Setting the Mood, Maude

Let's talk about setting the mood of a story through the use of descriptive detailing.

I have to admit (or maybe, I have to confess, I don't know which would be more accurate) the visual scene of a story's opening is what gets me writing.  I see an image first in my head.  And then I write the story around that image.

Verbal photographs, kiddo.  That's the key.

And I think it's a good technique--one that is becoming rare these days.  I find it rare, in my opinion, to find a writer who can make a Polaroid shot in words so clear, so vivid, it instantly comes into sharp clarity the moment one reads the passage to themselves. 

Yet isn't that one of the key ingredients needed to be perfected if a writer wants to be successful?

Words describing images,  or individual actions, sets the tone for the entire story.  In any genre I'm thinking.  But so especially true if you're writing noir/hard boiled detectives.  The mood of the story sets up the interaction between characters.  Ultimately sets up the motives for each of the characters involved in the story.  So important.  So critical for a story to succeed.

Take the photo above.  When I wrote this Turner Hahn/Frank Morales story you're about to read the image that exploded in my head was very much like the one above.  I saw it clearly.  Absolutely crystal clear:  Turner and Frank moving around in a dark basement filled with boxes and boxes stacked on top of each other, their flash lights throwing out long beams of white light cutting through the darkness.

Maybe I'm all wrong. (What?!  Me?  Wrong?  Oh Pissssshawww, Maude!)

Read the story below.  Tell me what you think.

We Found Beatrice Bonner

 

            The dark basement smelled of dreams long forgotten.

             Of memories unremembered.

            In the inky darkness the startling white beams of our flashlights cut through the cobwebs and layers of dust and decay and played across the clutter of a lifetime’s worth of hoarding in stark silence.  Carefully we made our way through the narrow corridors of the blackened basement,  the white beams of our  flashlights arcing across the canyon walls of dust covered boxes stacked clear to the floor jousts above our heads to the darkly moist cement floor.

            The place smelled.  Smelled old.  Ancient.  With a whiff of decay–a sharp sting of disease.

            Boxes.  Magazines.  Newspapers.  Books.  An assortment of bicycles.  Steamer trunks, one atop another, locked and sealed shut back when Nixon was president.  Clothes.  Boxes and boxes of clothes neatly folded, covered in a fine coating of dust; smelling dank and fungal infested.  A life time of someone never letting go.  Never discarding either the important or the frivolous.

            Our flashlights danced across the darkness to our left and right.  Seeking.  Looking for what we already knew was down here.  In silence we made our way deeper and deeper into the basement of the old house knowing that we were eventually going to find the grisly prize at the end of our search. 

            Behind me I heard my partner grunt and then heard a box slide to one side ominously.  Twisting around I played the beam of light across his face and then at the tall column of boxes towering over his head suddenly beginning to tilt dangerously toward him.  The red headed wannabe Mountain Gorilla braced the leaning stack with one outstretched hand with a look of growing frustration playing across his rugged looks.

            “This place is fraking nightmare, Turner.  One wrong move and we’re going to be buried in a mountain of shit.  It’ll take a month for the forensics boys to find us.”

            I turned back to face the front, a grin playing across my lips.  We were both big men.  But Frank was the proverbial Spanish bull in an English china shop.  He had shoulders that would make the prow of an aircraft carrier feel slighted.  Arms as thick as the main cables holding up the Golden Gate.  Finesse, my friend, is not his main forte.  Blunt trauma is more his shtick.

            The flashlight in my hand roamed across the curtain of darkness in front of me and there, just visibly at the far end of the flashlight beam, the image of a brick wall and an edge of a large, deep, wash basin.

            “Over here,” I said quietly.

            And we found what we knew we would find.  In the middle of the deep wash basin.  The bloody stump of a person’s leg.  Ripped from the victim from just below the knee cap.  Still wrapped in the tan cloth of a pant’s leg.  The foot encased in a black, worn old shoe with a bleached out, formless blue sock partially covering an exposed ankle.

            A heavy coat of coagulated blood covered the bottom of the wash basin. Lying flat in the sink beside the single shoe was a hack saw.  A bloody hack saw with a broken blade.  Playing the flashlight across the dust covered cement floor of the basement to my left and right I could find nothing else for a body.  But I did find a fifty-five gallon drum, black and dull, with white letters that said ‘Hydrochloric Acid’ stenciled across the middle of it.  The lid of the barrel was partially closed.  The stench of the acid . . .and some other smell I didn’t want to dwell on . . . overwhelming.

            I didn’t want to pull the lid to one side and look inside.  Fortunately I didn’t have to.  Frank’s voice behind me stopped me.

            “Turner, looky-here.  In the wall to the right and above the wash basin.  See it?”

            I saw it.  It was unmistakable.

            Two dark red bricks were missing from the wall.  Visibly in the light was the smooth round curve of a human skull partially filling the gaping hole.  Both powerful beams of our flashlights latched onto the wall and didn’t move for a long time.  Neither of us said anything.

            We found her.  Beatrice Bonner.  A thirteen year old girl missing for the last twenty years.  Found her stuffed into the basement wall of a dilapidated wreck of a house owned by a hermit named Charles Friedman.  But the missing person file would soon be replaced.  She was no longer missing.  From the large round hole in the top of her skull–a clean, sharp puncture wound made by something long and sharp–the Missing Person stamp would soon be changed to Murder.

            “Call the boys,” I said quietly as the flashlight turned back and illuminated the bloody stump standing upright in the sink.  “Tell’em we found the old man and the girl.  Tell’em to bring enough boys over.  This is a double-homicide case now.”

            Cautiously we trekked our way out of the basement and slowly moved up the rickety steps of the basement to the kitchen.  The house was empty.  Old and empty.  Forgotten and empty.  It sat in the middle of a corner lot almost hidden from prying eyes by weeds and rows of untrimmed bushes.  Visible from the west side windows of the kitchen was the sagging frame of a detached garage.  One garage door stood at a severe angle.  Held upright by a single hinge still attached to the garage.  Glancing out the window I could see the trunk lid and tail lights of an old car.  A car that hadn’t been moved in generations.  Hugging up against the car’s sides were boxes and boxes of newspapers.  Dried, faded, fungus-infested newspapers. 

            The kitchen itself was amazingly clean and tidy.  There were no dishes in the sink.  They was nothing on the flat surface of the kitchen counters that seemed out of place.  In the middle of the kitchen floor was a small white painted table with four matching chairs.  Chairs precisely aligned..  The table’s surface spotlessly clean.

            “What’s wrong with this picture?” Frank grunted, turning to look at me and lifting a questioning eyebrow.

