The Ghost of Sherlock Holmes

From Chronicles:

Arthur Conan Doyle’s Adventures of Sherlock Holmes are an enduring part of our cultural lexicon. In the cases Holmes and his trusted friend, Dr. Watson, pursued, Doyle brilliantly weaved mystery with subtle commentary exposing the uneasy interactions between the various classes of British society. Although Doyle’s stories have been adapted for the screen many times, Sidney Lanfield’s 1939 film, The Hound of the Baskervilles, is considered one of the finest and it is a perfect sort of spooky film for an October viewing. Basil Rathbone’s portrayal of Sherlock Holmes captures the essence of Doyle’s most famous character who, in this instance is approached to solve a dark and prowling mystery surrounding Baskerville Hall.

Baskerville Hall, we learn, has been plagued by a terrible curse. As the story opens, Sir Hugo Baskerville is discovered to be the latest victim of a vicious hound lurking in the moor that attacks unsuspecting strangers and regular inhabitants of Devonshire. A legend surrounding Baskerville and the hound adds another layer of strangeness and fear to this gothic tale. Apparently, there is an age-old curse on the Baskervilles whereby some kind of demon-dog sets upon members of the family.There is an air of the supernatural attached to the story, but of course the rationalist Holmes dismisses such explanations. For his logical and deductive mind, this analysis is not only impossible; it’s also quite useless.

The family doctor warns  the family’s last heir, the young Sir Henry Baskerville, not to return to the estate.  Holmes decides to help the young master and encourages him to disregard the advice, vowing to solve the mystery once and for all.

The arrival of the detectives Holmes and Watson to Baskerville Hall, however, is marked by one strange event after another. The housekeeper and his wife behave toward the Hall and the estate in an odd, possessive manner. Their gaunt appearance enhances the oddity of their behavior, and they are naturally on the list of suspects in the murder of Sir Hugo Baskerville.

Although Holmes does not question the existence of a hound, he correctly suspects that someone is deceiving Sir Henry in order either to drive him away from his rightful inheritance or simply trying to murder him. The mood of the film has all the classic elements of horror and gothic storytelling.The London fog settles over the scene just as a mysterious stranger attempts to kill Sir Henry; later, the foreboding landscape of the moors of Devonshire figure prominently in both the mood and the action of the story.

Although filmed in studio, every decision made by the set designers stays faithful to Doyle’s vision of the story and holds up for viewing today. The lifeless trees, the night, the perpetual fog, and Baskerville Hall itself, all create a gripping sense of atmospheric horror. Other 19^th century gothic worlds come to mind, such as those created by the Brontë sisters, with Mr. Rochester’s “mad woman in the attic” or Heathcliff roaming Wuthering Heights. Here, too, the foreboding house and the moor are characters in and of themselves. But in many ways, this is also a typical Hollywood production—one that aims to bring the “charm” of Victorian England to a primarily American audience, but with a gothic twist. It is a familiar routine now, but it was novel in 1939.

As usual, Holmes plays harmless tricks on his friend and sidekick, Dr. Watson, here by appearing in Devonshire in disguise. Often, Holmes’ disguises involve taking on the personae of people in the lower classes, those who go unrecognized and unnoted by wealthy aristocrats like Watson. Holmes brings out the snobbery of the elites and shines a spotlight on the growing rift in British society. Yet, of course, Holmes himself enjoys the high life, which paradoxically allows him to speak for those less fortunate.

This is not to say that Holmes is in any way charitable. In fact, most of the time, he appears almost without compassion, self-involved, and especially looking down upon those of lesser intellect. But his much-needed if overbearing analytical skills allow him to solve one mystery after another, bringing closure and even happiness to those who have been afflicted by the darkness that always lurks in the foggy streets of London.

Although Rathbone is considered by many to be the quintessential Holmes (my own heart tends to embrace Jeremy Brett’s brilliant portrayal), he had misgivings about playing the famous detective. Rathbone was classically trained as a stage actor, and he brought that training to the role of Holmes. Unfortunately for Rathbone, however, the role managed to give him a bit of anxiety.

In his 1956 autobiography, In and Out of Character, Rathbone wrote that he was “jealous of his [Sherlock Holmes’] mastery in all things, both material and mystical …  [Holmes] was sort of a god in his own way, seated on some Anglo-Saxon Olympus of his own design and making! Yes, there was no question about it, Holmes had given me an acute inferiority complex!” (Read more.)

