"Do Not Open the Door."

On the morning of her fifth day at the cabin on Devil's Lake the sky was blood red. An ominous sensation gave Emma a chill so that she actually shivered. For some reason, throughout the rest of the morning she was unable to shake the feeling of foreboding it gave her.

As noon approached she decided to run into town to pick up a few groceries. On the way she'd stop at Lena's Diner to catch a little gossip over a light lunch.

"Hey, how's that book coming along," Lena said as she walked up to the counter at Lena's. 

Emma wondered how forthright to be "You know how it is with writers. Sometimes the words just flow and other times..." Her words tapered off. Hank Bigelow, seated at the far table, was looking at her in a way that made her uncomfortable. 

Lena glanced over at Hank, then spoke to Emma in a low voice. "Never mind him. He's just an old lumberjack who's lived too long up in the woods here." 

"Tuesday someone told me he killed a man once. Any truth in that?"

"Oh I don't know," Lena said, scrunching her nose. "You know what they say. Don't believe everything you hear."

"Is he still staring at me?"

Lena looked up, tugged at a strand of her hair and curled it around her finger, then grabbed a pitcher of icewater and walked around to two or three tables filling glasses before coming back to Hank. "Here ya go, buddy. Can I bring your tab?" 

Hank muttered something incoherent, placed a ten dollar bill on the table, shoved his chair back and stood. "Lena, that was pretty good. I don't know how ya do it," he said.

"That's my secret. You know how to keep secrets? I do, too."

Hank turned, headed for the door without looking back. 

"How many years have you been coming up here, Emma?"

"Must've been about seven or eight. I wrote my first novel here." 

"Was that Destiny?"

"No, Destiny was my second. Drowning. That was my first. All my novels start with the letter D. My English teacher gave me a D on my senior project and said I'd never amount to anything. My poetry sucked, and my stories were silly sentimental nothings," she said. 

"What's the title of this one going to be?"

"The working title is Daggers."

"So you're doing another murder mystery?"

"It's about a relationship gone bad. The title comes from the way she looked at him in the end."

"Does she get away with it?" Lena's smile was infectious and the cloud over Emma's day began to lift.

"I can't tell you that. The characters will decide how this plays out."

* * * * 

That evening the promised shift in the weather rolled in. As the wind began picking up, the trees around the lake began to sway. Emma went to the front door and watched as the sky turned a deep shade of grey and a sense of unease began to permeate the air. A rumble of distant thunder could be heard and the sky itself seemed to growl as it roiled, the clouds swirling, their edges tinged with an ominous shade of green.

As the storm drew near, with its flashes of lightning, the air became charged with static electricity.

While growing up Emma actually enjoyed storms like this, impressed with their power. Tonight that sense of foreboding that chilled her that morning had returned.

The rain, initially pelting sporadically on the roof and windows, was soon pouring down in sheets. The thunder grew louder and more frequent till it was a deafening roar shaking the entire cabin.

Each bolt of lightning illuminated the sky in a blinding flash, casting a stark and eerie light upon the landscape. The wind whipped the trees as if trying to tear them from the earth.

The outside air was filled with the acrid smell of ozone which seeped into the cabin. The sharp tang stung Emma's nostrils and made her feel as if the very fabric of reality was being ripped apart. The rain yielded to hail, pelting the roof, siding and windows with icy bullets.

In the midst of all this cacophony, Emma felt small and powerless, like a mortal caught in the wrath of the gods themselves. Then, as suddenly as it began, the storm began to recede, the thunder and lightning retreating into the distance as the rain faded to a gentle patter. 

Emma poured herself a second glass of wine, grabbed her laptop off the counter and nestled into a recliner. She wanted to capture in words what she had just experienced and felt. After no more than a minute or two she heard a knock at the door. She looked at the clock – it was very late. Who could be knocking at her door at this hour?

As she stood to go look through the peephole, she knocked the wineglass off the

end table, shattering on the hardwood floor, the wine spreading like a blood stain.

When the knocking started up again, it made her jump. Emma's heart raced as she considered whether to open the door.

But then she remembered the warnings she had heard from neighbors – strange things had been happening in the out here. People were disappearing. Some were found dead, with no explanation as to how they died. 

"Don't open the door for anyone," they had said. "No matter how much they plead or beg. Don't let them in."

Emma's fear grew as the knocking grew more insistent. She bent over a picked up a shard of glass, her heart racing.

Then, suddenly, the knocking stopped. There was silence. Emma held her breath, waiting to see if it was really over.

But then she heard a voice, a chilling whisper from just outside the door.

"Please, let me in," it said. "I need your help. Don't be afraid."

Emma knew she shouldn't, but her curiosity got the better of her. She slowly approached the door, her hand shaking as she reached for the doorknob. Then she heard it – a low growl, followed by a scratching sound. Something was clawing at the door, trying to get in. 

* * * 

Disclaimer: The idea for this story occurred while I was at Walgreens. While looking at the book rack I saw that one of the books had the title Do Not Open the Door. I wrote the title down, wondering what I'd write. I asked ChatGPT for a story outline which I fleshed out and ended up with this. The illustrations were created by using an AI app to modify a couple of my original paintings.

Related Link

The Unfinished Stories of Richard Allen Garston.

