTE: In researching this article, I found a site in England that has pictures of Jones, his family and his headstone.","It can be found by clicking here.","Introduction ©Bob Gay","February, 2004","PROLOGUE The Rocket Satellite","In the depths of space, some twenty thousand miles from the earth, the body of Professor Jameson within its rocket container cruised upon an endless journey, circling the gigantic sphere.","The rocket was a satellite of the huge, revolving world around which it held to its orbit.","In the year 1958 Professor Jameson had sought for a plan whereby he might preserve his body indefinitely after his death.","He had worked long and hard upon the subject.","Since the time of the Pharaohs, the human race had looked tor a means by which the dead might be preserved against the ravages of time.","Great had been the art of the Egyptians in the embalming of their deceased, a practice which was later lost to humanity of the ensuing mechanical age, never to be rediscovered.","But even the embalming of the Egyptians–so Professor Jameson had argued–would be futile in the face of millions of years, the dissolution of the corpses being just as eventual as immediate cremation following death.","The professor had looked for a means by which the body could be preserved perfectly forever.","But eventually he had come to the conclusion that nothing on earth is unchangeable beyond a certain limit of time.","Just as long as he sought an earthly means of preservation, he was doomed to disappointment.","All earthly elements are composed of atoms which are forever breaking down and building up, but never destroying themselves.","A match may be burned, but the atoms are still unchanged, having resolved themselves into smoke, carbon dioxide, ashes, and certain basic elements.","It was clear to the professor that he could never accomplish his purpose if he were to employ one system of atomic structure, such as embalming fluid or other concoction, to preserve another system of atomic structure, such as the human body, when all atomic structure is subject to universal change no matter how slow.","He had then soliloquized upon the possibility of preserving the human body in its state of death until the end of all earthly time—to that day when the earth would return to the sun from which it had sprung.","Quite suddenly one day he had conceived the answer to the puzzling problem which obsessed his mind, leaving him awed with its wild, uncanny potentialities.","He would have his body shot into space enclosed in a rocket to become a satellite of the earth as long as the earth continued to exist.","He reasoned logically.","Any material substance, whether of organic or inorganic origin, cast into the depths of space would exist indefinitely.","He had visualized his dead body enclosed in a rocket flying off into the illimitable maw of space.","He would remain in perfect preservation, while on earth millions of generations of mankind would live and die, their bodies to molder into the dust of the forgotten past.","He would exist in this unchanged manner until that day when mankind, beneath a cooling sun, should fade out forever in the chill, thin atmosphere of a dying world.","And still his body would remain intact and as perfect in its rocket container as on that day of the far–gone past when it had left the earth to be hurled out on its career.","What a magnificent idea!","At first he had been assailed with doubts.","Suppose his funeral rocket landed upon some other planet or, drawn by the pull of the great sun, were thrown into the flaming folds of the incandescent sphere? Then the rocket might continue on out of the solar system, plunging through the endless seas of space for millions of years, to finally enter the solar system of some far–off star, as meteors often enter ours.","Suppose his rocket crashed upon a planet, or the star itself, or became a captive satellite of some celestial body?","It had been at this juncture that the idea of his rocket becoming the satellite of the earth bad presented itself, and he had immediately incorporated it into his scheme.","The professor had figured out the amount of radium necessary to carry the rocket far enough away from the earth so that it would not turn around and crash, and still be not so far away but what the earth's gravitational attraction would keep it from leaving the vicinity of the earth and the solar system.","Like the moon, it would forever revolve around the earth.","He had chosen an orbit sixty–five thousand miles from the earth for his rocket to follow.","The only fears he had entertained concerned the huge meteors which careened through space (at tremendous rates of speed.","He bad overcome this obstacle, however, and had eliminated the possibilities of a collision with these stellar juggernauts.","In the rocket were installed radium repulsion rays which swerved all approaching meteors from the path of the rocket as they entered the vicinity of the space wanderer.","The aged professor had prepared for every contingency, and had set down to rest from his labors, reveling in the stupendous, unparalleled results he would obtain.","Never would his body undergo decay; and never would his bones bleach to return to the dust of the earth from which all men originally came and to which they must return.","His body would remain millions of years in a perfectly preserved state, untouched by the hoary palm of such time as only geologists and astronomers can conceive.","His efforts would surpass even the wildest dreams of H.","Rider Haggard, who depicted the wondrous, embalming practice of the ancient nation of Kor in his immortal novel, She, wherein Holly, under the escort of the incomparable Ayesha, looked upon the magnificent, lifelike masterpieces of embalming by the long–gone peoples of Kor.","With the able assistance of a nephew, who carried out his instructions and wishes following his death.","Professor Jameson was sent upon his pilgrimage into space within the rocket he himself had built.","The nephew and heir kept the secret forever locked in his heart.","Generation after generation had passed upon its way.","Gradually humanity had come to die out, finally disappearing from the earth altogether.","Mankind was later replaced by various other forms of life which dominated the globe for their allotted spaces of time before they too became extinct.","The years piled up on one another, running into millions, and still the Jameson Satellite kept its lonely vigil around the earth, gradually closing the distance between satellite and planet, yielding reluctantly to the latter's powerful attraction.","Forty million years later, its orbit ranged some twenty thousand miles from the earth while the dead world edged ever nearer the cooling sun whose dull, red ball covered a large expanse of the sky.","Surrounding the flaming sphere, many of the stars could be perceived through the earth's thin, rarefied atmosphere.","As the earth cut in slowly and gradually toward the solar luminary, so was the moon revolving ever nearer the earth, appearing like a great gem glowing in the twilight sky.","The rocket containing the remains of Professor Jameson continued its endless travel around the great ball of the earth whose rotation had now ceased entirely—one side forever facing the dying sun.","There it pursued its lonely way, a cosmic coffin, accompanied by its funeral cortege of scintillating stars amid the deep silence of the eternal space which enshrouded it.","Solitary it remained, except for the occasional passing of a meteor flitting by at a remarkable speed on its aimless journey through the vacuum between the far–flung worlds.","Would the satellite follow its orbit to the world's end, or would its supply of radium soon exhaust itself after so many eons of time, converting the rocket into the prey of the first large meteor which chanced that way? Would it some day return to the earth as its nearer approach portended, and increase its acceleration in a long arc to crash upon the surface of the dead planet? And when the rocket terminated its career, would the body of Professor Jameson be found perfectly preserved or merely a crumbled mound of dust?","CHAPTER I 40,000,000 Years After","Entering within the boundaries of the solar system, a long, dark, pointed craft sped across the realms of space towards the tiny point of light which marked the dull red ball of the dying sun which would some day lie cold and dark forever.","Like a huge meteor it flashed into the solar system from another chain of planets far out in the illimitable Universe of stars and worlds, heading towards the great red sun at an inconceivable speed.","Within the interior of the space traveler, queer creatures of metal labored at the controls of the space flyer which juggernauted on its way.","towards the far–off solar luminary.","Rapidly it crossed the orbits of Neptune and Uranus and headed sunward.","The bodies of these queer creatures were square blocks of a metal closely resembling steel, while for appendages, the metal cube was upheld by four jointed legs capable of movement.","A set of six tentacles, all metal, like the rest of the body, curved outward from the upper half of the cubic body.","Surmounting it was a queer–shaped head rising to a peak in the center and equipped with a circle of eyes all the way around the head.","The creatures, with their mechanical eyes equipped with metal shutters, could see in all directions.","A single eye pointed directly upward, being situated in the space of the peaked head, resting in a slight depression of the cranium.","These were the Zoromes of the planet Zor which rotated on its way around a star millions of light years distant from our solar system.","The Zoromes, several hundred thousand years before, had reached a stage in science, where they searched for immortality and eternal relief from bodily ills and various deficiencies of flesh and blood anatomy.","They had sought freedom from death, and had found it, but at the same time they had destroyed the propensities for birth.","And for several hundred thousand years there had been no births and few deaths in the history of the Zoromes.","This strange race of people had built their own mechanical bodies, and by operation upon one another had removed their brains to the metal heads from which they directed the functions and movements of their inorganic anatomies.","There had been no deaths due to worn–out bodies.","When one part of the mechanical men wore out, it was replaced by a new part, and so the Zoromes continued living their immortal lives which saw few casualties.","It was true that, since the innovation of the machines, there had been a few accidents which had seen the destruction of the metal heads with their brains.","These were irreparable.","Such cases had been few, however, and the population of Zor had decreased but little.","The machine men of Zor had no use for atmosphere, and had it not been for the terrible coldness of space, could have just as well existed in the ether void as upon some planet.","Their metal bodies, especially their metal–encased brains, did require a certain amount of heat even though they were able to exist comfortably in temperatures which would instantly have frozen to death a flesh–and–blood creature.","The most popular pastime among the machine men of Zor was the exploration of the Universe.","This afforded them a never ending source of interest in the discovery of the variegated inhabitants and conditions of the various planets on which they came to rest.","Hundreds of space ships were sent out in all directions, many of them being upon their expeditions for hundreds of years before they returned once more to the home planet of far–off Zor.","This particular spacecraft of the Zoromes had entered the solar system whose planets ware gradually circling in closer to the dull red ball of the declining sun.","Several of the machine men of the space craft's crew, which numbered some fifty individuals, were examining the various planets of this particular planetary system carefully through telescopes possessing immense power.","These machine men had no names and were indexed according to letters and numbers.","They conversed by means of thought impulses, and were neither capable of making a sound vocally nor of hearing one uttered.",""Where shall we go?" queried one of the men at the controls questioning another who stood by his side examining a chart on the wall.",""They all appear to be dead worlds, 4R–3579," replied the one addressed, "but the second planet from the sun appears to have an atmosphere which might sustain a few living creatures, and the third planet may also prove interesting for it has a satellite.","We shall examine the inner planets first of all, and explore the outer ones later if we decide it is worth the time."",""Too much trouble for nothing," ventured 9G–721.",""This system of planets offers us little but what we have seen many times before in our travels.","The sun is so cooled that it cannot sustain the more common life on its planets, the type of life forms we usually find in our travels.","We should have visited a planetary system with a brighter sun."",""You speak of common life," remarked 25X–987.",""What of the uncommon life? Have we not found life existent on cold, dead planets with no sunlight and atmosphere at all?"",""Yes, we have," admitted 90–721, "but such occasions are exceedingly rare."",""The possibility exists, however, even in this case," reminded 4R–3579, "and what if we do spend a bit of unprofitable time in this one planetary system—haven't we all an endless lifetime before us? Eternity is ours."",""We shall visit the second planet first of all," directed 25X–987, who was in charge of this particular expedition of the Zoromes, "and on the way there we shall cruise along near the third planet to see what we can of the surface.","We may be able to tell whether or not it holds anything of interest to us.","If it does, after visiting the second planet, we shall then return to the third.","The first world is not worth bothering with."","The space ship from Zor raced on in a direction which would take it several thousand miles above the earth and then on to the planet which we know as Venus.","As the space ship rapidly neared the earth, it slackened its speed, so that the Zoromes might examine it closely with their glasses as the ship passed the third planet.","Suddenly, one of the machine men ran excitedly into the room where 25X–987 stood watching the topography of the World beneath him.",""We have found something!" he exclaimed.",""What?"",""Another space ship!"",""Where?"",""But a short distance ahead of us on our course.","Come into the foreport of the ship and you can pick it up with the glass."",""Which is the way it's going?" asked 25X–987.",""It is behaving queerly," replied the machine man of Zor.",""It appears to be in the act of encircling the planet."",""Do you suppose that there really is life on that dead world–intelligent beings like ourselves, and that this is one of their space craft?"",""Perhaps it is another exploration craft like our own from some other world," was the suggestion.",""But not of ours," said 25X–987.","Together, the two Zoromes now hastened into the observation room of the space ship where more of the machine men were excitedly examining the mysterious space craft, their thought impulses flying thick and fast like bodiless bullets.",""It is very small!"",""Its speed is slow!"",""The craft can hold but few men," observed one.",""We do not yet know of what size the creatures are," reminded another.",""Perhaps there are thousands of them in that space craft out there.","They may be of such a small size that it will be necessary to look twice before finding one of them.","Such beings are not unknown."",""We shall soon overtake it and see."",""I wonder if they have seen us?"",""Where do you suppose it came from?"",""From the world beneath us," was the suggestion.",""Perhaps."","CHAPTER II The Mysterious Space Craft","The machine men made way for their leader, 25X–987, who regarded the space craft ahead of them critically.",""Have you tried communicating with it yet?" he asked.",""There is no reply to any of our signals," came the answer.",""Come alongside of it then," ordered their commander.",""It is small enough to be brought inside our carrying compartment, and we can see with our penetration rays just what manner of creatures it holds.","They are intelligent, that is certain, for their space ship does imply as much."","The space flyer of the Zoromes slowed up as it approached the mysterious wanderer of the cosmic void which hovered in the vicinity of the dying world.",""What a queer shape it has," remarked 25X–987.",""It is even smaller than I had previously calculated."","A rare occurrence had taken place among the machine men of Zor.","They were overcome by a great curiosity which they could not allow to remain unsatiated.","Accustomed as they were to witnessing strange sights and still stranger creatures, meeting up with weird adventures in various comers of the Universe, they had now become hardened to the usual run of experiences which they were in the habit of encountering.","It took a great deal to arouse their unperturbed attitudes.","Something new, however, about this queer space craft had gripped their imaginations, and perhaps a subconscious influence asserted to their minds that here they have come across an adventure radically unusual.",""Come alongside it," repeated 25X–987 to the operator as he returned to the control room and gazed through the side of the space ship in the direction of the smaller cosmic wanderer.",""I'm trying to," replied the machine man, "but it seems to jump away a bit every time I get within a certain distance of it.","Our ship seems to jump backward a bit too."",""Are they trying to elude us?"",""I don't know.","They should pick up more speed if that is their object."",""Perhaps they are now progressing at their maximum speed and cannot increase their acceleration any more."",""Look!" exclaimed the operator.",""Did you just see that? The thing has jumped away from us again!"",""Our ship moved also," said 25X–987.",""I saw a flash of light shoot from the side of the other craft as it jumped."","Another machine man now entered and spoke to the commander of the Zorome expedition.",""They are using radium repellent rays to keep us from approaching," he informed.",""Counteract it," instructed 25X–987.","The man left, and now the machine man at the controls of the craft tried again to close with the mysterious wanderer of the space between planets.","The effort was successful, and this time there was no glow of repulsion rays from the side of the long metal cylinder.","They now entered the compartment where various objects were transferred from out of the depths of space to the interplanetary craft.","Then patiently they waited for the rest of the machine men to open the side of their space ship and bring in the queer, elongated cylinder.",""Put it under the penetration ray!" ordered 25X–987.",""Then we shall see what it contains!"","The entire group of Zoromes were assembled about the long cylinder, whose low nickel–plated sides shone brilliantly.","With interest they regarded the fifteen–foot object which tapered a bit towards its base.","The nose was pointed like a bullet.","Eight cylindrical protuberances were affixed to the base while the four sides were equipped with fins such as are seen on aerial bombs to guide them in a direct, unswerving line through the atmosphere.","At the base of the strange craft there projected a lever, while in one side was a door which apparently opened outward.","One of the machine men reached forward to open it but was halted by the admonition of the commander.",""Do not open it up yet!" he warned.",""We are not aware of what it contains!"","Guided by the hand of one of the machine men, a series of lights shone down upon the cylinder.","It became enveloped in a haze of light which rendered the metal sides of the mysterious space craft dim and indistinct while the interior of the cylinder was as clearly revealed as if there had been no covering.","The machine men, expecting to see at least several, perhaps many, strange creatures moving about within the metal cylinder, stared aghast at the sight they beheld.","There was but one creature, and he was lying perfectly still, either in a state of suspended animation or else of death.","He was about twice the height of the mechanical men of Zor.","For along time they gazed at him in a silence of thought, and then their leader instructed them.",""Take him out of the container."","The penetration rays were turned off, and two of the machine men stepped eagerly forward and opened the door.","One of them peered within at the recumbent body of the weird–looking individual with the four appendages.","The creature lay up against a luxuriously upholstered interior, a strap affixed to his chin while four more straps held both the upper and lower appendages securely to the insides of the cylinder.","The machine man released these, and with the help of his comrade removed the body of the creature from the cosmic coffin in which they had found it.",""He is dead!" pronounced one of the machine men after a long and careful examination of the corpse.",""He has been like this for a long time."",""There are strange thought impressions left upon his mind," remarked another.","One of the machine men, whose metal body was a different shade than that of his companions, stepped forward, his cubic body bent over that of the strange, cold creature who was garbed in fantastic accoutrements.","He examined the dead organism a moment, and then he turned to his companions.",""Would you like to hear his story?" he asked.",""Yes!" came the concerted reply.",""You shall, then," was the ultimatum.",""Bring him into my laboratory.","I shall remove his brain and simulate the cells into activity once more.","We shall give him life again, transplanting his brain into the head of one of our machines."","With these words he directed two of the Zoromes to carry the corpse into the laboratory.","As the space ship cruised about in the vicinity of this third planet which 25X–987 had decided to visit on finding the metal cylinder with its queer inhabitant, 8B–52, the experimenter, worked unceasingly in his laboratory to revive the long–dead brain cells to action once more.","Finally, after consummating his desires and having his efforts crowned with success, he placed the brain within the head of a machine.","The brain was brought to consciousness.","The creature's body was discarded after the all–important brain had been removed.","CHAPTER III Recalled to Life","As Professor Jameson came to, he became aware of a strange feeling.","He was sick.","The doctors had not expected him to live; they had frankly told him so—but he had cared little in view of the long, happy years stretched out behind him.","Perhaps he was not to die yet.","He wondered how long be had slept.","How strange he felt—as if he had no body.","Why couldn't he open his eyes? He tried very hard.","A mist swam before him.","His eyes had been open all the time but he had not seen before.","That was queer, he ruminated.","All was silent about his bedside.","Had all the doctors and nurses left him to sleep—or to die?","Devil tale that mist which now swam before him, obscuring everything in line of vision.","He would call his nephew.","Vainly he attempted to shout the word "Douglas," but to no avail.","Where was his mouth? It seemed as if he had none.","Was it all delirium? The strange silence—perhaps he had lost his sense of hearing along with his ability to speak—and he could see nothing distinctly.","The mist had transferred itself into a confused jumble of indistinct objects, some of which moved about before him.","He was now conscious of some impulse in his mind which kept questioning him as to how he felt.","He was conscious of other strange ideas which seemed to be impressed upon his brain, but this one thought concerning his indisposition clamored insistently over the lesser ideas.","It even seemed just as it someone was addressing him, and impulsively he attempted to utter a sound and tell them how queer he felt.","It seemed as it speech had been taken from him.","He could not talk, no matter how hard he tried.","It was no use.","Strange to say, however, the impulse within his mind appeared to be satisfied with the effort, and it now put another question to him.","Where was he from? What a strange question—when he was at home.","He told them as much.","Had he always lived there? Why, yes, of course.","The aged professor was now becoming more astute as to his condition.","At first if was only a mild, passive wonderment at his helplessness and the strange thoughts Which raced through his mind.","Now he attempted to arouse himself from the lethargy.","Quite suddenly his sight cleared, and what a surprise! He could see all the way around him without moving his head! And he could look at the ceiling of his room! His room? Was it his room? No— It just couldn't be.","Where was he? What were those queer machines before him? They moved on four legs.","Six tentacles curled outward from their cubical bodies.","One of the machines stood close before him.","A tentacle shot out from the object and rubbed his head.","How strange it felt upon his brow.","Instinctively he obeyed the impulse to shove the contraption of metal from him with his hands.","His arms did not rise, instead six tentacles projected upward to force back the machine.","Professor Jameson gasped mentally in surprise as he gazed at the result of his urge to push the strange, unearthly looking machine–caricature from him.","With trepidation he looked down at his own body to see where the tentacles had come from, and his surprise turned to sheer fright and amazement.","His body was like the moving machine which stood before him! Where was he? What ever had happened to him so suddenly? Only a few moments ago he had been in his bed, with the doctors and his nephew bending over him, expecting him to die.","The last words he had remembered hearing was the cryptic announcement of one of the doctors.",""He is going now."","But he hadn't died after all, apparently.","A horrible thought struck him! Was this the life after death? Or was it an illusion of the mind? He became aware that the machine in front of him was attempting to communicate something to him.","How could it, thought the professor, when he had no mouth.","The desire to communicate an idea to him became more insistent The suggestion of the machine man's question was in his mind.","Telepathy, thought he.","The creature was asking about the place whence he had come.","He didn't know; his mind was in such a turmoil of thoughts and conflicting ideas.","He allowed himself to be led to a window where the machine with waving tentacle pointed towards an object outside.","It was a queer sensation to be walking on the four metal legs.","He looked from the window and he saw that which caused him to nearly drop over, so astounded was he.","The professor found himself gazing out from the boundless depths of space across the cosmic void to where a huge planet lay quiet.","Now he was sure it was an illusion which made his mind and sight behave so queerly.","He was troubled by a very strange dream.","Carefully he examined the topography of the gigantic globe which rested off in the distance.","At the same time he could see back of him the concourse of mechanical creatures crowding up behind him, and he was aware of a telepathic conversation which was being carried on behind him—or just before him.","Which was it now? Eyes extended all the way around his head, while there existed no difference on any of the four sides of his cubed body.","His mechanical legs were capable of moving in any of four given directions with perfect ease, he discovered.","The planet was not the earth—of that he was sure.","None of the familiar continents lay before his eyes.","And then he saw the great dull red ball of the dying sun.","That was not the sun of his earth.","It had been a great deal more brilliant.",""Did you come from that planet?" came the thought impulse from the mechanism by his side.",""No," he returned.","He then allowed the machine men—for he assumed that they were machine men, and he reasoned that, somehow or other they had by some marvelous transformation made him over just as they were—to lead him through the craft of which he now took notice for the first time.","It was an interplanetary flyer, or spaceship, he firmly believed.","25X–987 now took him to the compartment which they had removed him to from the strange container they had found wandering in the vicinity of the nearby world.","There they showed him the long cylinder.",""It's my rocket satellite!" exclaimed Professor Jameson to himself, though in reality every one of the machine men received his thoughts plainly.",""What is it doing here?"",""We found your dead body within it," answered 25X–987.",""Your brain was removed to the machine after having been stimulated into activity once more.","Your carcass was thrown away."","Professor Jameson just stood dumbfounded by the words of the machine man.",""So I did die!" exclaimed the professor.",""And my body was placed within the rocket to remain in everlasting preservation until the end of all earthly time! Success! I have now attained unrivaled success!"","He then turned to the machine man.",""How long have I been that way?" he asked excitedly.",""How should we know?" replied the Zorome.",""We picked up your rocket only a short time ago, which, according to your computation, would be less than a day.","This is our first visit to your planetary system and we chanced upon your rocket So it is a satellite? We didn't watch it long enough to discover whether or not it was a satellite.","At first we thought it to be another traveling space craft, but when it refused to answer our signals we investigated."",""And so that was the earth at which I looked," mused the professor.",""No wonder I didn't recognize it.","The topography has changed so much.","How different the sun appears—it must have been over a million years ago when I died!"",""Many millions," corrected 25X–987.",""Suns of such size as this one do not cool in so short a time as you suggest."","Professor Jameson, in spite of all his amazing computations before his death, was staggered by the reality.",""Who are you?" he suddenly asked.",""We are the Zoromes from Zor, a planet of a sun far across the Universe."","25X–987 then went on to tell Professor Jameson something about how the Zoromes had attained their high stage of development and had instantly put a stop to all birth, evolution and death of their people, by becoming machine men.","CHAPTER IV The Dying World",""And now tell us of yourself," said 25X–987, "and about your world."","Professor Jameson, noted in college as a lecturer of no mean ability and perfectly capable of relating intelligently to them the story of the earth's history, evolution and march of events following the birth of civilization up until the time when he died, began his story.","The mental speech hampered him for a time, but he soon became accustomed to it so as to use it easily, and he found it preferable to vocal speech after a while.","The Zoromes listened interestedly to the long account until Professor Jameson had finished.",""My nephew," concluded the professor, "evidently obeyed my instructions and placed my body in the rocket I had built, shooting it out into space where I became the satellite of the earth for these many millions of years."",""Do you really want to blow how long you were dead before we found you?" asked 25X–987.",""It would be interesting to find out."",""Yes, I should like very much to know," replied the professor.",""Our greatest mathematician, 459C–79 will tell it to you." The mathematician stepped forward.","Upon one side of his cube were many buttons arranged in long columns and squares.",""What is your unit of measuring?" he asked.",""A mile"",""How many times more is a mile than is the length of your rocket satellite?"",""My rocket is fifteen feet long.","A mile is five thousand two hundred and eighty feet."","The mathematician depressed a few buttons.",""How far, or how many miles from the sun was your planet at that time?"",""Ninety–three million miles," was the reply.",""And your world's satellite—which you call moon from your planet—earth?"",""Two hundred and forty thousand miles."",""And your rocket?"",""I figured it to go about sixty–five thousand miles from the earth."",""It was only twenty thousand miles from the earth when we picked it up," said the mathematician, depressing a few more buttons.",""The moon and sun are also much nearer your planet now."","Professor Jameson gave way to a mental ejaculation of amazement.",""Do you know how long you have cruised around the planet in your own satellite?" said the mathematician.",""Since you began that journey, the planet which you call the earth has revolved around the sun over forty million times."",""Forty–million–years!" exclaimed Professor Jameson haltingly.",""Humanity must then have all perished from the earth long ago! I'm the last man on earth!"",""It is a dead world now," interjected 25X–987.",""Of course," elucidated the mathematician, "those last few million years are much shorter than the ones in which you lived.","The earth's orbit is of less diameter and its speed of revolution is greatly increased, due to its proximity to the cooling sun.","I should say that your year was some four times as long as the time in which it now takes your old planet to circumnavigate the sun.","How many days were there in your year?"",""Three hundred and sixty–five."",""The planet has now ceased rotating entirely."",""Seems queer that your rocket satellite should avoid the meteors so long," observed 459C–79, the mathematician.",""Automatic radium repulsion rays," explained the professor.",""The very rays which kept us from approaching your rocket," stated 25X–987, "until we neutralized them."",""You died and were shot out into space long before any life occurred on Zor," soliloquized one of the machine men.",""Our people had not yet even been born when yours had probably disappeared entirely from the face of the earth."",""Hearken to 72N–4783," said 25X–987, "he is our philosopher, and he just loves to dwell on the past life of Zor when we were flesh and blood creatures with the threat of death hanging always over our heads.","At that time, like the life you knew, we were born, we lived and died, all within a very short time, comparatively."",""Of course, time has come to mean nothing to us, especially when we are out in space," observed 72N–4783.",""We never keep track of it on our expeditions, though back in Zor such accounts are accurately kept.","By the way, do you know how long we stood here while you recounted to us the history of your planet? Our machine bodies never get tired, you know."",""Well," ruminated Professor Jameson, giving a generous allowance of time.",""I should say about a half a day, although it seemed scarcely as long as that."",""We listened to you for four days," replied 72N–4783.","Professor Jameson was really aghast.",""Really, I hadn't meant to be such a bore," he apologized.",""That is nothing," replied the other.",""Your story was interesting, and if it had been twice as long, it would not have mattered, nor would it have seemed any longer.","Time is merely relative, and in space actual time does not exist at all, any more than your forty million years' cessation of life seemed more than a few moments to you.","We saw that it was so when your first thought impressions reached us following your revival."",""Let us continue on to your planet earth," then said 25X–987.",""Perhaps we shall find more startling disclosures there."","As the space ship of the Zoromes approached the sphere from which Professor Jameson had been hurled in his rocket forty million years before, the professor was wondering how the earth would appear, and what radical changes he would find.","Already he knew that the geographical conditions of the various continents were changed.","He had seen as much from the space ship.","A short time later the earth was reached.","The space travelers from Zor, as well as Professor Jameson, emerged from the cosmic flyer to walk upon the surface of the planet.","The earth had ceased rotating, leaving one–half its surface always toward the sun.","This side of the earth was heated to a considerable degree, while its antipodes, turned always away from the solar luminary, was a cold, frigid, desolate waste.","The space travelers from Zor did not dare to advance very far into either hemisphere, but landed on the narrow, thousand–mile strip of territory separating the earth's frozen half from its sun–baked antipodes.","As Professor Jameson emerged from the space ship with 25X–987, he stared in awe at the great transformation four hundred thousand centuries had wrought.","The earth's surface, its sky and the sun were all so changed and unearthly appearing.","Off to the east the blood red, ball of the slowly cooling sun rested upon the horizon, lighting up the eternal day.","The earth's rotation had ceased entirely, and it hung motionless in the sky as it revolved around its solar parent, its orbit slowly but surely cutting in toward the great body of the sun.","The two inner planets, Mercury and Venus, were now very close to the blood red orb whose scintillating, dazzling brilliance had been lost in its cooling process.","Soon, the two nearer planets would succumb to the great pull of the solar luminary and return to the flaming folds, from which they had been hurled out as gaseous bodies in the dim, age–old past, when their careers had just begun.","The atmosphere was nearly gone, so rarefied had it become, and through it Professor Jameson could view with amazing clarity without discomfort to his eyes the bloated body of the dying sun.","It appeared many times the size he had seen it at the time of his death, on account of its relative nearness.","The earth had advanced a great deal closer to the great star around which it swung.","The sky towards the west was pitch black except for the iridescent twinkle of the fiery stars which studded that section of the heavens.","As he watched, a faint glow suffused the western sky, gradually growing brighter, the full moon majestically lifted itself above the horizon, casting its pale, ethereal radiance upon the dying world beneath.","It was increased to many times the size Professor Jameson had ever seen it during his natural lifetime.","The earth's greater attraction was drawing upon the moon just as the sun was pulling the earth ever nearer itself.","This cheerless landscape confronting the professor represented the state of existence to which the earth had come.","It was a magnificent spread of loneliness which bore no witness to the fact that it had seen the teeming of life in better ages long ago.","The weird, yet beautiful scene, spread in a melancholy panorama before his eyes, drove his thoughts into gloomy abstraction with its dismal, depressing influence.","Its funereal, oppressive aspect smote him suddenly with the chill of a terrible loneliness.","25X–987 aroused Professor Jameson from his lethargic reverie.",""Let us walk around and see what we can find.","I can understand how you feel in regard to the past.","It is quite a shock—but it must happen to all worlds sooner or later—even to Zor.","When that time comes, the Zoromes will find a new planet on which to live.","If you travel with us, you will become accustomed to the sight of seeing dead, lifeless worlds as well as new and beautiful ones pulsating with life and energy.","Of course, this world being your own, holds a peculiar sentimental value to you, but it is really one planet among billions."","Professor Jameson was silent.",""I wonder whether or not there are any ruins here to be found?" queried 25X–987.",""I don't believe so," replied the professor.",""I remember hearing an eminent scientist of my day state that, given fifty thousand years, every structure and other creation of man would be obliterated entirely from off' the earth's surface."",""And he was right," endorsed the machine man of Zor.",""Time is a great effacer."","For a long time the machine men wandered over the dreary surface of the earth, and then 25X–987 suggested a change of territory to explore.","In the space ship, they moved around the earth to the other side, still keeping to the belt of shadowland which completely encircled the globe like some gigantic ring.","Where they now landed arose a series of cones with hollow peaks.",""Volcanoes!" exclaimed the professor.",""Extinct ones," added the machine man.","Leaving the space ship, the fifty or more machine men, including also Professor Jameson, were soon exploring the curiously shaped peaks.","The professor, in his wanderings had strayed away from the rest, and now advanced into one of the cup–like depressions of the peak, out of sight of his companions, the Zoromes.","CHAPTER V Eternity or Death","He was well in the center of the cavity when the soft ground beneath him gave way suddenly and he catapulted below into the darkness.","Through the Stygian gloom he fell in what seemed to be an endless drop.","He finally crashed upon something hard.","The thin crust of the volcano's mouth had broken through, precipitating him into the deep, hollow interior.","It must have been a long ways to fall—or so it had seemed.","Why was he not knocked senseless or killed? Then he felt himself over with three tentacles.","His metal legs were four broken, twisted masses of metal, while the lower half of his cubic body was jammed out of shape and split.","He could not move, and half of his six tentacles were paralyzed.","How would he ever get out of there? he wondered.","The machine men of Zor might never find him.","What would happen to him, then? He would remain in this deathless, monotonous state forever in the black hole of the volcano's interior unable to move.","What a horrible thought! He could not starve to death; eating was unknown among the Zoromes, the machines requiring no food.","He could not even commit suicide.","The only way for him to die would be to smash the strong metal head, and in his present immovable condition, this was impossible.","It suddenly occurred to him to radiate thoughts for help.","Would the Zoromes receive his messages? He wondered how far the telepathic messages would carry.","He concentrated the powers of his mind upon the call for help, and repeatedly stated his position and plight.","He then left his mind clear to receive the thought answers of the Zoromes.","He received none.","Again he tried.","Still he received no welcoming answer.","Professor Jameson became dejected.","It was hopeless.","The telepathic messages had not reached the machine men of Zor.","They were too far away, just as one person may be out of earshot of another's voice.","He was doomed to a terrible fate of existence! It were better that his rocket had never been found.","He wished that the Zoromes had destroyed him instead of bringing him back to life—back to this!","His thoughts were suddenly broken in upon.",""We're coming!"",""Don't give up hope!"","If the professor's machine body had been equipped with a heart, it would have sung for joy at these welcome thought impressions.","A short time later there appeared in the ragged break of the volcano's mouth, where he had fallen through, the metal head of one of the machine men.",""We shall have you out of there soon," he said.","The professor never knew how they managed it for he lost consciousness under some strange ray of light they projected down upon him in his prison.","When he came to consciousness once more, it was to find himself inside the space ship.",""If you had fallen and had smashed your head, it would have been all over.","with you," were the first thought impulses which greeted him.",""As it is, however, we can fix you up first rate."",""Why didn't you answer the first time I called to you?" asked the professor.",""Didn't you hear me?"",""We heard you, and we answered, but you didn't hear us.","You see, your brain is different than ours, and though you can send thought waves as far as we can you cannot receive them from such a great distance."",""I'm wrecked," said the professor, gazing at his twisted limbs, paralyzed tentacles and jammed body.",""We shall repair you," came the reply.",""It is your good fortune that your head was not crushed."",""What are you going to do with me?" queried the professor.",""Will you remove my brains to another machine?"",""No, it isn't necessary.","We shall merely remove your head and place upon another machine body."","The Zoromes immediately set to work upon the task, and soon had Professor Jameson's metal head removed from the machine which he had wrecked in his fall down the crater.","All during the painless operation, the professor kept up a series of thought exchanges in conversation with the Zoromes, and it seemed but a short time before his head surmounted a new machine and he was ready for further exploration.","In the course of his operation, the space ship had moved to a new position, and now as they emerged 25X–987 kept company with Professor Jameson.",""I must keep an eye on you," he said.",""You will be getting into more trouble before you get accustomed to the metal bodies."","But Professor Jameson was doing a great deal of thinking.","Doubtlessly, these strange machine men who had picked up his rocket in the depths of space and had brought him back to life, were expecting him to travel with them and become adopted into the ranks of the Zoromes.","Did he want to go with them? He couldn't decide.","He had forgotten that the machine men could read his innermost thoughts.",""You wish to remain here alone upon the earth?" asked 25X–987.",""It is your privilege if you really want it so."",""I don't know," replied Professor Jameson truthfully.","He gazed at the dust around his feet.","It had probably been the composition of men, and had changed from time to time into various other atomic structures—of other queer forms of life which had succeeded mankind.","It was the law of the atom which never died.","And now he had within his power perpetual existence.","He could be immortal if he wished! It would be an immortality of never–ending adventures in the vast, endless Universe among the galaxy of stars and planets.","A great loneliness seized him.","Would he be happy among these machine men of another far–off world—among these Zoromes? They were kindly and solicitous of his welfare.","What better fate could he expect? Still, a longing for his own kind arose in him—the call of humanity.","It was irresistible.","What could he do? Was it not in vain? Humanity had long since disappeared from the earth—millions of years ago.","He wondered what lay beyond the pales of death—the real death, where the body decomposed and wasted away to return to the dust of the earth and assume new atomic structures.","He had begun to wonder whether or not he had been dead all these forty millions of years—suppose he had been merely in a state of suspended animation.","He had remembered a scientist of his day, who had claimed that the body does not die at the point of official death.","According to the claims of this man, the cells of the body did not die at the moment at which respiration, heart beats and the blood circulation ceased, but it existed in the semblance of life for several days afterward, especially in the cells of the bones, which died last of all.","Perhaps when he had been sent out into space in his rocket right after his death, the action of the cosmic void was to halt his slow death of the cells in his body, and hold him in suspended animation during the ensuing millions of years.","Suppose he should really die—destroying his own brain? What lay beyond real death? Would it be a better plane of existence than the Zoromes could offer him? Would be rediscover humanity, or had they long since arisen to higher planes of existence or reincarnation? Did time exist beyond the mysterious portals of death? If not, then it was possible for him to join the souls of the human race.","Had he really been dead all this time? If so, he knew what to expect in case he really destroyed his own brain.","Oblivion!","Again the intense feeling of loneliness surged over him and held him within its melancholy grasp.","Desperately, he decided to find the nearest cliff and jump from it—head–first! Humanity called; no man lived to companion him.","His four metal limbs carried him swiftly to the summit of a nearby precipice.","Why not gamble on the hereafter? 25X–987, understanding his trend of thought, did not attempt to restrain him.","Instead, the machine man Zor waited patiently.","As Professor Jameson stood there meditating upon the jump which would hurl him now into a new plane of existence—or into oblivion, the thought transference of 25X–987 reached him.","It was laden with the wisdom born of many planets and thousands of centuries' experience.",""Why jump?" asked the machine man.",""The dying world holds your imagination within a morbid clutch.","It is all a matter of mental condition.","Free your mind of this fascinating influence and come with us to visit other worlds, many of them are both beautiful and new.","You will then feel a great difference.","Will you come?"","The professor considered for a moment as he resisted the impulse to dive off the declivity to the enticing rocks far below.","An inspiration seized him.","Backing away from the edge of the cliff, he joined 25X–987 once more.",""I shall come," he stated.","He would become an immortal after all and join the Zoromes in their never–ending adventures from world to world.","They hastened to the space ship to escape the depressing, dreary influence of the dying world, which had nearly driven Professor Jameson to take the fatal leap to oblivion.","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","The Jameson Satellite","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/jameson.html","62.6","27 Feb 2004");
Page[25]=new Array("Title","Author","Publisher","A Book Review","Reviewer's Name","Put Review Here","Copyright","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/blank_br.htm","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/blank_br.htm","2.3","29 Sep 2003");
Page[26]=new Array("The Amazing Talented Herb Jeffries","By John DiMezzes","It is the late 1930's, and up on the theater screen, Herb Jeffries stars as the first b-western black cowboy, the Bronze Buckaroo, in a series of oaters made specifically for the Afro-American audience.","(Note the singular spelling of his name on the movie poster.)","It is the 1940's, and out of radios and record players, the melodious voice of Herb Jeffries flows, singing his renditions of "Flamingo" and "Satin Doll," songs he made famous while performing with Duke Ellington's band.","It is the 1990s and into the new millennium, and from performance stages and CD players, the voice of Herb Jeffries entertains and….","Well, perhaps the mathematically prone have already done their double-takes over the span of time presented.","But, there are no typographical errors here.","On September 24, 2004, Herb Jeffries will be 92 years "vintage" (as he likes to call it).",""We're subliminally brainwashed with that word 'old,'" he says.","The man is a marvel.In appearance and in voice, he seems a person half his age….NO exaggeration.","His voice sounds stronger now than it has ever been.","The long and continuing career of Herb Jeffries is a phenomenon of American culture.","Born of an Irish mother and an Italian father , and with an Ethiopian great-grandmother, Herb "chose to be black" early on, giving Afro-American children a handsome six-gun hero of their own to emulate, unlike the typical black stereotypes available in b-westerns (and most other films) of the period, where "Stepin Fetchits" would portray comic-relief characters who were afraid of ghosts and bereft of dignity.",""Harlem on the Prairie" (1937), "Two Guns Made from Harlem" (1938), "The Bronze Buckaroo" (1939), and "Harlem Rides the Range" (1939) presented heroic images with which their audiences could identify.","When the demand for b-westerns faded, Mr.","Jeffries concentrated on his vocal skills, working with Duke Ellington, among others, where he became identified with such standards as "Flamingo" and "Satin Doll."","In the 50's, he appeared in a handful of Hollywood films.","He then made a decision to move to France, where he spent a decade running a night club frequented by many a Hollywood personality.","He appeared in some 60's TV shows, had a period of limited exposure, and then re-emerged in the 90's, recording a comeback album.","Now, at nearly 92, he is a very busy man, involved in more recordings, live appearances, and, recently, a request performance for the president at the White House.","Herb Jeffries is now working on his autobiography.","There is talk of a movie of his life story, and, at this writing, I am informed that he is soon to get his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.","A more thorough assemblage of information regarding the life and times and history of this special man can be found on his own website: www.herbjeffries.com.","Imagine a dream where time stands still, and all that was still is, where cowboy heroes of one's childhood continue to ride today's range, and songsters sing youth's ballads into an adulthood's refrain, and that is the wonder known as Herb Jeffries.","Copyright © 2004 by John DiMezzes","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/jeffries.html","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/jeffries.html","6.9","14 Jul 2004");
Page[27]=new Array("FILM FOOTNOTES #1","Nellie and Bert Grace","by Raymond William Stedman","Yes, everyone knows that, after years of experimentation, the movies gained a voice in 1927, with Warner Brothers' The Jazz Singer, starring Al Jolson.","But moviegoers in Aberdeen, Scotland, had been getting sound with their celluloid fare for almost two decades before Jolson boasted, "You ain't heard nothin' yet." That was because the Star Picture Palace and the Gaiety Theatre had added a new dimension to cinema entertainment several years before World War I.","At the Star, owners Nellie Grace and her husband Bert stood behind the screen, unleashing an array of sound effects as the comedies and dramas unrolled on the other side of the stretched sheet.","Moreover, at appropriate moments the voices of Nellie and Bert became those of Louise Fazenda or Charlie Chaplin or almost any major star, Buster Keaton included.","(Whether Bert had a try at the Tarzan yell is not known.)","Nellie Gates, the surviving member of the team, lived well into the era of the talking film, which, of course, wrote finis to her special talent.","Nellie died, at 91, in the spring of 1972.","© 1999 Raymond William Stedman","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","FILM FOOTNOTES #1","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/film_foot1.htm","3.4","29 Sep 2003");
Page[28]=new Array("The Green Hornet Strikes Again","An Overview of the Serial","by Raymond William Stedman","THE GREEN HORNET STRIKES AGAIN","UNIVERSAL 1940","15 Chapters","Written by: George Plympton, Basil Dickey, Sherman Lowe","Directed by: Ford Beebe, John Rawlins, Jacques Jaccard (dialogue)","Cinematography: Jerome Ash","BRITT REID/THE GREEN HORNET - WARREN HULL","KATO - KEYE LUKE","CROGAN - PIERRE WATKIN","LENORE CASE - ANNE NAGEL","AXFORD - WADE BOTELER","Supporting Cast: Eddie Acuff as Lowry, James Seay as Bordine, Arthur Loft as Tauer, Joe A.","Devlin as Dolan, William Hall as Don DeLuca, Dorothy Lovett as Frances Grayson and Stella Merja, Jay Michael as Foranti, Charles Miller as G.","Otterson, Jeanne Kelly/Brooks as Gloria Manning, Irving Mitchell as Breedon, William Forrest as Harper, Eddie Dunn as Foley, Montague Shaw as Weaver","THE STORY: While Britt Reid is enjoying a vacation in Hawaii, Crogan, secret chief of the underworld, is running unchecked.","Reid and Kato head back for the mainland on the S.S.","Paradise, survive a maritime disaster,and soon are destroying Crogan's rackets one by one.","In 1939, when the Green Hornet was at his peak of radio popularity, Universal released a film version of his exploits, in serial form.","This chapter play closely reflected its popular, if implausible, airwaves counterpart.","The movie serial used the same principal characters, as well as the much-talked-about Hornet musical signature and gadgetry (from gas gun to buzzing super car).","Transferred too was the familiar voice of Al Hodge, the radio Green Hornet, which was heard when crusading publisher Britt Reid spoke from behind the Hornet mask.","The movie serial even resembled the radio one by having Reid and Kato take on one racket at a time, with only the thinnest unifying link in the form of an overall racket boss.","(For this episodic approach the movie received criticism from some quarters, though not from younger viewers, who were too fascinated by the combination of sound, speed, and gimmickry to worry about narrative progression.) To play Britt Reid, Universal hired Gordon Jones, a husky actor generally assigned to roles bordering on buffoonery, but nonetheless quite effective as a fighting journalist doubling as a masked avenger.","Nods of approval from audiences, and an okay from Green Hornet headquarters -- which didn't like some of the things Republic had done to the Lone Ranger (Britt Reid's great uncle) -- resulted in The Green Hornet Strikes Again.","It was released in late September, 1940, less than a year after the debut of the first Hornet chapter play.","Although three of the principal actors continued in their roles, Universal, instead of calling on Gordon Jones to play the lead again, gave the part to Warren Hull, one of Columbia's serial heroes, associated particularly with the Spider.","Hull had no difficulty making the transfer, but the Hornet sequel -- once Reid and Kato were back on the mainland -- slipped into the plot situations of its more intense predecessor.","Moreover, many of the shots, such as those of the Black Beauty exiting its hideaway or racing through town, were recycled from a serial that many viewers had been watching late chapters of only months earlier.","For those who had thrilled to The Green Hornet, the second serial was often a case of been-there-done-that.","Whatever the reason, the strikes didn't have quite the sting they had the first time around.","Independent of comparisons, however,The Green Hornet Strikes Again stands as a rather entertaining serial.","Even those who prefer the Gordon Jones Hornet, can recognize the strengths of Hull's performance, although the actor, about nine years older than Jones, was, perhaps, better suited to the sophisticated heroes of his other serials -- men one would expect to see relaxing in Hawaii -- than to the tough young publisher-son of Dan Reid.","Hull is, nonetheless, a believable hero, albeit one in a less intense undertaking than the first Hornet outing.","The Green Hornet Strikes Again in some ways resembles the early detective series of television, with their interludes of character interplay and largely unrelated cases.","As to the other players, dependable Pierre Watkin, in his customary three-piece suits, portrays a cold,though not particularly colorful, villain.","Crogan sits behind a desk in a stylish office, letting his gaggle of hoodlums (several played by actors who had performed similar duties in The Green Hornet) carry the action.","The equally office-bound Anne Nagel, as Reid's secretary, is surrounded by nicer people.","It is a delight to see her add a special touch to each dialogue exchange.","Eddie Acuff, not seen in the first serial, fits in well as star reporter Lowry, while Wade Boteler is again an amusing blusterer in the role of Reid's bodyguard, Michael Axford.","Hull, Boteler, Nagel, and Acuff form an excellent Sentinel office foursome, the working rapport of the actors being quite evident.","Some credit for the quartet's effectiveness should, perhaps, go to dialogue director Jacques Jaccard, who had helmed some major serials during the early silent era.","Kato (Keye Luke), is again a trusty Johnny-on-the-spot, though he is not given the opportunity to display the acumen for technology his character brought to the prior serial.","The Reid houseboy and chauffeur, who had stoutly proclaimed that he was Korean in The Green Hornet, says nothing about his heritage here.","Kato, however, is described by a crook as "that oriental." (Whether Kato was ever called Japanese in the radio version, and whether he was converted into a Filipino before or after Pearl Harbor, are matters of eternal controversy.*) Attractive Dorothy Lovett has a double role as an aluminum heiress and the brassy actress hired to replace her.","James Seay is Crogan's slimy field operator, Bordine.","Arthur Loft is principal henchman.","Familiar serial performers seen unbilled in minor roles include Roy Barcroft, who has one line as a police officer, and burly Harry Cording, playing a construction boss.","Toward the end of the chapter play, Jay Michael, of the WXYZ radio adventure stable, pops up as a menace with a purring voice.","Musical backgrounds are largely classical, ranging from the familiar "Flight of the Bumblebee" theme to "The Storm" segment of the overture to William Tell.","The latter is the music of choice for episode-closing sequences -- a great number of them being explosions that do not seem to ruffle the hero any more than the stock-shot sinking of the S.","Paradise.","The biting delivery of Al Hodge, by the way, is absent from this version, Hull himself doing the voice that filters through the mask.","Some minor notes: The bedroom chest that conceals the passageway to the Black Beauty swings out from the left.","In The Green Hornet it had swung out from the right.","And Hull is doubled in all the over-the-shoulder shots that show Reid at his desk, probably a means of freeing Hull for other shooting.","With this role Warren Hull, who should have been promoted from the B-picture ranks but was not, achieved a kind of historical footnote status, having portrayed three noted crimefighters--the Spider (from pulp fiction), Mandrake the Magician (from the comics), and the Green Hornet (from radio).","After his career in film making, which ended not long after this serial, Hull enjoyed a more profitable one in radio and television interview and quiz shows.","*A 1990s comic book series (published by NOW Comics) offered an ex post facto explanation of why the original Kato was sometimes called Filipino (or Korean, in the first movie serial): his friend Britt lied about Kato's Japanese heritage to save him a trip to an American internment camp.","Copyright ©1998 by Raymond William Stedman","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","The Green Hornet Stikes Again - An Overview of the Serial","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/hornet.htm","10.5","30 Sep 2003");
Page[29]=new Array("Bela Lugosi's Last Serial","by Raymond William Stedman","Filmgoers who recall Noah Beery, Jr., as only a grizzled wrangler in countless Western dramas may find it difficult to think of him as the hero of a 1935 tropical thriller, The Call of the Savage.","Yet what about the most unlikely rescuer of fair damsels ever to trod a south-sea island, the matchless Bela Lugosi? Aside from film buffs and viewers of the late late show, only those of older years remember Bela as Chandu the Magician.","He encountered Dr.","Chandler, counter-conjurer, for the first time in Fox's 1932 feature adaptation of the old radio mystery, with Edmund Lowe playing the title role.","Two years later Lugosi was Chandler, alias Chandu, in a serial sequel for Principal.","The title (what else but The Return of Chandu?) also was used for one of two features compiled from the collected chapters.","The other was called Chandu on the Magic Island.","For those who wonder in what kind of situation Bela Lugosi found himself as a serial good guy, let us say that his assignment was to protect an Egyptian princess from the forces of black magic.","This involved, as a beginning, snatching a poisoned cup from her fingers just as she raised it to her lips, then eluding the disappointed poisoners by vanishing magically.","From there on the audience followed a running battle between Chandu and a band of nasty necromancers headed by Lucien Prival.","During a stopover on a tropical island these scoundrels went so far as to begin sacrificial rites, with the princess the honored victim.","Bela, who probably was inclined to cheer them on from force of habit, stepped in at the climactic moment to break up the fun.","It was just about the last time Bela Lugosi did anything nice in a motion picture.","In his first serial work he was more in character.","Mascot's The Whispering Shadow (1933) found him playing very likely the nastiest red herring one could imagine, Professor Strang, proprietor of a waxworks inspired by the Grand Guignol.","After his deviation as Chandu, Bela returned to stride as Victor Poten, mad inventor in Victory's Shadow of Chinatown (1936).","Herman Brix brought Lugosi's wild schemes to an end in fifteen chapters.","In 1937 Lugosi was another mad inventor, Boroff by name, in S O S Coast Guard.","This time hero Ralph Byrd was too much for him.","Bela gave it one last try in The Phantom Creeps (1939).","And as Doctor Alex Zorka, a scientist with designs on ruling the world, he had a lot going for him.","First was a giant robot, somewhat more menacing than Houdini's Automaton.","Zorka developed it as a prototype of what be expected would be an army of mechanical warriors if he could swing the right deal.","Most of the time the robot stood idle behind a panel in the scientist's home.","But when Bela pressed the button on the control box strapped to his wrist and the panel slid open, juveniles in darkened theaters across the land bit down hard on their Milk Duds and twisted their Tootsie Rolls into misshapen masses.","Alex Zorka, nevertheless, was too versatile a mad inventor to rely solely upon a robot.","He had a G-man in a state of suspended animation by the end of Chapter 1.","Shortly before that, one of his highly explosive mechanical spiders went off in midair, causing a plane crash in which Zorka's wife was an unintended victim.","Zorka, at the crash scene, but concealing his identity, was forced as a physician to choke back his emotion and pronounce his wife dead during a wild hubbub--in the midst of which the heroine, a nosy reporter, shook off a restraining policeman with the cry, "Leave go of me!"","Dr.","Zorka also had defensive armor: if the police or a band of Nazilike agents became annoying, he pressed another button on his wrist and faded to invisibility.","This power also helped him several times to recover his most prized secret, a chunk of a meteorite he had found in Africa.","With it he could fashion an arsenal of powerful hand bombs and a potent ray gun--just as potent as the one Boris Karloff had devised in Universal's 1936 feature The Invisible Ray, which had co-starred Lugosi.","The similarity in weaponry is not surprising.","Part of the African sequence from The Invisible Ray (showing the discovery of a meteorite) was used in The Phantom Creeps to reveal how Lugosi discovered the hidden source of his power.","Borrowing was common in chapter-play making.","To keep costs low, the serial units appropriated everything at hand, from sets and costumes to stock shots and background music.","Thus The Phantom Creeps profited from the mysterioso theme of the Frankenstein films, as well as from some striking shots of a streamliner roaring past the snow-covered terrain used in every Universal serial of the day calling for a train chase--whether or not the snow was appropriate.","Also drawn upon were the tricks in simulating invisibility acquired by the studio's special-effects department in the concurrent cycle of Invisible Man pictures; the dockside, airport, and rural locales utilized in countless thrillers; and chase music that was not new when heard in Flash Gordon.","The contribution of The Phantom Creeps to later serials may have been an auto chase in which a 1939 black Nash pursued an ancient touring car.","The appearance of a vintage vehicle in a chase was a sure sign that sooner or later it would go over a cliff and burn.","New cars didn't match those in crashes in the stock-film library, and stock shots were meant to last many years.","But all this is not helping Bela Lugosi conquer the world.","To tell the truth, he doesn't quite make it.","For each of his weapons a defense is devised by the film's good scientist, Dr.","Mallory, described by Zorka as a "genius second only to me." The frustrations mount.","Mallory brews an antidote for suspended animation in Chapter 3 and later catches the terrible tinkerer with his invisibility down by means of an antidematerialization ray.","When his precious robot is blasted into a pile of nuts and bolts, Zorka takes to the skies, determined to bring the world to its knees with the hand bombs he begins dropping in key areas.","Like a child with the ultimate toy, he sits in the rear cockpit of an open plane, letting go his explosives while his man Monk pilots the craft in full chauffeur's regalia and dark glasses.","Then the inevitable pursuit planes surround him, as they did King Kong.","Announcing, "I'll take them all with me!" Zorka prepares to destroy most of North America by detonating all his lethal hardware.","Only Monk's lack of receptivity to the idea saves the situation.","The two airborne threats to humanity scuffle and plummet into the ocean, ending Dr.","Alex Zorka's career as a world-beater and Bela Lugosi's as a serial villain.","Excerpted from The Serials: Suspense and Drama by Installment,","© 1971, 1977 by Raymond William Stedman","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","Bela Lugosi's Last Serial","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/lugosi.htm","9.3","29 Sep 2003");
