Ruritanian Romance (GUMSHOE all, King In Yellow)

Paul Alexis had evidently had a well-defined taste in fiction. He liked stories about young men of lithe and alluring beauty who, blossoming into perfect gentlemen amid the most unpromising surroundings, turned out to be the heirs to monarchies and, in the last chapter, successfully headed the revolts of devoted loyalists, overthrowing the machinations of sinister presidents, and appearing on balconies, dressed in blue-and-silver uniforms, to receive the plaudits of their rejoicing and emancipated subjects. Sometimes they were assisted by brave and beautiful English or American heiresses, who placed their wealth at the disposal of the loyalist party; sometimes they remained faithful despite temptation to brides of their own nationality, and rescued them at the last moment from marriages of inconvenience with the sinister presidents or their still more sinister advisers; now and again they were assisted by young Englishmen, Irishmen or Americans with clear-cut profiles and a superabundance of energy, and in every case they went through a series of hair-raising escapes and adventures by land, sea and air. Nobody but the sinister presidents ever thought of raising money by the usual financial channels or indulging in political intrigue, nor did the greater European powers or the League of Nations ever have anything to say in the matter. The rise and fall of governments appeared to be by a private arrangement ...

Dorothy L. Sayers, Have His Carcase  

In a spacious meeting room overlooking the courthouse in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., a vision to “save Haiti” took shape. The $83 billion effort would reinvent the Western Hemisphere’s poorest nation, lavishing it with roadways, electricity grids, seaports and airports.

Haiti’s new dawn, attendees at the May 12 meeting were told, would be led by Christian Emmanuel Sanon — a 63-year-old Haitian American and self-described pastor and physician now detained in Haiti in connection with the investigation into the audacious assassination of Haitian President Jovenel Moïse.

Sanon’s stated mission during that gathering: Turn “Haiti into a free and open society,” said Parnell Duverger, 70, a retired professor who attended the Fort Lauderdale presentation and had drafted the redevelopment plan pitched by Sanon ... 

The revelations of a grand plan to rebuild Haiti backed by Sanon and others — as well as the draft contract and list of costs obtained by The Post — add a new financial dimension to the roiling investigation into a presidential slaying that has upended the fragile Caribbean state, leaving it rudderless amid a leadership squabble. Haitian and Colombian authorities, along with the FBI and Interpol are scrambling to unravel a cast of suspects that they say includes a former Drug Enforcement Administration informant nicknamed “Whiskey,” an opposition politician, Colombia mercenaries and Haitian Americans from South Florida ...

Washington Post, Records reveal how Haitian American held in assassination probe financed a ‘personal security’ team

plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose 

Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr, The Wasps. Translation: the more it changes, the more it's the same thing.

Marx Brothers, Hail Hail Freedonia

A Ruritanian romance is a peculiarly 19th century phenomenon that occasionally resurfaces today. At its heart it's a yearning for Daddy. Through no real virtue on Daddy's part, beyond birth and a certain charm, Daddy establishes himself on the Ruritanian throne and all is well again. Nobody ever asks whether Daddy is the right man for the job, or whether the country was better off without Daddy on the throne. Nor does anyone insinuate that a usurper, whoever it may be, might be challenged by other nations. It's accepted as a fait accompli. Daddy's home. Nobody questions Daddy.

Similarly Christian Emmanuel Sanon seems to have believed nobody would challenge him once he attained the throne - beg pardon, the presidency. He doesn't seem to have had a plan for establishing control of the country, or opening new relations with Haiti's neighbors, never mind the United States. Nor did he really have a plan for paying for it, beyond taking out a mountain of debt and trusting to his ability to raid the country's coffers once established. A very 45 way of looking at the world; I have to wonder who Sanon was expecting to win the 2020 election.

There have been many versions of Ruritania over the years, from the Marx Brothers' Freedonia to Robin Laws' King in Yellow, itself inspired by Robert W. Chambers' version of a Ruritanian version of New York in which modernity (and representative democracy) is vanquished and replaced by Imperial Dynasties. 