            “Someone has a cleaning fetish,” I answered, frowning myself. “In a house that’s been turned into warehouse of discarded trash.”

            “Our suspect?”

            Our suspect was a forty year old recently released mental patient by the name of Jacob Friedman.  The son of the home owner, Charles Friedman.  Four hours earlier Jacob walked into South Side Precinct, took the ancient elevator up to the second floor which housed the homicide section, found Frank and I sitting at our desks doing paperwork, and confessed he had just murdered his father.

            Just like that.  A nervous little man with hands that wouldn’t stop shaking and watery blue eyes that could not look you straight in the face.  Confessed standing beside our desk in a soft voice of quiet resignation.  He said he had killed his father.  Said he knew where Beatrice Bonner’s remains were.  Said he wanted to go back to the hospital.  Wanted to go back to the lock up ward.  Back to safety. And never wanted to left alone again.

            Jacob Friedman had spent the last eighteen years in an insane asylum.  Ten of those eighteen years in a high-security section of the asylum.  Behind locked doors and barb wire fences.  In a padded cell.  With eyes observing him eighteen of the twenty-four hours of the day.  Twenty years ago the state accused him of kidnaping Beatrice Bonner and murdering her.  Circumstantial evidence, of course, since a body was never discovered. Jacob was already known by the neighbors as being a sick, twisted kid.  Several testified it was Jacob who had stolen their beloved pets and had abused and tortured them in the woods behind the Friedman’s house.  The same neighbors, and other witnesses, said this scared, frail and pale creature of a man and the girl had been seen together that day walking down to neighborhood convenience store.  They remembered him walking back from the store.  Alone.

            Beatrice Bonner was never seen again.

            Until now.

            I remember the drive out into the suburbs to find the Friedman’s house.  It was an overcast, sour, despicable day of random showers, high humidity, and sweltering heat.  It seemed that day the weather had every one in a bad, scurrilous mood.  As I drove the Shelby GT350 Mustang, my favorite car, with Frank sitting in the passenger side bucket seat to my right, I remember listening to music of Depeche Mode playing on the radio.  It was their Policy of Truth.  A rumble of bass guitars lamenting about a love gone bad.  A perfect cover tune for this case, I thought to myself, as I drove.

            Thinking about the case the music still plays darkly in my mind.

            Eerily, as we drove back to the precinct house hours later after the forensic boys went over the place minutely, the song played again over the radio. 

            A couple of days later Assistant District Attorney Anthony Scarborough beamed up at us and said we had did a find job in this investigation.  The case was opened and shut.  This time Jacob Friedman would get the gas chamber and no smart lawyer would get him off by copping an insanity plea.

            “Did he sign a confession?”

            “Hasn’t said a word or moved a muscle since the day he walked in and told us he did it,” I answered sourly.  “Been sitting in his cell like a statue.  Hardly eats.  Never says a word.  Doesn’t move a muscle.”

            “Well . . . that’s okay,” the DA growled and nodded.  But the furrows of lines creasing his forehead looked worrisome. “As long as you to testify he confessed to the crimes when he approached you.  That, and the evidence we have, should be enough for a conviction.”

            “What evidence, Jethro?” Frank grunted, frowning, and looking like a maleficent volcano about to explode.

            I fought hard  to hide the grin that wanted split my lips in two.  Jethro was a moniker my mountain-gorilla lookalike for a partner use to label people he thought were blithering idiots.  And he pegged Deputy DA Anthony Scarborough at the top of the list.

            “I am not Jethro, Sergeant Morales!  How many times do I have to tell you that?  And the evidence?  Try this out.  He’s a known sadist.  He’s father’s remains–what little there is of him–was found in a basement sink in a house he and his father occupied.  He was last seen with the girl as they walked to a local store.  And his fingerprints are all over the weapon used to chop his father up!  What more evidence do you need?”

            Open and shut.

            Even I felt the guy was probably guilty.  But . . .

            This nagging voice in the back of my head.  An insistent whisper that just wouldn’t shut up.  Couldn’t make out what it was trying to say.  But I could tell it sure as hell wasn’t happy in the way this case was playing out.

            Brother . . . if you’re a cop . . . you get these nagging little voices occasionally.  Listen to them.  More times than not they start yapping at you just below the surface of consciousness when something’s wrong in the investigation.  Not yelling loud enough to slap you up the side of the head with a brick and tell you what’s wrong.  But making noise; an irritating noise that tells you you’ve screwed up somewhere.  You missed something.  Or overlooked something.  Or something just doesn’t add up.

            Or maybe . . .just  maybe . . . it was just too damn easy.

            Frank and I rode in elevator in silence.  Just the two of us.  Both of us had our arms folded across our chests and frowns on our lips.  We eyed our sour mugs in the reflections coming off the stainless steel doors in front of us.  We both knew something was wrong.  Something didn’t fit.  Something was out of whack somewhere.

            “Do you think maybe . . . ?”

            “Damn right,” he nodded before I could finish.  “A guy keeps his kitchen spotless yet leaves the basement sink looking like a butcher’s table.  Doesn’t make sense.”

            “So he’s possibly not our . . . . ,” I started to say.

            “Hell no!  Some other freaking sicko did the murder of the old man!” Frank snapped angrily, nodding in head decisively.  “And I’d bet next month’s paycheck Beatrice Bonner’s murder was a frame-up as well!”

            “So maybe we should . . . ?”    

            “You took the words right out of my mouth, kiddo!  By god, we ought to go back to the house and go over it like a fine tooth.  Cover that fucker from antic to sub basement.  There’s gotta be something we missed over there.  Gotta be!”

            I grinned as the elevator doors opened and glanced at my pal.

            “Glad we talked,” I said, nodding, as we stepped out of the elevator.

            “Turner, sometimes you talk to much.”

            The grin widened as we made our way out to the parking lot and to the Shelby Mustang.

         

            Hours.

            Hours of searching the basement.  The ground floor.  The upstairs.  Combing through everything.  Probing ever nook and cranny.  And finally, tackling the piles of newspapers that seemed to be tall, silent columns of deadly silence littering the basement floor.

            And . . . . epiphany.

            Something clicked.  Something slapped together in our collective heads.  Those little voices bothering both of us suddenly shutting up.  We looked up from the piles of newspapers almost burying us and just stared at each other.

            “I’ll be go to hell,” Frank snarled, shaking his head in disbelief and looking down at browned, brittle paper spread out across his lap.  “Gag me with a spoon, California Girl, and call me stupid!”

