The Dwarf's Four Coffins: Part 1
It began as a joke, but he soon found himself trapped in a fiend's web of terror, his very identity, his very soul at stake!
I must confess that I am not what anyone could call a saintly man. I don't give money to charities, even meager pennies. I don't really care about loving my neighbors, or the plight of cripples, minorities and women. I also don't care much for churches, though that is mostly because a lifetime of cold, hard uncomfortable school desks have given me plenty of reason to avoid any organizations which require regularly scheduled attendance that in turn involve plunking myself down on cold, hard uncomfortable wooden benches. Pure comfort issues, nothing personal.
But I've never felt any hatred, or wished harm against any of those people and places. In fact, I don't believe I've ever felt true hatred, deep seething hatred, in my entire life towards anyone or anything until recently. I'd felt spite, bitterness, sure, but those were merely fleeting brushes with discontent.
I stand now near the River Wear here in England in the early morning. There are very few leaves left on the trees, yet there is a beauty about them. Fresh morning dew adorns the branches and grass. The River Wear is a cool green-gray this morning and not the sparkling gold it becomes when the sun sets at mid-day, which is how I usually see it, as I'm not usually up this early. It is beautiful.
I should say that I am merely admiring this because it feels like today will be my last. I feel like an inmate headed for the gas chamber, ready to order a delicious final meal provided by a sympathetic warden. A condemned inmate. A dead man walking. A killer making his final peace with god. Perhaps I am.
God. I feel as if this is my first time of knowing him. I guess I'll find out if he exists if my plan fails or I succeed and am caught. But I'm not ready to give up a lifetime of atheism just to make my final moments happy ones. No, that would be cheating. Untrue to myself. And that's what is at the core of all of this, really, my desire to regain my identity. I must hold on to whatever remains. Nevertheless, if today is to be my last day it will be spent at first admiring the craft of god, or whoever is responsible for this early morning beauty. It makes me feel good. Like a truly good man.
It will make me feel so much better once I've wrapped my hands around the midget's neck. No. Maybe I'll shoot him. Poison would be nice, considering how much of my ale he drinks. Maybe a nice, big fire as he sleeps would work.
Midget. How crude of me to use such terminology as I sit writing. The politically correct term is "little person" or "dwarf". As far as I'm concerned though, the term for the one I'm dealing with would be demon, fiend, imp, cur, wretch, devil, monster, and a whole host of other names which would be most offensive to the sensitive ears of my lady readers.
Even after all this time, I wouldn't want to offend them most of all. Not my loyal fans. All this time. Let me think, how did this all start?
My name, as any well-read connosieur of modern romantic fiction will know immediately from sampling my writing style, is Fitz Ranger. Real name Fritz Lieber Grangheld. Name was shortened to Fritz Grangheld because of the similarity between my first and middle names with a noted writer of science fiction. Then it became Fritz Granger, because books written by people with foreign-sounding names don't sell very well. Finally, it was shortened to Fitz Ranger, because it sounded the most "Manly" and would attract more female readers. Silly name, but it worked.
I made those changes at the behest of my agent and good friend Kaylyn Dix. We had tried getting my romance novels and short stories published by ever major publisher under all of my original names and hundreds of aliases with no relation to mine own. Each with no success. Each day went by, more rejection letters, no rejection letters, no letters, and a mountain of bills piling up. Then the unthinkable happened.
I won the lottery. Unfortunately, there was a mishap and someone else was awarded the money due to a computer error, even though my name had been drawn. This had happened a few times before to other contestants, so to keep me hushed and to not panic the public before the machine could be fixed, the lottery people gave me all the money I should have won, but secretly, no publicity. I immediately paid off my growing debt, and purchased a large mansion near a castle over in Durham. I was so eager to finally taste the high life that I booked myself for a 6-month cruise. Never had so much fun in my life, I must have written a dozen stories on that trip.
It was such a pleasant surprise to find, when I returned, that one of my short stories HAD been published! Not only that, it was so successful that ALL of my shorts had been published, and several novels too! I had also been anthologized, and received several anthologies of my own! As Kaylyn told me, I was "Huge". We were both multimillionaires, all in sixth months, and demand was still growing, with my inventory not even halfway used! All of our years of work had finally paid off.
One problem though, during my absence, Kaylyn, respecting my privacy on my trip and wanting to give me a surprise when I returned, had not submitted a photograph of me to put on the back of my books. This had the unfortunate effect of giving people the impression that I was another Salinger, a recluse at best, at worst a freak. Tabloid rumors about "The real Fitz Ranger" ran wild. I was a former romance film star who had faked his death. I was a brand name used by hundreds of different authors. I was a child prodigy. I was a bunch of monkeys. I was a hunchback. I was an alien. Oh, how silly those rumors were. Kaylyn had also withheld film deals and such so that only I could approve them in person, this gave me a bad image in Hollywood, as one who plays rough. Furthermore, because of my pen name, efforts to locate me also failed, and the lotto people still wouldn't talk. I was an enigma to the public.
