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    Other Kingdoms
    Other Kingdoms
    Other Kingdoms
    Ebook299 pages4 hours

    Other Kingdoms

    By Richard Matheson

    3/5

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    About this ebook

    For over half a century, Richard Matheson has enthralled and terrified readers with such timeless classics as I Am Legend, The Incredible Shrinking Man, Duel, Somewhere in Time, and What Dreams May Come. Now the Grand Master returns with a bewitching tale of erotic suspense and enchantment.…

    1918. A young American soldier, recently wounded in the Great War, Alex White comes to Gatford to escape his troubled past. The pastoral English village seems the perfect spot to heal his wounded body and soul. True, the neighboring woods are said to be haunted by capricious, even malevolent spirits, but surely those are just old wives' tales.

    Aren't they?

    A frightening encounter in the forest leads Alex into the arms of Magda Variel, an alluring red-haired widow rumored to be a witch. She warns him to steer clear of the wood and the perilous faerie kingdom it borders, but Alex cannot help himself. Drawn to its verdant mysteries, he finds love, danger…and wonders that will forever change his view of the world.

    Other Kingdoms casts a magical spell, as conjured by a truly legendary storyteller.



    At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherMacmillan Publishers
    Release dateMar 1, 2011
    ISBN9781429966443
    Other Kingdoms
    Author

    Richard Matheson

    Richard Matheson (1926-2013) is the author of many classic novels and short stories. He wrote in a variety of genres including terror, fantasy, horror, paranormal, suspense, science fiction and western. In addition to books, he wrote prolifically for television (including The Twilight Zone, Night Gallery, Star Trek) and numerous feature films. Many of Matheson’s novels and stories have been made into movies including I Am Legend, Somewhere in Time, and Shrinking Man. His many awards include the World Fantasy and Bram Stoker Awards for Lifetime Achievement, the Hugo Award, Edgar Award, Spur Award for Best Western Novel, Writer’s Guild awards, and in 2010 he was inducted into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame.

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    Reviews for Other Kingdoms

    3/5

    64 ratings14 reviews

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    • 2/5
      Disappointing.
    • 3/5
      A novel about the horrors of The Great War and being a Navy brat veers wildly off-track when the narrator encounters the Fey Folk.
    • 3/5
      While there were some things about this book that I liked (at least initially), I can't give it my wholehearted approval. The narrator became very annoying and repetitious (I know he is an elderly man when "writing" the book, but it gets to be too much) and although the beginning promised terrifying events and a barely believable story, the second part of the book pretty much fell flat. I was actually kind of glad when it was over, although I did finish it. Sad to say, it was definitely not as strong as other amazing things I've read by this author.
    • 3/5
      Good, but not great! The style, with the narrator constantly interrupting, bugged me at times. Still, I enjoyed it. The story is told by an 82 year old man recalling when he was 18. He served in WW I, moved to England, and had this adventure with fairies, a witch, and all sorts of craziness!
    • 1/5
      Meh. I found this rather annoying and pointless. It wasn't terrible, and I managed to slog through, but it was a near thing. Neither erotic, nor enchanting, in my view.
    • 4/5
      It's like Avatar, only with fairies instead of 10-foot aliens! OK, not entirely.
    • 2/5
      An eighteen year old veteran of WWI moves to northern England on the advice of a deceased war buddy. Once there he soon receives warnings from the locals about avoiding the woods because of the "wee folk". Unwilling to believe such a bumptious notion, the protagonist sets forth with abandoned and finds his bedrock beliefs about the world to be dead wrong.Something about this author's style rubs me the wrong way. I hated how the narrator kept commenting about his writing style. It continually threw me out of the story and felt somehow pompous. Besides that the characters seemed to just have emotions without any real explanation. The main character's love interest came totally out of left field for me. They both just immediately loved each other deeply and perfectly. What's so hard to believe about that? Hmmmm... everything? Ah well.
    • 3/5
      A passably nice story. Although, how can you expect any less of Richard Matheson. His skill is unparalleled, and he writes with an ease that is easy to overlook. However, all that talent is brought to bear on a fairly inconsequential story.An 18-year old leaves the trenches of Europe and moves to the British Isles, much of this driven because of a father that he hates. He visits and moves to the small town of one of his trench-mates where he is introduced to witches, fairies, and the strange world of the Middle Kingdoms.Matheson has done his research – it is evidenced throughout. And, as I’ve already indicated, he brings his considerable talents to bear on the story. However, there just isn’t that much story to be had here. In addition, the scenes that are meant to strike horror do no more than ruffle the reader’s feathers. (One other problem, the contrivance of having an 80-year old author of potboiler horror write this memoir gets old relatively quickly.)What keeps the reader going is the way Matheson skillfully keeps us guessing about where the truth lies – who is good and who is bad. And there is a sweetness about one of the love stories that does ring of some truth.Which all leads to a story that is not bad, but is not great. A quick read. An easy read. But a read that, I have a feeling, will disappear as quickly as the memory of some of the stories protagonists.
    • 2/5
      Other Kingdoms starts off strong. A young soldier makes an unusual friend in the trenches, who dies and leaves behind a mystery. The soldier goes off to his late friend's hometown in England. This had real promise, but then the story degenerates into a Mary-Sue-ish romp as beautiful supernatural women throw themselves at our protagonist.Women are portrayed as either insane and cruel or vapid and one-dimensional, things happen for no apparent reason, the romance in the story is unbelievable, and the depressing ending feels forced.This book gets two stars instead of one for its interesting and unusual writing style.
    • 3/5
      This is a strange book, defined by what it's not more than what it is, the paths it could have gone down but didn't.I'll step lightly here. As usual, Matheson is brief and the cover blurb covers the first third of this short novel.We start out with the narrator detailing his horrible home life under the oppressive rule of Captain White, United States Navy. But Alex flees home to serve in WWI. There he meets the charming Harold, an English soldier in the trenches. And Harold dies but, with his dying breath, he urges Alex to go to Gatford, his hometown. He also urges him to avoid "the middle" - a warning Alex thinks about a lot in the first half of the book and not so much in the second because, like much else here, things shift in importance and emphasis frequently. The war shifts from immediate to background horror. This is not a horror of war novel.Alex's welcome in Gatford, particularly after showing around a lump of gold inherited from Harold, is not what he expects. There is dark talk about the source of the gold, the faeries in the nearby wood. But this is not a mystery about whether the woods are haunted by little people.And, when the beautiful Magda saves Alex from an invisible menace in that wood, the book doesn't go down the paths the reader expects.And it's not just the twisting plot that is unexpected. It's the tone. White's narration breaks up any sustained tone of horror. He frequently points out the errors of his eighteen year old, callow, lying self. He can't help pointing out those "Arthur Black touches" - frequent alliteration - in his oral history-like account. He lays on the foreshadowing thickly, quite consciously, but, at novel's end, the horrors he predicted may not be those we anticipated. Despite all the terrors and magic and talk of astral bodies and scrying and psychic projections and wiccanism, this book is, at its core, the sad reminisces of a man in his 80s talking about his life's one great, pure love.Was I disappointed? Not really because I didn't really want to go to any of those places I thought I was being taken to, and Matheson is always concise enough a writer that even his missteps don't feel like a waste of time.
    • 2/5
      My first reading experience of Richard Matheson was 'I Am Legend', a piece of work that deserves all of the praise it has received. I loved that story and, although I did not read anything else by Matheson for a few years, I was under the assumption that he was a masterful storyteller of horror and strange happenings.Then I read "Earthbound." That was about a man who cheats on his wife with the ghost of a young woman. That book is full of what I imagine an older man perceives as pervy sex while having not much plot. I thought that this was a fluke on Matheson's part, one bad story.Recently I read this book, "Other Kingdoms." Once again, it's about a man who is seduced by a wicked woman (a witch rather than a ghost), way too much sex, and bad plot. The character types of women in these last two books I've read by Matheson have left a bad taste with me. I've seen two stereotypes for his women: evil and loose or child-like and innocent.If you're thinking of picking this up because you liked 'I Am Legend', I have one word for you: Don't.
    • 4/5
      The name Richard Matheson didn't mean anything to me. I saw this novel in the top 10 for sci-fi books and figured it was worth a shot. Then, I glance at the back cover. Stephen King and other authors I love to read are praising this Matheson saying he's their favorite. Nice, I thought. I scan the list of previous works and realize I'm an idiot. Although I hadn't recognized his name I sure did his works such as Terror at 20,000 Feet, I Am Legend and What Dreams May Come. This one is also quite the tale. Young man can't wait to leave home to escape an overbearing father. Goes to war and bonds with a fellow in the trenches. After the war, he ends up traveling to his friends home town in England. Weirdness ensues. Witches and fairies and mythical creatures. Oh my. The 80-something year old narrator goes off on tangents quite frequently in his recollection of events. I wasn't sure if that was the way of his writer-self or if it was old age as he described. I'm just not sure if I can believe that after everything this kid goes through, he'd become a productive member of society. Let alone a sane one.
    • 4/5
      This tale of witchcraft and faerie is charmingly set in a remote British village at the very end of the Great War. The supernatural beings with whom the narrator mingles require only minimal suspension of disbelief. On the other hand, the narrator himself is something of a dolt, albeit one who is seemingly irresistible to unearthly females. The book's great weakness is repeated disregard of Chekov's dictum about the gun over the mantle. Here there are firearms (speaking metaphorically) over the mantle, on top of the couch, scattered across chairs, littering the floor - and not one of them ever goes off. Maybe this steady disappointment of expectations is a literary device; if so, it's not a good one.
    • 3/5
      Somewhat disappointed in this one. Considering "What Dreams May Come" is one of my all time favorite books, I think this fell short of my expectations.

    Book preview

    Other Kingdoms - Richard Matheson

    Introduction

    To begin with, my name is not Arthur Black. My family name is White. My given name is Alexander. The publisher of my twenty-seven novels decided that Alexander White was not an appropriate name for the author of the MIDNIGHT series—choice selections such as MIDNIGHT BLOOD THIRST and MIDNIGHT FLESH HUNGER. Among twenty-four other tasteful items. Accordingly, he gave me the name of Arthur Black. I went along with it. I needed the money. At three thousand dollars a shot—later three-five—I managed to squeeze by.

    Despite the questionable tenor of my thirty-year oeuvre, I hesitated to write this book. Why? Because it’s true. No matter the wonders and indescribable terrors (which I have nonetheless attempted to describe, anyway), every incident is factual. You will, undoubtedly, question that statement. Rereading my manuscript, I am tempted to question it myself. Yet my account is true; I swear it. Forget the MIDNIGHT series (assuming you have had the poor judgment and loose change to actually read them). This is not (is not, I emphasize) fiction. Bizarre, incredible, bone-chilling though it may be (and I have tried not to overstate the more grotesque elements), there is not a doubt in my mind that they all took place in the year 1918, when I was eighteen years old.

    I am eighty-two years old now—which gives you some idea of how long I waited to write this book.

    Arthur Black (as you know me)

    February 9, 1982                        

    I

    Chapter One

    I was born in Brooklyn, New York, on February 20, 1900. The son of Captain Bradford Smith White, USN, and Martha Justine Hollenbeck. I had one sister, Veronica, younger than I, who died the same year these strange incidents began.

    Captain Bradford Smith White, USN, was a swine. There, I’ve written it down after all these years. He was a total swine. No, he wasn’t. He was a sick man. His brain was gnarled—shadow ridden, you might say.