One morning early in May I stood before the steel safe in my bedroom, trying on the golden jewelled crown. The diamonds flashed fire as I turned to the mirror, and the heavy beaten gold burned like a halo about my head. I remembered Camilla's agonized scream and the awful words echoing through the dim streets of Carcosa. They were the last lines in the first act, and I dared not think of what followed—dared not, even in the spring sunshine, there in my own room, surrounded with familiar objects, reassured by the bustle from the street and the voices of the servants in the hallway outside. For those poisoned words had dropped slowly into my heart, as death-sweat drops upon a bed-sheet and is absorbed. Trembling, I put the diadem from my head and wiped my forehead, but I thought of Hastur and of my own rightful ambition ...

A version of the Ruritanian romance turned bad that I have long wanted to see and have read several times is The Empire Builders, a play by Boris Vian. A respectable bourgeoise family led by Daddy flees a strange, unknown and terrifying Noise, running further and further upward as the stairs, rooms, apartments below vanish - or are absorbed. They pretend nothing is truly wrong. 

Yet always ahead of them, with them, haunting them is the Schmürz. The audience is never certain what the Schmürz is, and the cast pretend it does not exist, though when they think nobody's looking they kick, whip and torment it as though it were the cause of all their troubles. Yet nothing rids them of the Schmürz. 

MadLab Theatre, Columbus Ohio

Though a Ruritanian Romance horror plot has many echoes of Pulp I think it would be better played Purist, and The Empire Builders is the reason why. That slow collapse of established order; the grinding, inescapable Noise; the omnipresent Schmürz.

At its heart Purist is an inescapable doom. There is no killing Cthulhu, any more than Daddy can smash the Schmürz.  

So, what three things hide at the center of a Ruritanian plot?

1. Daddy's In Charge. There's someone who ought to be on the throne - and it is a throne, whether or not deluded thinkers call it a presidency - and currently is not. The central focus of the plot is to put Daddy back on the throne.
2. Simpler Times. Aspects of modern life that Daddy doesn't like get pushed aside. It's a lot like living in a Studio Ghibli setting. Old fashioned, virtuous, and not a whiff of modern ways beyond maybe the radio, rotary aircraft or funky robot ninjas. Nobody ever asks whether indoor plumbing has been invented yet or where Porco Rosso keeps his latrine, probably because they wouldn't like the answer.
3. Wicked Viziers. Sometimes called Presidents, Councilors, Prime Ministers or similar. These are the forces keeping Daddy from the throne. They represent all that is wrong with modern life, and must be swept aside so Daddy can take charge. 

Turn that Purist and make it a horror plot, and you have:

1. Daddy's On The Run. Maybe Daddy still has hopes of regaining the throne, but right now it's time to beat feet. If you're a little slow, a little late, it will go very badly for Daddy - and by extension, for you.
2. Times They Are a-Changin'. Black is now white. Dogs and cats, living together. Whatever was accepted as the norm is now completely and utterly other. Things are out of place, zeppelins fly overhead, Azimov's rockets are gearing up for launch to the stars. Lethal injection chambers in every public square. It's a new dawn, a new day - but Big Brother has replaced Daddy, and His eye is always on you. What is that peculiar Noise?
3.  The Schmürz. Your sins follow you like flies on garbage. Always one step ahead, they greet you at every turn. You can beat them, punish them, blame them for your misfortunes but they cannot, will not die. The next door you open, there they are. In King In Yellow terms a Schmürz has a lot in common with a Walking Corpse (p166 Paris book) except it cannot truly die and has no attacks to speak of. It exists to be attacked and is indifferent to attacks - but it is always there. 

That's it for this week. Enjoy!   

Assassination (GUMSHOE All)

Once upon a time there was a rich asshole named Ross Perot. He owned a nice house in Bermuda, but became very upset because he couldn't dock his yacht. There were reefs in the way. So he brought in a few explosives experts and blew up the reef. This was, as you might imagine, contrary to local law. The rich asshole told local law to fuck off, and off it duly fucked. 

However, Perot did at least have the decency to make sure his explosives experts got off the island without spending a night in jail. He did this by putting them on board his private plane and zipping them out of the country within a few hours of the explosion.

I mention this because I, like many of you, have been paying attention to recent events in Haiti. 

If you're going to go to the trouble of assassinating a president, why wouldn't you make sure the assassins fled the country?

Answer: you do that when you don't care what happens to the assassins, probably because they're idiots. With the possible exception of those few still on the run as of time of writing, who may be out of the country by now. Bet the triggerman (men?) had a plane or boat waiting. Either that or a shallow grave. Perhaps both.