  

The Opening Idea in Thomas Merton's Opening the Bible

"What kind of book is this?" Such a question cannot be answered without taking into account the very peculiar claims that have been made for the Bible by Christian, Jewish and even Muslim believers: claims which, to many modern men, are outrageous. Claims that this book is unlike any other, and that man's very destiny depends on it.

We cannot understand anything about the Bible unless we face the fact that these claims are made seriously, and that the outrage taken at them is also fully serious. Neither can be discounted. It is of the very nature of the Bible to affront, perplex and astonish the human mind. Hence the reader who opens the Bible must be prepared for disorientation, confusion, incomprehension, perhaps outrage.

* * * *

Thus begins a little volume by Thomas Merton titled Opening the Bible.

What I like about Merton's opening setup is that for many Christians the Bible has ceased to be a challenge or a problem. We (and I include myself here) can easily fall into the trap of reading the Bible in a non-engaged way, superficially grazing its contents on auto-pilot.  

This weekend I was looking again at one of my journals from our year in Mexico. (My wife and I worked at an orphanage south of Monterrey beginning in late 1980.) I noticed that my approach to daily Bible study at that time included (1) identifying a passage, (2) recording the message it contained, (3) identifying the larger context, (4) questions it raises, and (5) application.

When I look at the questions I was asking myself, I saw honesty and real searching. For example, in an Old Testament passage from I Kings  we read that God raised up an adversary against Solomon from the royal line of Edom because Solomon's heart had turned away from God. 

Among the many questions raised then (4 November 1981) I find these of special interest: "Was Solomon being punished, or disciplined? If Solomon was so wise (he was called the wisest man on earth) then how did he fail so badly?

* * * *

For those unfamiliar with Merton (1915-1968), his book Seven Storey Mountain was a worldwide bestseller. I remember being introduced to the book by a social studies teacher who lived across the street from us in Bridgewater back in the 60s. Like Saint Augustine, Merton was a roustabout in his youth. When God got hold of him he joined the Abbey of Gethsemani, a Trappist monastery in Kentucky. 

In the 1990s, while doing research for my story The Unfinished Stories of Richard Allen Garston, I had a desire to visit Gethsemani in order to accurately portray the setting. The central character in my story had escaped to this place for murky reasons that can be deduced from the story's ambiguous end. While there I saw where Thomas Merton's remains are buried. The memory is still vivid. (What my children probably remember most is the stinky cheese I bought there, something akin to Lindbergher, which I ate in the car, much to their displeasure.)

Thomas Merton spent 27 years here in this remote community of ascetics. Daily Bible reading and reflection left him a changed man. He writes, "The Bible is without question one of the most unsatisfying books ever written--at least until the reader has come to terms with it in a very special way."

* * * * 

Trivia: Thomas Merton died 10 December 1968, 54 years ago this weekend.

Here is a link again to my story The Unfinished Stories of Richard Allen Garston. Feedback welcome. Maybe one day I'll publish an anthology of my own unfinished stories. 

Eight Stories to Fill Downtime During Your Lockdown

When I built my first website in 1995 it included a section devoted to art by two crayon artists, Jeffrey Robert and Don Marco. I also used the web to share some of my fiction. The global internet--World Wide Web--was in its infancy then. Very early on three of my stories were translated into other languages. A couple years later I posted two short stories by my daughter. They ended up being published in California and New Zealand. 

Here are a few of the stories I shared at ennyman.com back then. No need to buy the books they appear in. I wrote them to be shared and enjoyed.

---

The M Zone
The revelation came suddenly. Like an "Aha!"... only it was an "Oh no!."

---

Two Acts That Changed the World
Of the dozen or so German physicists who had been assigned the task of building a super-bomb for Germany, Wilhelm Kurtweil more than any knew the consequences for humanity should the Nazis succeed in being the first to achieve this ultimate quest.

---

The Unfinished Stories of Richard Allen Garston
How impossible to know what is real and what is not.

---

The Nose
The crammed little bar sizzled with energy. So much was happening in the room that it began to unsettle him. He wondered why he ever said he would meet his friends here.

[Story inspired by an incident that happened to Italo Calvino's Mr. Palomar]

---

An Unremembered History of the World
This story begins slow, does not follow modern conventions of quick exciting hook etc. It is old fashioned. It exists because the author believed the story was worth the work and the reader who worked at it would be rewarded. I would not have it on this site if it were not important to me.

---

A Poem About Truth
The opening lines are derivative. The story is original. The message is timeless.

---

Terrorists Preying
Although I'd been an art major in college -- mostly painting and drawing -- I became discouraged with it shortly after graduation and gave it up. I was living with my family on Long Island at the time and for some while afterwards I still visited the New York art galleries, making regular tours of the Whitney, the Guggenheim and the Modern.

What finally got me out of art was the whole directionlessness of it all....

---

The Breaking Point
It was a Wednesday when the bill arrived. Cassie Hedberg's birthday was the following Monday, so it wasn't too difficult to put one and one together to make two.

Winner of the 1991 Arrowhead Regional Arts Fiction Competition

* * * * 

Still looking for more good reads, here's a link to four more, stories by Anton Chekov, Jack London, Jospeh Conrad, Jorge Luis Borges.