It was then that me and Kaylyn, over dinner, began what we considered a harmless joke at first. If the media thought I was some sort of misshapen monster, and if the public that once rejected my novels now couldn't get enough of them, why not pull the biggest prank possible on them? I'd show them. Kaylyn loved the idea. We would call up an elaborate banquet and invite the media to meet "me", and in my place, we would hire some actor to portray some warped, deformed, perverted version of myself to fit the rumors. We began casting auditions immediately to see who would be "me".
It was then that I met the Dwarf, and his four coffins.
But I've never felt any hatred, or wished harm against any of those people and places. In fact, I don't believe I've ever felt true hatred, deep seething hatred, in my entire life towards anyone or anything until recently. I'd felt spite, bitterness, sure, but those were merely fleeting brushes with discontent.
I stand now near the River Wear here in England in the early morning. There are very few leaves left on the trees, yet there is a beauty about them. Fresh morning dew adorns the branches and grass. The River Wear is a cool green-gray this morning and not the sparkling gold it becomes when the sun sets at mid-day, which is how I usually see it, as I'm not usually up this early. It is beautiful.
I should say that I am merely admiring this because it feels like today will be my last. I feel like an inmate headed for the gas chamber, ready to order a delicious final meal provided by a sympathetic warden. A condemned inmate. A dead man walking. A killer making his final peace with god. Perhaps I am.
God. I feel as if this is my first time of knowing him. I guess I'll find out if he exists if my plan fails or I succeed and am caught. But I'm not ready to give up a lifetime of atheism just to make my final moments happy ones. No, that would be cheating. Untrue to myself. And that's what is at the core of all of this, really, my desire to regain my identity. I must hold on to whatever remains. Nevertheless, if today is to be my last day it will be spent at first admiring the craft of god, or whoever is responsible for this early morning beauty. It makes me feel good. Like a truly good man.
It will make me feel so much better once I've wrapped my hands around the midget's neck. No. Maybe I'll shoot him. Poison would be nice, considering how much of my ale he drinks. Maybe a nice, big fire as he sleeps would work.
Midget. How crude of me to use such terminology as I sit writing. The politically correct term is "little person" or "dwarf". As far as I'm concerned though, the term for the one I'm dealing with would be demon, fiend, imp, cur, wretch, devil, monster, and a whole host of other names which would be most offensive to the sensitive ears of my lady readers.
Even after all this time, I wouldn't want to offend them most of all. Not my loyal fans. All this time. Let me think, how did this all start?
My name, as any well-read connosieur of modern romantic fiction will know immediately from sampling my writing style, is Fitz Ranger. Real name Fritz Lieber Grangheld. Name was shortened to Fritz Grangheld because of the similarity between my first and middle names with a noted writer of science fiction. Then it became Fritz Granger, because books written by people with foreign-sounding names don't sell very well. Finally, it was shortened to Fitz Ranger, because it sounded the most "Manly" and would attract more female readers. Silly name, but it worked.
I made those changes at the behest of my agent and good friend Kaylyn Dix. We had tried getting my romance novels and short stories published by ever major publisher under all of my original names and hundreds of aliases with no relation to mine own. Each with no success. Each day went by, more rejection letters, no rejection letters, no letters, and a mountain of bills piling up. Then the unthinkable happened.
I won the lottery. Unfortunately, there was a mishap and someone else was awarded the money due to a computer error, even though my name had been drawn. This had happened a few times before to other contestants, so to keep me hushed and to not panic the public before the machine could be fixed, the lottery people gave me all the money I should have won, but secretly, no publicity. I immediately paid off my growing debt, and purchased a large mansion near a castle over in Durham. I was so eager to finally taste the high life that I booked myself for a 6-month cruise. Never had so much fun in my life, I must have written a dozen stories on that trip.
It was such a pleasant surprise to find, when I returned, that one of my short stories HAD been published! Not only that, it was so successful that ALL of my shorts had been published, and several novels too! I had also been anthologized, and received several anthologies of my own! As Kaylyn told me, I was "Huge". We were both multimillionaires, all in sixth months, and demand was still growing, with my inventory not even halfway used! All of our years of work had finally paid off.
One problem though, during my absence, Kaylyn, respecting my privacy on my trip and wanting to give me a surprise when I returned, had not submitted a photograph of me to put on the back of my books. This had the unfortunate effect of giving people the impression that I was another Salinger, a recluse at best, at worst a freak. Tabloid rumors about "The real Fitz Ranger" ran wild. I was a former romance film star who had faked his death. I was a brand name used by hundreds of different authors. I was a child prodigy. I was a bunch of monkeys. I was a hunchback. I was an alien. Oh, how silly those rumors were. Kaylyn had also withheld film deals and such so that only I could approve them in person, this gave me a bad image in Hollywood, as one who plays rough. Furthermore, because of my pen name, efforts to locate me also failed, and the lotto people still wouldn't talk. I was an enigma to the public.
It was then that me and Kaylyn, over dinner, began what we considered a harmless joke at first. If the media thought I was some sort of misshapen monster, and if the public that once rejected my novels now couldn't get enough of them, why not pull the biggest prank possible on them? I'd show them. Kaylyn loved the idea. We would call up an elaborate banquet and invite the media to meet "me", and in my place, we would hire some actor to portray some warped, deformed, perverted version of myself to fit the rumors. We began casting auditions immediately to see who would be "me".
It was then that I met the Dwarf, and his four coffins.
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