            “Stupid!”  I said, smirking,  as I ran a hand through my hair.  “But who the hell would have caught it fifteen years ago?”

            “Yeah.  But still . . .”

            Buried deep in one pile of newspapers were six papers which had blazing headlines across the front page in big letters saying,  Body of Dismembered Girl Found In Woods.

            Six of them.  Two in Kansas.  One in Missouri.  Two in Illinois.  And Beatrice Bonner.

All almost identical stories. Cases that stretched out across decades.  Girl snatched off a sidewalk in a quiet residential neighborhood.  Missing for weeks.  And then pedestrians, or hikers, or construction workers, stumble onto the scattered bones of the dead in a forest.  The girls were killed by two holes punctured into the back of the head.  And then dismembered.

            The murders went back eighteen years.  The first two happening when Jacob Friedman was only two years old.

            “Jacob Friedman didn’t murder Beatrice Bonner,” Frank growled, looking up at me and frowning.  “His father was the killer.  Apparently a serial killer.”

            “But I betcha our sicko killer didn’t try to hide his little secret from his son.”

            “You think Jacob helped the old man kill these girls?”

            “Don’t think so,” I said, shaking my head no.  “But the kid knew.  Knew for a long time.  And knowing what his father was doing made him go off the deep end.”

            “Say,” Frank said, lifting an eyebrow in surprise and half turning to look at the brick wall and the hole where we found Beatrice Bonner’s remains.  “You know, we haven’t found a thing that mentions Jacob’s mother.  No divorce papers.  No funeral notices.  Nothing.  You don’t think . . . ?”

            We both looked at the brick wall of the basement and narrowed our eyes thoughtfully.

            Yeah.  She was in there.  Behind a cement patch in the casement wall.  It took a team of forensic boys three hours to dig her out.  But she was, like the other victims, dismembered and with two holes punched into the back of her skull.

            We had solved seven old cases of murder.  But we still didn’t know who killed Jacob Friedman’s father.

            “Jacob could have,” Frank said, rubbing his chin thoughtfully as we stood watching the lab boys insert bones into plastic baggies and label each one meticulously.  “Could have come back from the crazy house and just . . . snapped.  The old man must have said something and Jacob just lost it.  Went bat-shit crazy.”

            I was half listening to Frank’s musings.  But I was more interested in a newspaper I found which detailed the disappearance of Beatrice Bonner.  It was a concise, well written story.  So well written two things leapt out at me almost instantly.

            The first one was Beatrice Bonner’s family lived directly across the street from the Friedman’s house.  The second one was the dead girl’s father was a plumber.  When I read that I stopped, looked up and at the now gaping hole where Beatrice and Mrs. Friedman had been resting in for all these years. 

            Sure enough.  Water pipes snaked in through the casement wall and twisted their way down toward the washtub sink in front of us.

            “Come on,” I said, tossing the paper to one side and turning to leave.  “I think I know who killed Old Man Friedman.”

            He was an old man now.  Patrick Bonner.  White haired, bone thin.  Skin dark brown and rawhide tough.  Dressed in an old shirt long faded with time and baggy blue jeans. He was sitting on the front porch in a battered looking rocking chair, one leg thrown over the other, smoking a cigarette and eyeing the comings and goings of the police and lab boys with a dispassionate interest.  Didn’t blink an eye or move a muscle when he saw Frank and I come out of the Friedman house, walk down the sidewalk, cross the street, and start up the sidewalk leading to his house.

            “Did you figure it out, boys?” he finally said in a casual, almost friendly voice, as our feet slapped on the first step leading up to the porch.

            “Yes sir, most of it.”  I said, nodding.  “But you can fill in the details if you want.”

            One eye narrowed and watched us for a moment or two as the cigarette hung in his lips and blue smoke drifted up past his face.  Finally he shrugged, lifted a hand up and pulled the cigarette out and snapped it out into the lawn in front of him.

            “Sure.  Why not.  It’s all over now.  The waiting.  The unknowing.  The anger.  All of it.  Gone.  I hope that sonofabitch burns in hell.  Burns for eternity.”

            “What happened, Mr. Bonner?” Frank asked.

            “Charlie’s been in a wheel chair for the last three years.  In poor health.  Living off what little retirement and Social Security he could get.  When he found out Jacob was getting out of the hospital and was coming home he called me and asked me if I would be willing to fix a leak down in the basement.  I didn’t like the sonofabitch.  Never did.  Always thought he was an odd old coot.  Thought his son was nuts.  But I said okay.  I’d come over and see what I could do.

            That’s when I found her.  Beatrice.  I had to knock a hole in the brick wall and take a peek at the plumbing.  Just happened to pick the exact spot Charlie used to hide what he did to my daughter.  I went . . . . well, you know.  You know what happened next.”

            “And Jacob?”  I asked.  “Where does Jacob come in to all of this?”

            “I dunno,” sighed the old man, shaking his head and looking thoughtful.  “He must have found what I did to his father in the basement.  What little sanity he had left him decided to check out.  I saw him get into a taxi and disappear down the street.  Apparently the taxi took him straight to you guys.  Hell, I’ve been sitting on this porch and waiting for you guys to show up for the last three days.   Was beginning to wonder if I was going to get away with it.”

            We took him downtown.  Booked him for Murder One.  Then we went over to deputy District Attorney Anthony Scarborough and told him he was a fucking idiot.  Well . . . not so bluntly.  But when we left he had no doubt what we thought of him.  After that we drove Jacob Friedman back to the insane asylum.  We left him smiling at us dreamily as two male nurses gently took him by his arms and started walking him down the wide garden path of oblivion.

            Justice is a cruel bitch.

. . . while we're sharing old stories

 . . . while we're on the subject of sharing old ideas, today I thought I'd share another short story, and another character of mine I hold close to my heart.

Roland of the High Crags.

Roland is a warrior-monk of the Bretan Order.  He is also a skilled wizard.  Warrior, monk, and wizard; a monk sworn to fight Evil in all its manifestations.

Yes. He is a hero in the classic sense for the definition of 'hero' in the genre called 'Fantasy.'  Yet he's flawed.  He has weaknesses.  He has fears.  And he doesn't mind admitting them.

The idea for this character came to me, oddly enough, from watching my youngest daughter--then about four or five--playing around with her dolls in the library with me.  A thought struck me that made me start thinking.  Just what would a father do to protect his children?  How far would he go, and what odds would he face, in keeping harm away form his child?

Another idea struck me as well.  Just how deep, and how strong, is the power of love?  Any love.  The love of a father for his child--the love of a mother--the love (brotherly love) one feels for a friend.  The love and devotion for religion--for faith--for an idea?

That's how the Roland series was born.  The exploration of love, faith, treachery, hope and . . . ultimately . . . discovery.

The first book is the one above.  Roland of the High Crags: Evil Arises.  It begins the adventure.
But, sadly, the reading mass hasn't discovered it yet.  So (and admittedly in a desperate attempt to resuscitate the project) I thought I would share a Roland short story in the hopes it might regenerate some interest.

So here goes.  I hope you like it.

Lamenting Souls

Evil burns in colors sullen, Pilgrim.

Aye, Fellow Traveler. In the eyes of a wizard Evil smolders in colors dark and menacing. All life shimmers and glows. Trees. Flowers. The animals of the forest. The denizens of the watery deep. Dragons. Man. All life shimmers a color and a hue unique to its own. Even Magic, Pilgrim. Magic glows in colors unique to the brand of magic used.

I am the one called Roland. Roland of the High Crags. I am a warrior monk of the Bretan Way. My magic is Bretan. Here, in the snow capped peaks of the High Kanris, I have taken vows to protect the weak and the innocent from those which would feed upon their souls. Evil of any kind. My vows are unbending. I cannot flinch. I can not withdraw from the fight. I fight the noble fight. The fight that Evil must be confronted. Must be constantly sought out and defeated.

For the true believer knows, Pilgrim. Evil can never be destroyed. Only constrained in heavy chains if resolutely confronted.

So began this adventure on one bright moon lit night as I rode the warm updrafts rising into the night hair from forest floors below us. I and my good companion, a Huygens-bred Great Wing who called himself Cedric.

A Great Wing, friend, is a giant hawk. A powerful bird of prey found only among the snow capped peaks of the High Kanris. A bird, this Cedric, a hundred and eighty hands high. Roughly fifteen feet tall when wings folded and standing on clawed talons. A fierce warrior. Fearless and bold. With wings strong enough to carry me long distances over forest floor or mountain peak in this rugged land I call home. A great warrior in his own right–a partner who has agreed to stay at my side in my fight against both the Dragon and against Evil.

On this lonely night as we rode the moon beams over a nameless valley, the jagged black peaks of mountains towering over us and capped by snow gleaming bright and brilliant on moonlight, we both heard the eerie voice rising up from below calling for us.

Help, masters! Help this weary soul! Save me and my kinfolk from our tormentors!

Oh, please, oh great wizard. We beseech thee!The pleading voice of a ghost, Pilgrim.
Aye, the dead doth speak. The night filled with wandering souls. Lost souls. Tormented souls. Sad souls. For one reason or another souls who will not step into the Netherworld and swim in the warm waters of the River of Time. This voice rising up to us as we sailed silently over a valley floor of ancient forests was a tormented soul–a soul wishing to journey into the Netherworld. But one kept here in the Outer Worlds by supernatural forces stronger than it.

Cedric, old friend, did not hesitate. With me strapped firmly in the saddle it dipped one mighty wing and circled above the forest floor, one great eye of his peering into the moon light night to find the source of this pleading lament. Eyeing something human eyes are incapable of seeing the great beast folded its wings and dived downward toward a small forest clearing.

With a powerful whoosh! of wings Cedric settled into the high grass of the small clearing. Folding his wings hesitantly it eyed the black forest encircling the clearing expecting some kind of trap to be sprung. Leaping from the saddle, the curved bronze hued blade of my ancient Dragon scimitar in hand, I too expected trouble. Moving away from my winged companion, the tall grass waving in the moonlight in my wake, sword in hand, I waited for our lamenting ghost to make its appearance.

She came, soon enough, floating across the tall grass in a meandering cloud of a million fireflies.

  Master, oh! You heard me! You heard my pleas! Thanks be to the



Fireflies, millions of them, danced around us, rising and falling, in some kind of merry fugue. The Inner Eye within me, the third eye all wizards and those with magical powers possess and that gives them the power to see the auras of life, glowed with joy and relief. This Inner Eye of mine saw this ghostly entity was that of a child, a small child, a female long absent from the Outer Realms in physical form yet trapped in this world unable to move on.

"Calm yourself, child, and tell me why you speak of others and why you dwell in this valley still?"

I am called Rebecca, master. I and my kinfolk–parents, uncles, cousins, aunts and distant kin–settled in this valley many, many years hence. Far from others like us

we decided to build our homes here in peace, in solitude, in peace. But soon after my birth a great evil came to us. A great evil disguised as a human. One by one it began to take us. It stalked us all. Sank its bloody fangs into our souls and took our spirits from us. Even in death it holds us here, master. We cannot leave this valley. We cannot enter the Netherworld. We have been here

for a long, long time. So long some of us are beginning to fade into nothingness,master! Can you help us? Can you free us from our tormentor? Oh, please, master!

Please help us!



I felt the child’s pain. I felt the faint menace yet reaching out with its cold gripping and holding onto her soul. I knew what had to be done. Yet the perils I knew were great. Great for me. Even more so for the child’s soul and those of her kin.

"I can journey to your time, child. I can find this evil sorcery and I can challenge it. But it is powerful, this magic. I cannot guarantee I can defeat it. If it defeats me, child, it will grow far stronger. Perhaps strong enough to leave this valley which keeps it trapped within."

I will help you, master! I–we all–will help you find this dark magic and defeat

it! This we promise!

"Return to you kin, child. Tell them I travel into the past. Tell them to remain silent upon my appearance. The evil that holds you need not know of my coming until I am already arrived."

The fireflies, millions of them, reacted to my words. The swirled around us twice and then drifted away in a long weaving line in one direction of the dark forest pressing down upon us. Still gripping the ancient blade in my hand I turned and eyed my old friend.

"If we journey back to the child’s time and are caught forever there our souls will be consumed, old friend. We will never escape. You do not need to travel with me. Go you your way and I shall go mine."

For an answer the giant war bird bent its thick neck down and, using its long hooked beak gently, pushed me hard backward, making me stumble back through the high grass two or three steps. From his mind I felt a hot retort of anger for me for even suggestion such an idea.

Grinning, feeling Cedric’s anger in my mind, I nodded and reached up with a gloved hand and slapped the war bird’s great hook beaked fondly. True friend and warrior he was. Through thick and thin. We would ride together in this battle.

"Very well, Cedric. Prepare yourself. The journey will be swift but cold. Colder than the fiercest of any winter’s breath we ever endured together."