    Veronica and I (especially Veronica) suffered greatly at his hands. His discipline was iron based. The Navy spared him from being institutionalized, I believe. Where else could his near-demented behavior be permitted? Our mother, tenderhearted and emotional, died before she was forty. I should say, escaped before she was forty. Her wifehood was an extended sojourn in Hell.

    *   *   *

    I present a small example:

    One day in March 1915, Mother, Veronica, and I received an invitation (an order) to attend a dinner on father’s ship (a supply ship, I recall). None of us wanted to go, but there was scant alternative—Daddy’s ship for dinner or, for refusing, several weeks (perhaps a month) of indeterminate punishment.

    So we donned our respectful bibs and tuckers, and were driven to the Navy Yard, there to discover that Daddy’s ship was anchored on the Hudson River, which, with driving winds, was being whipped into minor tsunamis.

    Would any husband and father in his right mind have permitted his family to face such a perilous experience? I ask you, would any husband and father in his right mind not have canceled the entire crazy venture and taken his family to a decent restaurant? I answer for you. Of course he would. Did Captain Bradford Smith White, USN, behave as though he was in his right mind? One guess. We were scheduled to have dinner aboard the USS White—Swine, it should have been named. If we all drowned en route—what is it the ruffian set says today?—tough titties. Regrettable but unavoidable.

    We stepped, lurchingly, aboard the Captain’s gig—his private launch—and departed. The side awnings were lowered, Dad’s concession to reality, no doubt. The wind, however, was blowing so tremendously that the awnings kept flapping open at their bottoms, spraying us with Hudson River. Needless to say—I say it regardless—the waves were more than choppy; they were semi-mountainous. The gig shuddered and bounced, tilted and rocked. Mother pleaded with the Captain to turn back, but he remained adamant, lips compressed and bloodless. We would be arriving at the ship toot-sweet—he actually used the phrase, or, should I say, butchered it? Mother held a handkerchief to her lips, no doubt to prevent losing any prior meals that day. Veronica wept. I take that back; attempted (in vain) to keep from weeping, because the Captain loathed her tears, making it abundantly clear that he did with many a dark critical glance.

    Somehow, despite my conviction that we were all destined for the bottom of the river, we finally arrived—still alive but damp—at Dad’s ship, which, dear reader, was scarcely the conclusion of our mal de mer nightmare. There were, you see, no convenient steps to the deck, only an exterior metal ladder, which, because of the leaping waves, was running with water. Up this slip-and-slide companionway climbed the White clan, totally convinced that death of one variety or another—by falling and/or drowning—was imminent. (Actually falling first, then submersion in the briny deep.)

    The spotlight of the gig glared on—increasing our blind ascent—what with the ship’s spotlight also on—and Mother went first, assisted (poorly) by a terrified sailor. To my amazement—and disbelieving relief—she neither fell nor submerged, achieving the deck, still damp but unscathed. Veronica went next. At that moment, I summoned a hope for guardian angels. Surrendering completely her effort not to weep and offend the Captain, she labored, assisted, up the puddling ladder, slipping more than once and shedding copious tears and sobs. I followed; gripping the cold ladder railing so rigidly, my hands went numb. No assistance for me. Father either assumed I was strong enough to manage on my own—or else harbored a secret hope that I would tumble to a watery grave and relieve him of an irritating son.

    Whatever the case, I climbed alone, clutching the ladder railing with both hands. Above me—I tried not to look up but did, distracted by the wild flapping of Veronica’s skirt, catching sight, at one point, of her underpants—a momentary glimpse of wetness. No surprise. I did the same. I wonder if Mother had, also, suffered alike. The weakness could not possibly have come from Father’s side of the genes. If he had any weakness, it was a total inability to identify with other human beings.

    At one point of the death-defying climb, Veronica slipped off the ladder completely, screaming in terror, the high heel of her left shoe (why didn’t she wear mountain-climbing boots?) nicking the top of my head (why didn’t I wear a fireman’s helmet?), which began to drip blood. A chancy moment. Was Veronica to hurtle to the river? Was I to bleed to death?

