For some of use there was a time when we turned heads. Many of us still do.
Turning Heads
love
Cat in the Rain
A woman and a man are stuck in their hotel room in Italy due to rain. The woman sees a cat, and decides she wants it.
Quickie
Simon Grover always felt like a goldfish in a coptercab. The plexiglass bubble afforded full 360-degree vision, but people could also see you from the crowded traffic lanes above a big city. “Hurry,” said Simon Grover, a small, energetic man with close-set hazel eyes and a stubborn chin. “I’m hurrying,” the pilot told him with frustrating indifference. Milton Lesser was a prolific, poly-pseudonymous, poly-genre fiction writer of the mid-20th century, authoring works under the pen names of Stephen Marlowe, Adam Chase, Stephen Wilder (and in at least one ghost-writing effort, Ellery Queen), among others. This story first appeared in October [Read More]
The Hollow Column (Told by the Tax Collector)
“Every man’s fate is fore-ordained,” said the tax-collector, reflectively stroking his beard. “Although we may not understand it at the moment each particular event that happens is simply a means prepared for some destined end that may be many years remote in time. Vishnu the Preserver saved the life of the little maid of Jhalnagor so that her father’s life might later on be saved. But none can read the future, so that we are all blindly doing the things of to-day without knowing their real bearing on the things of a far-away to-morrow. And one man can make or [Read More]
The Other Woman
“I am in love with my wife,” he said—a superfluous remark, as I had not questioned his attachment to the woman he had married. We walked for ten minutes and then he said it again. I turned to look at him. He began to talk and told me the tale I am now about to set down. The thing he had on his mind happened during what must have been the most eventful week of his life. He was to be married on Friday afternoon. On Friday of the week before he got a telegram announcing his appointment to a [Read More]
Old Man Bobo’s Mandy
Old man Bobo was the sole survivor of a once famous trio. Two out of the three, Doc Dickson and Pap Spooner, had passed to the shades, and the legend ran that when their disembodied spirits reached the banks of Styx, the ruling passion of their lives asserted itself for the last time. They demurred loudly, impatiently, at the exorbitant fee, ten cents, demanded by Charon. “We weigh light,” said Pap Spooner, “awful light! Call it, mister, fifteen cents for the two!” “Ten cents apiece,” replied the ferryman, “or three for a quarter.” Thereupon the worthy couple seated themselves in [Read More]
Hearts and Creeds
It is spring-time, the sun shines brightly, and everyone is gay. Even the window-panes of the old stone houses seem to wear a cheerful smile. Along the street of the little town streams a crowd in bright holiday attire. The whole population of the town is there: workers, soldiers, tradespeople, priests, officials, fishermen; all are intoxicated with the spirit of spring-time, talking, laughing, singing in joyous confusion, as if they were a single body overflowing with the zest of life. The hats and parasols of the women make a medley of bright colours; red and blue balloons, like wonderful flowers, [Read More]
Valentine Day
Ha monny young folk are langin for th’ fourteenth o’ February! An ha mony old pooastmen wish it ud niver come? Sawr owd maids an’ crusty owd bachelors wonder ‘at fowk should have noa moor sense nor to waste ther brass on sich like nonsense. But it’s noa use them talkin’, for young fowk have done it befoor time, an’ as long as it’s i’th’ natur on ‘em to love one another an’ get wed, soa long will valentine makers have plenty to do at this time o’th’ year. Ther’s monny a daycent sooart of a young chap at thinks [Read More]
Kew Gardens
From the oval-shaped flower-bed there rose perhaps a hundred stalks spreading into heart-shaped or tongue-shaped leaves half way up and unfurling at the tip red or blue or yellow petals marked with spots of colour raised upon the surface; and from the red, blue or yellow gloom of the throat emerged a straight bar, rough with gold dust and slightly clubbed at the end. The petals were voluminous enough to be stirred by the summer breeze, and when they moved, the red, blue and yellow lights passed one over the other, staining an inch of the brown earth beneath with [Read More]