Stepping away from my feathered brother I lifted a gloved hand up over bowed head. Closing my eyes I began the process of focusing the Inner Eye. Into the Netherworld we had to enter together. Into that domain that was neither in the present nor in the past. Neither in the future nor in the minds of mortal man. But only after stepping into the Netherworld would Cedric and I be able to travel across the deep waters of the River of Time. Travel into the past. Into the far, far past.

First came the tingling, electrical charge of entering the Netherworld. A surge of wild exuberance–of overwhelming warmth and static electricity, sweeping across us. Stimulating very pore, ever nerve ending in our bodies with a sense of narcotic bliss. The smells–the sounds–the roar of the Netherworld almost overwhelmed our senses. But swiftly it swept past us–and then darkness engulfed us. Darkness yet the sensation of floating on calm waters of a wide river.

Indeed, the River of Time is a an endless river, Pilgrim. A deep, wide river that flows for eternity into the Past and for an eternity into the far Future. It never ends. It has no beginning. It goes on in both directions forever. Time limitless flows in this body of water. And it, like the Netherworld itself, is filled with souls passing across the dark waters, traveling in both directions at once.

But the calm waters began to get choppy. The smooth motion of riding in a boat changed to the hurling, undulating crash of a being tossed hither and yon in a ship riding the winds of a howling hurricane! Cold–cold far colder than the winds of the frigid northern glaciers–howled angrily in our ears. Buffeted and bruised we stood together enduring the journey. Winds howled. Screamed. Faintly carrying the voices of hundreds–thousands–millions of souls crying out to us we hurled past them.

And then . . . suddenly . . . . silence.

The smells of a high mountain valley. The soft touch of a mountain breeze playing across my cheeks. The smells of wild flowers and forests old in my nostrils. Opening my eyes I lifted my head and peered around me. Cedric stood exactly in the same place I saw him last. But, looking up at the stars I could see we had arrived. Arrived in this same valley as had recently being standing in. But in a far, far, more ancient time.

In the night wind I heard the faint echo of laughter and the sounds of a music. Sheathing the ancient blade I walked to my feathered friend and leapt into the saddle and strapped myself in. Cedric spread his wide, powerful wings and leapt high into the night sky. Wings strong and swift had us climbing swiftly into a starry, moon filled night. Banking sharply to the right it did not take us long to spy the small hamlet of simple log cabins setting beside a small river in a not too distant mountain clearing.

Life, Pilgrim. Remember I said Life glows with an aura all its own. Even ghosts have an aura. Life–in a different setting–yet living still. Unless, unless . . .

In the moonlight the cabins looked old and decrepit. The moon’s silver beams played across low roof lines and log walls. From chimneys columns of smoke lifted into the night sky while on the surface of the moving river, like glittering orbs of a thousand scintillating diamonds, moon beams played across its dark watery surface. Twice we circled the hamlet in silence, Cedric’s wings riding the night air like the master of the hunt he was. Pointing to a spot beside the river I said nothing. Nor had to. My old friend heard my thoughts. Twisting around quickly and folding his wings we dropped like a stone toward the river’s bank. Settling onto the river bank like avenging wraiths I leapt from my saddle and then patted the hardened yellow beak of the war bird gently.

"Stay alert, old friend. We hunt that which hunts us. Evil lurks in the night waiting to lunge at our throats."

One last slap on the Great Wing’s beak and I started walking down a well trodden path toward the one building in the hamlet which light filtered through windows and into the night. From this low slung, long building came the sounds of laughter and music. The laughter of adults mingled with the squeals of children. Aye, Pilgrim. On first blush the warmth of the light, the sound of music and much laughter emanating from within this old inn, should have warmed my heart. All seemed well. All seemed as it should. Yet the Inner Eye I possessed told me otherwise. I knew, Pilgrim. I knew Evil hoary and ancient nestled within. And it was waiting for me to step unsuspectingly into its elaborate trap.

Ducking my head to slip under the low roof line I opened the inn’s door and stepped into the brightly lit interior. Closing the rough wooden plank door behind me I gazed at those who gazed at me and nodded. Twenty souls sat around long tables on roughly hewn benches or stood leaning against a long bar which stretched the width of the building to my left. Farmers. Woodsmen. Children of all ages. Warriors wearing habiliments and weapons unfamiliar to me. Merchants in outrageously colorful apparel. All sat or stood silently and stared at me with frozen smiles pressed upon their lips.

Ghosts, Pilgrim.

Souls captured and consumed by the Evil which hid itself somewhere in this room. Captured long, long ago in a far away past and held in psychic servitude all these years in this valley of the damned. Ghosts who’s auras told me they screamed in silent agony yet danced at the whim of that which held them so tightly in his grip.

"Master, thank the gods!" Rebecca’s happy voice came to me as she ran with face smiling and eyes dancing in joy to me. "The terrible thing which had imprisoned us all these years has fled! Fled the moment he felt your presence about the hamlet as you and your giant bird circled in the night. Thank you, master! Thank you! We are free, finally free!"

Tiny little hands gripped my calloused, hardened hand and pressed it against her cheek for a moment and then turned and pulled me deeper into the room. Several of the ancient warriors from lands I knew not approached me with smiling faces and heartily pounded me on my back and expressed their gratitude. An old patriarch, with thick white beard and long white air falling to his wide shoulders, rose from one of the benches and walked to the bar. Pouring something black and strange into a large stone cut, smiling like the grateful head of a large family, he turned and offered me the cup.

"Drink, wizard. Drink! Tonight we will celebrate our release from hell’s grasp. Tomorrow we will journey into the Netherworld and swim in the warm waters of eternity. Drink, kind sir. Drink and let us hear you tell us how great of a wizard you are!"

Evil’s black heart pounded with rhythmic assuredness my ears. Encircling me were the smiling of the ghosts many–their auras twisting and squirming and screaming in silent horror as they knew what was to come next yet powerless to prevent it. Smiling sadly, staring down at the dark fluid that was neither wine nor water, I felt the pain of the many–and the arrogant confidence of the Evil One–and knew what I had to do.

With a flick of the wrist I tossed the black liquid from the cup. It arched away from me in a long graceful curve and eventually splashed onto the rough planked wooden floor of the inn. The moment it touched the flooring it began hissing its killing acid bite and burrowed deep into the ancient wood.

"Your tricks will not deceive me, Ancient One. I feel your presence here. I know you hold these souls in a grip of servitude. Enough with this subterfuge. Release those who have served you for so long and allow them to enter The Netherworld."

Like a black tidal wave of raw emotion I felt the presence of the Ancient One recoil from me, its ancient soul quivering with hot anger as it moved away. Most of the souls encircling me took a step back from me as well. But two–two warriors from ancient lands long forgotten–reacted differently. Rage and anger filled their faces as they unsheathed the straight blades of ancient weapons and leapt at me. Like magic Helshvingar was in my hand. Steel met flashing steel in deadly play and rang out like ancient chimes in a constant clang of a maleficent symphony.

Helshvingar.

The ancient Dragon scimitar I carried strapped to my side always. A curved blade of steel forged by the gods themselves. Steel. Yet not steel. Blue, like fine forged steel, it was not. No. This blade had a faint bronze hue to it that seemed to glow whenever released from its sheath. Down the length of the blade, on both sides, were some kind of old and forgotten script. No one knew what it said. But the blade’s name was of Dragon tongue. From an old, almost forgotten dialect.

Helshvingar.

The Killer of All Evil.

We fought, the three of us, in a fierce encounter of murderous intent. Our swords rain down in slashing blows met by counter strokes of equal fury. The din of battle, the dance of three warriors, moved across the floor of the ancient inn in a destructive soiree. Chairs were overturned. Tables were smashed and splintered. The two warriors of old–ancient yet not ancient–fought like madmen. In their eyes and on their faces were portraits of the rage and black murderous intent of the Ancient One himself. Deep, deep underneath the controlling grasp of the Ancient One I could feel the souls of the two men crying out in anguish. They were trapped. Helpless. They screamed in despair and pleaded for me to somehow release them from their bondage. Faintly–like voices heard in a breeze from far away–I heard their pleas.

Grimly I doubled my efforts to save them from their damned eternity.

Their swordplay was good for warriors ancient. I felt the Ancient One’s expertise in the way he forced his bonded slaves to fight. But they fought in a style of swordplay far more simple in structure than what a Bretan warrior-monk is taught. I noticed the rudimentary styles of both immediately and waited for the moment to strike. It came after the fifteenth stroke of the sword when one of the warriors lost his footing and stumbled to one side a half step. Like the strike of a viper’s bloody fangs Helshvingar slid in underneath the warrior’s blade and slashed across the warrior’s upper waist.

The moment Helshvingar’s magical blade touched the ghost’s torso a violent transformation took place. A cloud of black vapor blurred the image of the stricken warrior and hissed loudly up and away from the warrior. The clatter of the warrior’s ancient steel blade falling to the inn’s floor was masked as the scream of a thousand banshees filled our minds and souls with squeals of pain and anger. But the soul of the warrior–the soul of an honorable foe so long held in bondage– lifted above me glowing in the brilliance of bright white. As the newly released spirit lifted up and away from me, on the warrior’s face was the visage of a man suddenly freed from bondage and joyous in his new found freedom. The soul of the warrior rose rapidly, and just before it disappeared through the inn’s rough timbered ceiling above us, a hand waved at me–a gesture of gratitude from a soul who, for centuries, knew nothing but grief and torment and despair.

Waving farewell I smiled. And turned to face the entities who stood facing me in some lifeless facade of existence, lifting the curved, bronzed hued blade of Helshvingar up in the process.

"You cannot win this fight, Old One. This is the blade of the gods. Forged by the immortals to cut the bonds you hold over others. Forged to suck you into the blade itself and imprison you for the rest of eternity. As long as the blade and I act as one our combined magic will defeat you. Release those who you yet control, Old One. Release them and face the fate that is in store for you."

From the Ancient One I felt pain and disbelief. Never before in its long existence had something like this ever happened to him. For a moment or two I felt the black presence of the Evil One quivering in indecision. My Inner Eye saw the Ancient One’s black vapor filling the room recoiling, twisting, contracting. And then, in the blinking of an eye, it made a decision! Again the screams of a thousand banshees filled the inn with a noise that almost was beyond endurance. From the forms of the remaining souls yet in the inn clouds of black vapor lifted from them and congealed into the main vaporous body of the Ancient One.

With a thundering roar the Ancient One ripped open the inn’s roof and began ascending rapidly into the moonlit night. Fleeing from me and from the power of Helshvingar as rapidly as it could. Turning, throwing open the inn’s door, I ran for the black form of Cedric waiting for me at the river’s edge. The giant war bird had its beaked head lifted upward, screeching its war cry, as it watched the Ancient One flying away. With a bounding leap I hurled myself up into my old friend’s saddle. The moment I landed in the old leather Cedric spread its dark wings and bounded into to the air. So rapid was my old friend’s ascent into the night air I was almost hurled from the saddle itself. But somehow I strapped myself in still gripping Helshvingar in one hand.

The vaporous cloud of the Ancient One twisted and dove and climbed in its mindless haste to elude us. But riding the moonlit night’s air currents is the domain of a Great Wing. No entity–not even ancient horrors from the depth of The Netherworld itself–can dominate the skies like a Great Wing! For every move the Ancient One tried in his efforts to elude us Cedric had a counter. Through the night air we hurled recklessly!

But in the end–in the end–Cedric positioned himself over the long, snake-like vaporous body of the Ancient One. And I . . . I gripping with both hands the blade of Helshvingar . . leapt from saddle into the night air and into the depths of the vaporous cloud of this ancient evil itself.



A half hour later we returned to the long forgotten high mountain valley and settled gently into the tall grass on the spot where we first met the child Rebecca. Jumping from the saddle to stand beside my old friend we stood silently . . . expectantly . . .and waited.

She came again, the child Rebecca, in a cloud of a million beautifully bright fireflies. Drifting across the valley floor in a swarm of flickering light. As she approached we saw her take the ghostly form of a child. Each tiny firefly becoming an integral part of the child’s image as she approached and began to ascend into the night.

She said nothing to us. Yet as her ghostly image rose on the waves of moonbeams she lifted a hand up and waved goodbye. And in our souls we felt the wash of an overwhelming sense of freedom and longing drench us in tears of relief and gratitude.

　

Sharing an Oldie but Goodie

Thought I'd give you a treat today.  Thought I'd share a Turner Hahn and Frank Morales story.  An oldie but goodie.  I know, I know . . . you might have read this one earlier.  But here it is anyway. 

If you don't know (or haven't read a Turner Hahn/Frank Morales story) Turner and Frank are the first two permanent characters I created years ago.  Characters I want to share a lot of stories with to those who might like truly interesting, dynamic . . .  . . . uh . . . characters.

 

I don't know if you'll agree with me or not but noir fiction is devoid of clearly memorable characters.  Oh I am sure each of us can knock of half a dozen or more names of steely eyed, cold blooded, damnably efficient killers.  I can too.   But characters . . . basically good men with their own set of eccentricities doing a job, either by choice or unwillingly, which throws them into life and death situations,  seems to be sorely missing.