    Neither. Veronica, sobbing, stricken to the core, poor sweet dear that she was, regained her footing, assisted by the sailor who was with her, and was hauled up onto the deck by another sailor, a burly, redheaded, chuckling lout of a man. I followed, and so, to my chagrin, did Captain Bradford Smith White, USN, a thin smile on his granite lips. He was amused by the entire event. I’m sure Mother could have killed him. Ditto. Twice over.

    A few words about my sister. Veronica was a truly gentle soul. Once, in a driving rainstorm, she picked up a bleeding puppy that had been struck (and deserted) by a speeding motorist. She carried it home—five blocks—in her arms. By a stroke of ill fortune, the Captain was not away that afternoon and ordered her to remove that damned, whining beast from the premises before it bled all over the handmade Chinese rug.

    Only a hysterical, weeping fit by Veronica—and an atypical temperamental foot-stomping by Mother—not to mention a few choice verbal attacks by me, laced with impulsive profanities (for which I later paid a hefty price; I leave that to your imagination) persuaded the outgunned Captain Bradford Smith White, USN, to—stiffly—allow Veronica to take the shivering, silent—still bleeding—mutt to an unused corner of the cellar.

    I went down there with her, disobeying the good Captain’s injunction to go to your damned room. (Another dereliction for which I paid hefty price number 2.) There I watched the dear, sweet, bless-her-noble-heart girl—still crying softly, gulping down body-racking sobs—care, with loving gentleness, for the puppy (she was, poor girl, a teenage Florence Nightingale), washing and bandaging, with household bandages, no less. ("Puppy needs them more than him." Revealing to me—as if I needed it—her detestation of our father.) Fixing the puppy’s cuts and bruises, then kissing its damp head, crying anew when the puppy licked her hand.

    Happy ending? You want a happy ending? Skip it. In the early morning, Veronica rushed down to the cellar to see if the puppy was all right. It was gone. She ran to question Captain Bradford Smith White, USN, and Mother told her Father had gone for the day to discharge his naval duties—probably beating some sailor to death with a chain. But I digress.

    Crying helplessly, Veronica, suspecting the worst (most logically), hurried outside. To find the puppy on the back porch, curled up in an uncovered cardboard box. Needless to say—I am vengefully pleased to say—it was still raining, and the puppy was shaking uncontrollably and dying. Which it did that afternoon. I would like to describe the burial ceremony conducted by a heart-stricken Veronica, but the memory is too painful to relive in detail.

    One more Captain Bradford Smith White, USN, anecdote. One more black star in his Book of Swinishness. Its conclusion? He castigated Veronica (severely) for ruining a blanket, using a box of household bandages, and digging an unauthorized grave in the backyard soil and, further, conducting an un-Christian funeral ceremony without express permission from the Church. Was he kidding? No.

    *   *   *

    Veronica was never very healthy, much less robust. Mother drove her—a long, inconvenient drive—to a naval hospital for treatment. Captain You Know Who would not permit Veronica—or Mother or me—to be treated by a local physician. He was a naval officer (by God), and treatment for a naval officer’s family must (repeat, must) by administered by a naval hospital or clinic. (By God.)

    Veronica grew weaker by the year. By the time the influenza epidemic landed on the United States, she was primed for the blow, hardly resistant at all. Poor, dear, sweet Veronica. I still miss her and weep for her unhappiness.

    The Captain had his brutal effect on me, mostly in my preteen years. A Pisces (it has been labeled the trash bin of the zodiac), I, too, cried a lot before I was fifteen. Then my rising sign, whatever it may be (actually, I know), must have risen strongly and declared itself, for I began to shut myself off from Captain B. S., USN. He no longer got to me. If I’d been the happy owner of a loaded pistol, I would probably (I do not say undoubtedly) have shot him many times over. For Veronica. For Mother. For myself. No guilt involved. I knew that much. More like a sense of grinning justification.

