ERRATA
For Mitch read Janice, and vice versa, passim.
CHAPTER I
THE BEGINNING.
Wayne Addison was the cause of Bay City and memorable for that reason. It is not known how, why, when, where, or by whom he was killed, except that it was not by Lenore, who was not his wife. Many of the most memorable people in Bay City are dead. Most have remained so. This is a Good Thing.
CHAPTER II
STEVE FRAME. A CONFUSED MAN.
Steve Frame is most memorable for doing things twice over, such as dying and marrying Alice and being a father. His two children are Jamie, who has since been converted to Mac and Rachel's son, and Sally, who got to be his daughter between deaths when his widow Alice adopted her away from her very dead parents. Steve's first death was the result of an Australian helicopter crash; when it was discovered that he was not dead, merely confused, he returned to Bay City and became half of a construction company. He had married Rachel before through confusion and now, being still confused, he nearly did it again but drove off a cliff instead, causing his second and irrevocable death and Rachel's blindness. This was a Bad Thing as it turned out, because it was the cause of Mac shaving off his moustache.
CHAPTER III
BOB MORGAN. A GOOD COP.
Bob Morgan was a good cop and a good husband until he met Quinn Harding, the other half of the construction company. He continued to be a good cop but left off being a good husband. He was then shot down, more for being a good cop than any sort of husband at all.
CHAPTER IV
AN UNKNOWN MAN.
A man whose name is so unmemorable as to be insignificant was killed at his typewriter. He was not killed by Iris, his lover, so of course she was suspected. In time it was discovered by reading his typewriter ribbon that it was not Iris after all but a stranger who came in through windows and held Iris and Vivian hostage for hours on end.
CHAPTER V
OLD CHARLIE. A MAN IN A DOOR.
Old Charlie was married to old Ada. This would have been all right if only he had been able to get over his habit of having heart attacks in doorways. He couldn't and so it killed him.
CHAPTER VI
MITCH BLAKE.
Mitch Blake was Rachel's lover for a time; it sent him round the bend and to St. Croix, where he was drowned in a swimming pool and was Matthew's father. It is doubtful that he is dead at all; a vote was taken and the results were inconclusive.
CHAPTER VII
ALMA RUDDER. A DOLL.
Cecile was upset because Blaine was on the verge of marrying or married to or divorced from one of her [Cecile's] husbands, so she imported Alma Rudder, Blaine's old boyfriend Buzz' sister, from Wyoming and encouraged her to dress up as a large doll and emerge from closets at inopportune moments. This arrangement managed to drive both Blaine and Cecile crazy, Blaine because she didn't like dolls and Cecile because Alma persisted in calling her Cecil. Eventually Alma was killed in a room in the Happy Motel adjacent to Smiley's Diner, causing Cecile to fall under suspicion. In order to convince the police of her innocence she took to driving up and down the road and grew so fond of it that she attempted to drive right the way to the Chicago airport in the rain. Nothing came of this. Eventually it was discovered that the murderer was Blaine's mother Jeanne Ewing.
CHAPTER VIII
JEANNE EWING. A BAD WOMAN.
Jeanne came out of nowhere, rather like the demon king in a pantomime, and began living with her son Larry and his wife Clarice and their children. She was mean as mean could be to Clarice until she [Jeanne] died in hospital as a result of Alma's having stabbed her back. Before dying she managed to confess to two things: (a) to having killed Alma; and (b) to having another son, Catlin by name.
CHAPTER IX
DAVID THATCHER. A BAD MAN.