Page[30]=new Array("The Thing in the Cellar","by David H.","Keller","I first encountered the story you are about to read when I was 12 years old, in a paperback collection of horror stories.","At the time, to be perfectly honest, the story scared the pants off of me and led to a couple of sleepless nights (even today, it still gives me a bit of a shiver).","The details of the story have stayed crystal clear in my mind all these years, even though the title of the anthology is long forgotten, as were, until recently, the title of the story and the name of the author.","Fortunately, for both you and me, I have found that the source of my sleepless nights was a tale entitled, "The Thing in the Cellar" and that the author was a man by the name of David H.","Keller.","Dr.","David Henry Keller was born in 1880 and, upon graduation from medical school, specialized in the field of psychoanalysis.","Throughout his life he was a prolific writer, having written some 700 medical articles and ten medical books during his lifetime.","Keller was also known in medical circles for his (then) ground-breaking work with shell-shock victims during WWI.","While this might have been enough for some, Keller was also a writer of fiction, which he did for his own amusement; a practice he began, by some accounts, at the age of 14.","It was not until 1928, at the urging of his family, that Keller submitted one of his stories to Hugo Gernsback who was not only accepted the story for publication, but also sent a contract for more fiction and non-fiction material.","This led Keller to try his hand at being a full time writer and, for a short time, until the vagaries of the marketplace caused him to return to medicine, he wrote a wide variety of pulp fiction, in addition to factual articles about medicine.","Much of this work was done for Gernsback's publications and received quite of bit of acclaim.","Although largely forgotten today, Keller continued to work in medicine, and to write, up until his death in 1966.",""The Thing in the Cellar" was not written for Gernsback, but appeared in the March, 1932 issue of Weird Tales (cover at right...the cover reproduction is not very good, but Keller's name is nowhere to be found, leading me to speculate that his story was good enough to be published, but that it was not thought that his name would lend to increased sales).","So, what is it about this story by a nearly forgotten author that has dogged me for over 35 years? Is it my inner child: the easily frightened twelve year old who liked to read at night? Is it the matter of fact tone that Keller uses throughout the piece, which forces the reader to ponder the tale long after it has been read? Or, might it be the memories I have of my aunt's house, where her ironing board was stored on the back porch in such a way that it was firmly wedged against the cellar door? Whatever the reason, I hope you will enjoy "The Thing in the Cellar."","Happy Halloween!","Bob Gay","October, 2003","Introduction © 2003 by Bob Gay","It was a large cellar, entirely out of proportion to the house above it.","The owner admitted that it was probably built for a distinctly different kind of structure from the one which rose above it.","Probably the first house had been burned, and poverty had caused a diminution of the dwelling erected to take its place.","A winding stone stairway connected the cellar with the kitchen.","Around the base of this series of steps successive owners of the house had placed their firewood, winter vegetables and junk.","The junk had gradually been pushed back till it rose, head high, in a barricade of uselessness.","What was back of that barricade no one knew and no one cared.","For some hundreds of years no one had crossed it to penetrate to the black reaches of the cellar behind it.","At the top of the steps, separating the kitchen from the cellar, was a stout oaken door.","This door was, in a way, as peculiar and out of relation to the rest of the house as the cellar.","It was a strange kind of door to find in a modern house, and certainly a most unusual door to find in the inside of the house—thick, stoutly built, dexterously rabbeted together with huge wrought-iron hinges, and a lock that looked as though it came from Castle Despair.","Separating a house from the outside world, such a door would be excusable; swinging between kitchen and cellar it seemed peculiarly inappropriate.","From the earliest months of his life Tommy Tucker seemed unhappy in the kitchen.","In the front parlor, in the formal dining-room, and especially on the second floor of the house he acted like a normal, healthy child; but carry him to the kitchen, he at once began to cry.","His parents, being plain people, ate in the kitchen save when they had company.","Being poor, Mrs.","Tucker did most of her work, though occasionally she had a charwoman in to do the extra Saturday cleaning, and thus much of her time was spent in the kitchen.","And Tommy stayed with her, at least as long as he was unable to walk.","Much of the time he was decidedly unhappy.","When Tommy learned to creep, he lost no time in leaving the kitchen.","No sooner was his mother's back turned than the little fellow crawled as fast as he could for the doorway opening into the front of the house, the dining-room and the front parlor.","Once away from the kitchen, he seemed happy; at least, he ceased to cry.","On being returned to the kitchen his howls so thoroughly convinced the neighbors that he had colic that more than one bowl of catnip and sage tea was brought to his assistance.","It was not until the boy learned to talk that the Tuckers had any idea as to what made the boy cry so hard when he was in the kitchen.","In other words, the baby had to suffer for many months till he obtained at least a little relief, and even when he told his parents what was the mattet, they were absolutely unable to comprehend.","This is not to be wondered at because they were both hard-working, rather simple-minded persons.","What they finally learned from their little son was this: that if the cellar door was shut and securely fastened with the heavy iron Tommy could at least eat a meal in peace; if the door was simply closed and not locked, he shivered with fear, but kept quiet; but if the door was open, if even the slightest streak of black showed that it was not tightly shut, then the little three-year-old would scream himself to the point of exhaustion, especially if his tired father would refuse him permission to leave the kitchen.","Playing in the kitchen, the child developed two interesting habits.","Rags, scraps of paper and splinters of wood were continually being shoved under the thick oak door to fill the space between the door and the sill.","Whenever Mrs.","Tucker opened the door there was always some trash there, placed by her son.","It annoyed her, and more than once the little fellow was thrashed for this conduct, but punishment acted in no way as a deterrent.","The other habit was as singular.","Once the door was closed and locked, he would rather boldly walk over to it and caress the old lock.","Even when he was so small that he had to stand on tiptoe to touch it with the tips of his fingers he would touch it with slow caressing strokes; later on, as he grew, he used to kiss it.","His father, who only saw the boy at the end of the day, decided that there was no sense in such conduct, and in his masculine way tried to break the lad of his foolishness.","There was, of necessity, no effort on the part of the hard-working man to understand the psychology back of his son's conduct.","All that the man knew was that his little son was acting in a way that was decidedly queer.","Tommy loved his mother and was willing to do anything he could to help her in the household chores, but one thing he would not do, and never did do, and that was to fetch and carry between the house and the cellar.","If his mother opened the door, he would run screaming from the room, and he never returned voluntarily till he was assured that the door was closed.","He never explained just why he acted as he did.","In fact, he refused to talk about it, at least to his parents, and that was just as well, because had he done so, they would simply have been more positive than ever that there was something wrong with their only child.","They tried, in their own ways, to break the child of his unusual habits; failing to change him at all, they decided to ignore his peculiarities.","That is, they ignored them till he became six years old and the time came for him to go to school.","He was a sturdy little chap by that time, and more intelligent than the usual boys beginning in the primer class.","Mr.","Tucker was, at times, proud of him; the child's attitude toward the cellar door was the one thing most disturbing to the father's pride.","Finally nothing would do but that the Tucker family call on the neighborhood physician.","It was an important event in the life of the Tuckers, so important that it demanded the wearing of Sunday clothes, and all that sort of thing.",""The matter is just this, Doctor Hawthorn," said Mr.","Tucker, in a somewhat embarrassed manner.",""Our little Tommy is old enough to start to school, but he behaves childish in regard to our cellar, and the missus and I thought you could tell us what to do about it.","It must be his nerves."","Ever since he was a baby," continued Mrs.","Tucker, taking up the thread of conversation where her husband had paused, "Tommy has had a great fear of the cellar.","Even now, big boy that he is, he does not love me enough to fetch and carry for me through that door and down those steps.","It is not natural for a child to act like he does, and what with chinking the cracks with rags and kissing the lock, he drives me to the point where I fear he may become daft-like as he grows older."","The doctor, eager to satisfy new customers, and dimly remembering some lectures on the nervous system received when he was a medical student, asked some general questions, listened to the boy's heart, examined his lungs and looked at his eyes and fingernails.","At last he commented:",""Looks like a fine, healthy boy to me."",""Yes, all except the cellar door," replied the father.",""Has he ever been sick?"",""Naught but fits once or twice when he cried himself blue in the face," answered the mother.",""Frightened?"",""Perhaps.","It was always in the kitchen."",""Suppose you go out and let me talk to Tommy by myself?"","And there sat the doctor very much at his ease and the little six-year-old boy very uneasy.",""Tommy, what is there in the cellar you are afraid of?"",""I don't know."",""Have you ever seen it?"",""No, sir."",""Ever heard it? smelt it?"",""No, sir."",""Then how do you know there is something there?"",""Because."",""Because what?"",""Because there is."","That was as far as Tommy would go, and at last his seeming obstinacy annoyed the physician even as it had for several years annoyed Mr.","Tucker.","He went to the door and called the parents into the office.",""He thinks there is something down in the cellar," he stated.","The Tuckers simply looked at each other.",""That's foolish," commented Mr.","Tucker.","" 'Tis just a plain cellar with junk and firewood and cider barrels in it," added Mrs.","Tucker.",""Since we moved into that house, I have not missed a day without going down those stone steps and I know there is nothing there.","But the lad has always screamed when the door was open.","I recall now that since he was a child in arms he has always screamed when the door was open."",""He thinks there is something there," said the doctor.",""That is why we brought him to you," replied the father.",""It's the child's nerves.","Perhaps foetida, or something, will calm him."",""I tell you what to do," advised the doctor.",""He thinks there is something there.","Just as soon as he finds that he is wrong and that there is nothing there, he will forget about it.","He has been humored too much.","What you want to do is to open that cellar door and make him stay by himself in the kitchen.","Nail the door open so he can not close it.","Leave him alone there for an hour and then go and laugh at him and show him how silly it was for him to be afraid of an empty cellar.","I will give you some nerve and blood tonic and that will help, but the big thing is to show him that there is nothing to be afraid of."","On the way back to the Tucker home Tommy broke away from his parents.","They caught him after an exciting chase and kept him between them the rest of the way home.","Once in the house he disappeared and was found in the guest room under the bed.","The afternoon being already spoiled for Mr.","Tucker, he determined to keep the child under observation for the rest of the day.","Tommy ate no supper, in spite of the urgings of the unhappy mother.","The dishes were washed, the evening paper read, the evening pipe smoked; and then, and only then, did Mr.","Tucker take down his tool box and get out a hammer and some long nails.",""And I am going to nail the door open, Tommy, so you can not close it, as that was what the doctor said.","Tommy, and you are to be a man and stay here in the kitchen alone for an hour, and we will leave the lamp a-burning, and then when you find there is naught to be afraid of, you will be well and a real man and not something for a man to be ashamed of being the father of."","But at the last Mrs.","Tucker kissed Tommy and cried and whispered to her husband not to do it, and to wait till the boy was larger; but nothing was to do except to nail the thick door open so it could not be shut and leave the boy there alone with the lamp burning and the dark open space of the doorway to look at with eyes that grew as hot and burning as the flame of the lamp.","That same day Doctor Hawthorn took supper with a classmate of his, a man who specialized in psychiatry and who was particularly interested in children.","Hawthorn told Johnson about his newest case, the little Tucker boy, and asked him for his opinion, lohnson frowned.",""Children are odd, Hawthorn.","Perhaps they are like dogs.","It may be their nervous system is more acute than in the adult.","We know that our eyesight is limited, also our hearing and smell.","I firmly believe that there are forms of life which exist in such a form that we can neither see, hear nor smell them.","Fondly we delude ourselves into the fallacy of believing that they do not exist because we can not prove their existence.","This Tucker lad may have a nervous system that is peculiarly acute.","He may dimly appreciate the existence of something in the cellar which is unappreciable to his parents.","Evidently there is some basis to this fear of his.","Now, I am not saying that there is anything in the cellar.","In fact, I suppose that it is just an ordinary cellar, but this boy, since he was a baby, has thought that there was something there, and that is just as bad as though there actually were.","What I would like to know is what makes him think so.","Give me the address, and I will call tomorrow and have a talk with the little fellow."",""What do you think of my advice?"",""Sorry, old man, but I think it was perfectly rotten.","If I were you, I would stop around there on my way home and prevent them from following it.","The little fellow may be badly frightened.","You see, he evidently thinks there is something there."",""But there isn't."",""Perhaps not.","No doubt, he is wrong, but he thinks so."","It all worried Doctor Hawthorn so much that he decided to take his friend's advice.","It was a cold night, a foggy night, and the physician felt cold as he tramped along the London streets.","At last he came to the Tucker house.","He remembered now that he had been there once before, long ago, when little Tommy Tucker came Into the world.","There was a light in the front window, and in no time at all Mr.","Tucker came to the door.",""I have come to see Tommy," said the doctor.",""He is back in the kitchen," replied the father.",""He gave one cry, but since then he has been quiet," sobbed the wife.",""If I had let her have her way, she would have opened the door, but I said to her, 'Mother, now is the time to make a man out of our Tommy.' And I guess he knows by now that there was naught to be afraid of.","Well, the hour is up.","Suppose we go and get him and put him to bed?"",""It has been a hard time for the little child," whispered the wife.","Carrying the candle, the man walked ahead of the woman and the doctor, and at last opened the kitchen door.","The room was dark.",""Lamp has gone out," said the man.",""Wait till I light it."",""Tommy! Tommy!" called Mrs.","Tucker.","But the doctor ran to where a white form was stretched on the floor.","Sharply he called for more light.","Trembling, he examined all that was left of little Tommy.","Twitching, he looked into the open space down into the cellar.","At last he looked at Tucker and Tucker's wife.",""Tommy—Tommy has been hurt—I guess he is dead!" he stammered.","The mother threw herself on the floor and picked up the torn, mutilated thing that had been, only a little while ago, her little Tommy.","The man took his hammer and drew out the nails and closed the door and locked it and then drove in a long spike to reinforce the lock.","Then he took hold of the doctor's shoulders and shook him.",""What killed him, Doctor? What killed him?" he shouted into Hawthorn's ear.","The doctor looked at him bravely in spite of the fear in his throat.",""How do I know, Tucker?" he replied.",""How do I know? Didn't you tell me that there was nothing there? Nothing down there? In the cellar?"","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/cellar.html","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/cellar.html","22.6","29 Oct 2003");
Page[31]=new Array("How Santa Claus Came","to Simpson's Bar","by Bret Harte","Although largely forgotten today, Francis Bret Harte was once one of America's most popular authors.","Born in Albany, New York in 1839, Harte settled with his widowed mother in California in 1854.","After trying a number of vocations, he became the editor of the Overland Monthly and, with the publication of his story, "The Luck of Roaring Camp", his fame as a writer was secured.","Eventually, Harte's popularity caused him to leave California for the East Coast, where The Atlantic Monthly paid him the incredible sum of $10,000 for 12 stories a year, the highest figure offered an American writer up to that time.","By 1878, Harte had nearly abandoned writing and accepted the post of United States Counsul at Crefeld, Germany.","He continued to reside in Europe for the remainder of his life and died in London in 1902.","It is easy to see why Harte enjoyed such a high degree of popularity during his lifetime.","His tales of life in the mining camps and frontier posts of California are about people rather than about situations.","Harte's characters, once you get past the dialect, seem like real people and not the cutout characters that often appear in Westerns.","Although he occasionally falls victim to the poetic excesses of the late-Romantic style, his narrative style is not at all clichéd and it may be the richness of his descriptions that have defeated the makers of films adapted from Harte's works.","Forty-six films have been made from Harte stories, none memorable.","Simply stated, Harte's characters, dialogue and descriptions have a depth that many later chroniclers of the West have missed, making his stories very readable today.",""How Santa Claus Came to Simpson's Bar" first appeared in The Atlantic Monthly, vol.","29, issue 173 (March 1872).","Introduction ©Bob Gay","December, 2003","IT HAD BEEN RAINING in the valley of the Sacramento.","The North Fork had overflowed its banks, and Rattlesnake Creek was impassable.","The few boulders that had marked the summer ford at Simpson's Crossing were obliterated by a vast sheet of water stretching to the foothills.","The upstage was stopped at Granger's; the last mail had been abandoned in the tules, the rider swimming for his life.",""An area," remarked the Sierra Avalanche, with pensive local pride, "as large as the state of Massachusetts is now under water."","Nor was the weather any better in the foothills.","The mud lay deep on the mountain road; wagons that neither physical force nor moral objurgation could move from the evil ways into which they had fallen encumbered the track, and the way to Simpson's Bar was indicated by brokendown teams and hard swearing.","And further on, cut off and inaccessible, rained upon and bedraggled, smitten by high winds and threatened by high water, Simpson's Bar, on the eve of Christmas Day, 1862, clung like a swallow's nest to the rocky entablature and splintered capitals of Table Mountain, and shook in the blast.","As night shut down on the settlement, a few lights gleamed through the mist from the windows of cabins on either side of the highway, now crossed and gullied by lawless streams and swept by marauding winds.","Happily most of the population were gathered at Thompson's store, clustered around a red-hot stove, at which they silently spat in some accepted sense of social communion that perhaps rendered conversation unnecessary.","Indeed, most methods of diversion had long since been exhausted on Simpson's Bar; high water had suspended the regular occupations on gulch and on river, and a consequent lack of money and whiskey had taken the zest from most illegitimate recreation.","Even Mr.","Hamlin was fain to leave the bar with fifty dollars in his pocket—the only amount actually realized of the large sums won by him in the successful exercise of his arduous profession.",""Ef I was asked,"—he remarked somewhat later—"ef I was asked to pint out a purty little village where a retired sport as didn't care for money could exercise hisself, frequent and lively, I'd say Simpson's Bar; but for a young man with a large family depending on his exertions, it don't pay."","As Mr.","Hamlin's family consisted mainly of female adults, this remark is quoted rather to show the breadth of his humor than the exact extent of his responsibilities.","Howbeit, the unconscious objects of this satire sat that evening in the listless apathy begotten of idleness and lack of excitement.","Even the sudden splashing of hoofs before the door did not arouse them.","Dick Bullen alone paused in the act of scraping out his pipe, and lifted his head, but no other one of the group indicated any interest in, or recognition of, the man who entered.","It was a figure familiar enough to the company, and known in Simpson's Bar as the Old Man.","A man of perhaps fifty years; grizzled and scant of hair, but still fresh and youthful of complexion.","A face full of ready but not very powerful sympathy, with a chameleonlike aptitude for taking on the shade and color of contiguous moods and feelings.","He had evidently just left some hilarious companions, and did not at first notice the gravity of the group, but clapped the shoulder of the nearest man jocularly, and threw himself into a vacant chair.",""Jest heard the best thing out, boys! Ye know Smiley, over yar—Jim Smiley—funniest man in the bar? Well, Jim was jest telling the richest yarn about"—",""Smiley's a—fool," interrupted a gloomy voice.",""A particular—skunk," added another in sepulchral accents.","A silence followed these positive statements.","The Old Man glanced quickly around the group.","Then his face slowly changed.",""That's so," he said reflectively, after a pause, "certainly a sort of a skunk and suthin' of a fool.","In course."","He was silent for a moment, as in painful contemplation of the unsavoriness and folly of the unpopular Smiley.",""Dismal weather, ain't it?" he added, now fully embarked on the current of prevailing sentiment.",""Mighty rough papers on the boys, and no show for money this season.","And tomorrow's Christmas."","There was a movement among the men at this announcement, but whether of satisfaction or disgust was not plain.",""Yes," continued the Old Man in the lugubrious tone he had within the last few moments unconsciously adopted—"yes, Christmas, and tonight's Christmas Eve.","Ye see, boys, I kinder thought—that is, I sorter had an idee, jest passin' like, you know—that maybe ye'd all like to come over to my house tonight and have a sort of tear round.","But I suppose, now, you wouldn't? Don't feel like it, maybe?" he added with anxious sympathy, peering into the faces of his companions.",""Well, I don't know," responded Tom Flynn with some cheerfulness.",""P'r'aps we may.","But how about your wife, Old Man? What does she say to it?"","The Old Man hesitated.","His conjugal experience had not been a happy one, and the fact was known to Simpson's Bar.","His first wife, a delicate, pretty little woman, had suffered keenly and secretly from the jealous suspicions of her husband, until one day he invited the whole Bar to his house to expose her infidelity.","On arriving, the party found the shy, petite creature quietly engaged in her household duties, and retired abashed and discomfited.","But the sensitive woman did not easily recover from the shock of this extraordinary outrage.","It was with difficulty she regained her equanimity sufficiently to release her lover from the closet in which he was concealed, and escape with him.","She left a boy of three years to comfort her bereaved husband.","The Old Man's present wife had been his cook.","She was large, loyal and aggressive.","Before he could reply, Joe Dimmick suggested with great directness that it was the "Old Man's house," and that, invoking the Divine Power, if the case were his own, he would invite whom he pleased, even if in so doing he imperiled his salvation.","The Powers of Evil, he further remarked, should contend against him vainly.","All this delivered with a terseness and vigor lost in this necessary translation.",""In course.","Certainly.","Thet's it," said the Old Man with a sympathetic frown.",""Thar's no trouble about thet.","It's my own house, built every stick on it myself.","Don't you be afeard o' her, boys.","She may cut up a trifle rough—ez wimmin do—but she'll come round."","Secretly the Old Man trusted to the exaltation of liquor and the power of courageous example to sustain him in such an emergency.","As yet, Dick Bullen, the oracle and leader of Simpson's Bar, had not spoken.","He now took his pipe from his lips.",""Old Man, how's that yer Johnny gettin' on? Seems to me he didn't look so pert last time I seed him on the bluff heavin' rocks at Chinamen.","Didn't seem to take much interest in it.","Thar was a gang of 'em by yar yesterday—drownded out up the river—and I kinder thought o' Johnny, and how he'd miss 'em! Maybe now, we'd be in the way ef he wus sick?"","The father, evidently touched not only by this pathetic picture of Johnny's deprivation, but by the considerate delicacy 'of the speaker, hastened to assure him that Johnny was better, and that a "little fun might liven him up." Whereupon Dick arose, shook himself,'and saying, "I'm ready.","Lead the way.","Old Man: here goes," himself led the way with a leap, a characteristic howl, and darted out into the night.","As he passed through the outer room, he caught up a blazing brand from the hearth.","The action was repeated by the rest of the partly, closely following and elbowing each other, and before the astonished proprietor of Thompson's grocery was aware of the intention of his guests, the room was deserted.","The night was pitchy dark.","In the first gust of wind their temporary torches were extinguished, and only the red brands dancing and flitting in the gloom like drunken will-o'-the-wisps indicated their whereabouts.","Their way led up Pine Tree Canyon, at the head of which a broad, low, bark-thatched cabin burrowed in the mountainside.","It was the home of the Old Man, and the entrance to the tunnel in which he worked when he worked at all.","Here the crowd paused for a moment out of delicate deference to their host, who came up panting in the rear.",""P'r'aps ye'd better hold on a second out yer, whilst I go in and see that things is all right," said the Old Man, with an indifference he was far from feeling.","The suggestion was graciously accepted, the door opened and closed on the host, and the crowd, leaning their backs against the wall and cowering under the eaves, waited and listened.","For a few moments there was no sound but the dripping of water from the eaves and the stir and rustle of wrestling boughs above them.","Then the men became uneasy, and whispered suggestion and suspicion passed from the one to the other.",""Reckon she's caved in his head the first lick!"",""Decoyed him inter the tunnel and barred him up, likely."",""Got him down and sittin' on him."",""Prob'ly biling suthin' to heave on us: stand clear the door, boys!" For just then the latch clicked, the door slowly opened and a voice said, "Come in out o' the wet."","The voice was neither that of the Old Man nor of his wife.","It was the voice of a small boy, its weak tremble broken by that preternatural hoarseness which only vagabondage and the habit of premature self- assertion can give.","It was the face of a small boy that looked up at theirs —a face that might have been pretty, and even refined, but that it was darkened by evil knowledge from within, and dirt and hard experience from without.","He had a blanket around his shoulders, and had evidently just risen from his bed.",""Come in," he repeated, "and don't make no noise.","The Old Man's in there talking to mar," he continued, pointing to an adjacent room, which seemed to be a kitchen, from which the Old Man's voice came in deprecating accents.",""Let me be," he added querulously to Dick Bullen, who had caught him up, blanket and all, and was affecting to toss him into the fire, "let go o' me, you d——d old fool, d'ye hear?"","Thus adjured, Dick Bullen lowered Johnny to the ground with a smothered laugh, while the men, entering quietly, ranged themselves around a long table of rough boards which occupied the center of the room.","Johnny then gravely proceeded to a cupboard and brought out several articles, which he deposited on the table.",""Thar's whiskey.","And crackers.","And red herons.","And cheese." He took a bite of the latter on his way to the table.",""And sugar." He scooped up a mouthful en route with a small and very dirty hand.",""And terbacker.","Thar's dried appils too on the shelf, but I don't admire 'em.","Applis is swellin'.","Thar," he concluded, "now wade in, and don't be afeard.","I don't mind the old woman.","She don't b'long to me.","S'long."","He had stepped to the threshold of a small room, scarcely larger than a closet, partitioned off from the main apartment, and holding in its dim recess a small bed.","He stood there a moment looking at the company, his bare feet peeping from the blanket, and nodded.",""Hello, Johnny! You ain't goin' to turn in agin, are ye?" said Dick.",""Yes, I are," responded Johnny decidedly.",""Why, wot's up, old fellow?"",""I'm sick."",""How sick?"",""I've got a fevier.","And childblains.","And rheumatiz," returned Johnny, and vanished within.","After a moment's pause, he added in the dark, apparently from under the bedclothes—"And biles!"","There was an embarrassing silence.","The men looked at each other and at the fire.","Even with the appetizing banquet before them, it seemed as if they might again fall into the despondency of Thompson's grocery, when the voice of the Old Man, incautiously lifted, came deprecatingly from the kitchen.",""Certainly! Thet's so.","In course they is.","A gang o' lazy, drunken loafers, and that are Dick Bullen's the ornariest of all.","Didn't hev no more sabe than to come round yar with sickness in the house and no provision.","Thet's what I said: 'Bullen,' sez I, 'it's crazy drunk you are, or a fool,' sez I, 'to think o' such a thing.' 