The Unfinished Stories of Richard Allen Garston (part 4)

In the latter half of the 1990's I began sharing my stories on my website at ennyman.com. Several years earlier I'd been told that no matter how good a writer you are, the publishing houses will not seriously consider you unless you have written a novel. Up until the internet age a short story writer would spend his or her time sending manuscripts to literary magazines in the hopes of finding an audience. Overnight, the world wide web became a game changer. Writers could now connect with readers around the globe.

In 2011, when I decided to assemble my stories into eBooks, I pulled them from off my website. Recently, I returned them to the Short Stories page there, more interested in having readers than selling eBooks. This is an excerpt from a longer story that became a centerpiece in my eBook Newmanesque. It's a story about writers, a favorite theme for many a writer of one sort or another. (eg. Cakes and Ale by Somerset Maugham.)

* * * *
BY WAY OF INTRODUCTION

In an effort to learn more about Richard Allen Garston, our hero Joe Urban has learned that one of the two people familiar with Garston's stories has passed away. The second has taken up residence in a Trappist monastery. Joe sets about on a quest to locate the now reclusive Gary Spencer.

The Unfinished Stories of Richard Allen Garston (part 4)

Princeton Seminary Library is one of the most comprehensive in North America, if not the world. It seemed probable to me, therefore, that I would not come up empty handed were I to begin my search here and, in point of fact, this presumption was correct. With the able assistance of Linda Gallagher in their reference department, I located the names and addresses of a dozen Trappist monasteries in the United States. I learned that worldwide there are as many as ninety communities of Trappist monks and nearly sixty of Trappistine nuns.

Many of the monasteries are affiliated so that one of the original houses will assume responsibility for the monasteries that are spin-offs. Since Trappists are famed chiefly for their Vows of Silence, I was surprised to learn that while this is a spiritual discipline that is practiced, it is not a mandatory absolute for all of life. Hence they participate in councils and other rather ordinary affairs and interactions, including the conduct of business enterprises to fund their work.

If Gary Spencer had removed himself to Trappist life, he had not necessarily placed himself in permanent incommunicado. In other words, if I could find him, perhaps he could speak with me and shed further light on the mystery of Richard Allen Garston.

I wrote letters to the nearest monasteries first-- St Joseph's Abbey in New England, Genesee Abbey in New York, and Holy Cross Abbey in Virginia. Genesee Abbey replied within the week and said there was no Gary Spencer in their ranks. More than a month passed before I received answers from the other two communities. This displeased me. I wondered if my inquiries had not provided enough detail.

I followed up with letters to New Melleray Abbey, Abbey of Gethsemani, Abbey of the Holy Spirit, Mepkin Abbey, and the many other Trappist monasteries scattered across North America. Abbey of Gethsemani was the only one from which I received no reply. The other Abbeys likewise asserted that they had no knowledge of a Gary Spencer in residence.

The following spring Lynn had booked a business trip to Lousiville, Kentucky, not far from the Abbey of Gethsemani mentioned above. Being of a curious frame of mind I decided to tag along and visit the monastery while she took care of her business. It seemed a good way to get a feel for Trappist life. The trip was not likely to interfere with my work since my writing was now at a near standstill.

While preparing for the journey I discovered that Gethsemani was the community of monks to which Thomas Merton had belonged. I recalled the name only vaguely from some references made by a high school social studies teacher I respected. I immediately borrowed several books from the library and tried to get a feel for Merton and for Trappist life. The whole idea of it, turning from the world, embracing solitude, somehow began to resonate with me. I've not been particularly religious after so many years in the world of commerce, and there began to be a stirring of old memories, recognitions, recollections from my childhood when it seemed that God and nature and harmony and natural beauty all pointed to something higher and better and purer to aspire to. I have always respected people who had a strong faith, whose lives demonstrated an adherence to their convictions.

LYNN AND I FLEW INTO LOUISVILLE on Saturday evening. She had a trade show to attend from Monday through Wednesday which gave us Sunday to drive down to Bardstown to find the Abbey. I had made arrangements to stay at a retreat center there through midweek and we would fly home on Thursday.

Our rented Ford Taurus explored many a winding road as we pursued Gethsemani. The remote splendor of rolling hills provided a picturesque preface for my visit. At last we drew near, entering by the south parking lot.

Once away from the car I became immediately aware of the silence. Not the silence of the place, but the silent sublimity of the setting. In this setting, so removed from the bustle of the world, no truck or train rumbled in the distance, no dogs barked their fool heads off, no man-made sound intruded the peace and poignancy that was present there. My senses savored it.

The main building is large, and even more imposing as one draws near. We walked past a small assembly of gravestones.

"Are you sure you want to go through with this?" Lynn asked. The way she said it helped me realize she didn't care for the place. I, on the other hand, found myself drawn to it.

The retreats are unstructured, though monks are available for consultation and a conference in the evenings. Seven times a day the monks assemble in choir, celebrating the salvation of God in prayer and worship. In retrospect I must tell you that my initial emotion was one of being part of a grand tradition, swallowed up in a river of history.

In making our initial entrance to the grounds I didn't know what would greet me there. Suddenly the bells rang, announcing vespers. Supper would be in half an hour.

In retrospect it seems strange that I should come to this monastery to seek another, to find Richard Garston. Thomas Merton wrote that Gethsemani was a place set apart for our own discovery, to find ourselves. "In Your light we see light," wrote the Psalmist. In the silence of the heart we listen for the voice of God.