Some sources claim the mercs had nothing to do with it, that President Moïse was actually killed by third parties shortly before their arrival. Plausible, certainly. It would mean the mercs are basically expendable patsies. Gullibles. 

But, God a'mighty, how dumb do you have to be to answer an advert on the internet looking for someone to help arrest a president? Hands up who thinks American agents from whichever agency it may be can go to a foreign country, arrest and extradite any member of its government, whether the president or the local garbage collector. Go on, shame yourselves.

Nigerian 419 victims are Mensa members compared to Haitian American James Solages, who claims to have been hired to help execute a warrant, not a person. Or Manuel Antonio Grosso Guarín, former member of the Columbian armed forces, who posted pictures of his Haitian vacation on Facebook shortly before the deed.

Sourced from 2008 Cohen film Burn After Reading

The other question floating across my forebrain is why the hell did whoever the brains of the operation is need twenty eight people to shoot one man? [Assuming that the President's own guard didn't do him in prior to their arrival, of course.] Though I suppose the answer is, Brains didn't have anyone on the payroll capable of sneaking in like Sam Fisher, so Brains hired a mess of morons to ram-raid the place. Creche of cretins? Band of boobs? 

Gosh, if only Brains had a couple of pretty girls with a spray bottle. Or some kind of Heath Robinson remote control rifle. It would have been so much easier.

Frankly, it just goes to show - if it needed showing - that thriller writers whose protagonists or antagonists are highly skilled ex-SAS/Special Forces types capable of killing a man sixteen different ways with a pencil, and who effortlessly execute insanely complex schemes while simultaneously completing the New York Times crossword, in pen, are talking out of their arses. 

Paid killers aren't geniuses. Spies aren't charismatic James Bond types. They're silly, greedy little idiots playing with toys, or ex-military who've spent too long in the sun. 

I mean, look at some of these clowns. The spy who couldn't spell. Kevin Mallory, who China paid a measly $25K for state secrets and is now spending his twilight years in prison. Mark Thatcher (fucked if I'll call him Sir, much less The Honorable) who bankrolled a coup and has since been refused residency in Monaco and Gibraltar, jurisdictions not famous for their integrity. Or, as Sir Roger Moore once said of Monaco's new quasi-criminal citizens, 'how do you say piss off in Russian?'  The Achille Lauro PLO hijackers. Dangerous? Certainly. In the same way a 4 year old with a handgun is dangerous. But you'd never see these loons in a James Bond film.

Honestly, it gives me hope when I read about $80 million bank heists. Not that I want banks robbed, but at least someone's putting the effort in. That was a clever stunt. Or the Hatton Garden crew. Though to be fair the Bangladesh Bank Burglars were let down by a spelling error, and the Hatton Garden robbers were arrested after blabbing in a pub which the police were surveilling. Human nature strikes again.

Night's Black Agents and games like it thrive on highly skilled ex-SAS/Special Forces types doing the impossible and looking damn cool in the process. NBA even proposes the Hit as a potential active mission:

The agents must kill someone. This can be a simple sniping, or a gang rumble. Provide the target and his security, plan a weakness in one or both. 

Of course, it doesn't come with an exfiltration plan. 

Let's play with the concept, in a little scene I'll call:

A Large Splodge of Wonga!

[Wonga = cash. Quote from Simon Mann, one of Mark Thatcher's pals.]

The Hit went off more or less successfully. The agents might have lost some assets or a Network contact or two, but the target is down. Time to make that clean getaway ... 

What happened to our clean getaway?

Mr. Smith let the side down, and either failed to arrange an exfiltration or just didn't bother. The agents are in hostile territory, with few escape routes. I've done something similar in Macau before, but that assumed vampiric involvement. This is a straight, old-fashioned hit, with no supernatural elements.