'Staples,' I sez, 'be you a man, Staples, and 'spect to raise h—ll under my roof and invalids lyin' round?' But they would come—they would.","Thet's wot you must 'spect o' such trash as lays round the bar."","A burst of laughter from the men followed this unfortunate exposure.","Whether it was overheard in the kitchen, or whether the Old Man's irate companion had just then exhausted all other modes of expressing her contemptuous indignation, I cannot say, but a back door was suddenly slammed with great violence.","A moment later and the Old Man reappeared, haply unconscious of the cause of the late hilarious outburst, and smiled blandly.",""The old woman thought she'd jest run over to Mrs.","MacFadden's for a sociable call," he explained with jaunty indifference, as he took a seat at the board.","Oddly enough it needed this untoward incident to relieve the embarrassment that was beginning to be felt by the party, and their natural audacity returned with their host.","I do not propose to record the convivialities of that evening.","The inquisitive reader will accept the statement that the conversation was characterized by the same intellectual exaltation, the same cautious reverence, the same fastidious delicacy, the same rhetorical precision, and the same logical and coherent discourse somewhat later in the evening which distinguish similar gatherings of the masculine sex in more civilized localities and under more favorable auspices.","No glasses were broken in the absence of any; no liquor was uselessly spilled on the floor or table in the scarcity of that article.","It was nearly midnight when the festivities were interupted.",""Hush," said Dick Bullen, holding up his hand.","It was the querulous voice of Johnny from his adjacent closet, "Oh, dad!"","The Old Man arose hurriedly and disappeared in the closet.","Presently he reappeared.",""His rheumatiz is coming on agin bad," he explained, "and he wants rubbin'."","He lifted the demijohn of whiskey from the table and shook it.","It was empty.","Dick Bullen put down his tin cup with an embarrassed laugh.","So did the others.","The Old Man examined their contents and said hopefully, "I reckon that's enough; he don't need much.","You hold on all o' you for a spell, and I'll be back," and vanished in the closet with an old flannel shirt and the whiskey.","The door closed but imperfectly, and the following dialogue was distinctly audible:",""Now, sonny, whar does she ache worst?"",""Sometimes over yar and sometimes under yer; but it's most powerful from yer to yer.","Rub yer, dad."","A silence seemed to indicate a brisk rubbing.","Then Johnny:",""Hevin' a good time out yer, dad?"",""Yes, sonny."",""Tomorrer's Chrismiss—ain't it?"",""Yes, sonny.","How does she feel now?"",""Better.","Rub a little furder down.","Wot's Chrismiss, anyway? Wot's it all about?"",""Oh, it's a day."","This exhaustive definition was apparently satisfactory, for there was a silent interval of rubbing.","Presently Johnny again:",""Mar sez that everywhere else but yer everybody gives things to everybody Chrismiss, and then she jist waded inter you.","She sez thar's a man they call Sandy Claws, not a white man, you know, but a kind o' Chinemin, comes down the chimbley night afore Chrismiss and gives things to chillern—boys like me.","Puts 'em in their butes! Thet's what she tried to play upon me.","Easy now, pop, whar are you rubbin' to—thet's a mile from the place.","She jest made that up, didn't she, jest to aggrewate me and you? Don't rub thar...Why, dad?"","In the great quiet that seemed to have fallen upon the house, the sigh of the near pines and the drip of leaves without was very distinct.","Johnny's voice, too, was lowered as he went on.",""Don't you take on now, for I'm gettin' all right fast.","Wot's the boys doin' out thar?"","The Old Man partly opened the door and peered through.","His guests were sitting there sociably enough, and there were a few silver coins and a lean buckskin purse on the table.",""Bettin' on suthin'—some little game or 'nother.","They're all right," he replied to Johnny, and recommenced his rubbing.",""I'd like to take a hand and win some money," said Johnny reflectively after a pause.","The Old Man glibly repeated what was evidently a familiar formula, that if Johnny would wait until he struck it rich in the tunnel he'd have lots of money, etc., etc.",""Yes," said Johnny, "but you don't.","And whether you strike it or I win it, it's about the same.","It's all luck.","But it's mighty cur'o's about Chrismiss —ain't it? Why do they call it Chrismiss?"","Perhaps from some instinctive deference to the overhearing of his guests, or from some vague sense of incongruity, the Old Man's reply was so low as to be inaudible beyond the room.",""Yes," said Johnny, with some slight abatement of interest, "I've heard o' him before.","Thar, that'll do, dad.","I don't ache near so bad as I did.","Now wrap me tight in this yer blanket.","So.","Now," he added in a muffled whisper, "sit down yer by me till I go asleep." To assure himself of obedience, he disengaged one hand from the blanket, and grasping his father's sleeve, again composed himself to rest.","For some moments the Old Man waited patiently.","Then the unwonted stillness of the house excited his curiosity, and without moving from the bed he cautiously opened the door with his disengaged hand, and looked into the main room.","To his infinite surprise it was dark and deserted.","But even then a smoldering log on the hearth broke, and by the upspringing blaze he saw the figure of Dick Bullen sitting by the dying embers.",""Hello!"","Dick started, rose and came somewhat unsteadily toward him.",""Whar's the boys?" said the Old Man.",""Gone up the canyon on a little pasear.","They're coming back for me in a minit.","I'm waitin' round for 'em.","What are you starin' at.","Old Man?" he added, with a forced laugh.",""Do you think I'm drunk?"","The Old Man might have been pardoned the supposition, for Dick's eyes were humid and his face flushed.","He loitered and lounged back to the chimney, yawned, shook himself, buttoned up his coat and laughed.",""Liquor ain't so plenty as that, Old Man.","Now don't you git up," he continued as the Old Man made a movement to release his sleeve from Johnny's hand.",""Don't you mind manners.","Sit jest whar you be; I'm goin' in a jiffy.","Thar, that's them now."","There was a low tap at the door.","Dick Bullen opened it quickly, nodded "good night" to his host, and disappeared.","The Old Man would have followed him but for the hand that still unconsciously grasped his sleeve.","He could have easily disengaged it: it was small, weak and emaciated.","But perhaps because it was small, weak and emaciated he changed his mind, and drawing his chair closer to the bed, rested his head upon it.","In this defenseless attitude the potency of his earlier potations surprised him.","The room flickered and faded before his eyes, reappeared, faded again, went out, and left him—asleep.","Meantime Dick Bullen, closing the door, confronted his companions.",""Are you ready?" said Staples.",""Ready," said Dick; "what's the time?"",""Past twelve," was the reply; "can you make it?—it's nigh on fifty miles, the round trip hither and yon."",""I reckon," returned Dick shortly.",""Whar's the mare?"",""Bill and Jack's holdin' her at the crossin'."",""Let 'em hold on a minit longer," said Dick.","He turned and reentered the house softly.","By the light of the guttering candle and dying fire he saw that the door of the little room was open.","He stepped toward it on tiptoe and looked in.","The Old Man had fallen back in his chair, snoring, his helpless feet thrust out in a line with his collapsed shoulders, and his hat pulled over his eyes.","Beside him, on a narrow wooden bedstead, lay Johnny, muffled tightly in a blanket that hid all save a strip of forehead and a few curls damp with perspiration.","Dick Bullen made a step forward, hesitated and glanced over his shoulder into the deserted room.","Everything was quiet.","With a sudden resolution he parted his huge mustaches with both hands and stooped over the sleeping boy.","But even as he did so, a mischievous blast, lying in wait, swooped down the chimney, rekindled the hearth and lit up the room with a shameless glow from which Dick fled in bashful terror.","His companions were already waiting for him at the crossing.","Two of them were struggling in the darkness with some strange misshapen bulk, which as Dick came nearer took the semblance of a great yellow horse.","It was the mare.","She was not a pretty picture.","From her roman nose to her rising haunches, from her arched spine hidden by the stiff machillas of a Mexican saddle, to her thick, straight bony legs, there was not a line of equine grace.","In her half-blind but wholly vicious white eyes, in her protruding underlip, in her monstrous color, there was nothing but ugliness and vice.",""Now then," said Staples, "stand cl'ar of her heels, boys, and up with you.","Don't miss your first holt of her mane, and mind ye get your off stirrup quick.","Ready!"","There was aleap, a scrambling struggle, a bound, a wild retreat of the crowd, a circle of flying hooves, two springless leaps that jarred the earth, a rapid play and jingle of spurs, a plunge and then the voice of Dick somewhere in the darkness.",""All right!"",""Don't take the lower road back onless you're hard pushed for time! Don't hold her in downhill! We'll be at the ford at five.","G'lang! Hoopa! Mula! GO!"","A splash, a spark struck from the ledge in the road, a clatter in the rocky cut beyond and Dick was gone.","Sing, 0 Muse, the ride of Richard Bullen! Sing, 0 Muse, of chivalrous men! The sacred quest, the doughty deeds, the battery of low churls, the fearsome ride and gruesome perils of the Flower of Simpson's Bar! Alack! She is dainty, this Muse! She will have none of this bucking brute and swaggering, ragged rider, and I must fain follow him in prose, afoot!","It was one o'clock, and yet he had only gained Rattlesnake Hill.","For in that time Jovita had rehearsed to him all her imperfections and practiced all her vices.","Thrice had she stumbled.","Twice had she thrown up her roman nose in a straight line with the reins, and resisting bit and spur, struck out madly across country.","Twice had she reared, and rearing, fallen backward; and twice had the agile Dick, unharmed, regained his seat before she found her vicious legs again.","And a mile beyond them, at the foot of a long hill, was Rattlesnake Creek.","Dick knew that here was the crucial test of his ability to perform his enterprise, set his teeth grimly, put his knees well into her hanks, and changed his defensive tactics to brisk aggression.","Bullied and maddened, Jovita began the descent of the hill.","Here the artful Richard pretended to hold her in with ostentatious objurgation and well-feigned cries of alarm.","It is unnecessary to add that Jovita instantly ran away.","Nor need I state the time made in the descent; it is written in the chronicles of Simpson's Bar.","Enough that in another moment, as it seemed to Dick, she was splashing on the overflowed banks of Rattlesnake Creek.","As Dick expected, the momentum she had acquired carried her beyond the point of balking, and holding her well together for a mighty leap, they dashed into the middle of the swiftly flowing current.","A few moments of kicking, wading and swimming, and Dick drew a long breath on the opposite bank.","The road from Rattlesnake Creek to Red Mountain was tolerably level.","Either the plunge in Rattlesnake Creek had dampened her baleful fire, or the art which led to it had shown her the superior wickedness of her rider, for Jovita no longer wasted her surplus energy in wanton conceits.","Once she bucked, but it was from force of habit; once she shied, but it was from a new, freshly painted meetinghouse at the crossing of the county road.","Hollows, ditches, gravelly deposits, patches of freshly springing grasses, flew from beneath her rattling hoofs.","She began to smell unpleasantly, once or twice she coughed slightly, but there was no abatement of her strength or speed.","By two o'clock he had passed Red Mountain and begun the descent to the plain.","Ten minutes later the driver of the fast Pioneer coach was overtaken and passed by a "man on a pinto hoss"—an event sufficiently notable for remark.","At half-past two Dick rose in his stirrups with a great shout.","Stars were glittering through the rifted clouds, and beyond him, out of the plain, rose two spires, a flagstaff and a straggling line of black objects.","Dick jingled his spurs and swung his riata, Jovita bounded forward, and in another moment they swept into Tuttleville and drew up before the wooden piazza of the Hotel of All Nations.","What transpired that night at Tuttleville is not strictly a part of this record.","Briefly I may state, however, that after Jovita had been handed over to a sleepy ostler, whom she at once kicked into unpleasant consciousness, Dick sallied out with the barkeeper for a tour of the sleeping town.","Lights still gleamed from a few saloons and gambling houses; but avoiding these, they stopped before several closed shops and, by persistent tapping and judicious outcry, roused the proprietors from their beds and made them unbar the doors of their magazines and expose their wares.","Sometimes they were met by curses, but oftener by interest and some concern in their needs, and the interview was invariably concluded by a drink.","It was three o'clock before this pleasantry was given over, and with a small waterproof bag of india rubber strapped on his shoulders, Dick returned to the hotel.","But here he was waylaid by Beauty—Beauty opulent in charms, affluent in dress, persuasive in speech, and Spanish in accent! In vain she repeated the invitation in Excelsior, happily scorned by all Alpine-climbing youth, and rejected by this child of the Sierras—a rejection softened in this instance by a laugh and his last gold coin.","And then he sprang to the saddle and dashed down the lonely street and out into the lonelier plain where presently the lights, the black line of houses, the spires and the flagstaff sank into the earth behind him again and were lost in the distance..","The storm had cleared away, the air was brisk and cold, the outlines of adjacent landmarks were distinct, but it was half-past four before Dick reached the meetinghouse and the crossing of the country road.","To avoid the rising grade he had taken a longer and more circuitous road, in whose viscid mud Jovita sank fetlock-deep at every bound.","It was a poor preparation for a steady ascent of five miles more; but Jovita, gathering her legs under her, took it with her usual blind, unreasoning fury, and a half hour later reached the long level that led to Rattlesnake Creek.","Another half hour would bring him to the creek.","He threw the reins lightly upon the neck of the mare, chirruped to her and began to sing.","Suddenly Jovita shied with a bound that would have unseated a less practiced rider.","Hanging to her rein was a figure that had leaped from the bank, and, at the same time, from the road before her arose a shadowy horse and rider.",""Throw up your hands," commanded the second apparition, with an oath.","Dick felt the mare tremble, quiver and apparently sink under him.","He knew what it meant and was prepared.",""Stand aside, Jack Simpson.","I know you, you d—d thief! Let me pass, or—"","He did not finish the sentence.","Jovita rose straight in the air with a terrific bound, throwing the figure from her bit with a single shake of her vicious head, and charged with deadly malevolence down on the impediment before her.","An oath, a pistol shot, horse and highwayman rolled over in the road, and the next moment Jovita was a hundred yards away.","But the good right arm of her rider, shattered by a bullet, dropped helplessly at his side.","Without slacking his speed, he shifted the reins to his left hand.","But a few moments later he was obliged to halt and tighten the saddle girths that had slipped in the onset.","This, in his crippled condition, took some time.","He had no fear of pursuit, but looking up he saw that the eastern stars were already paling, and that the distant peaks had lost their ghostly whiteness and now stood out blackly against a lighter sky.","Day was upon him.","Then completely absorbed in a single idea, he forgot the pain of his wound and, mounting again, dashed on toward Rattlesnake Creek.","But now Jovita's breath came broken by gasps, Dick reeled in his saddle, and brighter and brighter grew the sky.","Ride, Richard; run, Jovita; linger, O day!","For the last few rods there was a roaring in his ears.","Was it exhaustion from loss of blood, or what? He was dazed and giddy as he swept down the hill, and did not recognize his surroundings.","Had he taken the wrong road, or was this Rattlesnake Creek?","It was.","But the brawling creek he had swum a few hours before had risen, more than doubled its volume, and now rolled a swift and resistless river between him and Rattlesnake Hill.","For the first time that night Richard's heart sank within him.","The river, the mountain, the quickening east, swam before his eyes.","He shut them to recover his self-control.","In that brief interval, by some fantastic mental process, the little room at Simpson's Bar and the figures of the sleeping father and son rose upon him.","He opened his eyes wildly, cast off his coat, pistol, boots and saddle, bound his precious pack tightly to his shoulders, grasped the bare flanks of Jovita with his bared knees, and with a shout dashed into the yellow water.","A cry rose from the opposite bank as the head of a man and horse struggled for a few moments against the battling current, and then were swept away amidst uprooted trees and whirling driftwood.","The Old Man started and woke.","The fire on the hearth was dead, the candle in the outer room flickering in its socket, and somebody was rapping at the door.","He opened it, but fell back with a cry before the dripping, half-naked figure that reeled against the doorpost.",""Dick?"",""Hush! Is he awake yet?"",""No; but, Dick—"",""Dry up, you old fool! Get me some whiskey, quick!"","The Old Man flew and returned with—an empty bottle! Dick would have sworn, but his strength was not equal to the occasion.","He staggered, caught at the handle of the door and motioned to the Old Man.",""Thar's suthin in my pack yer for Johnny.","Take it off.","I can't."","The Old Man unstrapped the pack, and laid it before the exhausted man.",""Open it, quick."","He did so with trembling fingers.","It contained only a few poor toys— cheap and barbaric enough, goodness knows, but bright with paint and tinsel.","One of them was broken; another, I fear, was irretrievably ruined by water, and on the third—ah me! there was a cruel spot.",""It don't look like much, that's a fact," said Dick ruefully—"but it's the best we could do—Take 'em, Old Man, and put 'em in his stocking, and tell him—tell him, you know—hold me, Old Man—"","The Old Man caught at his sinking figure.",""Tell him," said Dick, with a weak little laugh —"tell him Sandy Claus has come."","And even so, bedraggled, ragged, unshaven and unshorn, with one arm hanging helplessly at his side, Santa Claus came to Simpson's Bar and fell fainting on the first threshold.","The Christmas dawn came slowly after, touching the remoter peaks with the rosy warmth of ineffable love.","And it looked so tenderly on Simpson's Bar that the whole mountain, as if caught in a generous action, blushed to the skies.","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","The Library-How Santa Claus Came to Simpson's Bar","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/harte1.html","42","17 Dec 2003");
Page[32]=new Array("CLAYTON MOORE","September 14, 1914 - December 28, 1999","They predicted rain for the Sunday memorial ceremony for Clayton Moore January 16th at the Gene Autry Western Museum in Los Angeles.","My son Chris and I did not care, we had to be there to say goodbye to the man who had made the Lone Ranger live on the screen and actually made himself into the embodiment of that character.","Many years ago, my three sons and I met Moore and Silver at the opening of one of the Lone Ranger Restaurants where he was making a personal appearance.","Now, here we were at the closing of his public life.","As we made our way up the path to the Museum, a line of mounted policemen met us.","At the head of that line stood Silver, older and grayer and temporarily out of retirement, there to bid a silent goodbye to his riding partner.","He wore the very saddle that the Lone Ranger sat upon as he rode the dusty trails of the old west.","Moore’s daughter, Dawn, stood beside the horse holding his bridle.","Once inside the main patio area, we signed the guest book and received a Memorial leaflet with a picture of Moore and a list of the guest speakers.","The Lone Ranger’s Creed was printed inside and it was a piece of memorabilia to treasure.","As the hour drew near for things to start, a crowd began to assemble.","The threatening skies went unheeded.","Many cowboys in Old West gear milled around exchanging stories of their movie days.","Many were familiar, but their names were a blur.","A man wandered around wearing a Lone Ranger tee shirt he had purchased in the gift shop.","In the middle of the patio was a glass case that held the actual Lone Ranger mask, hat and brace of two six shooters in their holsters.","How many times had Clayton Moore donned that gear and transformed himself in the Lone Ranger? Too many times to count.","To us fans, he had actually become the Lone Ranger.","Moore often had said that his childhood goal in life was to either be a policeman or a cowboy.","In the Lone Ranger, he had accomplished both ambitions.","The small auditorium only held about 250 people, so only invited guests and speakers were inside.","The rest of our crowd, numbering about 200, watched the event over closed circuit TV monitors in the patio.","It was still a moving experience.","Producer Rob Word emceed the event.","Tributes were given by actors Rand Brooks, Johnny Crawford, Alex Cord and Leonard Maltin.","Rand Brooks had worked with Moore at the onset of his career in The Son of Monte Cristo.","He recounted tales of their struggles as starving, young unknowns.","Speaking of his genuine admiration and love for the man, Brooks found it hard to fight back the tears as he spoke.","Genuinely moved, he said, “ I never, in all my years, ever heard Clayton say…” Brooks paused and then wiped away his tears.","“He never said one bad word about anyone, anyone.”","Johnny Crawford of the “Rifleman”, who had acted in some episodes of the Lone Ranger as a child actor, said: “ He never let you down.","Clayton was always a gentleman, down to earth, always friendly, upbeat and full of energy.","There’ll never be anyone like him…he WAS the Lone Ranger.”","Alex Cord recounted with a touch of humor and admiration his respect for the character of the Lone Ranger as portrayed by Moore.","Los Angeles County Supervisor Mike Antanovich proclaimed Moore “a hero” and presented Moore’s Daughter Dawn and widow Clarita with a tribute voted by the Los Angeles County Supervisor’s Office.","Between the speeches, clips of Moore’s career were shown and the crowd responded loudly at the sound of the William Tell overture.","Clayton’s last public appearance at the 1998 Golden Boot Awards, where he was inducted into the hall of fame was shown.","It was clear that he was ailing, but he rose to the occasion and gave out a hearty HI YO SILVER at the end of his appearance.","The outpouring of love for this man was evident throughout the morning.","The Wrather Corporation that had taken the mask away from Moore did not fare as well; quite a few barbed comments were thrown.","Five years of legal battles finally restored the mask to the real Lone Ranger, Clayton Moore.","Leonard Maltin proclaimed; “Some people, some actors will complain about typecasting.","That never worried Clayton, in part because he loved the role so much.”","How proud the day made me to have been the one to introduce this kind man and hero into the lives of my three young sons so many years ago.","My son Chris and I left the ceremony with a renewed respect for this man no longer with us in life, but who will be there always through the miracle of film and video.","His example of truth and justice lives on.","Adios, Kimo Sabe.","Tom Mason","January 19, 2000","Photos by Chris Mason","NOTE: While we realize that everyone assumes the correct spelling is "Kemo Sabe", we have chosen to go with the spelling used at the Memorial.","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","The Clayton Moore Memorial","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/ranger.htm","9","29 Sep 2003");
Page[33]=new Array("Murder On The Limited","by Howard Finney","As with many authors of the pulp era, Howard Finney is only remembered as a name and not as a person.","There is no record of his birth, his death, nor of his other writing achievements, if there were any, outside of three short stories.","The only source to mention Finney suggests that he may have been a pseudonym, but, since no one has owned up to being him at this late date, there is a good chance that we may never know who he was.","Yet, while Finney may be forgotten, his work lives on and his short story, "Murder on the Limited," is a good combination of a railroad story and murder mystery with a couple of twists.","The investigators of the crime, detectives, if you will, are railroad men: seasoned professionals who know the train and its operations inside and out.","The murder mentioned in the title has all the trappings of a classic locked room mystery, but is investigated, and solved, in a manner that owes more to the hard-boiled school of detection than the cerebral style that one usually associates with the locked room dilemma.","Most interestingly, in a departure from the times, Finney allows the black Pullman porter to have a major part in the solving of the crime rather than just showing up for comic relief.",""Murder on the Limited" originally appeared in the September, 1932 issue of Detective Dragnet a nearly forgotten pulp magazine published by Magazine Publishers.","The cover shown to the right is one of the few examples of the magazine available and appears here to give the reader a feel for the title.","Perhaps if Finney had hung around for another year, he might be better remembered, as the magazine changed its name to Dime Detective and had a well remembered, and successful, run under that title.","Bob Gay","September, 2004","Introduction © 2004 by Bob Gay","A long wail from the engine's whistle rose above the vibrations of the pullmans as the Mississippi Limited peeled away the miles of western Ohio.","It was the only reminder Stanley, the pullman conductor, had that there was anyone else awake on the Limited other than himself.","He glanced through the window of the men's smoking compartment and saw the lights of Bellefontaine rush up on their left and then drop behind.","He set his watch back an hour to Central Standard time.","Bellefontaine was the last point on Eastern time.","What a break if he could do that with his own life—set it back and gain a handicap, as the Limited did.","Above the hum of steel on steel and the song of the wheels he heard the ring of the porter's buzzer at the other end of the car.","Queer that—at this hour in the morning.","A moment later steps sounded in the vestibule and Jeb, the porter, pushed his head through the curtain.","His black face, extra dark against the spotless white of his jacket, was set in a frown halfway between worry and fear.",""Boss, lady wants to see you.","Lower Three—"","A woman pushed by him hastily, pulling a thin kimono about her nightgown.","She was middle-aged and plump.","Stanley recognized her.","She and her husband had made the run from New York.","Her white face and haggard eyes brought him to his feet.",""My husband's vanished—disappeared right before my eyes," she blurted huskily.",""Vanished?"",""Yes.","He went to get me a drink of water and he hasn't come back.' The frown left Stanley's face for a moment.",""But my dear madam, why alarm yourself so quickly? Maybe he stepped out on a platform for a smoke.","Take a look, Jeb."","As the porter went out, she pulled back a loose strand of hair from her gray face, and shook her head.",""No, no.","You're wasting precious time," she half-whispered in a low, urgent tone.",""He doesn't smoke.","And the only place he would stop would be here.","Something's happened to him, something strange.","He vanished before my very eyes."","She shivered and clutched her kimono more tightly about her.","It was chilly in the car this time of night.","But Stanley saw in her face that it was more than the temperature that made her shiver and turn her stricken eyes toward the slightly swaying curtain to the corridor.","He nodded for her to go on.",""He was coming down the aisle with a cup of water when he disappeared.","It was so strange and sudden I thought I was dreaming at first.",""A few minutes after he had gone for the water, I looked through the curtain and saw him coming down the aisle with the cup in his hand.","I pulled myself up in bed to take the water.","A moment later, when I thought it strange he hadn't reached the berth, I looked out again.","The aisle was empty.","He'd vanished.","It was just as though I'd never seen him there a minute before.",""The paper cup was lying in the middle of the car.","I waited a few moments, thinking perhaps he'd spilled the water and gone back for more.","But he didn't come and when I looked out again, the paper cup was gone too."","She glanced around the room and for an instant at the curtain, her features drawn and haunted.","The sinister import of her words stirred Stanley uneasily.","Thirty years on the railroad had taught him to evaluate the excited demands of passengers for their true worth.","But this woman's story was a new one, fantastic, and yet touched with truth.","The door of the vestibule slammed and he heard the voices of Kelley, the railroad conductor, and Hunt, the brakeman.",""Stay here and keep calm, Mrs.","Saunders," he said evenly.",""We'll look for him."","As he pushed through the curtains, he saw her fingers wandering instinctively over the tightly constricted cords of her neck, trying to shake back her steadily rising hysteria.",""This fellow Saunders has pulled a Houdini," he muttered to the two trainmen.",""Vanished like a puff of smoke.","It's a queer story."","Kelley nodded at the porter.",""He told us."","Stanley glanced toward the room.",""She's scared stiff.","Got something on her mind she hasn't spilled yet.","See what you can find out."",""O.K.", Kelley assented and slipped through the door.","Hunt peered into Stanley's face.",""I don't like it," he ground out tensely.","Stanley turned away.",""We'll take a look in this car."","The light from the end of the Pullman shone dimly down the aisle, revealing the neat series of polished shoes.","The snores of several of the sleeping passengers droned from behind the heavy green curtains and mingled with the steady clacking of the wheels on the rail joints.","Stanley walked down the aisle slowly, pausing before each berth, listening intently.","He reached Number Three, the Saunders' berth and his knee rubbed against something.","The inert, bare foot of a man was protruding into the aisle.","A low whine of terror escaped the porter.","Stanley gripped his arm in a warning for silence and pushed the curtains aside.","A man in pajamas was lying diagonally across the bed, face down.","The small light above the pillow illuminated the shock of iron-gray hair lying against the white sheet and his tightly clenched hands.","His body was inert, lifeless as a wax figure.","The section of his white pajamas from just below the shoulder blades to the small of the back was a dark, moist red that glistened like jelly in the yellow ray of the light.","His head was half turned toward them, revealing the wild agony in his eye and the lips drawn back for the scream that had never passed them.","Stanley's unsteady fingers pulled at the pajamas.","The shirt came away from the skin with a slight, sucking sound and revealed the wound.",""Stabbed," Hunt gasped.","Stanley pushed the door of the vacant drawing room closed and stared at Hunt's gray, shocked face.","Murder on the Limited! Momentarily stunned as he was, he composed himself and answered the question on the brakeman's mute lips.",""Go forward and tell Schwartz to open up the throttle right into Muncie so no one can jump off.","Drop a wire for the operator at Schyler Junction to the police at Muncie.","Tell them to have men on both sides of the track when we run in."","Hunt stumbled out of the door.",""On your way," Stanley added, "send Kelley back.","Don't let on to the woman."","A moment later Kelley's big frame pushed through the door.","His rough-hewn features were like chalk as he wiped his brow on his blue sleeve.",""Well?" he breathed.","Stanley spoke mechanically.",""Saunders was stabbed from behind and throttled as he came down the aisle with the water.","That's the way he vanished."","He opened the door and peered down the dark pullman.",""And the murderer is lying behind those curtains.","Probably watching us now," he added softly.",""Waiting for the next move."","He thought of a deadly snake, coiled in the darkness, ready to strike if stumbled upon.","Kelley licked his lips.",""Dumped Saunders back in his own berth while the woman was out giving the alarm.","Playing safe."",""What did you get out of the woman?" Stanley asked out of the corner of his mouth, his eyes still searching the aisle speculatively, trying to penetrate the secret behind those gently swaying curtains.",""Saunders life had been threatened before they left New York.","It seems he was an eye-witness to a gang shooting in St.","Louis a few months ago.","There were some other witnesses but they won't talk, scared to death.","Saunders was a pretty high-class man—refused to be intimidated.","He was the state's star witness and on his way back for the trial.",""Before they left New York yesterday he got a couple of telephone calls, warnings to lay off.","He laughed 'em off.","He got a telegram on the train at Rochester.","Just two words—Coffin Car—"","Stanley's thin, resolute face hardened and his lips set in a grim line.","It would have been better for Saunders if he had listened to the warning.","It would be better for himself if he heeded the threat embodied in Saunders' lifeless, staring face.","He felt that warning now as his eyes roved down the aisle, felt himself being watched, and the menace of invisible eyes.",""We'll take a look in these berths," he rasped.","Kelley's glance shifted uneasily.",""Suppose this guy is wise.","If he lays low in his berth and doesn't get cold feet we haven't got a clue.","Might be any one of the passengers in the car."",""Maybe," Stanley said softly.",""But it's ten to one he's dressed.","You can't make a getaway all of a sudden-like in your pajamas."","Kelley's eyes flickered and then steadied before the level gaze of the older man.",""O.K.", he muttered.","Stanley opened the curtains of the berths with deft, cautious fingers and played the light over the interiors.","He was wary, alert.","Some stirred and muttered vaguely but he quickly flashed off the light and passed on.","He eliminated the women from consideration.","Lower Ten was a man, sunk deep in the covers, snoring fitfully.","Only the top of his black hair showed.","They were all like that, asleep, apparently innocent.","At the other end of the car Kelley cursed softly.",""How can a dirty killer lie there and look so peaceful?"",""Of course one of them might have clothes on beneath those covers," Stanley frowned.",""But I can't go down the line and yank everything off them to find out." Jeb moved closer and nudged him.",""They's a funny thing about one of them passengers."",""Yes."",""Well, now, you know all them passengers always leave their shoes beneath the berths so's I can shine 'em.","Well, I done finished shinin' all the shoes tonight and I don't find none beneath Lower Ten.","Dey ain't no one in the upper but that don' explain what the gentleman in the lower done with his'n less they's right on his feet."","Stanley gave Jeb one long silent look—but there were unspoken words in that look.","He turned and his eyes fell on the shadowed curtains of Lower Ten, bored through it, and seemed to meet the sinister, watching eyes that he had been steadily conscious of.","He and Kelley and Jeb moved silently down the aisle and closed in on the berth.","His sharp ears detected a rustle and then silence.","He spread the curtains and turned on the flashlight.","The passenger was in the same position as when they had first gone through the car.","Stanley watched him, could hardly detect his breathing.","He got the impression of a coiled spring, held by a hair trigger.","His