I hugged Lynn goodbye and watched her drive cautiously from the grounds. As I carried my bags to a registration room in the guesthouse I thought of Sean Connery arriving at the monastery in Umberto Eco's Name of the Rose. Murders and intrigue followed.

* * * * 

If interested in reading the whole of this story, you can find it here at my original website where you may begin properly at the beginning. 

Unfinished Stories (Part 10)

SHORT STORY MONDAY

Here's a trio of Easter Eggs we decorated Saturday evening.

Unfortunately, the Unfinished Stories of Richard Allen Garston appears to be... unfinished. Next week we'll start something new.

Unfinished Stories (Part 8)

SHORT STORY MONDAY

Gary Spencer, the last man alive to have read all of Richard Allen Garston's works, changed his name to Father William and now resides at a Trappist monastery in Kentucky. Father William had agreed to open up a little regarding Garston's writings and life. In this second dialogue, Joe Urban learns of the content of Garston's stories. It's probably my favorite part of the story.

The Unfinished Stories of Richard Allen Garston (Part 8)
Dialogue Two

I returned to my room with pen in hand, hastily outlining the details of our conversation. While my record may be imprecise in certain respects, overall it captures the essential elements of our conversation.

Our second conversation was immensely different. We spoke of the stories themselves.

His stories had a strange effect on me. When later I returned to my room it was as if my brain had become benumbed by liquor (though I had had none other than the Kentucky Bourbon which saturates the unique Trappist fudge they manufacture) or that I had fallen into a stupor of some sort. Whereas I spent the first night furiously attempting to reconstruct our dialogue, the second night left me in a state of introspective psycho-emotional inebriation. The first day's dialogue was liberating because I had attained a remarkable sense of self-forgetfulness. The stories of day two, on the other hand, were like a mirror, and ultimately I could not close off my day without attempting to find in myself the causation for this dark resonance.

Now that a measure of time has passed, I have no notes to adequately re-construct the day, or the stories. Here is the best of what I recall.

We began by the garden and walked along a narrow path to a field below the Abbey. I reminded him that he would tell me about the stories, and he began with this.

"Here's one I remember vividly," he said, "about a man who spent his whole life writing and re-writing the same story. The first half of his life it kept getting longer and more complex. The novella became a novel, which subsequently became an epic. The story ultimately grappled with every conceivable theme and the infinite permutations on those themes.

"The second half of his life he began to distill each facet of the story down to its unifying essence. For decades he re-wrote and edited and revised and polished his prose so that it became a lengthy, but finely crafted poem. This he continued to tighten and sharpen until it became ever more pointed, and potent. As the old man's heart weakened, the power of his verse strengthened.

"The last week of his life he attempted to compress all of his life's work into seventeen syllables..."

"A haiku!"

"Yes."

"What happened next?"

"It's unfinished."

This is how the day went. Stories were summarized and apparent meanings attached to them, stories about old people, children, orphans, criminals, natives, Orientals, immigrants, slaves, rich, poor, warriors, powerful, powerless. Stories from all stations of life, all facets of time, all portions of human history. Stories differing as greatly as mountains differ from deserts, rivers from butterflies, mould spores from the sun. Complicated puzzles, plots, games, dazzling wordplay, a hideous monster who had healing powers; a murder, told from the point of view of a piece of furniture, and the incriminating fragment of testimony it offered; a magic stone that made children tell the truth when they touched it; a temple made of daisies that turned men into birds; a stone that gave supernatural knowledge; the man who held the answer to a question no one dared to ask.

The stories were strange, dense, multi-dimensional, yet so simply told.

There was one story about a man whose hands and feet had been cut off during the Spanish Inquisition. He survived the atrocity and, in a story called The Ghost of Isla Rosa, went on to gain revenge on his tormentors.

In another story, Don Quixote, Oedipus and Bertrand Russell become engaged in a debate regarding the thesis "Is it futile to Dream?"

Another story I remember had something to do with time. Evidently it was built around the premise that history is elastic. That is, that future events can change past ones. I'm not sure what it was really about, but I recall being somewhat impressed by the manifold distortions of reality inherent in this concept.

Then there were the innumerable stories about struggle. Struggles with lust, with greed, with the need for freedom, with impulsiveness, the longing for spontaneity... struggles with materialism, solipsism, discontent, passivity, hypersensitivity, futility, austerity, pugnacity, hysteria... and ultimately the struggle for meaning and significance. These latter were difficult for me. They had a pointedness that frightened me.

There were also enigmatic stories, bewildering riddles, ambiguous conundrums and labyrinthine psychological spectacles.

Some of the stories he told in deplorable detail, others he summarized in a few swift sentences, and still others he simply alluded to or implied. He may not have said a word about them but I knew of their existence by the way he avoided speaking of them. I regretted the lack of time, and somehow he felt shortchanged as well.

Finally there were the suicide notes.

"Emma shared with me the introduction to one of these," I said.

"Emma?" he said. The way he said it threw me off because I couldn't tell if he were indicating he knew her, or didn't know her.

"Garston's sister-in-law. Wife of the brother, you know, the one who burned his work."

"I know, yes, I know."

Father William took an inordinate amount of time composing his thoughts. Eventually he continued to tell me of the thousand and one suicide notes.

"Ironic, isn't it?" I asked.

"What's that?"

"Well, all that energy spent attempting to keep his characters alive. But no one was able to help keep him alive."

"Yessssss," said he, enunciating it with a prolonged hiss.

I thought of the fragment. I thought of Emma. And I wondered now what I was really looking for.

CONTINUE

Unfinished Stories (Part 6)

SHORT STORY MONDAY

To re-cap: Joe Urban, our determined narrator has located Gary Spencer, the last man alive who had read all of Richard Allen Garston's works. Spencer has changed his name to Father William and now resides at a Trappist monastery in Kentucky, the same one that Thomas Merton is buried at incidentally. Father William has agreed to open up a little with Joe regarding the writings and life of R. A. Garston. This is the first of several dialgues between the seeker and the source.

Unfinished Stories of Richard Allen Garston (Part 6)

We stood on a patio facing the road. Father William glanced up the hill toward the neat rows of crosses where the Abbey's many monks have been laid in their final repose and my eyes followed to the cemetery there where I had spent my previous day's contemplation. Strange, to me, was the notion that earthly celebrity had gained for Brother Louis Merton a more distinctively decorated plot than his fellows.

My eyes strayed back to the road, and to the hills beyond. Father William suggested we walk. I found the idea appealing and we were soon down the stairs, down the drive and across to the other side. My thoughts flew to the object of my quest.

"So why all the mystery?" I asked. "Why all the different explanations for not finishing anything?"

"Sometimes you don't feel free to tell the truth. People won't believe it or don't want to believe it or ask too many questions."

"And you believe he made a compact with the devil."

"I'm certain of it."

"Why's that?"

"I knew Richard better than anyone. He had to share with someone. I was there for him. I didn't condemn him. I listened, and he trusted me."

"So how did it happen? How does one go about making a compact with the devil? This is something you read about, but -- "

"I can't really answer that."

"But you said --"

"That isn't something he would have shared."

"But -- "

"It's like the frogs near here. If you walk about in the early evening you hear their chorus, each striving with all its heart to be heard. Now, you go to find one of these frogs and as soon as you step remotely near, no sound whatsoever. One minute, they seem ever so desirous to be discovered, yet in the next they conceal. Seldom will you find one in these marshes, because their intent is to remain hidden. Richard Allen Garston hid himself masterfully."

I began again to ask my question, and once more he re-directed. "I would still like to know --" I said.

"Let's begin with a different question. Where does fiction come from? You think there was no original Faust? In the case of Faust, of course, the real Faust was only accused of having been in league with the devil because the wonders of technology, at that time, had no explanation other than a supernatural one. Since they did not believe it from God, then it must be the devil. In other words, the truth was rejected, and a fiction was believed. Fear and ignorance were all around. Fiction is often rooted in fear. It is a counterfeit that hides the truth."

I assented.

Father William continued. "Yet while it is true that things are ascribed to the devil that are entirely undevilish, there are other instances when it is very much the devil that traps people. Entices, then snares, and every good Christian knows that we need to be on our guard against the devil because he is ever prowling the earth, a liar and a deceiver...."

"Yes, yes, go on, go on. I attended Sunday school."

"But you don't believe in the devil."

"Does it matter? Sarte wrote --"

"Listen, you don't have to tell me what other people say or think or write. I was only noting that you don't believe in the devil."

"You're right. I was --"

"You were defending your position by obscuring the truth and quoting someone famous. It matters not a whit to me what you believe and do not believe, though ultimately, you'll find that it will matter very much for you." He looked at me in an uncondemning way, his eyes sad and open in a manner that invited me to peer inside his soul, but I evaded his look.

He continued. "My point is this. In fiction there are countless stories about devils, demons, darkness. And there are countless stories of love, heroism, courage, inner conflict, personal valor, human achievement, human stupidity. When you convince me that there is no such thing as love, courage, heroism, human achievement or stupidity, I will then be persuaded that there is no such thing as the devil. Fiction is a mirror, reflecting the way things really are." He looked off and away. "There is a devil and Richard Garston made a pact with him. As with everything, there is always a price."

"How did it come about? What kind of pact? What did the devil look like?"

We had climbed a hill and I found myself winded. Father William graciously paused to let me catch my breath. He looked skyward and whistled. I believe it possible that he allowed a smirk to crease his face though to smirk would have been a signal of pride for he was many years my senior. He did not, however, make comment. Instead, he kept to our theme. "My brother," he said, placing his hand on my shoulder, "you are asking me to divulge things which have been long buried. I'm not sure what good it will do to open these old graves."

"I don't know why it matters so much," I said. "For some reason, and I don't know why, I've felt compelled to learn more about this man. You have no idea how much sleep I've lost over it. Yet, it seems no small wonder that we are standing here talking today when I had already given up hope of ever finding you."

"So, what is it you wish to learn from me?"

"There was this writer who wrote for almost two decades. Hardly a word of what he has written remains. The writers with whom he shared portions of his work all acknowledge his genius, yet only two men have ever read the full body of his work. One of these quit life and devoted himself wholly to God; the other burned it all and said it was from the devil. I want to know how this happened. How did you see God where Garston's brother saw only darkness?"