    *   *   *

    I have avoided, long enough, the transmission of my terrible tale. (Remember, of course, that it is, as well, a wondrous tale.) You know, already, that I have been too emotionally bound up to convey it for more than sixty years. So if I forget myself and allow my Arthur Black commercial overstatement to leak through, kindly take pity on the blind-eyed, money-seeking element in my elderly author persona. I promise you that what I am about to tell you did not ooze from my diseased brain. It happened.

    *   *   *

    Return with me to 1918. I was eighteen years of age. World War One was in full swing. Captain Bradford Smith White, USN, wanted me, naturally, to join the Navy; he would see to it that I got a proper position. Does it surprise you to read that I demurred? I enlisted in the army. I cannot adequately describe the intense pleasure I experienced when I witnessed the look of utter revulsion on his face when I told him the good news. (I was going to war for Uncle Sam!)

    So there I was, an army enlistee, no doubt destined for a journey to France.

    It was not the exact beginning of my nightmare-to-come, but it was certainly a good start.

    Chapter Two

    On April 16, 1917, the United States declared war on Germany. What a declaration of war means, I have no idea. I suppose it means, We will now fire shells and bullets at you and fully expect reciprocation. Or, You are no longer our friend, and we hereby declare that we regard you as our enemy. Or some such nonsense.

    On June 7, National Draft Day, I enlisted and eventually became a nonentity in the 111th Infantry, Twenty-eighth Division, AEF (American Expeditionary Force). I have already told you about dear old Dad’s reaction to my back-turning on the U.S. Navy. After I’d related the news to him, he retired to the bathroom, there to expel at least a two months’ supply (probably more) of bile at the displeasing information.

    Later, I discovered that conscription applied to any young patriots between the ages of twenty-one and thirty-one. So I could have waited. What, and deprive myself of the pleasure of viewing the Captain’s face curl up with disgust? No, I did it at the right moment. So I could have been killed sooner. No matter. Actually, I could have been killed, anyway.

    In July, I was shipped by train (I was merely a package to be shipped from pillar to post) to Camp Kearny in California, where I cut a dashing figure in my rumpled garb and Boy Scout hat, no leggings, three weeks in overalls. For sixteen weeks, I learned the skills of open warfare, part of which was trench warfare. General Pershing did not approve of it—he preferred offense attacks.

    I was defined as a rifleman. Due to supply shortages, our rifles were made of wood; we got real ones only on the shooting range. We were also taught the operation of the bayonet. I came to the assumption that the victim of a bayonet insertion would require an operation, Major. We were also instructed in camouflage. As though it would be of value in the trenches.

    Captain Bradford Smith White, USN, would have been gratified by the fact that there were no Nigras in my company; they served exclusively in a segregated regiment. They were later (Capt. would not have been gratified) completely integrated in the French army, issued French helmets, rifles, and other equipment. Those blacks who remained in the AEF performed such prestigious services as grave digging and onion peeling.

    Why were we called doughboys? I was told that soldiers marching in Southwest deserts were covered with so much sweat-stained dust that they and their uniforms took on the appearance of adobe coating. Adobe was, presently, altered to doughboy. Probably not true, but as good as any explanation. The soldiers’ blouse buttons resembling lumps of fried dough? Dubious.

    On December 7, 1917, the United States declared (that word again) war on Austria-Hungary. No way out of it now.

    I was shipped overseas on a small British liner. We slept on a lower deck, officers getting upper berths. The food, to be charitable, was god-awful, the smell even worse, the water barely drinkable—there were moments when I almost regretted not taking the Captain’s offer to assist me. Almost.

    It took thirteen vomitous days to arrive in Brest. There, empty of stomach, we were transported in French forty and eights. (Box cars—forty hommes, eight chevaux—horses.) Traveling in said style, we were taken to the British sector and, there, driven in small, old, rattly, drafty trucks to the Front—euphemism for Death Zone. There, bolstered by cheap French champagne—seventy cents a quart at that time, five dollars a quart when demand exceeded supply, or when the French discovered that we had more money than we knew what to do with and didn’t want to get blown up with currency in our pockets. At any rate, we paid it.

    Thus, in late December of 1917, I entered the trenches. That was how they expressed it. Entered the trenches. As though it was a stage direction. Which, in a way, of course, it was. The problem being that the play was a one-act tragedy-farce starring us. With no hope of a happy ending. And, conceivably, no performers remaining to take final bows. Until the next season, when an all-new cast was called upon to emote—or die.

    So, physically, mentally, and militarily unprepared, I entered the trenches.

    Chapter Three

    How do I describe life in the trenches during World War I? Historical-Pastoral? To quote Polonius: Tragical-Historical-Comical? Pastoral-whatever? Who knows? I am not the Bard of Avon. I’m Arthur Black. Perhaps Hamlet plus Macbeth plus King Lear plus any other gory play penned by Shakespeare. Too bad he didn’t write The Inferno. That would have come closer.

    I won’t go into many details here. I’ll save them for later in my story. Correction: my account. All I’ll say, at this point, is By golly, it was fun! Minus a few small elements. A thousand rats, for instance. We shot them, pounded them with shovels, et cetera. Not too many, mind. They did warn us of impending bombardment: They vanished beforehand.

    Speaking of bombardments—another element I’ll sketch in at this moment. Where we were had been, so I was told, woods and farm fields, which were soon artilleryized (my own word) to a forest of splintered tree trunks.

    Shell shock.

    Explosions, you see, create a vacuum, and when the air rushes back in, it creates a bit of a stir in the cerebro-spinal fluid, which has a tendency to—how should I put it discreetly?—make a fellow grumpy. No problem. Grumpy doughboys were removed from the line and treated, with gentle loving care, at one of the many glamorous resorts in the Gallic countryside. That may be an exaggeration. It is. Bleeding from the ears and shrieking with pain, they were removed from the lines and probably never seen again.

    Now I’m giving you details. Sorry. One more. Dawn attacks by representatives of the Triple Alliance—Germany, Austria-Hungary, Luxembourg. They were admirable opponents, since they had been preparing for nine years before the rest of us. Been discussing it since 1888.

    No more grisly details until later. You Arthur Black fans, hold on—you’ll have your demented appetites whetted, I assure you. For now, I will confine myself to more technical information. (You Arthur Black fans may choose to skip the next section. Though, if you do, I will summon forth the Great God Horribilis to suck the marrow from your bones. So there.)

    Moving onward. Life in the trenches was not really fun, by golly! Less than fun. Two million of us went to France. Fewer than two hundred thousand came back. Does that give you a hint? It took a long time for me to escape the distress of memories.

    The trench I lived in was five feet deep with three more feet of sandbags. I am glad it was a French-British trench. I was told that the American trenches were only four feet deep, which could scarcely prevent one’s head from being blown off. We had a fire step, which allowed the bravest of us to fire at the Huns or hurl hand grenades. We were good at that because of baseball experience. Strike three, good-bye, Mr. Kraut! At least that was my Arthur Black fancy.

    The Brits, knowing better, placed proper emphasis on trench life. Hand grenades, machine guns, and mortars were more their style. Plus, warnings about the Germans’ proclivity toward same. Good for them. If it weren’t for their cautioning words, you could be looking at a collection of blank pages. MIDNIGHT NOTHING by Arthur Black.

    *   *   *

    Walking past Harold Lightfoot that afternoon changed my entire life.

    I say walking. It was closer to slogging, the trench floor being three inches deep in mud. Sunday afternoon. Either the Germans were observing the Sabbath or they were temporarily out of ammunition.

    At any rate, I splashed brown viscous goo across the legs and lap of the young man, sitting, unnoticed by me, cleaning some kind of weapon. I say some kind because, following its mud immersion, there was no way to distinguish what kind of weapon it was except that it was as long as a rifle and disgustingly splattered. "’Ey you BF, mind your step!" were the rotund young man’s opening words to

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