free hand stole down, grasped the rim of the bedclothes, pulled them down gently.","He had a flash of the dark blue suit the man was wearing, saw an arm swing back.","The flashlight was dashed from his hand, the berth plunged in darkness.","As he tried to draw away, a stunning blow crashed down on his head and he stumbled back against Kelley.","The muzzle of a black, snub-nosed automatic thrust through the split in the curtains and fanned them menacingly.","The other two froze and raised their hands.","He sucked in his breath from pain and pushed his up slowly.",""Turn around."","The voice behind the curtain was muffled but peremptory, and they obeyed, facing the opposite berths.",""The first one of you that makes a break gets what Saunders got," the voice whispered.","They heard him getting out of the berth.",""If you know what's good for you, you'll lay low until I get off this train."","There was the shuffle of a foot on the carpet—then silence.","A moment later the vestibule door clicked.","Stanley swung around and ran for the vestibule.","Kelley called to him.",""Stop.","He'll drill you."","Stanley kept running—saw no one on the platform—and ran into the next car.","The aisle was empty.","Kelley caught up with him, seized his arm.",""Were almost into Muncie," pleaded Kelley.",""If he doesn't make a break for it, the cops can help us take him." Stanley cursed harshly.",""Did you see his face?"","Kelley shook his head in the negative.","They went back and searched the berth.","There was nothing, no clues—only blood-stained sheets where Saunders' body had lain.",""We're running into Muncie in a few minutes," Kelley blurted.",""We'll get him there.","At least we uncovered him."","Stanleys lips curled grimly.","They sped into the outskirts of Muncie, flashed by streets and factories.","The long whaaa, whaaa of Schwartz's whistle screamed twice, flinging a warning ahead.","Stanley saw policemen and plainclothes dicks every few car lengths as they rushed down the platform.","A great shudder ran through the train, a grinding, tearing jar, and the scream of protesting wheels under the squeeze of the brakes.","The Limited came to a stop.","He swung off and in his momentum almost bowled over a tall, stout figure in blue and two plainclothes men.",""You the pullman conductor?" the stout officer shouted.",""I'm Braden, chief of police here.","We've got your train covered.","What's the story?"","Stanley gave it to him tersely.",""Any passengers getting off here?" Braden barked.",""No.","Only three or four pickups for St.","Louis."","The station was deserted except for the police and men loading mail.","The last of the pickups for St.","Louis was climbing the steps of the car reserved for Muncie space, a plump traveling salesman with a loud, green suit.","Stanley felt tense, strained.","He said slowly.",""We'll have to go in and take him.","Give us the two plainclothes men."","Braden nodded silently and the two dicks walked down and got on the observation car with him and Kelley.","Stanley explained to them tersely with set jaw.",""We'll work right through from here forward.","I'm checking every passengers ticket.","He can't show the stub for Lower Ten without giving himself away.","And if he can't show a ticket that puts the finger on him."","The two dicks kept their hands in their pockets, ready for trouble.","Most of the passengers were still asleep.","Stanley woke them and made them show their stubs.","Some wanted to start an argument but he moved on, left them spluttering.","There was only one car further ahead when he took the ticket of the last Muncie passenger, a heavily built, ill-tempered fellow.",""What's the big delay?" he growled, drawing his watch and waving it before Stanley's eyes, "We've been sitting in this station almost a half hour now.","Am I on the Mississippi Limited or a milk train?"",""Sorry," Stanley apologized.",""Sorry, sorry," the passenger exclaimed.",""That won't get me into St.","Louis on time."","The pullman conductor's eyes flashed but he handed back the stub in silence.","He glanced in the lavatory on the way out.","It was empty, as he had expected.","He was getting into that frame of mind.","There was only one more car ahead.","He wondered how the killer had tricked him.","He had vanished into thin air more completely than the hazy, blue pall of cigarette smoke that hung in the stuffy lavatory.","Everything was in order in the last car.",""Come back to that drawing room in the next car," he said, still frowning.","Stanley knocked on the door again and pushed it open immediately.","The man from Muncie was standing in the middle of the floor.",""Now what?" Stanley smiled apologetically.",""Sorry to disturb you again.","Was there anyone in this drawing room when you came on board?"","The man raised dark, heavy eyebrows curiously.",""Why, no.","I don't get you."","Stanley opened the lavatory door again.","The air inside was still thick with cigarette smoke and stale.","Four or five butts were mashed on the floor.","The drawing room was supposed to have been unoccupied until the man from Muncie boarded the train.","Stanley regarded the passenger with shrewd, appraising eyes.","They rested on his smooth black hair.","His glance turned toward the upper berth.",""Open that up," he said to the porter standing in the doorway.","The passenger started and leaned forward.",""What's this all about?" he rasped.","The porter's key rattled in the lock.","As the shelf swung down, a hoarse cry burst from the negro and he sprang back.","A man's head and shoulders rolled over the side, and dragged by their weight, the whole body crashed to the floor.","The fellow was bound and gagged with strips torn from the sheets.","His plump figure and loud green suit betrayed him as one of the passengers Stanley had seen getting on at Muncie.","The black eyes of the other passenger flamed and his hand stole toward his coat.",""Hold that pose," cried one of the dicks, flashing his service pistol.","Stanley knelt and examined the man on the floor.",""He's alive.","Got a good crack in the head, though."","He glanced up at the crouched, tense figure in front of him.",""A clever trick," he said harshly.",""You almost got away with it."",""What's it all about?" the other spat.",""After you murdered Saunders and got away from us you hid in here in the lavatory.","When this man got on at Muncie and the porter left, you cracked him down, took his tickets and hid him up there.","Passed yourself off as getting on at Muncie.","Very clever—except for one thing you forgot."","The fellow's dark face worked with fury.",""You meddling old fool," he hissed.","He struck with his foot—quicker than Stanley could dodge.","When he came to he was lying on the side cushion of the drawing room.","Jeb and Kelley were the only ones in the room.","Jeb was leaning over him, dabbling his head with a wet towel, muttering unintelligibly, while Kelley looked on.","Beneath him came the hum of the wheels.",""We're moving," he exclaimed, sitting up.",""Sure," grinned Kelley.",""Where are the others?"",""Done take the one to jail and t'other to the hospital," Jeb drawled.","Stanley lay back with a great sigh of relief.",""There's one thing those dicks couldn't understand," Kelley grinned.",""How'd you spot that guy?"",""Remember when we came through the first time and I took his Muncie ticket? He was so damned ornery and kept waving his watch in front of my face?" "Yeah"",""And complainin' about the delay?"",""Yeah?"",""His watch was on Eastern Standard time.","Muncie's on Central Standard time.","I thought it was phony his watch should be on Eastern time, him supposed to be getting on at Muncie."","Stanley shook his finger at Jeb with a quizzical smile.",""Can't fool a couple of old railroad men, eh, Jeb?"","Copyright","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","Murder on the Limited by Howard Finney","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/finney.html","27.7","9 Sep 2004");
Page[34]=new Array("The Zayat Kiss","by Sax Rohmer","While researching the origins of Dr.","Fu Manchu for my introduction to the Nostalgia League edition of The Insidious Dr.","Fu Manchu, I ran across numerous references to the first Fu Manchu story entitled, "The Zayat Kiss".","Most sources spoke of the story only briefly and concentrated instead on how it was followed by nine more stories that were eventually assembled into the above named novel.","The story is also nearly impossible to find in any anthologies, and, to the best of my searching, is not available on the Internet.","For such a seminal work, this seemed quite odd and none of the sources I consulted could offer an answer to what I considered to be some key questions: what was the first Fu Manchu story about, why hasn't it been reprinted, and did Rohmer write the stories in a serialized fashion to finance the writing of the complete novel?","The answer to the first two questions becomes clear upon reading "The Zayat Kiss".","The story is, with only some minor additions, the first three chapters, and the beginning of the fourth chapter, of The Insidious Dr.","Fu Manchu and, since it is the same as the novel, this would explain why it has been overlooked.","It does read quite well on its own, however, and it is easy to see how readers of the time were caught up in the mysterious doings of the good Dr.","and why they would want to read more.","The answer to the third question is a bit more difficult.","Rohmer gave many different accounts concerning the creation of Fu Manchu (one account can be found in the above link) and never makes specific mention about the writing of the novel, except in the most general of terms.","I then consulted Rohmer scholar, Dr.","Lawrence Knapp, who was kind enough to send me this (edited) reply:","...I don't believe Rohmer planned to write a "novel"; he apparently planned a "series" of short stories that he could continue if the first few sold or abandon if some other project was received well.","His first stories were simple stand-alone affairs.","He started a novel titled Zalithea but abandoned it after six chapters.","He then turned to writing anything that paid including comedy sketches, songs, ghostwriting and the occasional short story....The ten Fu Manchu stories were surprisingly successful and were submitted to Methuen for consideration for publication in book form.","It narrowly escaped rejection and was published in June of 1913.","The rest, as they say, is history.","Time and again, when his finances were flagging, he returned to his always popular villain for what was an all but guaranteed sale.","So, there you have it.","Rohmer wrote "The Zayat Kiss" as a stand-alone story, later incorporated it into a novel, rather than the other way around and, if you've read the novel, you know what is in store for you here.","In any event, we hope you enjoy it.",""The Zayat Kiss" was originally published in England in The Story-Teller in October of 1912.","It was published again in the United States in the February 15, 1913 issue of Collier's.","This is its first Internet appearance.","Rather than annotate the story to death, I have indicated where the chapter breaks occur in the novel and have simply placed a red asterisk (*) where the text of the story differs from that of the novel, leaving it to you, the reader, to discover the differences for yourself.","Introduction © Bob Gay, January 2003","For further information about Sax Rohmer and Fu Manchu, please visit Dr.","Knapp's The Page of Fu Manchu.","TNL has also assembled a gallery entitled, "Images of Fu Manchu", that features many of the ways that Fu Manchu has been portrayed in books, comics and film.","Illustration from the February 15, 1913 issue of Collier's by Joseph Clement Coll.","From the collection of Lawrence Knapp.",""A GENTLEMAN TO SEE YOU, DOCTOR."","From across the common a clock sounded the half hour.",""Ten-thirty !" I said.",""A late visitor.","Show him up, if you please."","I pushed my writing aside and tilted the lamp shade as footsteps sounded on the landing.","The next moment I had jumped to my feet, for a tall, lean man, with his square-cut, clean-shaven face sun baked to the hue of coffee, entered and extended both hands with a cry:",""Good old Petrie! Didn't expect me, I'll swear!"","It was Nayland Smith, whom I had thought to be in Burma!",""Smith," I said, and gripped his hands hard, "this is a delightful surprise! Whatever—however—"",""Excuse me, Petrie!" he broke in.",""Don't put it down to the sun!" And he put out the lamp, plunging the room into darkness.","I was too surprised to speak.",""No doubt you will think me mad," he continued, and dimly I could see him at the window, peering out into the road, but before you are many hours older you will know that I have good reason to be cautious.","Ah, nothing suspicious! Perhaps I am first this time." And stepping back to the writing table, he relighted the lamp.",""Mysterious enough for you?" he laughed, and glanced at my unfinished MS.",""A story, eh? From which I gather that the district is beastly healthy—what, Petrie? Well, I can put some material in your way that, if sheer uncanny mystery is a marketable commodity, ought to make you independent of influenza and broken legs and shattered nerves and all the rest."","I surveyed him doubtfully, but there was nothing in his appearance to justify me in supposing him to suffer from delusions.","His eyes were too bright, certainly, and a hardness now had crept over his face.","I got out the whisky and siphon, saying:",""You have taken your leave early?"",""I am not on leave," he replied, and slowly filled his pipe.",""I am on duty."",""On duty!" I exclaimed.",""What, are you moved to London, or something?"",""I have got a roving commission, Petrie, and it doesn't rest with me where I am to-day, nor where I shall be to-morrow."","There was something ominous in the words, and putting down my glass, I faced round and looked him squarely in the eyes.",""Out with it!" I said.",""What is it all about?"","Smith suddenly stood up and stripped off his coat.","Rolling back his left shirt sleeve he revealed a wicked-looking wound in the fleshy part of the forearm.","It was quite healed, but curiously striated for an inch or so around.",""Ever seen one like it?" he asked.",""Not exactly," I confessed.",""It appears to have been deeply cauterized."",""Right! Very deeply! A barb steeped in the venom of a hamadryad went in there!"","A shudder I could not repress ran through me at mention of that most deadly of all the reptiles of the East.",""There's only one treatment," he continued, rolling his sleeve down again, "and that's with a sharp knife, a match, and a broken cartridge.","I lay on my back raving for three days afterward in a forest that stank with malaria, but I should have been lying there now if I had hesitated.","Here's the point.","It was not an accident!"",""What do you mean?"",""I mean that it was a deliberate attempt on my life, and I am hard upon the tracks of the man who extracted that venom—patiently, drop by drop—from the poison glands of the snake, who prepared the arrow, and who caused it to be shot at me."",""What fiend is this?"",""A fiend who, unless my calculations are at fault, is now in London, and who regularly wars with pleasant weapons of that kind.","Petrie, I have traveled from Burma not in the interest of the British Government merely, but in the interests of the entire white race, and I honestly believe—though I pray I may be wrong—that its survival depends largely upon the success of my mission."","To say that I was perplexed conveys no idea of the mental chaos created by these extraordinary statements, for into my humdrum suburban life Nayland Smith had brought fantasy of the wildest.","I did not know what to think, what to believe.",""I am wasting precious time!" he rapped decisively, and, draining his glass, he stood up.",""I came straight to you because you are the only man I dare to trust.","Except the big chief at headquarters, you are the only person in England, I hope, who knows that Nayland Smith has quitted Burma.","I must have some one with me, Petrie, all the time—it's imperative! Can you put me up here, and spare a few days to the strangest business, I promise you, that ever was recorded in fact or fiction?"","I agreed readily enough, for, unfortunately, my professional dudes were not onerous.",""Good man!" he cried, wringing my hand in his impetuous way.",""We start now."",""What, to-night?"",""To-night! I had thought of turning in, I must admit.","I have not dared to sleep for forty-eight hours, except in fifteen-minute stretches.","But there is one move that must be made to-night and immediately.","I must warn Sir Crichton Davey."",""Sir Crichton Davey—of the India—"",""Petrie, he is a doomed man! Unless he follows my instructions without question, without hesitation—before Heaven, nothing can save him! I do not know when the blow will fall, how it will fall, nor from whence, but I know that my first duty is to warn him.","Let us walk down to the corner of the common and get a taxi." *",""What's this?" muttered my friend hoarsely.","Constables were moving on a little crowd of carious idlers who pressed about the steps of Sir Crichton Davy's house and sought to peer in at the open door.","Without waiting for the cab to draw up to the curb, Nayland Smith recklessly leaped out, and I followed closely at his heels.",""What has happened?" he demanded breathlessly of a constable.","The latter glanced at him doubtfully, but something in his voice and bearing commanded respect.",""Sir Crichton Davey has been killed, sir."","Smith lurched back as though he had received a physical blow, and clutched my shoulder convulsively.","Beneath the heavy tan his face had blanched, and his eyes were set in a stare of horror.",""My God!" he whispered.",""Just too late!" *","With clenched fists he turned and, pressing through the group of loungers, bounded up the steps.","In the hall a man who unmistakably was a Scotland Yard official stood talking to a footman.","Other members of the household were moving about, more or less aimlessly, and the chilly hand of, King Fear had touched one and all, for, as they came and went, they glanced ever over their shoulders, as if each shadow cloaked a menace, and listened, as it seemed, for some sound which they dreaded to hear.","Smith strode up to the detective and showed him a card, upon glancing at which the Scotland Yard man said something in a low voice, and, nodding, touched his hat to Smith in a respectful manner.","A few brief questions and answers, and, in gloomy silence, we followed the detective up the heavily carpeted stair, along a corridor lined with pictures and busts, and into a large library.","A group of people were in this room, and one, in whom I recognized Chalmers Cleeve of Harley Street, was bending over a motionless form stretched upon a couch.","Another door communicated with a small study, and through the opening I could see a man on all fours examining the carpet.","The uncomfortable sense of hush, the group about the physician, the bizarre figure crawling, beetlelike, across the inner room, and the grim hub, around which all this ominous activity turned, made up a scene that etched itself indelibly on my mind.","As we entered.","Dr.","Cleeve straightened himself, frowning thoughtfully.",""Frankly, I do not care to venture any opinion at present regarding the immediate cause of death," he said.",""Sir Crichton was addicted to cocaine, but there are indications which are not in accordance with cocaine poisoning.","I fear that only a post-mortem can establish the facts—if," he added, "we ever arrive at them.","A most mysterious case!"","Smith stepping forward and engaging the famous pathologist in conversation, I seized the opportunity to examine Sir Crichton's body.","The dead man was in evening dress, but wore an old smoking jacket.","He had been of spare but hardy build, with thin, aquiline features, which now were oddly puffy, as were his clenched hands.","I pushed back his sleeve and saw the marks of the hypodermic syringe upon his left arm.","Quite mechanically I turned my attention to the right arm.","It was unscarred, but on the back of the hand was a faint red mark, not unlike the imprint of painted lips.","I examined it closely, and even tried to rub it off, but it evidently was caused by some morbid process of local inflammation if it were not a birthmark.","Turning to a pale young man whom I had understood to be Sir Crichton's private secretary, I drew his attention to this mark and inquired if it were constitutional.",""It is not, sir," answered Dr.","Cleeve, overhearing my question.",""I have already made that inquiry.","Does it suggest anything to your mind? I must confess that it afforded me no assistance."",""Nothing," I replied.",""It is most curious."",""Excuse me, Mr.","Burboyne," said Smith, now turning to the secretary, "but Inspector Weymouth will tell you that I act with authority.","I understand that Sir Crichton was—seized with illness in his study?"",""Yes, at half-past ten.","I was working here in the library and he inside, as was our custom."",""The communicating door was kept closed?"",""Yes, always.","It was open for a minute or less about ten-twenty-five, when a message came for Sir Crichton.","I took it in to him, and he then seemed in his usual health."",""What was the message?"",""I could not say.","It was brought by a district messenger, and he placed it beside him on the table.","It is there now, no doubt."",""And at half-past ten?"",""Sir Crichton suddenly burst open the door and threw himself, with a scream, into the library.","I ran to him, but he waved me back.","His eyes were glaring horribly.","I had just reached his side when he fell, writhing, upon the floor.","He seemed past speech, but as I raised him and laid him upon the couch he gasped something that sounded like 'The red hand!' Before I could get to the bell or telephone he was dead!"","Mr.","Burboyne's voice shook as he spoke the words, and Smith seemed to find this evidence confusing.",""You do not think he referred to the mark on his hand?"",""I think not.","From the direction of his last glance I feel sure he referred to something in the study."",""What did you do?"",""Having summoned the servants, I ran into the study.","But there was nothing unusual to be seen.","The windows were closed and fastened.","He worked with closed windows in the hottest weather.","There is no other door, for the study occupies the end of a narrow wing, so that no one could possibly have gained access to it while I was in the library unseen by me.","Had some one concealed himself in the study earlier in the evening—and I am convinced that it offers no hiding place—he could only have come out again by passing through here."","Nayland Smith tugged at the lobe of his left ear, as was his habit when meditating.",""You had been at work here in this way for some time?"",""Yes.","Sir Crichton was preparing an important book."",""Had anything unusual occurred prior to this evening?"",""Yes," said Mr.","Burboyne with evident perplexity, "though I attached no importance to it at the time.","Three nights ago Sir Crichton came out to me and appeared very nervous; but at times his nerves—you know? Well, on this occasion he asked me to search the study.","He had an idea that something was concealed there."",""Something or some one?"",""'Something' was the word he used.","I searched, but fruitlessly, and he seemed quite satisfied and returned to his work."",""Thank you, Mr.","Burboyne.","My friend and I would like a few minutes private investigation in the study."","(End Chapter 1)","Sir Crichton Davey's study was a small one, and a glance sufficed to show that, as the secretary had said, it offered no hiding place.","It was heavily carpeted, and overfull of Burmese and Chinese ornaments and curios, and upon the mantelpiece stood several framed photographs which showed this to be the sanctum of a wealthy bachelor who was no misogynist.","A map of the Indian Empire occupied the larger part of one wall.","The grate was empty, for the weather was extremely warm, and a green-shaded lamp on the littered writing table afforded the only light.","The air was stale, for both windows were closed and fastened.","Smith immediately pounced upon a large, square envelope that lay beside the blotting pad.","Sir Crichton had not even troubled to open it, but my friend did so.","It contained a blank sheet of paper!",""Smell!" he directed, handing the letter to me.","I raised it to my nostrils.","It was scented with some pungent perfume.",""What is it?" I asked.",""It is a rather rare essential oil," was the reply, "which I have met with before, though never in Europe.","I begin to understand, Petrie."","He tilted the lamp shade and made a close examination of the scraps of paper, matches, and other debris that lay in the grate and on the hearth.","I took up a copper vase from the mantelpiece, and was examining it curiously when he turned, a strange expression on his face.",""Put that back, old man," he said quietly.","Much surprised, I did as he directed.",""Don't touch anything in the room.","It may be dangerous."","Something in the tone of his voice chilled me, and I hastily replaced the vase and stood by the door of the study, watching him search methodically every inch of the room—behind the books, in all the ornaments, in table drawers, in cupboards, on shelves.",""That will do," he said at last.",""There is nothing here and I have no time to search further."","We returned to the library.",""Inspector Weymouth," said my friend, "I have a particular reason for asking that Sir Crichton's body be removed from this room at once and the library locked.","Let no one be admitted on any pretense whatever until you hear from me."","It spoke volumes for the mysterious credentials borne by my friend that the man from Scotland Yard accepted his orders without demur, and, after a brief chat with Mr.","Burboyne, Smith passed briskly downstairs.","In the hall a man who looked like a groom out of livery was waiting.",""Are you Wills?" asked Smith.",""Yes, sir."",""It was you who heard a cry of some kind at the rear of the house about the time of Sir Crichton's death?"",""Yes, sir.","I was locking the garage door, and, happening to look up at the window of Sir Crichton's study, I saw him jump out of his chair.","Where he used to sit at his writing, sir, you could see his shadow on the blind.","Next minute I heard a call out in the lane."",""What kind of call?"","The man whom the uncanny happening clearly had frightened seemed puzzled for a suitable description.",""A sort of wail, sir," he said at last.",""I never heard anything like it before and don't want to again."",""Like this?" inquired Smith, and he littered a low, wailing cry, impossible to describe.",""The same, sir, I think," Wills said, "but much louder."",""That will do," said Smith, and I thought I detected a note of triumph in his voice.",""But stay! Take us through to the back of the house."","The man bowed and led the way, so that shortly we found ourselves in a small, paved courtyard.","It was a perfect summer's night, and the deep blue vault above was jeweled with myriads of starry points.",""Up yonder are the study windows, sir.","Over that wall on your left is the back lane from which the cry came, and beyond is Regent's Park."",""Are the study windows visible from there?"",""Oh, yes, sir."",""Who occupies the adjoining house?"",""Major General Platt-Houston, sir, but the family is out of town."",""Those iron stairs are a means of communication between the domestic offices and the servants' quarters, I take it?"",""Yes, sir."",""Then send some one to make my business known to the Major General's housekeeper; I want to examine those stairs."","Singular though my friend's proceedings appeared to me, I had ceased to wonder at anything.","Since Nayland Smith's arrival at my rooms I seemed to have been moving through the fitful phases of a nightmare.","My friend's account of how he came by the wound in his arm; the scene on our arrival at the house of Sir Crichton Davey; the secretary's story of the dying man's cry.",""The red hand!"; the hidden perils of the study; the wail in the lane—all were fitter incidents of delirium than of sane reality.","So, when a white-faced butler made us known to a nervous old lady who proved to be the housekeeper of the next-door residence, I was not surprised at Smith's saying:",""Lounge up and down outside, Petrie.","Everyone has cleared off now.","It is getting late.","Keep your eyes open and be on your guard.","I thought I had the start, but he is here before me, and, what is worse, he probably knows by now that I am here, too."","With which he entered the house and left me out in the square, with leisure to think, to try to understand.","The crowd which usually haunts the scene of a sensational crime had been cleared away, and it had been circulated that Sir Crichton had died from natural causes.","The intense heat having driven most of the residents out of town, practically I had the square to myself, and I gave myself up to a brief consideration of the mystery in which I so suddenly had found myself involved.","By what agency had Sir Crichton met his death? Did Nayland Smith know? I rather suspected that he did.","What was the hidden significance of die perfumed envelope? Who was that mysterious personage whom Smith so evidently dreaded, who had attempted his life, who presumably had murdered Sir Crichton? Sir Crichton Davey, during the time that he had held office in India and during his long term of service at home, had earned the good will of all, British and native alike.","Who was his secret enemy?","Something touched me lightly on the shoulder.","I turned, with my heart fluttering like a child's.","This night's work had imposed a severe strain even upon my callous nerves.","A girl wrapped in a hooded opera cloak stood at my elbow, and, as she glanced up at me, I thought that I never had seen a face so seductively lovely nor of so unusual a type.","With the skin of a perfect blonde, she had eyes and lashes as black as a Creole's, which, together with her full red lips, told me that this beautiful stranger, whose touch had so startled me, was not a child of our northern shores.",""Forgive me," she said, speaking with an odd, pretty accent, and laying a slim hand with jeweled fingers confidingly upon my arm, "if I startled you.","But—is it true that Sir Crichton Davey has been murdered?"","I looked into her big, questioning eyes, a harsh suspicion laboring in my mind, but could read nothing in their mysterious depths—only I wondered anew at my questioner's beauty.","The grotesque idea momentarily possessed me that, were the bloom of her.","red lips due to art and not to nature, their kiss would leave—though not indelibly—just such a mark as I had seen upon the dead man's hand.","But I dismissed the fantastic notion as bred of the night's horrors, and worthy only of a medieval legend.","No doubt she was some friend or acquaintance of Sir Crichton's who lived close by.",""I cannot say that he has been murdered," I replied, acting upon the latter supposition and seeking to tell her what she asked as gently as possible.",""But he is—"",""Dead?"","I nodded.","She closed her eyes and uttered a low, moaning sound, swaying dizzily.","Thinking she was about to swoon, I threw my arm round her shoulders to support her, but she smiled sadly and pushed me gently away.",""I am quite well, thank you," she said.",""You are certain? Let me walk with you until you feel quite sure of yourself."","She shook her head, flashed a rapid glance at me with her beautiful eyes, and looked away in a sort of sorrowful embarrassment, for which I was entirely at a loss to account.","Suddenly she resumed:",""I cannot let my name be mentioned in this dreadful matter, but—1 think I have some information—for the police.","Will you give this to—whomever you think proper?"","She handed me a sealed envelope, again met my eyes with one of her dazzling glances, and hurried away.","She had gone no more than ten or twelve yards, and I still was standing bewildered, watching her graceful, retreating figure, when she turned abruptly and came back.","Without looking directly at me, but alternately glancing toward a distant corner of the square and toward the house of Major General Platt-Houston, she made the following extraordinary request:",""If you would do me a very great service, for which I always would be grateful"—she glanced at me with passionate intentness—"when you have given my message to the proper person, leave him and do not go near him any more to-night!"","Before I could find words to reply she gathered up her cloak and ran.","Before I could determine whether or not to follow her (for her words had aroused anew all my worst suspicions she had disappeared! I heard the whirr of a restarted motor at no great distance, and in the instant that Nayland Smith came running down the steps I knew that I had nodded at my post.",""Smith!" I cried as he joined me, "tell me what we must do!"","And rapidly I acquainted him with the incident.","My friend looked very grave; then a grim smile crept round his lips.",""She was a big card to play," he said; "but he did not know that I held one to beat it."",""What! You know this girl? Who is she?"",""She is one of the finest weapons in the enemy's armory, Petrie.","But a woman is a two-edged sword, and treacherous.","To our great good fortune, she has formed a sudden predilection, characteristically Oriental, for yourself.","Oh, you may smile, but it is evident.","She was employed to get this letter placed in my hands.","Give it to me."","I did so.",""She has succeeded.","Smell."","He held the envelope under my nose, and, with a sudden sense of nausea, I recognized the strange perfume.",""You know what this presaged in Sir Crichton's case? Can you doubt any longer? She did not want you to share my fate, Petrie."",""Smith," I said unsteadily, "I have followed your lead blindly in this horrible business and have not pressed for an explanation, but I must insist before I go one step farther upon knowing what it all means."",""Just a few steps farther," he rejoined.",""As far as a cab.","We are hardly safe here.","Oh, you need not fear shot or knives.","The man whose servants are watching us now scorns to employ such clumsy tell-tale weapons." *",""Pull up the window on your side, Petrie, and look oat behind.","Good! We've started."","The cab moved off with a metallic jerk, and I turned and looked back through the little window in the rear.",""Some one has got into another cab.","It is following ours, I think."","Nayland Smith lay back and laughed unmirthfully.",""Petrie," he said, "if I escape alive from this