Category: Novels

"Who he?"

Every morning I hate to be born, and every night I'm afraid to die. I live my life within these parentheses, and since I'm constantly walking a tightrope over hysteria, I'm perceptive to the dilemmas of other people as they cross their own chasms.

Chapters

1. CHAPTER I

Every morning I hate to be born, and every night I'm afraid to die. I live my life within these parentheses, and since I'm constantly walking a tightrope over hysteria, I'm perc...

2. CHAPTER II

Jake Lennox had been fighting a losing battle with himself for ten years, and it was a struggle he had never been aware of. The two levels of his mind hated each other and were...

3. CHAPTER III

The Lennox apartment was on Knickerbocker Square which is one of scores of hidden relics of the past concealed on The Rock. There are elongated sycamore trees corseted with ceme...

4. CHAPTER IV

Four o'clock in the morning after Christmas I was trying to see how many different ways I could type NOW IS THE TIME FOR ALL GOOD MEN TO COME TO THE AID OF THEIR PARTY when my p...

5. CHAPTER V

They got into a dusty car parked in front of the Precinct Station. Fink was a small, slender man with thin blonde hair and the harmless manner of a bank clerk. He had a soft swe...

6. CHAPTER VI

When I was a kid on the Rock, one of my friends turned racketeer and went into the bicycle-stealing business. He put the heist on six bikes which he hid in the Indian Caves in I...

7. CHAPTER VII

It took Lennox eleven hours to struggle through the script for the January 15th "Who He?" show. He consumed one ream of paper, half a pound of coffee, two quarts of ice cream, a...

8. CHAPTER VIII

A head-shrinker once explained to me that people confronted with a crisis act exactly like a J-walker about to be run down by a car. They do one of three things. Either they dod...

9. CHAPTER IX

Like most agencies, Borden's Oleomargarine was born of treason. In 1940, Borden, Olson and Mardine, the three top account men of Riley & Reeves, mutinied and set up their own ag...

10. CHAPTER X

Nine o'clock the next morning, Roy Audibon left Gracie Hospital and took a cab down to the network. His ribs were taped, his face was bruised, his teeth were clenched in a dazzl...

11. CHAPTER XI

Audibon took Gabby's hand and pressed it gallantly. Then he led her across the sidewalk to the waiting cab. He helped her in, followed, and gave the network address to the driver.

12. CHAPTER XII

By five o'clock Saturday morning, Lennox had walked himself to exhaustion. He slipped into the apartment in 33 Knickerbocker Square and went to bed. At nine o'clock he was shot...

13. CHAPTER XIII

Gabby had gone to bed early Saturday night. The work of catching twelve white pigeons and cleaning up their droppings had exasperated and exhausted her. By five o'clock Sunday m...

14. CHAPTER XIV

Lennox awoke in the role of Mr. Lefty Leftwich from Brockton, Mass. He turned over in bed like a ship launched sideways and immediately began bellowing the ballad about feet, fe...

15. CHAPTER XV

THE BODY CAME DOWN AND JERKED THE BODY CAME DOWN AND JERKED THE BODY CAME down and jerked the body came down and jerked thebodycamedownandjerkedthebodycamedown andjerked THE. BO...

16. CHAPTER XVI

This Friday, Robin and I packed a bag, bought groceries and liquor, got into the car and got off The Rock. We drove out toward Trenton, and ten miles this side of Princeton Junc...