 

I'm talking about people you actually would like to get to know and hang around with.  People you could trust.  People who you could share a bawdy joke with.  Those kinds of people.  Turner Hahn and Frank Morales are two who do this for me.  Each unique.  Each a character.

 

Turner looks like the spitting image of a well known movie star who worked the cinema back in the 30's and 40's.  A farm boy who hates the farm.  A guy who, by sheer accident, becomes filthy rich (honestly) yet chooses to remain a cop.  A guy with a wiry sense of humor.

 

Frank Morales is a hulking monster with short cropped stringy red hair with a jaw made out of plate armor.  If Turner's humor is wiry . . . Frank's is morbidly dry.  And he's incredibly intelligent with an IQ that may be four-digits long.  Yes . . . I said four-digits long.  Frank is also a married man.  Happily married (rare to find such a character in the noir/hard-boiled world).  A beautiful wife, a house full of kids, dogs, cats, and parrots.

 

Put the two of'em together and they make one hell of a homicide detective team.  Or at least, I think so.  So here's Coercion.  See if you like it.

 

Coercion

 

 

 

 

            “You know, this probably isn’t a good idea.”

            I stood behind my partner, Frank Morales, with hands in slacks and watched the big gorilla hold the wiry form of Nick James in on one of his big, shovel sized hands like the kid was nothing but a discarded rag doll.  Frank had his other hand up and cocked back like a ram, his fist the size of a wrecking ball, about to jackhammer straight into the kid’s face

            Frank turned, looked over his shoulder, and shook his head.

            “Turn, we don’t have time for niceties. Shit is gonna explode pretty fucking soon if we don’t get some answers.  And I’m betting this little creep has some answers.”

            I grinned.  Couldn’t argue with simple logic like that.

            We were standing in the back room of a pool hall down on First Street.  A smoke filled, dimly lit dive with a back room that smelled of stale cigarettes and piss.  Out front two people were knocking around a cue ball–the click of the balls smacking into each other somehow oddly comforting to listen to.  Glancing at my watch I noted it was a quarter past one in the afternoon.  We had exactly forty-five minutes to find Tex Edwards.  Just forty-five minutes.

            Or all kinds of hell were indeed going to be let loose.

            “Nick, I can’t tell you how much this kind of interrogation hurts me.  Hurts me somewhat less than it’s gonna hurt you, I’ll admit.  But let’s not quibble over nuances.  A little cooperation would be helpful.  Tell us what we want to know and you won’t have to go to the emergency room.  Or spit out teeth.”

            “But I haven’t a clue where the hell Tex is, Frank!  Shit. He doesn’t give me an itinerary of his coming and goings.  Why would he?”

            Crack!  The sound of a fist smacking into hard bone was almost as sharp and clear as the pool playing behind us.  Nick, the idiot, flew back two or three feet, smashed into a stack of beer, rattling bottles and threatening to tip over, before sliding semi-unconscious to the floor.  Frank walked over Nick, reached down and yanked him to a standing upright position,  and rolled up his fist again.

            “You know where Tex is.  You know his little hideaway.  I know you do.  Now, we can do this one of two ways.  We can be civilized and you can answer my questions without any form of coercion.  Or I can beat you to a bloody pulp and throw your ass in jail for resisting arrest and accessory to a murder.  You’re choice.”

            “Oooh, coercion.” I crowed, grinning as I looked at Frank.  “A big word for you, buddy,”

            “Yeah, I know.  I don’t use’em often,” Frank nodded, almost smiling, but not taking his tiny little eyes off Nick.

            True.  As smart as the block of cement was, he wasn’t usually a talker.  But when he took on the mantel of Lead Investigator of a crime it was remarkable to see the transformation sweep over him.  Like watching a rerun of Doctor Jekyll and Mr. Hide.

            We’re cops.  Homicide division down at South Side Precinct.  Yeah . . . I know.  Cops are not supposed to act like goons and beat the shit out of potential witnesses.  We’re supposed to follow rules.  Department regulations.  And we do.  Most of the time.  But there comes a time . . . a place . . . where you have to bend the rules.  Take chances.  Even . . . become a goon.

            Take this case.

            Two hours earlier in the day the two of us were driving down Melrose in my rag top ‘71 Camaro heading toward a witness’ house to talk to her.  Different crime–different case.  My case.  But it was a beautiful day.  The sun was out.  The sky was a pale light blue.  The street filled with the traffic and noise I find very comforting to listen to.  Half way there my cell phone rings.  Pulling it out of my sport coat I handed it to Frank to answer.  He frowned, flipped it open, and grunted.  And then listened for the next three minutes before snapping it closed and looking at me grimly.

            “That was the lieutenant.  Apparently we’re investigating a kidnapping.  Top priority.”

            “Whose been nabbed?”

            “A kid.  The son of–get this–Lewis Abernathy.”

            I whistled softly in surprised.  Lewis Abernathy was maybe the richest guy in the city.  The state.  Damn close to being as richest guy in the country.  Abernathy Industries owned just about every kind of major manufacturing and high tech industry one could think of.  Rich wasn’t a word that came close to describing Lewis Abernathy’s wealth.  Frowning, looking at Frank, I raised an eyebrow expectantly.

            “Five million dollars in old, and unlisted, bills.  Nothing bigger than a twenty.  That’s what the kidnappers want.  And they want it by two this afternoon.  Or they kill the kid.”

            “What do you have for leads?”

            “Me?  What do you mean . . . me?”

            “It’s your case, buddy.  I’ve got mine.  Now you’ve got yours.”

            Frank started to make a protest.  But he took one look at my kisser and decided to clam up.  And then he shook his head and sighed.

            “Shit.  Okay, my case.”

            “What do you have for a lead?”

            “Need to get back to the precinct.  Supposed to have a video from a security cam from  the kid’s school showing how he was nabbed.  We’ll start with that.”

            I made a sudden U-turn in front of a cabby . . . who hit his bakes and screeched to a stop as he proudly saluted me with his middle finger . . .and we hurried back to the precinct.  We watched the video.  The three of us.  Frank.  Me.  And Lieutenant Yankovich.

            We call him Yank.  As tall and Frank and me.  Slightly stooped over.  The haggard, pale face of a corpse.  Yet for a boss the guy is okay.  And as a cop goes they don’t make them any smarter.