David Thatcher was a very Bad Man but a Good Thing all the same. He was a bad husband because although he was married to Jennifer he seduced Sally Frame to the point of fathering her child Kevin. He also (coincidentally) was the father of his wife's son Kevin, and the two Kevins in time became so indistinguishable as to become one slightly larger Kevin. Sally forgot all about her Kevin and became engaged to Peter Love. When her fiancé found out about her terrible memory he broke it off with her, and when Jennifer realised that Sally was 1/2 Kevin's mother she went mad and drove off a cliff. There then appeared a third Kevin in the form of an uncle who promised to give Sally an awful lot of money to watch on Kevin's behalf when he [Uncle Kevin] died. David perceived this to be a Good Idea and promptly put a pillow across the old man's face so that Sally might have the money sooner. He managed to convince her to let him have a great many little bits of money. He also managed to convince another man called Royal Dunning to let him have a great many large bits of money. Eventually after very cleverly managing to get himself disengaged from Sally he got himself shot at the country club. Catlin Ewing (who will be thoroughly dealt with in later chapters) was arrested, partly because of his tendency to step into view and pound Thatcher mercilessly (for little or no reason other than that he tended to smack Sally), but mostly because he had confessed. It must be noted, however, that Catlin was not in fact guilty and so Sally made up her mind that Royal Dunning was. David was a Good Thing because if it had not been for him Peter would never have discovered what a truly rotten memory Sally had and would have married her. This would have been a tremendous difficulty when Catlin appeared, because apart from being married to someone else she would have had nothing to confide.
CHAPTER X
ROYAL DUNNING. A GOOD DOCTOR.
Royal Dunning was an obstetrician who sold babies for vast sums of money. When Sally determined that he had killed David she arranged a tryst with him in the cabin. When he arrived she attempted to record his confession on a tape recorder which she had borrowed from Cecile, but Dr. Dunning had such an aversion to being recorded that he knocked her down and injected her with something and took her back to his clinic (clearly under the impression that she was in need of obstetrical care). Catlin arrived at the cabin and found the tape, which he subsequently dropped in a rainstorm as he dashed to the clinic. Once there he climbed through a window and removed Sally, knowing full well that Sally could not possibly be in need of obstetrical care. In the meantime Cecile, who was looking for something at the clinic, surprised Dr. Dunning who was very busy being dead at his telephone. Everyone rejoiced because it seemed reasonable to assume that he had committed suicide and killed David but when it turned out that he had been murdered as well some people said Catlin was guilty while others favoured Cecile. In reality it was neither.
CHAPTER XI
CATLIN EWING. AN INNOCENT MAN.
When Catlin was being transferred from point A to point B (although no bypass was required, merely a rainstorm and a cliff) the car he was in was forced off the road. The two accompanying police officers perished but Catlin (after a two week period during which he grew a beard and did not die) resurrected himself in the back of Ada's car immediately prior to his memorial service.
CHAPTER XII
JULIA SHEARER. A MULTIFACETED GIRL.
Julia began as an actress madly pining for Jamie Frame. It is not known how old she was, but she seemed to be of a certain age. In time she regained some of her youth and transferred her pining from being for Jamie's sake to being for Gil's sake. Gil was paying attentions to Sally [Julia's cousin] until she became engaged to Peter. He then reciprocated Julia's affection. Julia was by then not an actress but an authoress, due to the fact that she spent so much time with Felicia, pushing her into pools, etc. Eventually she went to New York with three other females and three males. Realising that she would be playing gooseberry in a rather big way she very obligingly got herself killed off by Ross.
CHAPTER XIII
SID BATES. A HAPPY WANDERER.
Sid Bates was someone who knew things about Royal Dunning so Cecile and Cass and Felicia and Wallingford went to pay him a visit. While in his abode Cass and Wallingford stepped out, and Cecile and Felicia chanced upon Bates' dead body in a refrigerator. They rushed out screaming and rushed back in (still screaming) with Cass and Wallingford. When they checked out the refrigerator it proved to be empty. Cecile and Felicia gave way to hysteria.
CHAPTER XIV
MARK SINGLETON. AN INDECENT MAN.