As to exactly where, I'll leave that to the Director. It could even be somewhere entirely fictional - in Swords of the Serpentine, say. The location's key characteristics are:

1. Small, as in Lichtenstein small.  
2. Relatively isolated. You can fly out or catch a boat, but either there are no land borders or the ones that do exist are cut off by mountains or similarly difficult terrain. Deserts, jungles, that kind of thing. 
3. Alternatively it's easy to get across the border, but the folks on the other side are even less welcoming that the ones you're fleeing from. Diplomacy needed to wangle a safe harbour. 
4. Heavily armed. The hostile territory's armed forces, police, internal security possess sophisticated armaments and aren't shy about using them. Shoot first and ask questions never is their operating protocol.
5. Even more heavily armed. Never mind the cops; the average citizen has a handgun, shotgun, SMG, machete, and is especially jumpy right now. So don't provoke an armed mob, not unless you like being barbecued.
6. Game of Thrones. The hostile territory's government has a few would-be leaders waiting in the wings. Theoretically the agents could cut a deal with one of these claimants: safety in return for ... something. 
7. Asset rich, aka Wild Geese. The hostile territory possesses something that the outside world really wants. That means there are important state and non-state actors who might get involved, for a price. Maybe the Chinese Embassy will provide safe haven, or that mysterious multinational conglomerate can lend a jet. 

Start at Heat 6 minimum. After all, the agents did kill someone important. Starting Heat can increase depending on how messy the Hit was, but it will not start at less than 6.

Then let the good times roll. 

Even if the agents are captured, there's always a chance bribery - the large splodge of wonga - will get them out. Of course, capture can be difficult to arrange when the country's up in arms ...

Enjoy!

Not Quite Book Review Corner: The Abombinable Mr Seabrook

The Abominable Mr Seabrook, Drawn & Quarterly 2017, Joe Ollmann.

William Seabrook ought to be one of the most famous names in horror. This American pre-gonzo gonzo author and adventurer only went and invented the freakin' zombie; if that isn't an iron-clad claim to fame, what is?

Yet he's largely forgotten by modern audiences. My copy of the Magic Island, Seabrook's Haiti reminiscence, is an Armchair Traveller 1989 reprint of the 1929 original, and for a while there, unless you haunted antiquarian bookstores, this was your only option. There have been reprints since, thank goodness.

In his day, Seabrook was one of the most famous popular authors going - exactly the kind of author, in fact, whose work might be found on the shelves of your Bookhounds' shop. He went to Africa to live among the cannibals, Arabia to see the Bedouins, Haiti to discover the secrets of voodoo, and the asylum to find out what it was like to recover from chronic alcoholism.

That was his besetting sin. Seabrook was a lifelong alcoholic. He spent his entire career drinking across the planet, stopping in now and again to turn out very readable copy. He learned the trick by working for Hearst's papers, and despite everything he never really lost it.

He did his best to lose everything else. Never a contented man, his trick is to find his way into what he thinks is happiness - whether it be tramping across Europe, almost penniless, to owning his own cotton farm, or being partner in a successful ad agency in the 1920s - and promptly throw it away, in search of more happiness. He married three times, and each time it ended badly, though his first marriage was probably the most successful.

His trip to Arabia, in 1924, was a spectacular success, and gave him material for his first big international smash hit, Adventures in Arabia: among the Bedouins, Druses, Whirling Dervishes and Yezidee Devil Worshipers, published in 1927. It gave him the credibility and funds to go to Haiti, where he found inspiration for his Magic Island, published 1929.

That was the very first time anyone saw, and described, the zombie. A creation of Haitian magic, Seabrook said the animated dead man resembled a lobotomy patient, animate, yet incapable of thought. This idea was later turned into the main plot for White Zombie, a poverty row horror quickie that caught fire largely thanks to Bela Lugosi's performance as 'Murder' Legendre.

This is one of the few times a traditional zombie, as described by Seabrook, appeared on screen. Haiti's merely a backdrop here, voodoo barely mentioned. It's Transylvania-by-the-sea, with a plot that doesn't bear close examination. Magic was dropped from zombie lore in later films, starting with White Zombie's sequel, Revolt of the Zombies. In that film zombies are created by means of a secret formula, not the end result of a particular religious ritual; part Lugosi-style hypnotic magic, part alchemical science. Soon zombies became creatures of mad science, cooked up by lunatics and Nazis for unholy purposes. Then George Romero and his investor friends make Night of the Living Dead in 1968, another poverty row quickie, made for gore-loving drive-in audiences. The word zombie isn't even used in the film; to the terrified cross-section of Americana trapped in a deserted farmhouse, the approaching dead are flesh-eating ghouls. That didn't matter. Nobody really cared where zombies came from any more. Night hints at a scientific explanation, blaming strange radiation scattered by a rogue Venus probe, but explanations weren't necessary. Zombies roamed. They ate the flesh of the people they murdered. They could be killed by a shot in the head, nothing else. That was all anyone needed to know.