"It's a common phenomenon," he said. "Look at the world where we live. In the 1930's Hitler was lauded by the London Times as a courageous and heroic figure. He instilled a renewed vigor and hope to the Fatherland. Others rightly deplored him. Two interpretations, one man. Marxist Socialist ideals have swept away hundreds of thousands of hearts in its tide. Never mind the millions who disappeared in Siberia. 'How can men's hearts be so blind?' one might ask. But the ideals of brotherhood and fraternity and community have deep roots in Scripture, and the echo reverberates in men's souls. Ayn Rand denounced altruism, but is Selfishness really a higher ideal? Where is the truth and where the fiction?"

I tried to sum up. "If I hear you correctly, it is possible that Garston's writings could lead one man to God and another away from Him."

He winced, took a deep breath. "Forgive me. Chest pains."

"I'm sorry. If this is--"

"That's all right. Nothing to do with our discussion. "

"Yet you said he made a compact with the devil."

"Yes, this is true."

"So explain to me how --"

"Come now. You've seen that silly optical illusion with the faces and the lamp. Some people see the faces, others the lamp. It's really not that difficult."

"Are you suggesting..." I didn't know how to articulate it and my words tapered off.

"Richard said it was like this. His writing was a form of combat. I can't explain it exactly, but the best I gathered was that he would create a character and that character was in a situation. The devil would then interfere, would paint the character into a corner, would utilize circumstances and the character's own weaknesses to destroy his or her confidence. Richard strove to give his characters a reason to go on, to pursue their ideals or dreams or whatever. They were battling for hope."

I rubbed my lower lip with my forefinger. It was sore and somewhat raw because I had been chewing on it.

"Your expression tells me you expect more than this."

I nodded."

If you believe, as I do, that the Bible could be written by men who were inspired, breathed into, by the Spirit of God, Espiritu Santo, then it is only a small step to accept the reality of a dark spirit writing words through human agency."

"I want to know how it happened."

"Scripture teaches us not to dwell on these things. As Paul writes to the Ephesians, it is shameful to even mention what the disobedient do in secret."

"You must have been curious yourself."

"This is not the purpose of your visit, is it?" he asked. His piercing eyes turned to slits, then widened again.

I wasn't really sure.

CONTINUED

Unfinished Stories (part 5)

SHORT STORY MONDAY

Our hero has just arrived at a Trappist monastery in Kentucky in search of the last living person to have read all of Richard Allen Garston's works. It was alleged by someone in a New Jersey writers group that Garston was the greatest writer of our time, yet remained unknown because of some obsession about not completing anything. Can someone be considered a great writer if their work never sees publication? Joe Urban is on a quest to find out more about this mysterious author of purportedly enormous talent.

The Unfinished Stories of Richard Allen Garston (part 5)

I did not attend vespers. Instead I re-read the literature I had been sent and contemplated my decision. In no time we were seated at tables in the refectory in the east quadrant of the house. The vegetarian fare, served buffet style, was consumed in silence.

Having heard that the Trappists here were quite famous for their cheese, I took a liberal portion. To my consternation the cheese smelled like dirty socks. Not wishing to offend, I placed a slice on a cracker and ate it. It was actually quite good. I devoured all I had taken and decided that maybe even Limburger might be a worthy conquest at some future day.

After supper I set about to make inquiries regarding Gary Spencer. This proved to be a greater difficulty than I had imagined. Even though I knew silence was the circumscribed expectation of the Order, I was determined to make my wishes known.

Rebuffed by two Brothers leaving the dining hall, I went back down to the waiting area where I had checked in. A certain Brother Michael or Micah suggested that I place a notice on the bulletin board in the hallway. Even before I walked away from the wall a Brother was reading it. I paused to see his reaction. There was none.

The next morning I woke during the third watch and, unable to find sleep, wrapped myself in a robe, walked outside. A twittering birdsong chorus hovered in the air anticipating dawn. I never sleep well the first night in a strange place and did not have a heart filled with song this morning.

I was staring off at the horizon when suddenly a hand grasped my elbow. Startled, I turned to see one of the Brothers, silently evaluating me. "I understand you are seeking me," he said.

My tongue failed me. "I also hear that you are a writer?"

The intonation was half statement, half question. "Yes. Who told you that?"

"You mentioned it in the application. I used to write some."

"You must be Gary Spencer."

"I used to be Gary Spencer. Now I am Father William."

"Why did you change your name?"

"That's the way it is here. Being one with Christ means being acquainted with the way of the Cross."

"How is it that you are here?" I asked.

"This is my fate. Yet even within the box that is my life there is a measure of freedom. Even a bird in a cage can appreciate the light of a bright morning sun and will sing at its rising. How is it that you are here?"

"Well, to be honest, I was looking for... well, I know it will seem strange to you, but I was looking for Richard Allen Garston. That is, I was looking for you because you once knew him, knew his work, could help me build a better image of him for myself."

"But why? What could you care about a dead man?"

"Listen," I said, "I understand that you can't give me all your time, but you do have evenings free. Can we meet later? I have a lot of burning questions and you are the last person on earth that can answer them for me."

He said yes, we could meet later, though he was not certain it would be all that useful for me. Enigmatically he added that he wasn't really certain that Lazarus wished to be raised again from his tomb now that he was finally buried. We agreed to find each other at seven that evening on the patio below the monk's graveyard.

While our agreement to meet exhilarated me, I failed at the time to perceive that a perceptible heaviness weighed on him. Strange how hindsight is twenty twenty.