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‘Vindictive’ Special Counsel Indictment Criminalizes Speech

 From The Federalist:

Monday’s motion to dismiss based on constitutional grounds argues the entirety of Smith’s case against Trump is based on prosecuting the latter’s speech. Free speech is a constitutionally secured American right.

“Additionally, as the United States Senate has previously tried and acquitted President Trump for charges arising from the same course of conduct alleged in the indictment, the impeachment and double jeopardy clauses both bar retrial before this Court and require dismissal,” says the constitutional dismissal motion. “Finally, because of our country’s longstanding tradition of forceful political advocacy regarding perceived fraud and irregularities in numerous Presidential elections, President Trump lacked fair notice that his advocacy in this instance could be criminalized. Thus, the Court should dismiss the indictment under the Due Process clause as well.”

The motion quotes multiple Supreme Court cases, including multiple leftist justices, affirming that Americans have a constitutionally protected right to speak freely, even when their statements are false. Chutkan has stated she believes the speech Smith is attempting to criminalize with his indictment — publicly alleging problems with an election Democrats won — comprises “conspiracy theories.”

Another motion seeks to introduce some protections for Trump in a case that may involve a Washington, DC jury pool in a district where 92 percent voted for the president who demanded Trump’s current prosecution. It requests the judge strike “inflammatory allegations” from Smith’s indictment: “Because the Government has not charged President Trump with responsibility for the actions at the Capitol on January 6, 2021, allegations related to these actions are not relevant and are prejudicial and inflammatory.” (Read more.)

 

From American Greatness:

The reason you have not heard of a gag order on par with the one imposed on former President Trump is that it is highly unusual. Normally, in a criminal proceeding, there are no gag orders. To the extent they exist, they typically only bind the lawyers, who are admonished to adhere to the rules of professional conduct. Rarely—as in almost never—are criminal defendants forced into a gag order on such spurious grounds as they might “vilify and implicitly encourage violence against public servants who are simply doing their jobs.”

In fact, precedent almost uniformly emphasizes familiar First Amendment principles, which limit the court’s authority, including disfavor towards “prior restraints” and “content-based restrictions” on speech.

In a case involving the prosecution of a congressman, the Sixth Circuit federal court of appeals noted that “such broadly based restrictions on speech in connection with litigation are seldom, if ever, justified. Trial judges, the government, the lawyers and the public must tolerate robust and at times acrimonious or even silly public debate about litigation.” (Read more.)

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A Panegyric for Dorothy Sayers

 From Eighth Day Institute:

The variety of Dorothy Sayers’ work makes it almost impossible to find anyone who can deal properly with it all. Charles Williams might have done so; I certainly can’t. It is embarrassing because, in our present state of festering intellectual class consciousness, the admission might be taken as a boast. It is nothing of the sort: I respect, though I do not much enjoy, that severe and civilized form, which demands much fundamental brain work of those who write in it and assumes as its background uncorrupted and unbrutalised methods of criminal investigation.

Prigs have put it about that Dorothy in later life was ashamed of her “tekkies” and hated to hear them mentioned. A couple of years ago my wife asked her if this was true and was relieved to hear her deny it. She had stopped working in that genre because she felt she had done all she could with it. And indeed, I gather, a full process of development had taken place. I have heard it said that Lord Peter is the only imaginary detective who ever grew up—grew from the Duke’s son, the fabulous amorist, the scholar swashbuckler, and connoisseur of wine, into the increasingly human character, not without quirks and flaws, who loves and marries, and is nursed by, Harriet Vane. Reviewers complained that Miss Sayers was falling in love with her hero. On which a better critic remarked to me, “It would be truer to say she was falling out of love with him; and ceased fondling a girl’s dream—if she had ever done so—and began inventing a man.”

There is in reality no cleavage between the detective stories and her other works. In them, as in it, she is first and foremost the craftsman, the professional. She always saw herself as one who has learned a trade, and respects it, and demands respect for it from others. We who loved her may (among ourselves) largely admit that this attitude was sometimes almost comically emphatic. One soon learned that “We authors, Ma’am” was the most acceptable key [This expression, attributed to Benjamuun Disraeli, was found to have a soothing effect upon Queen Victoria.]. Gas about “inspiration,” whimperings about critics or public, all the paraphernalia of dandyisme and “outsidership” were, I think, simply disgusting to her. She aspired to be, and was, at once a popular entertainer and a conscientious craftsman: like (in her degree) Chaucer, Cervantes, Shakespeare, or Molière. I have an idea that, with a very few exceptions, it is only such writers who matter much in the long run. “One shows one’s greatness,” says Pascal, “not by being at an extremity but by being simultaneously at two extremities.” Much of her most valuable thought about writing was embodied in The Mind of the Maker: a book which is still too little read. It has faults. But books about writing by those who have themselves written viable books are too rare and too useful to be neglected.

For a Christian, of course, this pride in one’s craft, which so easily withers into pride in oneself, raises a fiercely practical .. It is delightfully characteristic of her extremely robust and forthright nature that she soon lifted this problem to the fully conscious level and made it the theme of one of her major works. The architect in The Zeal of Thy House is at the outset the incarnation of—and therefore doubtless the Catharsis from—a possible Dorothy who the actual Dorothy Sayers was offering for mortification. His disinterested zeal for the work itself has her full sympathy. But she knows that, without grace, it is a dangerous virtue: little better than the “artistic conscience” which every Bohemian bungler pleads as a justification for neglecting his parents, deserting his wife, and cheating his creditors. From the beginning, personal pride is entering into the architect’s character: the play records his costly salvation.

As the detective stories do not stand quite apart, so neither do the explicitly religious works. She never sank the artist and entertainer in the evangelist. The very astringent (and admirable) preface to The Man Born to Be King, written when she had lately been assailed with a great deal of ignorant and spiteful obloquy, makes the point of view defiantly clear. “It was assumed,” she writes, “that my object in writing was ‘to do good.’ But that was in fact not my object at all, though it was quite properly the object of those who commissioned the plays in the first place. My object was to tell that story to the best of my ability, within the medium at my disposal—in short, to make as good a work of art as I could. For a work of art that is not good and true in art is not true and good in any other respect.” Of course, while art and evangelism were distinct, they turned out to demand one another. Bad art on this theme went hand in hand with bad theology. “Let me tell you, good  people, an honest writer would be ashamed to treat a nursery tale as you have treated the greatest drama in history: and this in virtue, not of his faith, but of his calling.” And equally, of course, her disclaimer of an intention to “do good” was ironically rewarded by the immense amount of good she evidently did.

The architectonic qualities of this dramatic sequence will hardly be questioned. Some tell me they find it vulgar. Perhaps they do not quite know what they mean; perhaps they have not fully digested the answers to this charge given in the preface. Or perhaps it is simply not “addressed to their condition.” Different souls take their nourishment in different vessels. For my own part, I have re-read it in every Holy Week since it first appeared, and never re-read it without being deeply moved.

Her later years were devoted to translation. The last letter I ever wrote to her was in acknowledgement of her Song of Roland, and I was lucky enough to say that the end-stopped lines and utterly unadorned style of the original must have made it a far harder job than Dante. Her delight at this (surely not very profound) remark suggested that she was rather starved for rational criticism. I do not think this one of her most successful works. It is too violently colloquial for my palate; but then, she knew far more Old French than I. In her Dante the problem is not quite the same. It should always be read in conjunction with the paper on Dante which she contributed to the Essays Presented to Charles Williams [Link to “‘…And Telling You a Story’: A Note on the Divine Comedy”]. There you get the first impact of Dante on a mature, a scholarly, and an extremely independent mind. That impact determined the whole character of her translation.

She had been startled and delighted by something in Dante for which no critic, and no earlier translator, had prepared her: his sheer narrative impetus, his frequent homeliness, his high comedy, his grotesque buffoonery. These qualities she was determined to preserve at all costs. If, in order to do so, she had to sacrifice sweetness or sublimity, then sacrificed they should be. Hence her audacities in both language and rhythm. (Read more.)

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Before and After House Tour

 From Thistlewood Farms:

Before I walk you through the rooms in the house and tell the story of how we moved, I wanted to start way back. Waaaaaay back.

Back at the very beginning.

The house we live in—the house we “jumped back” to in Texas was built in 1908. This is a picture taken with the original exterior of the home. There was a double porch on the front with columns that extended all the way to the top of the roof and the front porch extended all the way across the front of the house.

And yes. This is Texas. Apparently Texas had a snowstorm that year. (Read more.)

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Gen Z Never Learned Cursive

 From Deseret News:

According to The Atlantic, this means, “In the future, cursive will have to be taught to scholars the way Elizabethan secretary hand or paleography is today.” This directly impacts archival work. Many written documents from the 19th century and other early time periods are written in cursive. Or they’re written in a type of quasi-cursive that makes it difficult for non-cursive writers to identify individual letters.

While it was once taken for granted that American students would know how to read cursive, now that cannot be the case. Archival work largely depends on a reader’s ability to read hard-to-read texts in shorthand and/or cursive. Will this mean that universities will start having to offer college courses in history programs on how to read cursive? Only time will tell. Though with AI advancing, archival work might be impacted, too.

In Jan. 2023, researchers announced they were able to use artificial intelligence to transcribe a play written in the 1600s. Using AI, researchers were also able to confirm previously unknown authorship of the play by comparing it to other authors’ work from the time period, per Reuters. (Read more.)

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Five Ways to Support an Author

It is good form that, if you receive a free copy of a book from an author, you review the book somewhere, or at least tweet about it. Or if an author has reviewed several of your books, it is only common courtesy to review at least one of theirs, or at least link to their blog, or post about it on Facebook. Authors need to help each other; reciprocity is the name of the game. From The Catholic Writers Guild:

While we’re talking about free ways to support your favorite authors (I hope that includes me!), leaving reviews is high on the list. Amazon is the biggest one, but reviews on Barnes and Noble, Goodreads, the author’s website, and anywhere else you buy the book (like local bookshops that sell online, etc.), have a huge impact and can make the difference when someone is thinking about purchasing the book. While you’re on there, be sure to “like” the other five-star reviews so they populate at the top of the list. The best reviews mention specific things that you loved and why you would recommend it, but even just taking 30 seconds on Amazon to click five-stars without writing anything helps! 

Another simple, fun, and free way to support authors is to engage with them on social media. Following your favorite authors and liking their posts is a great start, but the algorithms require engagement to boost a post. A reel or post that has a lot of comments will have more exposure, and one that has multiple shares will see the most traffic. Next time you’re scrolling, take that quick second to comment, tag your friends who would also enjoy the post, and share the content on your own feed. You can find me on Facebook and Instagram @mariarileyauthor if you want to engage with me there!

My next suggestion has less to do with increasing sales and everything to do with encouraging your favorite author: send fan mail. There is something profoundly uplifting and motivating about a reader who loved your book and wanted to let you know. Nothing brightens my day more than reading an email from a child who loved my books. Bonus points for the seven-year-old’s note that included a picture of her holding my book. Seriously, a three-minute email could be exactly the thing that an author needs to stay focused and determined when writing her next book. It might be the difference between her throwing in the towel or continuing writing. As authors, we put ourselves out there and hope that people will like and buy our books. It’s tough business. A few kind words really go a long way, and they won’t cost you a cent.

Finally, if you have a book and author that you love, tell everyone you know. There is no marketing like word of mouth, and personal recommendations are second to none. If you loved a book, chances are your friends will too. Make it a habit to spread the word about your favorite books and hopefully turn a new reader onto his new favorite author. (Read more.)

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The Saplings of Sherwood

Robin Hood and Maid Marian

Robin Hood, Robin Hood,
Telling his beads,
All in the greenwood
Among the green weeds. 

~from the nursery rhyme "Robin Hood and Little John"

 Having grown up in a house surrounded by woods, I have always had a fascination with life in the forest, with the solitude, the dangers, the sense of freedom inherent in wilderness dwelling. Robin Hood has long been one of my heroes. He is essentially a noble character forced by circumstances to rebel against unjust laws. There are many tales about Robin Hood, ballads and poems spanning the centuries, including an account of his death. And not to forget the wonderful poem by Alfred Noyes, Sherwood Forest, which captures the magic of the Robin Hood tales:

Sherwood in the twilight, is Robin Hood awake?
Grey and ghostly shadows are gliding through the brake,
Shadows of the dappled deer, dreaming of the morn,
Dreaming of a shadowy man that winds a shadowy horn.

In Book 1 The Saplings of Sherwood of her new series The Telling of the Beads, Avellina Balestri revives the mystery and magic of the great forests of England which were the settings for many legendary quests and adventures, from those of King Arthur and his knights to those of Robin Hood and his Merry Men. Saplings imaginatively recounts the childhood of the folk hero called Robin of Locksley, the son and heir of a Saxon noble in the century following the Norman conquest of 1066. As Robin comes of age in the country where his people have been defeated and are second-class citizens, he finds the sufferings of the common folk more and more unbearable. Not only the poor suffer, however, as Robin's nemesis Roger Cavendish endures abuse at the hands of his own family, crippling him emotionally and spiritually. Meanwhile, Robin's devotion to his neighbor Marian Fitzwalter, a highborn Norman maiden, grows amid local quarrels and misunderstandings as well as festivals and happy times.