            We watched the tape.   Saw the dad’s big limo pull up in front of the front of the private school.  Saw the dirty white van setting at the curb just in front of the limo.  A van with ‘Dino Plumbing’ written on its sides.  Saw the chauffeur get out of the car and open the back door for the kid to get out.  Saw the kid’s body guard slide out of the limo’s front passenger side.   Watched both chauffeur and body guard smile at the kid and say something nice.  Saw the four masked thugs jump out of the back of the van and take out both driver and body guard with two quick slugs into their backs.  Watched closely as one of the masked thugs nabbed the kid and picked him up roughly in one arm and hurried back to the van.  Saw the van driver limp quickly around to the driver side and jump in.  Saw the van squealing away in a cloud of blue smoke coming out of the van’s back end.

            “That’s it,” Yank grunted in a rough whisper.  “ The chauffeur and body guard are wounded.  But they’ll make it.  Other than that,  that’s all we got.”

            “It’s enough,” Frank grunted, frowning, and rewinding the tape.

            “Enough?  You got something?”

            We both nodded.

            Hell.  When you work long enough with someone you like, the two of you start to think the same way.  See the same things.  Come to the same conclusions.

            “Watch the driver,” Frank said as he stepped back to watch the tape again.  “See the limp?  Left leg.  About two inches shorter than his right.  Remind you of anyone?”

            The three of us watched the tape again.  And then again.  And then again.

            “Yeah, it does look familiar.  Been years since I’ve noticed him around.  Can’t think of his name just yet.  But it’ll come to me.”

            “Tex Edwards,” Frank said, nodding.  “Been in the slammer for the last ten years on a robbery rap.  “Turn and I put him there.  Betcha five-to-one he got himself paroled.”

            I pulled out my cell phone and make a quick call.  It didn’t take long to confirm Frank’s suspicions.

            “Yep.  Been seen a couple of times down at Nick’s Pool Hall down on First Street,” I threw out.

            “Our first stop,” Frank grunted, the corners of his lips twitching–his form of a grin.

            Yank’s gray lips split back into a wide grin as he nodded.

            “Good hunting, boys.  Find the kid and bring him back alive.  Don’t do anything too foolish.  But if you do, I know the name of a good lawyer.”

            So here we were.  Having a nice, friendly, chat with Nick in the back room of his pool hall.  It didn’t take long to get a lead on Tex’s whereabouts.  And Nick got to keep his teeth.  Most of'em at least.

            It was a house down on 112^th Street South.  A house set back deep in the lot and surrounded by old elm trees.  To one side of the house was a detached garage.  In front of the house was a beat up, splinted picket fence screaming for a new paint job.  We drove by the house once to get a good look at the place.  Circling the block we parked about half a block down and then walked up to the house next to our target, hopped a fence, and now stood backs against the garage wall on the far side of the garage away from the house.

            “Did you notice the windows?  No screens.”

            “Flash Bangs,” I suggested, lifting one up in my hand and grinning.  “Yeah, thought you’d have that in mind.”

            “Smart ass,” he grunted, the corners of his lips twitching as he pulled out his 9 mm Glock from its holster underneath his left armpit. “Toss it in the side window.  I go in the front.  You go in the back.  Take’em out if they show any resistance.  First one finds the kid grabs him and runs.  The other will cover.”

            And that’s the way it went down.  The Flash Bang did its work.  Lots of noise.  The shock wave knocking everybody silly.  Only one gunman popped up as I went through the back door.  He was on his way out as I was on the way in.  But a knee to the groin and the butt of my Kimber on the back of his neck persuaded him to stick around.  Frank met Tex in a bedroom just as the creep was lifting a gun up to shoot the kid.  But he didn’t make it.   Frank, as big as the ugly butt head is, can move when he has to.  And he did.  A swift kick to the side of Tex’s good leg–just to the side of the kneecap–snapped the leg in two like a twig.  The guy screamed, dropped his gun, fell to the floor and grabbed his broken leg with both hands.   Frank shut him up by using a number 14 shoe size of his into the man’s face.

            The kid was safe.  We took him to his parents and watched father and mother grab their only kid and hug him for all their worth.  Yeah . . . no joke.  Even rich people love their kids just like everyone else does.   Go figure.

Re-inventing a Legend

All right.  A conundrum, kiddos.  A head-scratcher.

Along comes someone who wants a character written who acts like Sherlock Holmes but isn't Sherlock Holmes.  Yep . . .  acts like Holmes but isn't Holmes?

What exactly does that mean?

Sir Conan Dole, a small time country physician who, to supplement his income as a practicing doctor out in the rustic rural countryside of England, decided to invent a detective of unusual eccentricities.  So unusual in fact that the character threatened (and eventually did) become better known than his creator!

Sherlock Holmes has become a legend.  An intellectual circus of deduction, acute observation, and reason which overwhelms the reader in his application of solving violent crimes.

And the guy has his peculiarities.  He's apparently a gifted violinist.  He's a casual abuser of drugs. And someone who mistrusts women.  His photogenic mind is so voluminous it actually pushes people away from him.  And let's face it; the guy is a bit of a snob.  He knows he's smart and he doesn't hesitate to let everyone around him know he knows he's smart.

A fascinating creature for a reader to discover.  One hundreds of writers have tried to mimic in one fashion or another.  None of them, in my opinion, coming close to the luster of the original.

So now someone wants a new, historical, Holmes-wannabe to be created.  As a writer you have to ask yourself . . . . where the hell do you begin?  What traits of Holmes do you keep and which ones do you throw away?  Just who, and what, makes a Holmes character . . .  act Sherlock Holmes?

Is it just the intellect of the man?  His eccentricities?  His constant companionship with a Dr. Watson around to recount all his cases? 

Hmmm . . . .

The request was make him a 1st Century Roman.  Place him in a specific historical setting and work from there.  Okay.  That's no problem.  But . . . historically speaking . . . are there any examples of anyone in that time frame who thought like a Holmes?  And the answer is . . . possibly.  Greek philosophers and scientists (yes, there were Greek scientists), soon followed by Roman equivalents, were becoming more and more inquisitive on the intellectual plain, establishing by the 1st Century C.E., a long history of scientific reasoning and philosophical inquiry a gifted intellect might be aware of.

Good. 

Now, what kind of personality?  What's his familial background?  Where does he come from?   What are his eccentricities? (ever meet a genius who wasn't eccentric in some fashion?  Me neither)

So I have a character in mind.  Named him Decimus Octavius Virilis.  Ex-soldier.  Retired from the service with still all his limbs intact.  Distant cousin to Caesar Augustus.  Genius.  A character that is becoming more and more interesting the more I write about him.  Say . . . maybe I've got something here!

Read my previous blog.  Read the first chapter I've written.  See if you'll agree with me.