business I shall know that I bear a charmed life."","I made no reply as he pulled out the dilapidated pouch and filled his pipe.",""You have asked me to explain matters," he continued, "and I will do so to the best of my ability.","You no doubt wonder why a servant of the British Government, lately stationed in Burma, suddenly appears in London in the character of a detective.","I am here, Petrie—and I bear credentials from the very highest sources—because, quite by accident, I came upon a clue.","Following it up in the ordinary course of routine, I obtained evidence of the existence and malignant activity of a certain man.","At the present stage of the case I should not be justified in terming him the emissary of an Eastern power, but I may say that representations are shortly to be made to that power's ambassador in London."","He paused and glanced back toward the pursuing cab.",""There is little to fear until we arrive home," he said calmly.",""Afterward there is much.","To continue; This man, whether a fanatic or a duly appointed agent, is, unquestionably, the most malign and formidable personality existing in the known world to-day.","He is a linguist who speaks with almost equal facility in any of the civilized languages and in most of the barbaric.","He is an adept in all the arts and sciences which a great university could teach him.","He also is an adept in certain obscure arts and sciences which no university of to-day can teach.","He has the brains of any three men of genius.","Petrie, he is a mental giant."",""You amaze me!" I said.",""As to his mission among men.","Why did M.","Jules Fumeaux fall dead in a Paris opera house? Because of heart failure? No! Because his last speech had shown that he held the key to the secret of Tongking.","What became of the Grand Duke Stanislaus? Elopement? Suicide? Nothing of the kind.","He alone was fully alive to Russia's growing peril.","He alone knew the truth about Mongolia.","Why was Sir Crichton Davey murdered? Because had the work he was engaged upon ever seen the light, it would have shown him to be die only living Englishman who understood the importance of the Tibetan frontiers.","Is there a man who would arouse the West to a sense of the awakening of the East, that the millions only await their leader? He will die.","And this is only one phase of the devilish campaign.","The others I can merely surmise."",""But, Smith, this is almost incredible! What perverted genius controls this awful secret movement?"",""Imagine a person, tall, lean, and feline, high shouldered, with a brow like Shakespeare and a face like Satan, a close-shaven skull, and long, magnetic eyes of the true cat green.","Invest him with all the cruel cunning of an entire Eastern race, accumulated in one giant intellect, with all the resources of science past and present.","Imagine that awful being and you have a mental picture of Dr.","Fu-Manchu, the yellow peril incarnate in one man."","(End Chapter 2)","I sank into an armchair in my rooms and gulped down a strong peg of brandy.",""We have been followed here," I said.",""Why did you make no attempt to throw the pursuers off the track, to have them intercepted?"","Smith laughed.",""Useless, in the first place.","Wherever we went he would find us.","And of what use to arrest his creatures? We could prove nothing against them.","Further, it is evident that an attempt is to be made upon my life to-night—and by the same means that proved so successful in the case of poor Sir Crichton."","His square jaw grew truculently prominent, and he leaped stormily to his feet, shaking his clenched fists toward the window.",""The villain!" he cried.",""The fiendishly clever villain! I suspected that Sir Crichton was next, and I was right.","But I came too late, Petrie! That hits me hard, old man.","To think that I knew and yet failed to save him!"","He resumed his seat, smoking hard.",""Fu-Manchu has made the blunder common to all men of unusual genius," he said.",""He has underrated his adversary.","He has not given me credit for perceiving the meaning of the scented messages.","He has thrown away one powerful weapon—to get such a message into my hands—and he thinks that, once safe within doors, I shall sleep, unsuspecting, and die as Sir Crichton died.","But without the indiscretion of your charming friend I should have known what to expect when I received her 'information,' which, by the way, consists of a blank sheet of paper."",""Smith," I broke in, "who is she?"",""She is either Fu-Manchu's daughter, his wife, or his slave.","I am inclined to believe the latter, for she has no will but his will, except"—with a quizzical glance—"in a certain instance."",""How can you jest with some awful thing—Heaven knows what—hanging over your head? What is the meaning of these perfumed envelopes? How did Sir Crichton die?"",""He died of the Zayat Kiss.","Ask me what that is and I reply 'I do not know.' The zayats are the Burmese caravansaries, or rest houses.","Along a certain route—upon which I set eyes for the first and only time upon Dr.","Fu-Manchu—travelers who use them sometimes die as Sir Crichton died, with nothing to show the cause of death but a little mark upon the neck, face, or limb, which has earned in those parts the title of the 'Zayat Kiss.' The rest houses along that route are shunned now.","I have my theory, and I hope to prove it to-night if I live.","This was my principal reason for not enlightening Dr.","Cleeve.","Even walls have ears where Fu-Manchu is concerned.","I wanted an opportunity to study the Zayat Kiss in operation, and I shall have one."",""But the scented envelopes?"",""In the swampy forests of the district I have referred to a rare species of orchid, almost green and with a peculiar scent, is sometimes met with.","I recognized the heavy perfume at once.","I take it that the thing which kills the travelers is attracted by this orchid.","You will notice that the perfume clings to whatever it touches.","I doubt if it can be washed off in the ordinary way.","After at least one unsuccessful attempt to kill Sir Crichton—you recall that he thought there was something concealed in his study on a previous occasion?—Fu-Manchu hit upon the perfumed envelopes.","He may have a supply of these green orchids in his possession—possibly to feed the creature."",""What creature? How could any creature have got into Sir Crichton's room to-night?"",""You no doubt observed that I examined the grate of the study.","I found a fair quantity of fallen soot.","I at once assumed, since it appeared to be the only means of entrance, that something had been dropped down; and I took it for granted that the thing, whatever it was, must still be concealed either in the study or in the library.","But when I had obtained the evidence of the groom.","Wills, I perceived that the cry from the lane or from the park was a signal.","I noted that the movements of anyone seated at the study table were visible, in shadow, on the blind, and that the study occupied the corner of a two-storied wing and, therefore, had a short chimney.","What did the signal mean? That Sir Crichton had leaped up from his chair and either had received the Zayat Kiss or had seen the thing which some one on the roof had lowered down the straight chimney.","It was the signal to withdraw that deadly thing.","By means of the iron stairway at the rear of Major General Platt-Houston's I quite easily gained access to the roof above Sir Crichton's study—and I found this."","Out from his pocket Nayland Smith drew a tangled piece of silk, mixed up with which were a brass ring and a number of unusually large-sized split shot, nipped on in the manner usual on a fishing line.",""My theory proven," he resumed.",""Not anticipating a search on the roof, they had been careless.","This was to weight the line and to prevent the creature's clinging to the walls of the chimney.","Directly it had dropped in the grate, however, by means of this ring I assume that the weighted line was withdrawn, and the thing was only held by a slender thread, which sufficed, though, to draw it back again when it had done its work.","It might have got tangled, of coarse, but they reckoned on its making straight up the carved leg of the writing table for the prepared envelope.","From there to the hand of Sir Crichton—which, from having touched the envelope, would also be scented with the perfume—was a certain move."",""My God! How horrible!" I exclaimed, and glanced apprehensively into the dusky shadows of the room.",""What is your theory respecting this creature—what shape, what color?"",""It is something that moves rapidly and silently.","I have observed that the rear of this house is ivy covered right up to and above your bedroom.","Let us make ostentatious preparations to retire, and I think we may rely upon Fu-Manchu's servants to attempt my removal, at any rate—if not yours."",""But, my dear fellow, it is a climb of thirty-five feet at the very least!"",""You remember the cry in the back lane? It suggested something to me, and I tested my idea—successfully.","It was the cry of a dacoit.","Oh, dacoity, though quiescent, is by no means extinct.","Fu-Manchu has dacoits in his train, and probably it is one who operates the Zayat Kiss, since it was a dacoit who watched the window of the study this evening.","To such a man an ivy-covered wall is a grand staircase." *","The clock across the common struck two.","Having removed all traces of the scent of the orchid from our hands with a solution of ammonia.","Smith and I had followed the program laid down.","It was an easy matter to reach the rear of the house, by simply climbing a fence, and we did not doubt that, seeing the light go out in the front, our unseen watcher would proceed to the back.","The room was a large one, and we had made up my camp bed at one end, stuffing odds and ends under the clothes to lend the appearance of a sleeper, which device we also had adopted in the case of the larger bed.","The perfumed envelope lay upon a little coffee table in the center of the floor, and Smith, with an electric pocket lamp, a revolver, and a brassy beside him, sat on cushions in the shadow of the wardrobe.","I occupied a post between the windows.","The distant clock struck a quarter-past two.","A slight breeze stirred the ivy.","Something rose, inch by inch, above the sill of the westerly window.","I could see only its shadow, but a sharp, sibilant breath from Smith told me that he, from his post, could see the cause of the shadow.","Every nerve in my body seemed to be strung tensely.","I was icily cold, expectant, and prepared for whatever horror was upon us.","The shadow became stationary.","The dacoit was studying the interior of the room.","Then it suddenly lengthened, and, craning my neck to the left, I saw a lithe, black-clad form, surmounted by a yellow face, sketchy in the moonlight, pressed against the window panes!","One thin, brown hand appeared over the edge of the lowered sash, which it grasped, and then another.","The man made absolutely no sound whatever.","The second hand disappeared—and reappeared.","It held a small square box.","There was a very faint click.","The dacoit swung himself below the window with the agility of an ape as, with a dull, sickening thud, something dropped upon the carpet!",""Stand still, for your life!" came Smith's voice, high pitched.","A beam of white light leaped out across the room and played fully upon the coffee table in the center.","Prepared as I was for something horrible, I know that I paled at sight of the thing that was running round the edge of the envelope.","It was an insect, full six inches long, and of a vivid, venomous red color! It had something of the appearance of a great ant, with its long, quivering antennae and its febrile, horrible vitality; but it was proportionately longer of body and smaller of head, and had numberless rapidly moving legs.","In short, it was a giant centipede, apparently of the Scolopendra group, but of a form quite new to me.","These things I realized in one breathless instant; in the next—Smith had dashed the thing's poisonous life out with one straight, true blow of the golf club!","I leaped to the window and threw it widely open, feeling a silk thread brush my hand as I did so.","A black shape was dropping with incredible agility from branch to branch of the ivy, and without once offering a mark for a revolver shot, it merged into the shadows beneath, the trees of the garden.","As I turned and switched on the light Nayland Smith dropped limply into a chair, leaning his head upon his hands.","Even that grim courage had been tried sorely.",""Never mind the dacoit, Petrie," he said.",""Nemesis will know where to find him.","We know now what causes the mark of the Zayat Kiss.","Therefore science is richer for our first brush with the enemy, and the enemy is poorer-—unless he has any more unclassified centipedes.","I understand now something that has been puzzling me since I heard of it—Sir Crichton's stifled cry.","When we remember that he was almost past speech, it is reasonable to suppose that his cry was not "The red hand!' but 'The red ant!' Petrie, to think that I failed by less than an hour to save him from such an end!"","(End Chapter 3)","The body of a lascar, dressed in the manner usual on the P.& 0.","boats, was recovered from the Thames off Tilbury by the river police at 6 a.m.","this morning.","It is supposed that the man met with an accident in leaving his ship.","Nayland Smith passed me the evening paper and pointed to the above paragraph.",""For 'lascar' read 'dacoit,'" he said.",""Our last night's visitor, fortunately for us, failed to follow his instructions.","Also, he lost the centipede and left a clue behind him.","Dr.","Fu-Manchu does not overlook such lapses."","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","The Zayat Kiss","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/zayat.html","52","30 Apr 2004");
Page[35]=new Array("The Trailor Murder Mystery","by Abraham Lincoln","When one thinks of Abraham Lincoln, it is the highlights of his career that first come to mind: Lincoln the politician, the statesman, the orator and, most importantly, the man of humble beginnings who became the 16th President of the United States.","Yet, what is not known by many is that Lincoln also had a single foray into fiction writing, in the sometimes lurid genre of "true crime" fiction.","In the mid-1800s, at the time Lincoln was a practicing law, it was common for lawyers to write an overview of a case and present it as fiction.","These true crime pieces were very popular with the public and, apparently, were not considered to be a breach of ethics on the parts of the lawyer/authors.","Lincoln was no exception to this formula and based his story, which was originally titled, "A Remarkable Case of Arrest for Murder," on a the case in which he defended the Trailor brothers in 1841.","Why Lincoln chose to try his hand at this type of fiction writing is a bit of a mystery.","It is known that Lincoln was a fan of the work of Edgar Allan Poe and that Poe's "Murders in the Rue Morgue" was first published around the time that Lincoln was defending the Trailor brothers.","Lincoln may have been inspired by Poe to try his hand at writing, or, as some have suggested, the strangeness of the case itself may have led him to want to set it into print, five years after the fact.","Whatever the reasons behind its creation, "A Remarkable Case of Arrest for Murder" first appeared on the front page of the Quincy Whig on April 15, 1846 and was described as, "A murder mystery by Abraham Lincoln." The editors also went so far as to add the following editorial note:","The following narrative has been handed us for publication by a member of the bar.","There is no doubt of the truth of every fact stated; and the whole affair is of so extraordinary a character as to entitle it to publication, and commend it to the attention of those at present engaged in discussing reforms in criminal jurisprudence, and the abolition of capital punishment.","As near as can be determined, the facts set forth in the story are pretty much as it happened back in 1841.","The title, "The Trailor Murder Mystery," was first used when the story was reprinted in the March, 1952 issue of Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine and since the story is better known by that title, it is the one used here.","And one final note: history records that the Trailors never paid Lincoln for his defense.","Introduction ©Bob Gay","March, 2004","In the year 1841, there resided, at different points in the State of Illinois, three brothers by the name of Trailor.","Their Christian names were William, Henry and Archibald.","Archibald resided at Springfield, then as now the seat of Government of the State.","He was a sober, retiring, and industrious man, of about thirty years of age; a carpenter by trade, and a bachelor, boarding with his partner in business–a Mr.","Myers.","Henry, a year or two older, was a man of like retiring and industrious habits; had a family, and resided with it on a farm, at Clary's Grove, about twenty miles distant from Springfield in a northwesterly direction.","—William, still older, and with similar habits, resided on a farm in Warren county, distant from Springfield something more than a hundred miles in the same North-westerly direction.","He was a widower, with several children.","In the neighborhood of William's residence, there was, and had been for several years, a man by the name of Fisher, who was somewhat above the age of fifty; had no family, and no settled home; but who boarded and lodged a while here and a while there, with persons for whom he did little jobs of work.","His habits were remarkably economical, so that an impression got about that he had accumulated a considerable amount of money.","In the latter part of May, in the year mentioned, William formed the purpose of visiting his brothers at Clary's Grove and Springfield; and Fisher, at the time having his temporary residence at his house, resolved to accompany him.","They set out together in a buggy with a single horse.","On Sunday evening they reached Henry's residence, and staid over night.","On Monday morning, being the first Monday of June, they started on to Springfield, Henry accompanying them on horseback.","They reached town about noon, met Archibald, went with him to his boarding house, and there took up their lodgings for the time they should remain.","After dinner, the three Trailers and Fisher left the boarding house in company, for the avowed purpose of spending the evening together in looking about the town.","At supper, the Trailers had all returned, but Fisher was missing, and some inquiry was made about him.","After supper, the Trailers went out professedly in search of him.","One by one they returned, the last coming in after late tea time, and each stating that he had been unable to discover anything of Fisher.","The next day, both before and after breakfast, they went professedly in search again, and returned at noon, still unsuccessful.","Dinner again being had, William and Henry expressed a determination to give up the search, and start for their homes.","This was remonstrated against by some of the boarders about the house, on the ground that Fisher was somewhere in the vicinity, and would be left without any conveyance, as he and William had come in the same buggy.","The remonstrance was disregarded, and they departed for their homes respectively.","Up to this time, the knowledge of Fisher's mysterious disappearance had spread very little beyond the few boarders at Myers', and excited no considerable interest.","After the lapse of three or four days, Henry returned to Springfield, for the ostensible purpose of makings further search for Fisher.","Procuring some of the boarders, he, together with them and Archibald, spent another day in ineffectual search, when it was again abandoned, and he returned home.","No general interest was yet excited.","On the Friday, week after Fisher's disappearance, the Postmaster at Springfield received a letter from the Postmaster nearest William's residence, in Warren county, stating that William had returned home without Fisher, and was saying, rather boastfully, that Fisher was dead, and had willed him his money, and that he had got about fifteen hundred dollars by it.","The letter further stated that William's story and conduct seemed strange, and desired the Postmaster at Springfield to ascertain and write what was the truth in the matter.","The Postmaster at Springfield made the letter public, and at once, excitement became universal and intense.","Springfield, at that time, had a population of about 3,500, with a city organization.","The Attorney General of the State resided there.","A purpose was forthwith formed to ferret out the mystery, in putting which into execution, the Mayor of the city and the Attorney General took the lead.","To make search for, and, if possible, find the body of the man supposed to be murdered, was resolved on as the first step.","In pursuance of this, men were formed into large parties, and marched abreast, in all directions, so as to let no inch of ground in the vicinity remain unsearched.","Examinations were made of cellars, wells, and pits of all descriptions, where it was thought possible the body might be concealed.","All the fresh, or tolerably fresh graves in the graveyard, were pried into, and dead horses and dead dogs were disintered, where, in some instances, they had been buried by their partial masters.","This search, as has appeared, commenced on Friday.","It continued until Saturday afternoon without success, when it was determined to despatch officers to arrest William and Henry, at their residences, respectively.","The officers started on Sunday morning, meanwhile, the search for the body was continued, and rumors got afloat of the Trailors having passed, at different times and places, several gold pieces, which were readily supposed to have belonged to Fisher.","On Monday, the officers sent for Henry, having arrested him, arrived with him.","The Mayor and Attorney Gen'l took charge of him, and set their wits to work to elicit a discovery from him.","He denied, and denied, and persisted in denying.","They still plied him in every conceivable way, till Wednesday, when, protesting his own innocence, he stated that his brothers, William and Archibald, had murdered Fisher; that they had killed him, without his (Henry's) knowledge at the time, and made a temporary concealment of his body; that, immediately preceding his and William's departure from Springfield for home, on Tuesday, the day after Fisher's disappearance, William and Archibald communicated the fact to him, and engaged his assistance in making a permanent concealment of the body; that, at the time he and William left professedly for home, they did not take the road directly, but, meandering their way through the streets, entered the woods at the North West of the city, two or three hundred yards to the right of where the road they should have travelled, entered them; that, penetrating the woods some few hundred yards, they halted and Archibald came a somewhat different route, on foot, and joined them; that William and Archibald then stationed him (Henry) on an old and disused road that ran near by, as a sentinel, to give warning of the approach of any intruder; that William and Archibald then removed the buggy to the edge of a dense brush thicket, about forty yards distant from his (Henry's) position, where, leaving the buggy, they entered the thicket, and in a few minutes returned with the body, and placed it in the buggy; that from his station he could and did distinctly see that the object placed in the buggy was a dead man, of the general appearance and size of Fisher; that William and Archibald then moved off with the buggy in the direction of Hickox's mill pond, and after an absence of half an hour, returned, saying they had put him in a safe place; that Archibald then left for town, and he and William found their way to the road, and made for their homes.","At this disclosure, all lingering credulity was broken down, and excitement rose to an almost inconceivable height.","Up to this time the well-known character of Archibald had repelled and put down all suspicions as to him.","Till then, those who were ready to swear that a murder had been committed, were almost as confident that Archibald had had no part in it.","But now, he was seized and thrown into jail; and indeed, his personal security rendered it by no means objectionable to him.","And now came the search for the brush thicket, and the search of the mill pond.","The thicket was found, and the buggy tracks at the point indicated.","At a point within the thicket, the signs of a struggle were discovered, and a trail from thence to the buggy track was traced.","In attempting to follow the track of the buggy from the thicket, it was found to proceed in the direction of the mill pond, but could not be traced all the way.","At the pond, however, it was found that a buggy had been backed down to, and partially into the water's edge.","Search was now to be made in the pond; and it was made in every imaginable way.","Hundreds and hundreds were engaged in raking, fishing, and draining.","After much fruitless effort in this way, on Thursday morning the mill dam was cut down, and the water of the pond partially drawn off, and the same processes of search again gone through with.","About noon of this day, the officer sent for William, returned having him in custody; and a man calling himself Dr.","Gilmore, came in company with them.","It seems that the officer arrested William at his own house, early in the day on Tuesday, and started to Springfield with him; that after dark awhile, they reached Lewiston, in Fulton county, where they stopped for the night; that late in the night this Dr.","Gilmore arrived, stating that Fisher was alive at his house, and that he had followed on to give the information, so that William might be released without further trouble; that the officer, distrusting Dr.","Gilmore, refused to release William, but brought him on to Springfield, and the Dr.","accompanied them.","On reaching Springfield, the Dr.","re-asserted that Fisher was alive, and at his house.","At this, the multitude for a time, were utterly confounded.","Gilmore's story was communicated to Henry Trailor, who without faltering, reaffirmed his own story about Fisher's murder.","Henry's adherence to his own story was communicated to the crowd, and at once the idea started, and became nearly, if not quite universal, that Gilmore was a confederate of the Trailors, and had invented the tale he was telling, to secure their release and escape.","Excitement was again at its zenith.","About three o'clock the same evening, Myers, Archibald's partner, started with a two-horse carriage, for the purpose of ascertaining whether Fisher was alive, as stated by Gilmore, and if so, of bringing him back to Springfield with him.","On Friday a legal examination was gone into before two Justices, on the charge of murder against William and Archibald.","Henry was introduced as a witness by the prosecution, and on oath re-affirmed his statements, as heretofore detailed, and at the end of which he bore a thorough and rigid cross-examination without faltering or exposure.","The prosecution also proved, by a respectable lady, that on the Monday evening of Fisher's disappearance, she saw Archibald, whom she well knew, and another man whom she did not then know, but whom she believed at the time of testifying to be William, (then present,) and still another, answering the description of Fisher, all enter the timber at the North West of town, (the point indicated by Henry,) and after one or two hours, saw William and Archibald return without Fisher.","Several other witnesses testified, that on Tuesday, at the time William and Henry professedly gave up the search for Fishers body, and started for home, they did not take the road directly, but did go into the woods, as stated by Henry.","By others, also, it was proved, that since Fisher's disappearance, William and Archibald had passed rather an unusual number of gold pieces.","The statements heretofore made about the thicket, the signs of a struggle, the buggy tracks, &c., were fully proven by numerous witnesses.","At this the prosecution rested.","Dr.","Gilmore was then introduced by the defendants.","He stated that he resided in Warren county, about seven miles distant from William's residence; that on the morning of William's arrest, he was out from home, and heard of the arrest, and of its being on a charge of the murder of Fisher; that on returning to his own house, he found Fisher there; that Fisher was in very feeble health, and could give no rational account as to where he had been during his absence; that he (Gilmore) then started in pursuit of the officer, as before stated; and that he should have taken Fisher with him, only that the state of his health did not permit.","Gilmore also stated that he had known Fisher for several years, and that he had understood he was subject to temporary derangement of mind, owing to an injury about his head received in early life.","There was about Dr.","Gilmore so much of the air and manner of truth, that his statement prevailed in the minds of the audience and of the court, and the Trailors were discharged, although they attempted no explanation of the circumstances proven by the other witnesses.","On the next Monday, Myers arrived in Springfield, bringing him the now famed Fisher, in full life and proper person.","Thus ended this strange affair and while it is readily conceived that a writer of novels could bring a story to a more perfect climax, it may well be doubted whether a stranger affair ever really occurred.","Much of the matter remains in mystery to this day.","The going into the woods with Fisher, and returning without him, by the Trailers; their going into the woods at the same place the next day, after they professed to have given up the search; the signs of a struggle in the thicket, the buggy tracks at the edge of it; and the location of the thicket, and the signs about it, corresponding precisely with Henry's story, are circumstances that have never been explained.","William and Archibald have both died since—William in less than a year, and Archibald in about two years after the supposed murder.","Henry is still living, but never speaks of the subject.","It is not the object of the writer of this to enter into the many curious speculations that might be indulged upon the facts of this narrative; yet he can scarcely forbear a remark upon what would, almost certainly, have been the fate of William and Archibald, had Fisher not been found alive.","It seems he had wandered away in mental derangement, and, had he died in this condition, and his body been found in the vicinity, it is difficult to conceive what could have saved the Trailors from the consequence of having murdered him.","Or, if he had died, and his body never found, the case against them would have been quite as bad, for, although it is a principle of law that a conviction for murder shall not be had, unless the body of the deceased be discovered, it is to be remembered, that Henry testified that he saw Fisher's dead body.","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","The Trailor Murder Mystery","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/lincoln.html","21.6","25 Mar 2004");