From Dr. Joseph Pearce at The Imaginative Conservative:

It was in the light or shadow of such historical abuse that I plucked a new novel, Saplings of Sherwood, from those shelves in my library that contain contemporary fiction. Published last year, it is billed as Book One of a larger work, The Telling of the Beads. As the title suggests, Saplings of Sherwood has as its setting the area surrounding Sherwood Forest during the years when Robin Locksley and Maid Marian were children and later teenagers. This is the first thing that gripped me. This is a book in which children are the principal characters, but it’s not a children’s book. On the contrary. Some of the content is decidedly not suited for children. In most fiction written for adults, children are decidedly absent, as creatures not really belonging in the adult world. Similarly, in most children’s literature, adults are decidedly absent or at least only visible in the periphery of our vision, as though adults do not really belong in the world of the child. It is difficult to have the both worlds not merely presented in parallel but in an interwoven drama of intersecting and conflicting desires. Only the greatest writers can do this successfully. One thinks perhaps of Dickens. In this sense, the young author of this novel, Avellina Balestri, has the mark of a great author, or at least a great author in the making.

As I continued reading with a heightened degree of interest and avidity, I wondered why such a novel had been self-published. Why had Miss Balestri not secured a reputable publisher for this work of indubitable literary merit? As I read on, the reason became apparent. On the one hand, the real presence of Catholicism would have precluded its acceptance by any secular publisher in our political and ideologically-charged culture. On the other hand, Miss Balestri’s unflinching approach to sexual activity would preclude its being accepted by any Christian publisher, except the most adventurous, such as Wiseblood Books.

With regard to the presence of sexual practices, Miss Balestri shows an all too rare sensibility. She is certainly not prudish nor puritanical, nor is she even coy; yet neither does she succumb to the lascivious voyeurism which is all too common in contemporary fiction. We are not left at the cabin door in the manner in which Waugh leaves the reader in Brideshead Revisited when Charles and Julia cross the threshold into Julia’s cabin and into the commencement of their adulterous affair; nor are we invited into the room to become a fly-on-the-wall. Instead, Miss Balestri shows us rape, attempted rape, child abuse, marital relations, and adulterous relations, without ever losing control of the descriptive language necessary to keep such incidents from becoming either offensive or titillating. This is a rare gift indeed.

Most important is the historical realism which pervades the telling of the tale. Even allowing for the fact that Sherwood Forest is a place of mystery, shrouded with mythic mist and haunted by the shades of the legendary spirits which walk in its shadows, the backdrop of twelfth-century England is alive with historical verity. Miss Balestri has done her homework. The tension between the Saxon population and their Norman overlords is shown as it must have been at the time. The daily lives of the protagonists seem to reflect what we know or imagine we know about the daily lives of people in medieval England. There is no gatecrashing of the past with anomalous and absurd characters from the present day, parachuted in to deliver the moral agenda of the nihilistic zeitgeist. There are no radical feminists or militant atheists. Instead, there are sinners innumerable and noble souls who try to live virtuously in spite of temptations to pride, hatred, anger, violence, and lust. They are not saints themselves, but they revere the saints enough to want to become more like them. They are, therefore, whether they know it or not, saints in the making. Such are Robin Locksley and Maid Marian.

It is perilous to offer the final word on any work of literature until the final word is written. I have no idea whether Miss Balestri has yet even written the final word. As such, I have no idea whether Book Two of The Telling of the Beads will be as good as this first book or, for that matter, whether there will be a Book Three or a Book Four. I do know, however, that I have just finished a truly masterful piece of storytelling. It is not without flaws, which I will desist from listing, but they are remarkably few in number. Above all, it is historical fiction which offers a true reflection of what is known of the historical facts. Although the story moves in the mysterious spaces in which the historical pieces are missing, it does so in a way that fits comfortably beside the historical pieces that are present in the documentary records. (Read more.)