Speaking personally, while I admire Seabrook as an author, I've always distrusted him as a historian. His stories are just too sensational, too gonzo, too perfect. The Magic Island is a case in point. Seabrook sees everything and tells all, each story more incredible than the last. The zombie story isn't even the most outrageous tale in the book; my personal favorite is the wedding feast, but the account of an actual voodoo ceremony complete with 'human sacrifice' is another strong contender. He's a ballyhoo author to his core, going to sensational places and emerging with even-more-sensational stories. Can the man who gets paid for churning out colorful stories be trusted to tell the truth?

The thing is, Seabrook's the first. Nobody knows what a zombie is, before he sees one and tells the world. What if he was lying? Or exaggerating?

What if there were no zombies, before Seabrook made them up?

That would make Seabrook the inventor of possibly the only truly American horror icon. Vampires, werewolves, mummies, ghosts, Mister Hyde, the Frankenstein monster - they all come from other sources, often European. If Seabrook exaggerated, if the zombie came from his imagination and a healthy dose of white rum … Nobody questioned him. It was taken on faith that Seabrook knew what he was talking about. In his wake came a teeming host of quasi-anthropologists, folklorists, adventurers, looking for voodoo, looking for excitement, looking for monsters. The Haitians knew how to milk credulous foreigners for everything they could get …

Joe Ollermann takes the reader on a guided tour of a colossal, life-long, booze-filled cock-up. Seabrook slowly destroys himself, and his talent, page by page. His sexual appetites, his love of adventure and corn liquor, his peerless imagination, sensationalism and bravado, all combine to create a disaster that some writers would give their soul to emulate. Make no mistake, Seabrook was the man to beat, in his heyday.

In the end, he beat himself. There are few moments more harrowing than the first pages of this novel, showing Seabrook at his worst, almost entirely destroyed, drinking his way across New York. He's on the brink of suicide - but can he pull himself out of the pit, for his ex-wife and young son, if for no other reason?

Image taken from the Guardian book review.

So, why should you pick this up?

First, if you have any love for the 1920s-1930s, this is the book for you. Seabrook saw and did everything, and knew pretty much everyone, from Maya Deren and Man Ray to Aleister Crowley and Theodore Drieser. It's a slice of history, from start to finish.

Second, if you're a Keeper looking for a useful patron, walk-in NPC or similar, William Seabrook's your boy. He's seen Timbuctoo and Brooklyn too. He'd fit in Masks of Nyarlathotep, Horror on the Orient Express or any of the classic stuff. Moreover, as hinted, he'd make an excellent walk-in for a Bookhounds campaign. Or a Dreamhounds campaign, for that matter, given his links with prominent surrealists and his travels to Paris in its bohemian heyday.

Third - well, it's a tragedy. We should remember our tragedies. For all his faults - and God knows there were many - there's something compelling about this poor soul's life. He spirals into a self-destructive black hole with, seemingly, no chance of redemption, and all you can think is, it could have been stopped. But would Seabrook have been happy if it had?

Finally, if you write, and you've wondered if it's worth it, if it can be good - read this book. Here's a man who knew success and disgrace, money and poverty. See if he has anything to tell you.

An Unusual Butcher (Trail of Cthulhu)

… it is held that, if necessary, a zombi can be turned into an animal, slaughtered, and the meat sold in the market, whence drives the assertion often met with among Haitian peasants in documenting belief that they have not only seen zombi but have bought their flesh. This, it is thought, can be distinguished by the fact that such meat will spoil much more readily than ordinary meat. Funk & Wagnalls Standard Dictionary of Folklore.

… the word is American-commercial-synthetic, like Nabisco, Delco, Socony. It stands for the Haitian-American Sugar Company - an immense factory plant, dominated by a huge chimney, with clanging machinery, steam whistles, freight cars. It is like a chunk of Hoboken. William Seabrook, The Magic Island.

Historically, to be a cook, to prepare food for others, was always to identify oneself with the degraded and debauched. Antony Bourdain, Typhoid Mary.

In 1928 Charles Souther, from Skowhegan, Maine, was appointed manager of the Hasco plant in Haiti. It was a new adventure for him. The American occupation was in full swing, and Haiti was under the control of the USMC, but there were still echoes of rebellion up in the hills. Souther, never a courageous man, stuck with his own in Port-a-Prince as much as he could. He was afraid of the Haitians, even the sophisticated men and women who had lived in France, and preferred the company of fellow Americans. He did not expect to stay long in Haiti. Ambition drove him, and this post would be a step up the ladder to success. He hoped, if he did well, to secure a better post Stateside.