Page[36]=new Array("Farewell to the Master","Part 1","by Harry Bates","Harry Bates was born Hiram Gilmore Bates III in 1900.","He began working as an editor for the Clayton chain of pulp magazines sometime in the 1920s and it is for his editorial contributions to the science fiction field that he is best remembered.","As the founding editor of Astounding Stories of Super-Science, which soon changed its name to the shorter Astounding Stories, Bates was able to change the direction of the science fiction genre.","While the Gernsback magazines, particularly Amazing Stories, featured large doses of "super-science," Bates had his authors focus more on action and story construction.","The science aspects of the stories also had to be more plausible and only offered in short doses.","That Bates was able to assert such a degree of control is not surprising, since Astounding had a word rate 4 times higher than the other pulps of the time and the quality of the work he helped to craft is still recognized today.","Unfortunately, Bates' editorial vision for Astounding Stories, and the horror magazine, Strange Tales, were not enough to help the Clayton group.","Only 34 issues of Astounding Stories, and 7 of Strange Tales, were produced before the entire Clayton group went bankrupt in 1933.","Bates wrote a number of stories during his editorial stint for Clayton, most done in collaboration with his assistant editor, Desmond W.","Hall, and most of which were published in Astounding Stories under the pen name of H.","Winter or Anthony Gilmore.","After the bankruptcy, he published only a handful more under his own name, some appearing, serendipitously, in the revived Astounding Science Fiction as published by Street & Smith and edited by John W.","Campbell.","There is no record of any published work appearing after 1952.","In fact, Bates later life seems to be a sort of mystery, as there is no record of what he did for a living after 1933, or any indication of his having but the most tenuous contact with the science fiction field after the Clayton group folded.","He died, for the most part forgotten by the genre he had helped shape, in 1981.","Outside of his editorial contributions, it is most likely that Bates would be totally forgotten today if it were not for his short story, "Farewell to the Master." Published in the Oct.","1940 issue of Astounding, the story did not even rate a cover blurb, being overshadowed by A.E.","Van Vogt's Slan.","Eventually, the story was made into the film The Day The Earth Stood Still, but the story only formed the basic premise of the film and was changed in many ways.","In the original story presented here, astute readers will notice that Gort does not appear, his name in the story is Gnut.","The famous phrase, "Klaatu Barada Niktu" is also absent and there is no love interest for Klatuu; that sub-plot was an invention for the film.","What most will find revelatory is the ending of the story which, without giving anything away, is a wonderful twist by Bates on the science fiction conventions of the time and, over 60 years later, still reflects on the perceptions that are sometimes a shortcoming of our all too human condition.","We hope you enjoy, "Farewell to the Master."","Introduction ©Bob Gay","May, 2004","NOTE: A thorough copyright search has been made for this story and no record of copyright is currently on file.","From his perch high on the ladder above the museum floor, Cliff Sutherland studied carefully each line and shadow of the great robot, then turned and looked thoughtfully down at the rush of visitors come from all over the Solar System to see Gnut and the traveler for themselves and to hear once again their amazing, tragic story.","He himself had come to feel an almost proprietary interest in the exhibit, and with some reason.","He had been the only freelance picture reporter on the Capitol grounds when the visitors from the Unknown had arrived, and had obtained the first professional shots of the ship.","He had witnessed at close hand every event of the next mad few days.","He had thereafter photographed many times the eight-foot robot, the ship, and the beautiful slain ambassador, Klaatu, and his imposing tomb out in the center of the Tidal Basin, and, such was the continuing news value of the event to the billions of persons throughout habitable space, he was there now once more to get still other shots and, if possible, a new "angle."","This time he was after a picture which showed Gnut as weird and menacing.","The shots he had taken the day before had not given quite the effect he wanted, and he hoped to get it today; but the light was not yet right and he had to wait for the afternoon to wane a little.","The last of the crowd admitted in the present group hurried in, exclaiming at the great pure green curves of the mysterious time-space traveler, then completely forgetting the ship at sight of the awesome figure and great head of the giant Gnut.","Hinged robots of crude manlike appearance were familiar enough, but never had Earthling eyes lain on one like this.","For Gnut had almost exactly the shape of a man — a giant, but a man — with greenish metal for man's covering flesh, and greenish metal for man's bulging muscles.","Except for a loin cloth, he was nude.","He stood like the powerful god of the machine of some undreamt–of scientific civilization, on his face a look of sullen, brooding thought.","Those who looked at him did not make jests or idle remarks, and those nearest him usually did not speak at all.","His strange, internally illuminated red eyes were so set that every observer felt they were fixed on himself alone, and he engendered a feeling that he might at any moment step forward in anger and perform unimaginable deeds.","A slight rustling sound came from speakers hidden in the ceiling above, and at once the noises of the crowd lessened.","The recorded lecture was about to be given.","Cliff sighed.","He knew the thing by heart; had even been present when the recording was made, and met the speaker, a young chap named Stillwell.",""Ladies and gentlemen," began a clear and well-modulated voice — but Cliff was no longer attending.","The shadows in the hollows of Gnut's face and figure were deeper; it was almost time for his shot.","He picked up and examined the proofs of the pictures he had taken the day before and compared them critically with the subject.","As he looked a wrinkle came to his brow.","He had not noticed it before, but now, suddenly, he had the feeling that since yesterday something about Gnut was changed.","The pose before him was the identical one in the photographs, every detail on comparison seemed the same, but nevertheless the feeling persisted.","He took up his viewing glass and more carefully compared subject and photographs, line by line.","And then he saw that there was a difference.","With sudden excitement, Cliff snapped two pictures at different exposures.","He knew he should wait a little and take others, but he was so sure he had stumbled on an important mystery that he had to get going, and quickly folding his accessory equipment he descended the ladder and made his way out.","Twenty minutes later, consumed with curiosity, he was developing the new shots in his hotel bedroom.","What Cliff saw when he compared the negatives taken yesterday and today caused his scalp to tingle.","Here was a slant indeed! And apparently no one but he knew! Still, what he had discovered, though it would have made the front page of every paper in the Solar System, was after all only a lead.","The story, what really had happened, he knew no better than anyone else.","It must be his job to find out.","And that meant he would have to secrete himself in the building and stay there all night.","That very night; there was still time for him to get back before closing.","He would take a small, very fast infrared camera that could see in the dark, and he would get the real picture and the story.","He snatched up the little camera, grabbed an aircab and hurried back to the museum.","The place was filled with another section of the ever-present queue, and the lecture was just ending.","He thanked Heaven that his arrangement with the museum permitted him to go in and out at will.","He had already decided what to do.","First he made his way to the "floating" guard and asked a single question, and anticipation broadened on his face as he heard the expected answer.","The second thing was to find a spot where he would be safe from the eyes of the men who would close the floor for the night.","There was only one possible place, the laboratory set up behind the ship.","Boldly he showed his press credentials to the second guard, stationed at the partitioned passageway leading to it, stating that he had come to interview the scientists; and in a moment was at the laboratory door.","He had been there a number of times and knew the room well.","It was a large area roughly partitioned off for the work of the scientists engaged in breaking their way into the ship, and full of a confusion of massive and heavy objects — electric and hot-air ovens, carboys of chemicals, asbestos sheeting, compressors, basins, ladles, a microscope, and a great deal of smaller equipment common to a metallurgical laboratory.","Three white–smocked men were deeply engrossed in an experiment at the far end.","Cliff, waiting a good moment, slipped inside and hid himself under a table half buried with supplies.","He felt reasonably safe from detection there.","Very soon now the scientists would be going home for the night.","From beyond the ship he could hear another section of the waiting queue filing in — the last, he hoped, of the day.","He settled himself as comfortably as he could.","In a moment the lecture would begin.","He had to smile when he though of one thing the recording would say.","Then there it was again — the clear, trained video of the chap Stillwell.","The foot scrapings and whispers of the crowd died away, and Cliff could hear every word in spite of the great bulk of the ship lying interposed.",""Ladies and gentlemen," began the familiar words, "the Smithsonian Institution welcomes you to its new Interplanetary Wing and to the marvelous exhibits at this moment before you."","A slight pause.",""All of you must know by now something of what happened here three months ago, if indeed you did not see it for yourself in the telescreen," the voice went on.",""The few facts are briefly told.","A little after 5:00 p.m.","on September 16th, visitors to Washington thronged the grounds outside this building in their usual numbers and no doubt with their usual thoughts.","The day was warm and fair.","A stream of people was leaving the main entrance of the museum, just outside in the direction you are facing.","This wing, of course, was not here at that time.","Everyone was homeward-bound, tired no doubt from hours on their feet, seeing the exhibits of the museum and visiting the many buildings on the grounds nearby.","And then it happened.","On the area just to your right, just as it is now, appeared the time-space traveler.","It appeared in the blink of an eye.","It did not come down from the sky; dozens of witnesses swear to that; it just appeared.","One moment it was not here, the next it was.","It appeared on the very spot it now rests on."",""The people nearest the ship were stricken with panic and ran back with cries and screams.","Excitement spread out over Washington in a tidal wave.","Radio, television, and newspapermen rushed here at once.","Police formed a wide cordon around the ship, and army units appeared and trained guns and ray projectors on it.","The direst calamity was feared.","For it was recognized from the very beginning that this was no spaceship from anywhere in the Solar System.","Every child knew that only two spaceships had ever been built on Earth, and none at all on any of the other planets and satellites; and of those two, one had been destroyed when it was pulled into the Sun, and the other had just been reported safely arrived on Mars.","Then, the ones made here had a shell of a strong aluminum alloy, while this one, as you see, is of an unknown greenish metal."",""The ship appeared and just sat here.","No one emerged, and there was no sign that it contained life of any kind.","That, as much as any single thing, caused excitement to skyrocket.","Who, or what, was inside? Were the visitors hostile or friendly? Where did the ship come from? How did it arrive so suddenly right on this spot without dropping from the sky?"",""For two days the ship rested here, just as you now see it, without motion or sign that it contained life.","Long before the end of that time the scientists had explained that it was not so much a spaceship as a space–time traveler, because only such a ship would arrive as this one did — materialize.","They pointed out that such a traveler, while theoretically understandable to us Earthmen, was far beyond attempt at our present state of knowledge, and that this one, activated by relativity principles, might well have come from the far corner of the Universe, from a distance which light itself would require millions of years to cross."",""When this opinion was disseminated, public tension grew until it was almost intolerable.","Where had the traveler come from? Who were its occupants? Why had they come to Earth? Above all, why did they not show themselves? Were they perhaps preparing some terrible weapon of destruction?"",""And where was the ship's entrance port? Men who dared go look reported that none could be found.","No slightest break or crack marred the perfect smoothness of the ship's curving ovoid surface.","And a delegation of high-ranking officials who visited the ship could not, by knocking, elicit from its occupants any sign that they had been heard."",""At last, after exactly two days, in full view of tens of thousands of persons assembled and standing well back, and under the muzzles of scores of the army's most powerful guns and ray projectors, an opening appeared in the wall of the ship, and a ramp slid down, and out stepped a man, godlike in appearance and human in form, closely followed by a giant robot.","And when they touched the ground the ramp slid back and the entrance closed as before."",""It was immediately apparent to all the assembled thousands that the stranger was friendly.","The first thing he did was to raise his right arm high in the universal gesture of peace; but it was not that which impressed those nearest so much as the expression on his face, which radiated kindness, wisdom, the purest nobility.","In his delicately tinted robe he looked like a benign god."",""At once, waiting for this appearance, a large committee of high-ranking government officials and army officers advanced to greet the visitor.","With graciousness and dignity the man pointed to himself, then to his robot companion, and said in perfect English with a peculiar accent, 'I am Klaatu,' or a name that sounded like that, 'and this is Gnut.' The names were not well understood at the time, but the sight-and-sound film of the television men caught them and they became known to everyone subsequently."",""And then occurred the thing which shall always be to the shame of the human race.","From a treetop a hundred yards away came a wink of violet light and Klaatu fell.","The assembled multitude stood for a moment stunned, not comprehending what had happened.","Gnut, a little behind his master and to one side, slowly turned his body a little toward him, moved his head twice, and stood still, in exactly the position you now see him."",""Then followed pandemonium.","The police pulled the slayer of Klaatu out of the tree.","They found him mentally unbalanced; he kept crying that the devil had come to kill everyone on Earth.","He was taken away, and Klaatu, although obviously dead, was rushed to the nearest hospital to see if anything could be done to revive him.","Confused and frightened crowds milled about the Capitol grounds the rest of the afternoon and much of that night.","The ship remained as silent and motionless as before.","And Gnut, too, never moved from the position he had come to rest in."",""Gnut never moved again.","He remained exactly as you see him all that night and for the ensuing days.","When the mausoleum in the Tidal Basin was built, Klaatu's burial services took place where you are standing now, attended by the highest functionaries of all the great countries of the world.","It was not only the most appropriate but the safest thing to do, for if there should be other living creatures in the traveler, as seemed possible at that time, they had to be impressed by the sincere sorrow of us Earthmen at what had happened.","If Gnut was still alive, or perhaps I had better say functionable, there was no sign.","He stood as you see him during the entire ceremony.","He stood so while his master was floated out to the mausoleum and given to the centuries with the tragically short sight-and-sound record of his historic visit.","And he stood so afterward, day after day, night after night, in fair weather and in rain, never moving or showing by any slightest sign that he was aware of what had gone on."",""After the interment, this wing was built out from the museum to cover the traveler and Gnut.","Nothing else could very well have been done, it was learned, for both Gnut and the ship were far too heavy to be moved safely by any means at hand."",""You have heard about the efforts of our metallurgists since then to break into the ship, and of their complete failure.","Behind the ship now, as you can see from either end, a partitioned workroom has been set up where the attempt still goes on.","So far its wonderful greenish metal has proved inviolable.","Not only are they unable to get in, but they cannot even find the exact place from which Klaatu and Gnut emerged.","The chalk marks you see are the best approximation."",""Many people have feared that Gnut was only temporarily deranged, and that on return to function might be dangerous, so the scientists have completely destroyed all chance of that.","The greenish metal of which he is made seemed to be the same as that of the ship and could no more be attacked, they found, nor could they find any way to penetrate to his internals; but they had other means.","They sent electrical currents of tremendous voltages and amperages through him.","They applied terrific heat to all parts of his metal shell.","They immersed him for days in gases and acids and strongly corroding solutions, and they have bombarded him with every known kind of ray.","You need have no fear of him now.","He cannot possibly have retained the ability to function in any way."",""But — a word of caution.","The officials of the government know that visitors will not show any disrespect in this building.","It may be that the unknown and unthinkably powerful civilization from which Klaatu and Gnut came may send other emissaries to see what happened to them.","Whether or not they do, not one of us must be found amiss in our attitude.","None of us could very well anticipate what happened, and we all are immeasurably sorry, but we are still in a sense responsible, and must do what we can to avoid possible retaliations."",""You will be allowed to remain five minutes longer, and then, when the gong sounds, you will please leave promptly.","The robot attendants along the wall will answer any questions you may have."",""Look well, for before you stand stark symbols of the achievement, mystery, and frailty of the human race."","The recorded voice ceased speaking.","Cliff, carefully moving his cramped limbs, broke out in a wide smile.","If they knew what he knew!","For his photographs told a slightly different story from that of the lecturer.","In yesterday's a line of the figured floor showed clearly at the outer edge of the robot's near foot; in today's, that line was covered.","Gnut had moved!","Or been moved, though this was very unlikely.","Where was the derrick and other evidence of such activity? It could hardly have been done in one night, and all signs so quickly concealed.","And why should it be done at all?","Still, to make sure, he had asked the guard.","He could almost remember verbatim his answer:",""No, Gnut has neither moved nor been moved since the death of his master.","A special point was made of keeping him in the position he assumed at Klaatu's death.","The floor was built in under him, and the scientists who completed his derangement erected their apparatus around him, just as he stands.","You need have no fears."","Cliff smiled again.","He did not have any fears.","A moment later the big gong above the entrance doors rang the closing hour, and immediately following it a voice from the speakers called out "Five o'clock, ladies and gentlemen.","Closing time, ladies and gentlemen."","The three scientists, as if surprised it was so late, hurriedly washed their hands, changed to their street clothes and disappeared down the partitioned corridor, oblivious of the young picture man hidden under the table.","The slide and scrape of the feet on the exhibition floor rapidly dwindled, until at last there were only the steps of the two guards walking from one point to another, making sure everything was all right for the night.","For just a moment one of them glanced in the doorway of the laboratory, then he joined the other at the entrance.","Then the great metal doors clanged to, and there was silence.","Cliff waited several minutes, then carefully poked his way out from under the table.","As he straightened up, a faint tinkling crash sounded at the floor by his feet.","Carefully stooping, he found the shattered remains of a thin glass pipette.","He had knocked it off the table.","That caused him to realize something he had not thought of before: A Gnut who had moved might be a Gnut who could see and hear — and really be dangerous.","He would have to be very careful.","He looked about him.","The room was bounded at the ends by two fiber partitions which at the inner ends followed close under the curving bottom of the ship.","The inner side of the room was the ship itself, and the outer was the southern wall of the wing.","There were four large high windows.","The only entrance was by way of the passage.","Without moving, from his knowledge of the building, he made his plan.","The wing was connected with the western end of the museum by a doorway, never used, and extended westward toward the Washington Monument.","The ship lay nearest the southern wall, and Gnut stood out in front of it, not far from the northeast corner and at the opposite end of the room from the entrance of the building and the passageway leading to the laboratory.","By retracing his steps he would come out on the floor at the point farthest removed from the robot.","This was just what he wanted, for on the other side of the entrance, on a low platform, stood a paneled table containing the lecture apparatus, and this table was the only object in the room which afforded a place for him to lie concealed while watching what might go on.","The only other objects on the floor were the six manlike robot attendants in fixed stations along the northern wall, placed there to answer visitors' questions.","He would have to gain the table.","He turned and began cautiously tiptoeing out of the laboratory and down the passageway.","It was already dark there, for what light still entered the exhibition hall was shut off by the great bulk of the ship.","He reached the end of the room without making a sound.","Very carefully he edged forward and peered around the bottom of the ship at Gnut.","He had a momentary shock.","The robot's eyes were right on him! — or so it seemed.","Was that only the effect of the set of his eyes, he wondered, or was he already discovered? The position of Gnut's head did not seem to have changed, at any rate.","Probably everything was all right, but he wished he did not have to cross that end of the room with the feeling that the robot's eyes were following him.","He drew back and sat down and waited.","It would have to be totally dark before he essayed the trip to the table.","He waited a full hour, until the faint beams from the lamps on the grounds outside began to make the room seem to grow lighter; then he got up and peeped around the ship once more.","The robot's eyes seemed to pierce right at him as before, only now, due no doubt to the darkness, the strange internal illumination seemed much brighter.","This was a chilling thing.","Did Gnut know he was there? What were the thoughts of the robot? What could be the thoughts of a man-made machine, even so wonderful a one as Gnut?","It was time for the cross, so Cliff slung his camera around on his back, went down on his hands and knees, and carefully moved to the edge of the entrance wall.","There he fitted himself as closely as he could into the angle made by it with the floor and started inching ahead.","Never pausing, not risking a glance at Gnut's unnerving red eyes, moving an inch at a time, he snaked along.","He took ten minutes to cross the space of a hundred feet, and he was wet with perspiration when his fingers at last touched the one-foot rise of the platform on which the table stood.","Still slowly, silently as a shadow, he made his way over the edge and melted behind the protection of the table.","At last he was there.","He relaxed for a moment, then, anxious to know whether he had been seen, carefully turned and looked around the side of the table.","Gnut's eyes were now full on him! Or so it seemed.","Against the general darkness, the robot loomed a mysterious and still darker shadow that, for all his being a hundred and fifty feet away, seemed to dominate the room.","Cliff could not tell whether the position of his body was changed or not.","But if Gnut were looking at him, he at least did nothing else.","Not by the slightest motion that Cliff could discern did he appear to move.","His position was the one he had maintained these last three months, in the darkness, in the rain, and this last week in the museum.","Cliff made up his mind not to give away to fear.","He became conscious of his own body.","The cautious trip had taken something out of him -- his knees and elbows burned and his trousers were no doubt ruined.","But these were little things if what he hoped for came to pass.","If Gnut so much as moved, and he could catch him with his infrared camera, he would have a story that would buy him fifty suits of clothes.","And if on top of that he could learn the purpose of Gnut's moving — provided there was a purpose -- that would be a story that would set the world on its ears.","He settled down to a period of waiting; there was no telling when Gnut would move, if indeed he would move that night.","Cliff's eyes had long been adjusted to the dark and he could make out the larger objects well enough.","From time to time he peered out at the robot — peered long and hard, til his outlines wavered and he seemed to move, and he had to blink and rest his eyes to be sure it was only his imagination.","Again the minute hand of his watch crept around the dial.","The inactivity made Cliff careless, and for longer and longer periods he kept his head back out of sight behind the table.","And so it was that when Gnut did move he was scared almost out of his wits.","Dull and a little bored, he suddenly found the robot out on the floor, halfway in his direction.","But that was not the most frightening thing.","It was that when he did see Gnut he did not catch him moving! He was stopped as still as a cat in the middle of stalking a mouse.","His eyes were now much brighter, and there was no remaining doubt about their direction: he was looking right at Cliff!","Scarcely breathing, half hypnotized, Cliff looked back.","His thoughts tumbled.","What was the robot's intention? Why had he stopped so still? Was he being stalked? How could he move with such silence?","In the heavy darkness Gnut's eyes moved nearer.","Slowly but in perfect rhythm the almost imperceptible sound of his footsteps beat on Cliff's ears.","Cliff, usually resourceful enough, was this time caught flatfooted.","Frozen with fear, utterly incapable of fleeing, he lay where he was while the metal monster with the fiery eyes came on.","For a moment Cliff all but fainted, and when he recovered, there was Gnut towering over him, legs almost within reach.","He was bending slightly, burning his terrible eyes right into his own!","Too late to try to think of running now.","Trembling like any cornered mouse, Cliff waited for the blow that would crush him.","For an eternity, it seemed, Gnut scrutinized him without moving.","For each second of that eternity Cliff expected annihilation, sudden, quick, complete.","And then suddenly and unexpectedly it was over.","Gnut's body straightened and he stepped back.","He turned.","And then, with the almost jerkless rhythm which only he among robots possessed, he started back toward the place from which he came.","Cliff could hardly believe he had been spared.","Gnut could have crushed him like a worm — and he had only turned around and gone back.","Why? It could not be supposed that a robot was capable of human considerations.","Gnut went straight to the other end of the traveler.","At a certain place he stopped and made a curious succession of sounds.","At once Cliff saw an opening, blacker than the gloom of the building, appear in the ship's side, and it was followed by a slight sliding sound as a ramp slid out and met the floor.","Gnut walked up the ramp and, stooping a little, disappeared inside the ship.","Then, for the first time, Cliff remembered the picture he had come to get.","Gnut had moved, but he had not caught him! But at least now, whatever opportunities there might be later, he could get the shot of the ramp connecting with the opened door; so he twisted his camera into position, set it for the proper exposure, and took a shot.","A long time passed and Gnut did not come out.","What could he be doing inside? Cliff wondered.","Some of his courage returned to him and he toyed with the idea of creeping forward and peeping through the port, but he found he had not the courage for that.","Gnut had spared him, at least for the time, but there was no telling how far his tolerance would go.","An hour passed, then another.","Gnut was doing something inside the ship, but what? Cliff could not imagine.","If the robot had been a human being, he knew he would have sneaked a look, but as it was, he was too much of an unknown quantity.","Even the simplest of Earth's robots under certain circumstances were inexplicable things; what, then, of this one, come from an unknown and even unthinkable civilization, by far the most wonderful construction ever seen — what superhuman powers might he not possess? All that the scientists of Earth could do had not served to derange him.","Acid, heat, rays, terrific crushing blows — he had withstood them all; even his finish had been unmarred.","He might be able to see perfectly in the dark.","And right where he was, he might be able to hear or in some way sense the least change in Cliff's position.","More time passed, and then, some time after two o'clock in the morning, a simple homely thing happened, but a thing so unexpected that for a moment it quite destroyed Cliff's equilibrium.","Suddenly, through the dark and silent building, there was a faint whir of wings, soon followed by the piercing, sweet voice of a bird.","A mockingbird.","Somewhere in the gloom above his head.","Clear and full–throated were its notes; a dozen little songs it sang, one after the other without pause between — short insistent calls, twirrings, coaxings, cooings — the spring love song of perhaps the finest singer in the world.","Then, as suddenly as it began, the voice was silent.","If an invading army had poured out of the traveler, Cliff would have been less surprised.","The month was December; even in Florida the mockingbirds had not yet begun their song.","How had one gotten into that tight, gloomy museum? How and why was it singing there?","He waited, full of curiosity.","Then suddenly he was aware of Gnut, standing just outside the port of the ship.","He stood quite still, his glowing eyes turned squarely in Cliff's direction.","For a moment the hush in the museum seemed to deepen; then it was broken by a soft thud on the floor near where Cliff was lying.","He wondered.","The light in Gnut's eyes changed, and he started his almost jerkless walk in Cliff's direction.","When only a little away, the robot stopped, bent over, and picked something from the floor.","For some time he stood without motion and looked at a little object he held in his hand.","Cliff knew, though he could not see, that it was the mockingbird.","Its body, for he was sure that it had lost its song forever.","Gnut then turned, and without a glance at Cliff, walked back to the ship and again went inside.","Hours passed while Cliff waited for some sequel to this surprising happening.","Perhaps it was because of his curiosity that his fear of the robot began to lessen.","Surely if the mechanism was unfriendly, if he intended him any harm, he would have finished him before, when he had such a perfect opportunity.","Cliff began to nerve himself for a quick look inside the port.","And a picture; he must remember the picture.","He kept forgetting the very reason he was there.","It was in the deeper darkness of the false dawn when he got sufficient courage and made the start.","He took off his shoes, and in his stockinged feet, his hoes tied together and slung over his shoulder, he moved stiffly but rapidly to a position behind the nearest of the six robot attendants stationed along the wall, then paused for some sign which might indicate that Gnut knew he had moved.","Hearing none, he slipped along behind the next robot attendant and paused again.","Bolder now, he made in one spurt all the distance to the farthest one, the sixth, fixed just opposite the port of the ship.","There he met with a disappointment.","No light that he could detect was visible within; there was only darkness and the all-permeating silence.","Still, he had better get the picture.","He raised his camera, focused it on the dark opening, and gave the film a comparatively long exposure.","Then he stood there, at a loss what to do next.","As he paused, a peculiar series of muffled noises reached his ears, apparently from within the ship.","Animal noises — first scrapings and pantings, punctuated by several sharp clicks, then deep, rough snarls, interrupted by more scrapings and pantings, as if a struggle of some kind were going on.","Then suddenly, before Cliff could even decide to run back to the table, a low, wide, dark shape bounded out of the port and immediately turned and grew to the height of a man.","A terrible fear swept over Cliff, even before he knew what the shape was.","In the next second Gnut appeared in the port and stepped unhesitatingly down the ramp toward the shape.","As he advanced it backed slowly away for a few feet; but then it stood its ground, and thick arms rose from its sides and began a loud drumming on its chest, while from its throat came a deep roar of defiance.","Only one creature in the world beat its chest and made a sound like that.","The shape was a gorilla!","And a huge one!","Gnut kept advancing, and when close, charged forward and grappled with the beast.","Cliff would not have guessed that Gnut could move so fast.","In the darkness he could not see the details of what happened; all he knew was that the two great shapes, the titanic metal Gnut and the squat but terrifically strong gorilla, merged for a moment with silence on the robot's part and terrible, deep, indescribable roars on the other's; then the two separated, and it was as if the gorilla had been flung back and away.","The animal at once rose to its full height and roared deafeningly.","Gnut advanced.","They closed again, and the separation of before was repeated.","The robot continued inexorably, and now the gorilla began to fall back down the building.","Suddenly the beast darted at a manlike shape against the wall, and with one rapid side movement dashed the fifth robot attendant to the floor and decapitated it.","Tense with fear, Cliff crouched behind his own robot attendant.","He thanked Heaven that Gnut was between him and the gorilla and was continuing his advance.","The gorilla backed farther, darted suddenly at the next robot in the row, and with strength almost unbelievable picked it from its roots and hurled it at Gnut.","With a sharp metallic clang, robot hit robot, and the one of Earth bounced off to one side and rolled to a stop.","Cliff cursed himself for it afterward, but again he completely forgot the picture.","The gorilla kept falling back down the building, demolishing with terrific bursts of rage every robot attendant that he passed and throwing the pieces at the implacable Gnut.","Soon they arrived opposite the table, and Cliff now thanked his stars he had come away.","There followed a brief silence.","Cliff could not make out what was going on, but he imagined that the gorilla had at last reached the corner of the wing and was trapped.","If he was, it was only for a moment.","The silence was suddenly shattered by a terrific roar, and the thick, squat shape of the animal came bounding toward Cliff.","He came all the way back and turned just between Cliff and the port of the ship.","Cliff prayed frantically for Gnut to come back quickly, for there was now only the last remaining robot attendant between him and the madly dangerous brute.","Out of the dimness Gnut did appear.","The gorilla rose to its full height and again beat its chest and roared its challenge.","And then occurred a curious thing.","It fell on all fours and slowly rolled over on its side, as if weak or hurt.","Then panting, making frightening noises, it forced itself again to its feet and faced the oncoming Gnut.","As it waited, its eye was caught by the last robot attendant and perhaps Cliff, shrunk close behind it.","With a surge of terrible destructive rage, the gorilla waddled sideward toward Cliff, but this time, even through his panic, he saw that the animal moved with difficulty, again apparently sick or severely wounded.","He jumped back just in time; the gorilla pulled out the last robot attendant and hurled it violently at Gnut, missing him narrowly.","That was its last effort.","The weakness caught it again; it dropped heavily on one side, rocked back and forth a few times, and fell to twitching.","Then it lay still and did not move again.","The first faint pale light of the dawn was seeping into the room.","From the corner where he had taken refuge, Cliff watched closely the great robot.","It seemed to him that he behaved very queerly.","He stood over the dead gorilla, looking down at him with what in a human would be called sadness.","Cliff saw this clearly; Gnut's heavy greenish features bore a thoughtful, grieving expression new to his experience.","For some moments he stood so, then as might a father with his sick child, he leaned over, lifted the great animal in his metal arms and carried it tenderly within the ship.","Cliff flew back to the table, suddenly fearful of yet other dangerous and inexplicable happenings.","It struck him that he might be safer in the laboratory, and with trembling knees he made his way there and hid in one of the big ovens.","He prayed for full daylight.","His thoughts were chaos.","Rapidly, one after another, his mind churned up the amazing events of the night, but all was mystery; it seemed there could be no rational explanation for them.","That mockingbird.","The gorilla.","Gnut's sad expression and his tenderness.","What could account for a fantastic melange like that!","Gradually full daylight did come.","A long time passed.","At last he began to believe he might yet get out of that place of mystery and danger alive.","At 8:30 there were noises at the entrance, and the good sound of human voices came to his ears.","He stepped out of the oven and tiptoed to the passageway.","The noises stopped suddenly and there was a frightened exclamation and then the sound of running feet, and then silence.","Stealthily Cliff sneaked down the narrow way and peeped fearfully around the ship.","There Gnut was in his accustomed place, in the identical pose he had taken at the death of his master, brooding sullenly and alone over a space traveler once again closed tight and a room that was a shambles.","The entrance doors stood open and, heart in his mouth, Cliff ran out.","A few minutes later, safe in his hotel room, completely done in, he sat down for a second and almost at once fell asleep.","Later, still in his clothes and still asleep, he staggered over to the bed.","He did not wake up til mid-afternoon.","Continued in Part 2!","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","Farewell to the Master by Harry Bates","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/bates.html","46.9","26 May 2004");
Page[37]=new Array("Title","Author","Article","Copyright","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/blank.html","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/blank.html","2.6","19 May 2004");
Page[38]=new Array("Farewell to the Master","Part 2","by Harry Bates","Cliff awoke slowly, at first not realizing that the images tumbling in his head were real memories and not a fantastic dream.","It was recollection of the pictures which brought him to his feet.","Hastily he set about developing the film in his camera.","Then in his hands was proof that the events of the night were real.","Both shots turned out well.","The first showed clearly the ramp leading up to the port as he had dimly discerned it from his position behind the table.","The second, of the open port as snapped from in front, was a disappointment, for a blank wall just back of the opening cut off all view of the interior.","That would account for the fact that no light had escaped from the ship while Gnut was inside.","Assuming Gnut required light for whatever he did.","Cliff looked at the negatives and was ashamed of himself.","What a rotten picture man he was to come back with two ridiculous shots like these! He had had a score of opportunities to get real ones — shots of Gnut in action — Gnut's fight with the gorilla — even Gnut holding the mockingbird — spine-chilling stuff! — and all he had brought back was two stills of a doorway.","Oh, sure, they were valuable, but he was a Grade A ass.","And to top this brilliant performance, he had fallen asleep!","Well, he'd better get out on the street and find out what was doing.","Quickly he showered, shaved, and changed his clothes, and soon was entering a nearby restaurant patronized by other picture and newsmen.","Sitting alone at the lunch bar, he spotted a friend and competitor.",""Well, what do you think?" asked his friend when he took the stool at his side.",""I don't think anything until I've had breakfast," Cliff answered.",""Then haven't you heard?"",""Heard what?" fended Cliff, who knew very well what was coming.",""You're a fine picture man," was the other's remark.",""When something really big happens, you are asleep in bed."","But then he told him what had been discovered that morning in the museum, and of the worldwide excitement at the news.","Cliff did three things at once, successfully — gobbled a substantial breakfast, kept thanking his stars that nothing new had transpired, and showed continuous surprise.","Still chewing, he got up and hurried over to the building.","Outside, balked at the door, was a large crowd of the curious, but Cliff had no trouble gaining admittance when he showed his press credentials.","Gnut and the ship stood just as he had left them, but the floor had been cleaned up and the pieces of the demolished robot attendants were lined up in one place along the wall.","Several other competitor friends of his were there.",""I was away; missed the whole thing," he said to one of them — Gus.",""What's supposed to be the explanation for what happened?"",""Ask something easy," was the answer.",""Nobody knows.","It's thought maybe something came out of the ship, maybe another robot like Gnut.","Say — where have you been?"",""Asleep."",""Better catch up.","Several billion bipeds are scared stiff.","Revenge for the death of Klaatu.","Earth about to be invaded."",""But that's —"",""Oh, I know it's all crazy, but that's the story they're being fed; it sells news.","But there's a new angle just turned up, very surprising.","Come here."","He led Cliff to the table where stood a knot of people looking with great interest at several objects guarded by a technician.","Gus pointed to a long slide on which were mounted a number of short dark-brown hairs.",""Those hairs came off a large male gorilla," Gus said with a certain hard-boiled casualness.",""Most of them were found among the sweepings of the floor this morning.","The rest were found on the robot attendants."","Cliff tried to look astounded.","Gus pointed to a test tube partly filled with a light amber fluid.",""And that's blood, diluted — gorilla blood.","It was found on Gnut's arms."",""Good Heaven!" Cliff managed to exclaim.",""And there's no explanation?"",""Not even a theory.","It's your big chance, wonder boy."","Cliff broke away from Gus, unable to maintain his act any longer.","He couldn't decide what to do about his story.","The press services would bid heavily for it — with all his pictures — but that would take further action out of his hands.","In the back of his mind he wanted to stay in the wing again that night, but — well, he simply was afraid.","He'd had a pretty stiff dose, and he wanted very much to remain alive.","He walked over and looked a long time at Gnut.","No one would ever have guessed that he had moved, or that there had rested on his greenish metal face a look of sadness.","Those weird eyes! Cliff wondered if they were really looking at him, as they seemed, recognizing him as the bold intruder of last night.","Of what unknown stuff were they made — those materials placed in his eye sockets by one branch of the race of man which all the science of his own could not even serve to disfunction? What was Gnut thinking? What could be the thoughts of a robot — a mechanism of metal poured out of man's clay crucibles? Was he angry at him? Cliff thought not.","Gnut had had him at his mercy — and had walked away.","Dared he stay again?","Cliff thought perhaps he did.","He walked about the room, thinking it over.","He felt sure Gnut would move again.","A Mikton ray gun would protect him from another gorilla — or fifty of them.","He did not yet have the real story.","He had come back with two miserable architectural stills!","He might have known from the first that he would stay.","At dusk that night, armed with his camera and a small Mikton gun, he lay once more under the table of supplies in the laboratory and heard the metal doors of the wing clang to for the night.","This time he would get the story — and the pictures.","If only no guard was posted inside!","Cliff listened hard for a long time for any sound which might tell him that a guard had been left, but the silence within the wing remained unbroken.","He was thankful for that — but not quite completely.","The gathering darkness and the realization that he was now irrevocably committed made the thought of a companion not altogether unpleasant.","About an hour after it reached maximum darkness he took off his shoes, tied them together and slung them around his neck, down his back, and stole quietly down the passageway to where it opened into the exhibition area.","All seemed as it had been the preceding night.","Gnut looked an ominous, indistinct shadow at the far end of the room, his glowing red eyes again seemingly right on the spot from which Cliff peeped out.","As on the previous night, but even more carefully, Cliff went down on his stomach in the angle of the wall and slowly snaked across to the low platform on which stood the table.","Once in its shelter, he fixed his shoes so that they straddled one shoulder, and brought his camera and gun holster around, ready on his breast.","This time, he told himself, he would get pictures.","He settled down to wait, keeping Gnut in full sight every minute.","His vision reached maximum adjustment to the darkness.","Eventually he began to feel lonely and a little afraid.","Gnut's red-glowing eyes were getting on his nerves; he had to keep assuring himself that the robot would not harm him.","He had little doubt but that he himself was being watched.","Hours slowly passed.","From time to time he heard slight noises at the entrance, on the outside — a guard, perhaps, or maybe curious visitors.","At about nine o'clock he saw Gnut move.","First his head alone; it turned so that the eyes burned stronger in the direction where Cliff lay.","For a moment that was all; then the dark metal form stirred slightly and began moving forward — straight toward himself.","Cliff had thought he would not be afraid — but now his heart stood still.","What would happen this time?","With amazing silence, Gnut drew nearer, until he towered an ominous shadow over the spot where Cliff lay.","For a long time his red eyes burned down on the prone man.","Cliff trembled all over; this was worse than the first time.","Without having planned it, he found himself speaking to the creature.",""You would not hurt me," he pleaded.",""I was only curious to see what's going on.","It's my job.","Can you understand me? I would not harm or bother you.","I...I couldn't if I wanted to! Please!"","The robot never moved, and Cliff could not guess whether his words had been understood or even heard.","When he felt he could not bear the suspense any longer, Gnut reached out and took something from a drawer of the table, or perhaps he put something back in; then he stepped back, turned, and retraced his steps.","Cliff was safe! Again the robot had spared him!","Beginning then, Cliff lost much of his fear.","He felt sure now that this Gnut would do him no harm.","Twice he had had him in his power, and each time he had only looked and quietly moved away.","Cliff could not imagine what Gnut had done in the drawer of the table.","He watched with the greatest curiosity to see what would happen next.","As on the night before, the robot went straight to the end of the ship and made the peculiar sequence of sounds that opened the port, and when the ramp slid out he went inside.","After that Cliff was alone in the darkness for a very long time, probably two hours.","Not a sound came from the ship.","Cliff knew he should sneak up to the port and peep inside, but he could not quite bring himself to do it.","With his gun he could handle another gorilla, but if Gnut caught him it might be the end.","Momentarily he expected something fantastic to happen — he knew not what; maybe the mockingbird's sweet song again, maybe a gorilla, maybe — anything.","What did at last happen once more caught him with complete surprise.","He heard a sudden muffled sound, then words — human words — every one familiar.",""Gentlemen," was the first, and then there was a very slight pause.",""The Smithsonian Institution welcomes you to its new Interplanetary Wing and to the marvelous exhibits at this moment before you."","It was the recorded voice of Stillwell! But it was not coming through the speakers overhead, but much muted, from within the ship.","After a slight pause it went on: "All of you must...must —!" Here it stammered and came to a stop.","Cliff's hair bristled.","That stammering was not in the lecture!","For just a moment there was silence; then came a scream, a hoarse man's scream, muffled, from somewhere within the heart of the ship; and it was followed by muted gasps and cries, as of a man in great fright or distress.","Every nerve tight, Cliff watched the port.","He heard a thudding noise within the ship, then out the door flew the shadow of what was surely a human being.","Gasping and half stumbling, he ran straight down the room in Cliff's direction.","When twenty feet away, the great shadow of Gnut followed him out of the port.","Cliff watched, breathless.","The man — it was Stillwell, he saw now — came straight for the table behind which Cliff himself lay, as if to get behind it, but when only a few feet away, his knees buckled and he fell to the floor.","Suddenly Gnut was standing over him, but Stillwell did not seem to be aware of it.","He appeared very ill, but kept making spasmodic futile efforts to creep on to the protection of the table.","Gnut did not move, so Cliff was emboldened to speak.",""What's the matter, Stillwell?" he asked.",""Can I help? Don't be afraid.","I'm Cliff Sutherland; you know, the picture man."","Without showing the least surprise at finding Cliff there, and clutching at his presence like a drowning man would a straw, Stillwell gasped out:",""Help me! Gnut...Gnut —!"","He seemed unable to go on.",""Gnut what?" asked Cliff.","Very conscious of the fire-eyed robot looming above, and afraid even to move out to the man, Cliff added reassuringly: "Gnut won't hurt you.","I'm sure he won't.","He doesn't hurt me.","What's the matter? What can I do?"","With a sudden accession of energy, Stillwell rose on his elbows.",""Where am I?" he asked.",""In the Interplanetary Wing," Cliff answered.",""Don't you know?"","Only Stillwell's hard breathing was heard for a moment.","Then hoarsely, weakly, he asked:",""How did I get here?"",""I don't know," said Cliff.",""I was making a lecture recording," Stillwell said, "when suddenly I found myself here...or I mean in there —"","He broke off and showed a return of his terror.",""Then what?" asked Cliff gently.",""I was in that box — and there, above me, was Gnut, the robot.","Gnut! But they made Gnut harmless! He's never moved!"",""Steady, now," said Cliff.",""I don't think Gnut will hurt you."","Stillwell fell back on the floor.",""I'm very weak," he gasped.",""Something — Will you get a doctor?"","He was utterly unaware that towering above him, eyes boring down at him through the darkness, was the robot he feared so greatly.","As Cliff hesitated, at a loss what to do, the man's breath began coming in short gasps, as regular as the ticking of a clock.","Cliff dared to move out to him, but no act on his part could have helped the man now.","His gasps weakened and became spasmodic, then suddenly he was completely silent and still.","Cliff felt for his heart, then looked up to the eyes in the shadow above.",""He is dead," he whispered.","The robot seemed to understand, or at least to hear.","He bent forward and regarded the still figure.",""What is it, Gnut?" Cliff asked the robot suddenly.",""What are you doing? Can I help you in any way? Somehow I don't believe you are unfriendly, and I don't believe you killed this man.","But what happened? Can you understand me? Can you speak? What is it you're trying to do?"","Gnut made no sound or motion, but only looked at the still figure at his feet.","In the robot's face, now so close, Cliff saw the look of sad contemplation.","Gnut stood so several minutes; then he bent lower, took the limp form carefully — even gently, Cliff thought — in his mighty arms, and carried him to the place along the wall where lay the dismembered pieces of the robot attendants.","Carefully he laid him by their side.","Then he went back into the ship.","Without fear now, Cliff stole along the wall of the room.","He had gotten almost as far as the shattered figures on the floor when he suddenly stopped motionless.","Gnut was emerging again.","He was bearing a shape that looked like another body, a larger one.","He held it in one arm and placed it carefully by the body of Stillwell.","In the hand of his other arm he held something that Cliff could not make out, and this he placed at the side of the body he had just put down.","Then he went to the ship and returned once more with a shape which he laid gently by the others; and when this last trip was over he looked down at them all for a moment, then turned slowly back to the ship and stood motionless, as if in deep thought, by the ramp.","Cliff restrained his curiosity as long as he could, then shipped forward and bent over the objects Gnut had placed there.","First in the row was the body of Stillwell, as he expected, and next was the great shapeless furry mass of a dead gorilla — the one of last night.","By the gorilla lay the object the robot had carried in his free hand — the little body of the mockingbird.","These last two had remained in the ship all night, and Gnut, for all his surprising gentleness in handling them, was only cleaning house.","But there was a fourth body whose history he did not know.","He moved closer and bent very low to look.","What he saw made him catch his breath.","Impossible! — he thought; there was some confusion in his directions; he brought his face back, close to the first body.","Then his blood ran cold.","The first body was that of Stillwell, but the last in the row was Stillwell, too; there were two bodies of Stillwell, both exactly alike, both dead.","Cliff backed away with a cry, and then panic took him and he ran down the room away from Gnut and yelled and beat wildly on the door.","There was a noise on the outside.",""Let me out!" he yelled in terror.",""Let me out! Let me out! Oh, hurry!"","A crack opened between the two doors and he forced his way through like a wild animal and ran far out on the lawn.","A belated couple on a nearby path stared at him with amazement, and this brought some sense to his head and he slowed down and came to a stop.","Back at the building, everything looked as usual, and in spite of his terror, Gnut was not chasing him.","He was still in his stockinged feet.","Breathing heavily, he sat down on the wet grass and put on his shoes; then he stood and looked at the building, trying to pull himself together.","What an incredible melange! The dead Stillwell, the dead gorilla, and the dead mockingbird — all dying before his eyes.","And then that last frightening thing, the second dead Stillwell whom he had not seen die.","And Gnut's strange gentleness, and the sad expression he had twice seen on his face.","As he looked, the grounds about the building came to life.","Several people collected at the door of the wing, above sounded the siren of a police copter, then in the distance another, and from all sides people came running, a few at first, then more and more.","The police planes landed on the lawn just outside the door of the wing, and he thought he could see the officers peeping inside.","Then suddenly the lights of the wing flooded on.","In control of himself now, Cliff went back.","He entered.","He had left Gnut standing in thought at the side of the ramp, but now he was again in his old familiar pose in the usual place, as if he had never moved.","The ship's door was closed, and the ramp gone But the bodies, the four strangely assorted bodies, were still lying by the demolished robot attendants where he had left them in the dark.","He was startled by a cry behind his back.","A uniformed museum guard was pointing at him.",""This is the man!" the guard shouted.",""When I opened the door this man forced his way out and ran like the devil!"","The police officers converged on Cliff.",""Who are you? What is all this?" one of them asked him roughly.",""I'm Cliff Sutherland, picture reporter," Cliff answered calmly.",""And I was the one who was inside here and ran away, as the guard says."",""What were you doing?" the officer asked, eyeing him.",""And where did these bodies come from?"",""Gentlemen, I'd tell you gladly — only business first," Cliff answered.",""There's been some fantastic goings–on in this room, and I saw them and have the story, but —" he smiled, — "I must decline to answer without advice of counsel until I've sold my story to one of the news syndicates.","You know how it is.","If you'll allow me the use of the radio in your plane — just for a moment, gentlemen — you'll have the whole story right afterward — say in half an hour, when the television men broadcast it.","Meanwhile, believe me, there's nothing for you to do, and there'll be no loss by the delay."","The officer who had asked the questions blinked, and one of the others, quicker to react and certainly not a gentleman, stepped toward Cliff with clenched fists.","Cliff disarmed him by handing him his press credentials.","He glanced at them rapidly and put them in his pocket.","By now half a hundred people were there, and among them were two members of a syndicate crew whom he knew, arrived by copter.","The police growled, but they let him whisper in their ear and then go out under escort to the crew's plane.","There, by radio, in five minutes, Cliff made a deal which would bring him more money than he had ever before earned in a year.","After that he turned over all his pictures and negatives to the crew and gave them the story, and they lost not one second in spinning back to their office with the flash.","More and more people arrived, and the police cleared the building.","Ten minutes later a big crew of radio and television men forced their way in, sent there by the syndicate with which he had dealt.","And then a few minutes later, under the glaring lights set up by the operators and standing close by the ship and not far from Gnut — he refused to stand underneath him — Cliff gave his story to the cameras and microphones, which in a fraction of a second shot it to every corner of the Solar System.","Immediately afterward the police took him to jail.","On general principles and because they were pretty blooming mad.","Cliff stayed in jail all that night — until eight o'clock the next morning, when the syndicate finally succeeded in digging up a lawyer and got him out.","And then, when at last he was leaving, a Federal man caught him by the wrist.",""You're wanted for further questioning over at the Continental Bureau of Investigation," the agent told him.","Cliff went along willingly.","Fully thirty-five high-ranking Federal officials and "big names" were waiting for him in an imposing conference room — one of the president's secretaries, the undersecretary of state, the underminister of defense, scientists, a colonel, executives, department heads, and ranking "C" men.","Old gray-mustached Sanders, chief of the CBI, was presiding.","They made him tell his story all over again, and then, in parts, all over once more — not because they did not believe him, but because they kept hoping to elicit some fact which would cast significant light on the mystery of Gnut's behavior and the happenings of the last three nights.","Patiently Cliff racked his brains for every detail.","Chief Sanders asked most of the questions.","After more than an hour, when Cliff thought they had finished, Sanders asked him several more, all involving his personal opinions of what had transpired.",""Do you think Gnut was deranged in any way by the acids, rays, heat, and so forth applied to him by the scientists?"",""I saw no evidence of it."",""Do you think he can see?"",""I'm sure he can see, or else has other powers which are equivalent."",""Do you think he can hear?"",""Yes, sir.","That time when I whispered to him that Stillwell was dead, he bent lower, as if to see for himself.","I would not be surprised if he also understood what I said."",""At no time did he speak, except those sounds he made to open the ship?"",""Not one word, in English or any other language.","Not one sound with his mouth."",""In your opinion, has his strength been impaired in any way by our treatment?" asked one of the scientists.",""I have told you how easily he handled the gorilla.","He attacked the animal and threw it back, after which it retreated all the way down the building, afraid of him."",""How would you explain the fact that our autopsies disclosed no mortal wound, no cause of death, in any of the bodies — gorilla, mockingbird, or the two identical Stillwells?" — this from a medical officer.",""I can't."",""You think Gnut is dangerous?" — from Sanders.",""Potentially very dangerous."",""Yet you say you have the feeling he is not hostile."",""To me, I meant.","I do have that feeling, and I'm afraid that I can't give any good reason for it, except the way he spared me twice when he had me in his power.","I think maybe the gentle way he handled the bodies had something to do with it, and maybe the sad, thoughtful look I twice caught on his face."",""Would you risk staying in the building alone another night?"",""Not for anything." There were smiles.",""Did you get any pictures of what happened last night?"",""No, sir." Cliff, with an effort, held on to his composure, but he was swept by a wave of shame.","A man hitherto silent rescued him by saying:",""A while ago you used the word 'purposive' in connection with Gnut's actions.","Can you explain that a little?"",""Yes, that was one of the things that struck me: Gnut never seems to waste a motion.","He can move with surprising speed when he wants to; I saw that when he attacked the gorilla; but most other times he walks around as if methodically completing some simple task.","And that reminds me of a peculiar thing: at times he gets into one position, any position, maybe half bent over, and stays there for minutes at a time.","It's as if his scale of time values was eccentric, compared to ours; some things he does surprisingly fast, and others surprisingly slow.","This might account for his long periods of immobility."",""That's very interesting," said one of the scientists.",""How would you account for the fact that he recently moves only at night?"",""I think he's doing something he wants no one to see, and the night is the only time he is alone."",""But he went ahead even after finding you there."",""I know.","But I have no other explanation, unless he considered me harmless or unable to stop him -- which was certainly the case."",""Before you arrived, we were considering encasing him in a large block of glasstex.","Do you think he would permit it?"",""I don't know.","Probably he would; he stood for the acids and rays and heat.","But it had better be done in the daytime; night seems to be the time he moves."",""But he moved in the daytime when he emerged from the traveler with Klaatu."",""I know."","That seemed to be all they could think of to ask him.","Sanders slapped his hand on the table.",""Well, I guess that's all, Mr.","Sutherland," he said.",""Thank you for your help, and let me congratulate you for a very foolish, stubborn, brave young man — young businessman." He smiled very faintly.",""You are free to go now, but it may be that I'll have to call you back later.","We'll see."",""May I remain while you decide about that glasstex?" Cliff asked.",""As long as I'm here I'd like to have the tip."",""The decision has already been made — the tip's yours.","The pouring will be started at once."",""Thank you, sir," said Cliff — and calmly asked more: "And will you be so kind as to authorize me to be present outside the building tonight? Just outside.","I've a feeling something's going to happen."",""You want still another scoop, I see," said Sanders not unkindly, "then you'll let the police wait while you transact your business."",""Not again, sir.","If anything happens, they'll get it at once."","The chief hesitated.",""I don't know," he said.",""I'll tell you what.","All the news services will want men there, and we can't have that; but if you can arrange to represent them all yourself, it's a go.","Nothing's going to happen, but your reports will help calm the hysterical ones.","Let me know."","Cliff thanked him and hurried out and phoned his syndicate the tip — free — then told them Sanders' proposal.","Ten minutes later, they called him back, said all was arranged, and told him to catch some sleep.","They would cover the pouring.","With light heart, Cliff hurried over to the museum.","The place was surrounded by thousands of the curious, held far back by a strong cordon of police.","For once he could not get through; he was recognized, and the police were still sore.","But he did not care much; he suddenly felt very tired and needed that nap.","He went back to his hotel, left a call, and went to bed.","He had been asleep only a few minutes when his phone rang.","Eyes shut, he answered it.","It was one of the boys at the syndicate, with peculiar news.","Stillwell had just reported, very much alive — the real Stillwell.","The two dead ones were some kind of copies; he couldn't imagine how to explain them.","He had no brothers.","For a moment Cliff came fully awake, then he went back to bed.","Nothing was fantastic anymore.","Continued in Part 3.","Return to","The Library Return to","The Nostalgia League","The Library is a part of","The Nostalgia League","URL: http://thenostalgialeague.com","E-Mail: Library@thenostalgialeague.com","The names "The Nostalgia League", "TNL Online Magazine",","and the domain "thenostalgialeague.com" are owned and © 1999","by Raymond William Stedman.","Individual copyrights are as noted.","For site questions, contact: webmaster","Farewell to the Master by Harry Bates","http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/bates2.html","35.5","2 Jun 2004");
Page[39]=new Array("The Adventure of the Two Collaborators","by James M.","Barrie","Often the story behind the creation of a work of fiction is just as fascinating as the fiction itself.","Such is the case with "The Adventure of the Two Collaborators." By itself, the story is one of the best parodies of Sherlock Holmes ever written.","Once the story behind the story is known, however, it also becomes a delightful allegory that documents the only collaboration between Arthur Conan Doyle and James Barrie.","(NOTE: Those who wish to be surprised by the allegorical elements of this story may wish to skip the rest of this introduction, read the story and then return here.)","By 1890, James Barrie had established himself as a writer of prose and had set his sights on becoming a playwright (Peter Pan wasn't to appear until 1909).","His early efforts were only semi-successful, but in 1892 his play, Walker, London, became a hit and allowed him to approach Richard D'oyly Carte of the D'oyly Carte Opera: the same organization that was famous for its productions of the Gilbert and Sullivan operas at the Savoy Theatre.","Barrie presented D'oyle Carte with the idea for an opera (operetta) to be called Jane Annie or The Good Conduct Prize.","D'oyly Carte liked the idea and even gave the work to Arthur Sullivan (the Sullivan of Gilbert and Sullivan) in the hopes that Sullivan would write the score.","After reading though the material, Sullivan passed on the project and recommended Ernest Ford, one of his students, to write the music.","With all things in place, Barrie set to work on the libretto, only to suffer a nervous breakdown.","He turned to his friend Arthur Conan Doyle for help.","At the point he was approached by Barrie, Doyle was going through a number of changes.","He had recently given up his medical career in favor of full-time writing.","His son, Kingsley, had just been born.","Most importantly, he had also decided to bring about the demise of Sherlock Holmes, in order to give himself time "for more serious literary work." Whether writing for the theater represented a more serious style of writing, or whether he was simply trying to help out a friend is not really clear, but Doyle visited with Barrie for a number of days.","After discussing many issues, including Doyle's plans for Holmes, the two friends agreed to work together on bringing Jane Annie to the stage.","Great works can often come out of collaboration, but such was not the case with Jane Annie.","Doyle attempted to work from Barrie's notes, but couldn't quite find the correct path the story should take.","Later, when Barrie was recovered, he and Doyle found themselves at odds over the work and the storyline and libretto were in a constant state of flux nearly up to opening night.","Most all of the principals involved in the production were worried about the final product.","The public finally put their stamp on the work when, after the opening performance, they did not invite the authors onstage for a curtain call.","Numerous fixes and changes were made, but Jane Annie was a rather huge flop and only ran from March to April of 1893 for a total of 50 performances.","Fortunately, both authors were able to recover from their team-up with their egos, and friendship, intact.","Sometime after March of 1893, Barrie presented Doyle with a copy of his short story collection A Window in Thrums.","On the flyleafs of the book, he had written "The Adventure of the Two Collaborators." The story, which remained unprinted until Doyle's autobiography Memories and Adventures was published in 1924, is, as mentioned above, an excellent parody of Holmes and is also an allegorical accounting of their joint foray int