CONTINUED

The Unfinished Stories (part 3)

SHORT STORY MONDAY

The narrator, writer Joe Urban, has learned of a relatively unknown writer whose work is purportedly incredible. Till now, his own writing has been impotent in part because of a lack of passion for his subject matter. As he learns more about this unknown, it fires him and sets him out on a quest...

Only two people have ever had access to Richard Allen Garston's works. One was his friend Gary Spencer. The second, Garston's brother.

The Unfinished Stories of Richard Allen Garston (3)

I set about to find his brother and it led me to Camden in South Jersey where he had been pastor of an Independent Baptist congregation. Greg Garston had died the year previous. My determination to locate his wife, however, was rewarded. Her name was Emma and we spent a small portion of an afternoon together talking in generalities until I finally came to my point.

"I don't mean to pry, but can we talk a little bit about your husband's brother?"

"Well, he was a writer."

"Anything else?"

"He seemed very sad and dark, like he had secrets."

"What kind of secrets?" I asked.

She seemed unable to answer.

"I was told that your husband became caretaker of Richard's manuscripts after Richard died."

"I don't think so."

"What do you mean, you don't think so.?"

"I mean, Greg did that before Richard died."

"Did what?"

"Was caretaker of Richard's work. I'm using your word. I would have put it differently. We stored a lot of his things at our place. Collected them in our attic. Richard had a small apartment in Somerville. Not a lot of space."

"Did you ever read any of his stories?"

"They were stories? No, Greg made me practically take a vow not to look inside those boxes. One day he decided that he didn't want them in the attic anymore and he had them incinerated."

"And you never opened any of those boxes? Weren't you even just a little bit curious?"

She lightly scratched her chin with the tips of her fingernails.

"Yes," she said. "Yes, I was."

"But you never looked?"

"One should not make a habit of keeping secrets from one's spouses."

"So you did look!"

"Please, I'm sorry."

"Sorry about what? So you opened a box."

"You never know what you'll find when you open boxes. Some boxes are better left unopened."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"I'm not sure what to say. I'm afraid to tell you the truth."

"Why? What is there to conceal? Your husband isn't going to be angry any more. He's passed away. And Richard Allen Garston has been dead for a dog's age. Who is there left to offend?"

Emma stood up and left the room. I could hear her crying in the other room. Then I heard the sound of drawers opening, interspersed with rummaging. When she returned she was hold a single sheet of yellowed paper with typing on it. In the lower right it had the initials R.A.G. I took it from her as if receiving a sacred host. It was a fragment from a story beginning, ending with these words:

Untitled
A sunday afternoon ramble through the underbrush, nettles and thorns, where ideas lay dormant, nestled in for winter, hibernating against the cold. He had left the path to forge his own way. He wasn't sure what to write about any more. There were so many things he had become unsure about. Now this. He had lost his way.

Here's the reality: he was tired. And indecisive, vascillating between an ideal of what his life ought to be and trying in vain to find a voice that was authentic. All decisions originating from within himself seemed arbitrary, thus incapable of commanding his complete and undivided allegiance. The result: a paralysis of will, an inability to mobilize his powers, to consolidate the resources of his mind, heart, soul, experience, training.

He was wounded, with a wound he knew incurable.

In an upstairs room, sitting in the dilapidated cushioned chair which he had obtained at a flea market for fifty cents, he organized his thoughts and prepared to scratch out the story of his life, a suicide note. --R.A.G.

I was stunned, for this writer, this writer who had lost his way, who had been wounded with an incurable wound, who was once confident but now confused... this writer was me. Inside I trembled, though I concealed it from my hostess.

"Do you have more?" I asked.

She looked as if she were about to break down. Her cheeks were red, eyes averted.

"I'm having trouble putting this all together," I said. "For years your husband stored his brother's manuscipts in his attic. Then one day he decides to burn everything. Did he ever say why?"

"He only said that it was 'God's will' and that he didn't want to talk about it."

"Was this like, say, a week after Richard died?"

She shook her head.

"A month?"

She continued shaking her head.

"A year? Or when?"

When she didn't make any reply there was a long pause in our conversation which, though awkward, gave each of us a few moments to reflect. As I studied her pale grey eyes I could only guess where her thoughts were escorting her. The ticking clock on the mantle seemed to stress that I had overstayed my welcome, nevertheless I did need to ask about one more thing.

"Would you mind if I asked how Richard died?"

"It was terrible. He died in a fire."

"I thought it was a suicide."

"Yes, he set himself on fire in his bed."

"Sounds like an awful way to choose to die. How did they know it wasn't accidental."

"Oh yes, that's exactly what they thought until Greg got the letter."

"So there was a suicide note?"

"It was mailed the morning of the day he died."

"You're sure of that? And you're sure it was his handwriting."

"Definitely. He had a very distincitive way of making his letters, all full and round. His penmanship was like a work of art, like calligraphy. His whole life was that way, actually."

"Do you remember what it said?"

"Something like, 'When you read this I'll be gone.'"

"You sound as if you almost liked him."

She did not reply and I could tell she cared about him very deeply.

"How often did you see him?"

She didn't answer again.

"Do you still have his last letter?"

It seemed a stupid question as soon as I said it. Her husband had burned everything else the guy had written.