One of the problems he encountered was how best to staff his house. His wife was not up to the task, and they suffered for months, especially with food. No cook could satisfy them, and burnt, cold, ruined dinners thoroughly spoilt the Souther's digestions for the first few months of their stay. They tried to bring someone over from Maine, but couldn't find anyone willing to make the trip.

Then they found Antoine Baussan, an answer to a prayer. Classically educated in the Escoffier school, he could also turn out respectable American fare, like corn chowder and baked beans. It was love at first bite.

They ignored warnings from their Haitian neighbors. What did it matter to the Southers that Baussan had a bad reputation? When it came to lobster rolls and brown bread, Charles didn't care if it was prepared by the Devil himself. Moreover he was coming to love some of Baussan's Haitian dishes, particularly a curried stew that he called Chevre de Montagne a la Toussel, or Mountain Goat prepared as Baussan had done for a particularly famous wedding feast. Souther couldn't get enough of it, and his wife was growing fat.

When time came for Souther to move on, he found it impossible to part with Baussan. He arranged for the Haitian to come with him back to Maine, and Baussan was happy to oblige. In fact, he said he was looking forward to it.

Unfortunately Mrs. Souther was struck down by a devastating malady soon after their return. Charles was thrown into depression, relieved only by the devoted attentions of Antoine, who cooked up all his wife's favorite dishes to ease her pain. The doctors could do nothing for her; at least Baussan was trying to help.

When his wife passed, Souther was thrown into a frenzy of despair. He stopped seeing his friends, stopped going to his clubs, gave up work almost completely. After several weeks without word or sign of him, his friends and work colleagues finally descended on his house, alarmed at lack of contact.

Souther was not there. Nobody could say where, or when, he went. His devoted cook Baussan had vanished too. However alarm reached new heights when it was discovered that the family vault had been desecrated, and that Mrs. Souther's body was missing. What was more, it seemed as if the vault had been broken open from the inside.

As it had the hallmarks of a kidnapping case, the Federal authorities were called in. Bureau of Investigation agents began to suspect Baussan's involvement; the man's background was, at best, suspect, and it was thought he might be a Socialist agitator, inspired by European radicals. It was suggested that German Haitians had drawn Baussan into their conspiracies during the War, and that Baussan was on some kind of one-man revenge crusade.

Reports from Haiti that suggested Baussan was a devotee of sinister cults were discounted as fantasy.

Tracking Down Baussan

The investigators can be brought in independently by Souther's family and friends, as experts hired by the Bureau, or some other excuse as the Keeper desires.

The question for the investigators is, where did Baussan go next?

• Historic Maine. Baussan went to the Watch Hill Inn, Rhode Island, beloved of Hollywood stars and well-heeled industrialists. He's become an institution, training several intelligent men and women in his particular style. Moreover he's attained spiritual guru status, and become increasingly attached to Douglas Fairbanks, who relies on Baussan's advice to kick-start his failing film career. There's talk Fairbanks might persuade Baussan to come with him to California.
• High Seas. Baussan is one of the senior chefs aboard the USS Leviathan, formerly Germany's Vaterland, a luxury liner that cruises between New York and Europe, carrying hundreds of thousands of passengers but never making a cent's profit. It couldn't sell alcohol during Prohibition, and by the time it got permission the Great Depression knocked the guts out of the cruise market. More often than not she sails at half capacity, at best. For whatever reason she has great difficulty keeping crew; people just seem to vanish. Sailors are notorious for jumping ship in foreign ports, but this is becoming a serious problem.
• East Coast Hotspots. Baussan goes up and down the East Coast, working for wealthy families and hotels, but never staying long in any one place. Bad luck haunts him. There was that nasty incident in Florida where the son of the house went instantly insane, on getting a peek inside the walk-in freezer. Or that time in New York, where all the family died in a matter of hours, except the youngest daughter, who was bedridden with some kind of intestinal parasite for weeks. Where Baussan goes, trouble follows, and only his habit of continually crossing state lines looking for work has kept him out of the reach of the authorities - so far.  

That's it for this week. Enjoy!