TROLLEY
No. 1852
by Edward Lee
Smashwords Edition
Necro Publications
2012
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TROLLEY NO. 1852
© 2010 by Edward Lee
PROVIDENCE, RHODE ISLAND
1934
It was the spectral hump of Federal Hill that held the solitary man’s gaze in capture, as oft it did, whene’re he took to his work-desk in hopes of a Muse’s whisper. The westward panes framed this inexpressible sight which rose two miles distant, and for reasons the lean, stoop-shouldered man could not explicate, beguiled his aesthetic senses as if to whelm them most utterly. Near dead-center of the roof-crowned rise stood the blackly bedrabbed hulk of St. John’s Church, whose cold Gothic revival windows seemed to stare back at his gaze in a knowing despair. The man felt certain that one day this morbid and singularly sinister edifice would ignite the fuse of a new tale, yet as so often happens to the creatively inclined, there could be no tale without an accommodating catalyst.
The same could be said of his present scribbling, cursorily entitled “The Thing in the Moonlight,” not a tale of itself but some rather desultory notes for one. It gravitated around a salient and very haunting image that had stricken him in a dream not far agone: a decrepit trolley-car rusting on its iron rails, slack power wires hanging overhead like dead umbilici. Ill-hued yellow paint mouldered around the vestibuled car, a colour akin to jaundice. A black and rather faded stencil identified the vehicle:
This dream-image disconcerted the man to no end, that and the image of the car’s motorman who turned in shifting moonlight to display a heinous face that was nothing but a white fleshy cone tapering snout-like to a single blood-red tentacle…
Like the Gothic pile of the church, the blear-eyed man yearned to harness this image and then rein it into a tale of weird substantiality. But, lo, he knew without the proper catalyst, it would never be more than a page of fallow cacography. Such was the curse of a poor and aging scribe.
However, the door-slat’s clatter alerted him to the arrival of the day’s post, and instead of a nettlesome bill or—his worst fear—an eviction, he found a manila envelope waiting. The upper-left corner bore no name but just a New York City address. From inside, his long thin fingers extracted a handsomely designed if not suspiciously suggestive magazine. Eloquent letters spelled its uncanny epithet EROTESQUE and a sub-heading:
The
The woodcut showed what—after a studied glance—could only be the silhouette of a winnowy, well-busted woman, undeniably nude and pruriently posed.
A neatly typed cover letter read as thus:
Dear Mr. Lovecraft:
Forgive the intrusion of this unsolicited invitation. EROTESQUE is a privately-circulated periodical offering fictional fare of the most outre, iconoclastic, and unrepresentative, with eroticism as the central motif. Our readership demands sexually inspired fiction by the very best and most innovative authors of the day—authors such as yourself. Tales incorporating supernaturalism, experimental, da-da, alternate-history, and anti-authoritarian are most encouraged. Should you accept our offer, you will need to furnish a double-spaced typescript of no less than seven thousand words.
You need not worry about the potential controversy of your work appearing in a publication such as EROTESQUE (nor any attendant censorship ramifications); your contribution will be published pseudonymously, and we keep all pseudonyms under the most severe confidentiality. You may be surprised by how many of your peers publish with us on a regular basis.
We pay well above the industry standard; likewise we understand that authors of your admired caliber need not “audition” for inclusion, which is why we make the first-half payment in ADVANCE. Please find the enclosed cheque for $500.00. A second cheque for an identical sum will be rendered upon delivery of the ms. There is no deadline.
Should you not be interested, or are too pressed by your busy publishing schedule, simply return the cheque in the also-enclosed self-addressed, stamped envelope, and accept our thanks for your consideration.
We here at EROTESQUE would be honoured to have your preeminent work in our pages.
Cordially,
F. Wilcox
It would be superfluous to convey the extent of the writer’s surprise and exuberance. With a $500 draft in hand, and another promised upon delivery? These sums singularly exceeded any in this poor scribe’s professional history!
He visibly trembled, then, when he sat down to read…
The magazine, as was manifest, existed for subversive readers, indeed. The man found the tales therein professionally rendered, adroitly and engagingly plotted, and flamboyantly conceived; however, it could not be denied. They were pornographic. Hence, the periodical’s “private” circulation, for fiction such as this would be deemed illegal most anywhere. Desperate as he was for finances (this past winter he’d never been closer to the bread-line) he had to make the self-admission that he hardly approved of pornography; yet on the other hand…
This was all ballyhoo, of course, a cheap rationalization. The writer had no verve to write pornography but he
So…
He thought the following soliloquy: