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Alarms and Diversions

Foreword

Table of Contents

The pieces in Part I of this collection appear here in book form for the first time. All of them but one were written in the past two years or so. The exception, “Two O’Clock at the Metropole,” was written twenty years ago as one of a New Yorker series called “Where Are They Now?” This account of the Herman Rosenthal murder of 1912, like the story of the trial of Willie Stevens, “A Sort of Genius,” has been rewritten to place it in proper perspective. There is no longer a question as to the mundane whereabouts of the principal figures in these cases, for most of them died some time ago, or disappeared from public view and the records of the police. The two murder stories seem to belong to the present period of journalistic journeys into the tragic American past.

Many of these pieces, new and old, have been rewritten to some extent, mainly to bring them into accord with the changes wrought by time, the accumulation of new material, and certain shifts of viewpoint due to experience and the fruits of meditation. The piece about my mother, “Lavender with a Difference,” had to be put, sorrowfully, into the past tense. I have tampered with “Daguerreotype of a Lady” only to include the incident about Mrs. Detweiler’s ghost, which I had unaccountably forgotten.

“The French Far West” was originally written for the old New York Sunday World, and done over later for The New Yorker under another title, “Wild Bird Hickok and His Friends,” but I have restored the original title as being more suitable for my old and exciting adventure in the Gallic translation of American nickel and dime novels. The backward glance at Punch, a stoutly durable weekly which has had its highs and lows, like any other, may serve one good purpose in proving that the friendship of Great Britain and the United States has survived more than one acrimonious family squabble. Punch and The New Yorker have exchanged parodies in the recent past, with no holds barred and no bones broken. I predict that the two weeklies, like the nations they represent, will continue more in amity than in dissension, but, I hope, always with the healthy give and take that marks a sound friendship.

“The Last Flower,” originally published by Harper’s as a book in itself, is included here in its entirety.

Most of the material in this book originally appeared in The New Yorker. “There’s Something Out There!” and “The First Time I Saw Paris” were first published in Holiday, and “My Own Ten Rules for a Happy Marriage” is reprinted from the Cosmopolitan. In the two years I spent on the trail of the Loch Ness monster I got invaluable help from many British newspapermen. I especially want to thank William Hardcastle, of the London Daily Mail, who made constantly available to me his newspaper’s voluminous files on the subject. A. R. MacElwain, Frank Rizza and Nora Sayre were also of great assistance.

My grateful thanks go to Simon and Schuster and Harcourt, Brace for their gracious permission to let me reprint from their own books of mine much of the material that appears herein, and detailed acknowledgment of their kindness appears on another page.

J. T.

West Cornwall, Conn.