The story fragment was lying on the table and I selfishly wanted to ask if I could have it. Instead I pulled two dollars from my wallet and set them on the table. "Can you photocopy this for me?" Then I scribbled my address on a piece of paper. "Mail it to this address."

She nodded, as if this wouldn't be a problem.

"Oh, did you know his friend Gary Spencer?"

"His name was mentioned a few times. A writer friend, I believe."

"I'm trying to find him. Someone said he joined a monastery. You wouldn't have any idea where, would you?"

I left feeling pretty much like I'd come to a dead end and feeling sad in myself for these two brothers. Still, the blue sky and brightness of the sun lifted me up a bit as I returned north to my home. Though my thoughts were strange and all over the place, they continually returned to a single notion: to now find, if it were possible, Gary Spencer.

CONTINUED

The Unfinished Stories of Richard Allen Garston

SHORT STORY MONDAY

This is the introduction to a much longer story which I will strive to faithfully share here...

The Unfinished Stories of Richard Allen Garston
by Ed Newman

The stories had been stored in boxes. A ledger indicated that there were 3,283 of them, plus more than five thousand fragments, some of which had been codified to identify their relationship with other manuscripts. Since none of the stories were complete, who is to say whether the five thousand fragments were not in themselves stories? That would make more than eight thousand stories.

Richard Allen Garston died in 1975 at age forty-seven, burned to death in a fire. There was no autopsy performed, for there seemed to be no call for one. No one appeared to benefit from his death. The last eighteen years of his life he had been a recluse, his source of income unknown. None of his works were ever published. If he was one of our century's great authors we'll never know, for his manuscripts, annotated and filed in boxes, were burned by his brother.

I discovered, or became aware of, Richard Allen Garston through a writer's group in Bedminster, New Jersey in the spring of 1990. The chief propagator of Richard Allen Garston mythology was a certain Horace Keane who, to everyone's dismay, never missed a meeting. Actually, it's a wonder the group didn't utterly disband and reconvene elsewhere. Keane was a science fiction writer who whose ideas were, I suspect, completely plagiarized, though no one would dare make the accusation to his face. Most writer's groups are a little too nice in that way.

You will note that I have not called it "our group" because I only attended sporadically, and for no more than six or eight months. The only function of these details is to share with you the events that set me on my quest.

Keane was one of the oldtimers of the group and, as already noted, the regular attender. To describe this man, or any of the others, would be a diversion from my main story so I will not take us down that path other than to say that the purpose of the group was to read to each other what we were working on.

When I first began attending the meetings, Horace Keane's stories and references to Richard Allen Garston appeared to be so exaggerated that I suspected Garston to be a fabrication. It was not until my fourth or fifth meeting that I met the modestly eccentric novelist and playwright Willson Willis who confirmed Garston's existence. (The pen name Willis wrote under is a household name which I am confident you would recognize.)

There was a lady at the meeting who was working on a tragic love story and Keane began suggesting that she wasn't going deep enough into the tragedy part of it, that she should really explore and develop more thoroughly the dark recesses of her characters' souls. Willis cut him off. "Oh stop it now. Her style is all lightness and air. Not every story has to be a Richard Allen Garston."

Right then I knew. And I wanted to know more about the man and his work.

After the meeting I asked Mr. Willis if we could go somewhere for a bite to eat. He assumed, naturally, that I was interested in talking about his own work and declined, suggesting that he was tired. His routine was to wake early, to be at his writing desk by four.

"I realize you are busy, but would it be possible to perhaps meet for lunch sometime then? I want to hear more about this Richard Garston that Mr. Keane keeps talking about."

As soon as I said the name Willis got a strange look in his eyes, as if he were making some calculations in his head. "Oh," he said. After a short pause, he added, "It's getting too late to go anywhere else. Why don't you just come to my place? Follow me home and we can talk in my den."

After tarrying a little while longer at the meeting, we escaped to our cars and I followed him home. For my readers who know the area, it is one of the nicer homes on Burnt Mills Road, not far from the polo field.

···

My name, which I should have told you at the outset, is John Urban. My wife, Lynn, is a high-powered executive with a well-known Fortune 50 firm headquartered here in Jersey. A few years ago, when I got downsized out of a copywriting position with a New York ad agency she suggested I take a sabbatical and write the novel I had always claimed was in me, a suggestion I was eager to oblige.

I found the project more challenging than I'd imagined but was gratified to have finished the book, Kill Them With Kindness, in under a year. But writing was easy compared to the task of finding a publisher. Even with an agent. Even with New York contacts.

My second novel hasn't gone so well. It may be that I have been distracted with my efforts to find a home for the first. Or it may be, though I refuse to believe it, that I am tapped out. My first book felt honest and original. The second has felt wooden and now tires me rather than energizes.

After a while one is aware that the easy explanations for one's moods are no longer valid, that there are deeper root causes. As the song goes, sometimes it's hard to face reality, especially when the trouble is as plain as the stitches on your face. (I was in a car accident this past year.) For me, the trouble was Richard Allen Garston. I don't know how this thing got such a strong hold on me.

Unable to make progress in my second novel, I discarded it and began doing research for a short story, something I was confident I could finish quickly, but this, too, fell to the wayside. This was about the time I had begun attending the writer's group. My sterility had become almost oppressive.

CONTINUED NEXT WEEK