Robin Hood and Maid Marian

 About the Author:

Avellina Balestri is a Catholic author and editor based in the historic borderlands of Maryland and Pennsylvania. Her stories, poems, and essays have been featured in over thirty print and online publications. She has published two books: "Saplings of Sherwood", the first book in a Robin Hood retelling series, and "Pendragon's Shield", a collection of poetry. She is the Editor-in-Chief of Fellowship & Fairydust, a magazine inspiring faith & creativity and exploring the arts through a spiritual lens.

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The Rising Tide of Antisemitism

What a nightmare. From RAIR Foundation:

As we witness the erosion of classically liberal societies and the rising tide of antisemitism, it becomes evident that leftist influences have played a significant role in fostering not only divisions but also the spread of Islamic hatred towards Jews. In recent days, Germany has seen more violent Jew-hatred, reminiscent of its dark Nazi past. The Star of David has been brazenly graffitied on the doors of Jewish homes in Berlin, marking a horrifying echo of anti-Semitic persecution during the Nazi era. This deeply troubling development is a grim reminder of the consequences when hatred is left unchallenged.

This global trend of antisemitism has intensified, particularly following the outbreak of violence in the Israel-Hamas conflict, which erupted on October 7. Tragically, more than 1,300 Israelis have lost their lives, and over 3,200 individuals have sustained injuries. Additionally, hundreds have been kidnapped by Hamas forces during their invasion. This day is marked as one of the deadliest for Jews since the Holocaust, as Hamas indiscriminately targeted anyone within their reach.

Immigration Policy and Antisemitism

The country’s open-door policy towards Muslim migrants, spearheaded by former Chancellor Angela Merkel, has played a significant role in shaping the current landscape in Germany and has contributed to the proliferation of anti-Semitism. The recent acts of vandalism, intimidation, and violence are a manifestation of the deep-seated Islamic antisemitism that has taken root in parts of German society.

Acts of Vandalism and Fear

Disturbing images of the Star of David emblazoned on the doors of Jewish homes have sent shockwaves across the nation. Jewish residents in Berlin have reported a sharp increase in abuse following the recent Hamas attacks on Israel. One young Jewish woman returned home to find her door graffitied with this symbol. She spoke of her shock and fear, highlighting the deeply troubling impact of such incidents on individual lives. (Read more.)

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Love After Life: Nobel-Winning Physicist Richard Feynman’s Extraordinary Letter to His Departed Wife

 From The Marginalian:

In high school, the teenage Richard spent summers at the beach in his native Far Rockaway. There, he grew besotted with a striking girl named Arline — a girl he knew he would marry. Both complement and counterpoint to his own nature, Arline met Richard’s inclination for science with ardor for philosophy and art. (The art class he took just to be near her would lay the foundation for his little-known, lifelong passion for drawing.) By his junior year, Richard proposed. Arline accepted. With the eyes of young love, they peered into a shared future of infinite possibility for bliss.

But they were abruptly grounded when a mysterious malady began afflicting Arline with inexplicable symptoms — a lump would appear and disappear on her neck, fevers would roil over her with no apparent cause. Eventually, she was hospitalized for what was believed to be typhoid.

Gleick writes:

Feynman began to glimpse the special powerlessness that medical uncertainty can inflict on a scientific person. He had come to believe that the scientific way of thinking brought a measure of calmness and control in difficult situations — but not now.

Just as Feynman began bombarding the doctors with questions that steered them toward a closer approximation of the scientific method, Arline began to recover just as mysteriously and unpredictably as she had fallen ill. But the respite was only temporary. The symptoms returned, still shorn of a concrete explanation but now unambiguously pointing toward the terminal — a prognosis Arline’s doctors kept from her. Richard refused to go along with the deception — he and Arline had promised each other to face life with unremitting truthfulness — but he was forced to calibrate his commitment to circumstance.

Gleick writes:

His parents, Arline’s parents, and the doctors all urged him not to be so cruel as to tell a young woman she was dying. His sister, Joan, sobbing, told him he was stubborn and heartless. He broke down and bowed to tradition. In her room at Farmingdale Hospital, with her parents at her side, he confirmed that she had glandular fever. Meanwhile, he started carrying around a letter — a “goodbye love letter,” as he called it — that he planned to give her when she discovered the truth. He was sure she would never forgive the unforgivable lie.

He did not have long to wait. Soon after Arline returned home from the hospital she crept to the top of the stairs and overheard her mother weeping with a neighbor down in the kitchen. When she confronted Richard — his letter snug in his pocket — he told her the truth, handed her the letter, and asked her to marry him.

(Read more.)

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