Mark Singleton was wounded mysteriously and spent quite a while in hospital with his chest exposed. During this his first hospital stay he married Stacey Winthrop (who was pregnant but unwilling) through confusion; whether it was on his part or her part or indeed both their parts is unclear. They went away and divorced and Mark subsequently returned to Bay City and got himself hospitalised again. During this stay he again had his chest exposed (indecently) and did not even have the decency to die, although Nurse Emily Benson, who had killed both David and Dr. Dunning, did her best to convince him to do so. Given these circumstances (doing things twice over, marrying a woman through confusion, not dying when it was expected of him) he did the inevitable: fell in love with Alice.
CHAPTER XV
ROSS. A VERY BAD MAN.
Ross was such a Bad Man that he wore sunglasses and gloves all the time and had a moustache. He was Julia's killer and the driver of the car which forced Catlin's policemen off the road. He liked killing people very much; he very nearly killed Rachel, Kathleen, Cecile, Catlin, and Sally, and managed actually to kill (in addition to Julia and Catlin's policemen) Frank Wells, who had no taste in clothing. Ross eventually fell to his death from atop a castle in Spain, assisted by Catlin and Sally.
Everyone else in Bay City is either unmemorable or alive (or both).
CHAPTER XVI
OLIVE.
Olive served no known purpose and is memorable only because she began with a vowel and shoplifted from a boutique. It is not known whether she was related to or even on speaking terms with anyone else.
CHAPTER XVII
IRIS CARRINGTON. A SPIN-OFF.
Iris thought she was Mac's daughter until she was told otherwise. She was in fact merely his adopted daughter but this did not stop her from hating the women Mac married (viz. Rachel) like poison. She had a son, Dennis, who was the light of her life; she had numerous husbands, the only one whose name is at all memorable being Brian Bancroft. She had a maid called Vivian for quite some time. One day she went to Texas with her current husband, Dennis, and possibly Vivian, never to return. Dennis fell in love with someone and something would have happened but someone put an end to all memorable history of Texas. Vivian returned to Bay City and worked for the Corys until she married a chauffeur or gatekeeper or some kindred creature.
CHAPTER XVIII
JANICE FRAME.
Janice met Mac at a funeral and began having an affair with him. This was the cause of Rachel's affair (in retaliation) with Mitch. Janice was a Bad Woman (although it is not certain in which direction her badness tended) and Mac eventually saw through her and reunited with Rachel. It is not known what became of Janice.
CHAPTER XIX
STACEY WINTHROP.
Stacey Winthrop was Cass' sister and a lawyer who was having an affair with Mark Singleton. She and Jamie were in love and when she became pregnant it was not clear who the baby's father was. Mark assumed he was and insisted on marrying her. The baby [Marie] was born; she was the cause of Cass becoming an uncle.
CHAPTER XX
NICOLE LOVE.
Nicole was a model from New York who was addicted to cocaine. She fell madly for Jamie and he and Perry between them tried to help her get unaddicted by putting various things in restrooms, etc. Ted Bancroft was Brian's son and some form of drug addict-cum-pusher who tried to cause trouble and was eventually found in a restroom and taken away. Nicole (by now cured) realised that Jamie was crazy in love with Stacey and there was no hope, so she returned to modeling.
CHAPTER XXI
LEO MARS AND ABEL MARSH.
Leo and Abel were twins and both in love with Quinn. Leo was a singer and Abel was a doctor. Quinn did not like either of them much and they did not like each other so they disappeared, but not before Leo had caused a club known as The Warehouse. It has since vanished, but at one time Lily was a hostess there and it was frequented by nearly everyone in Bay City, including Sally (in a blue recurring motif outfit) and Peter.
CHAPTER XXII
HENRIETTA AND ROY BINGHAM.
Henrietta was married to Bob Morgan until he was shot; she then took up baking and spending a good deal of time with Roy Bingham. Lily grew impatient with the length of time the courtship was taking and so proposed on Roy's behalf. Henrietta accepted and they got married and disappeared inexplicably.
CHAPTER XXIII
GIL FENTON.
Gil and Peter were both coming to see Sally at the same time until Sally subtly indicated that she preferred Peter by becoming engaged to him. Gil was Felicia's chauffeur for a time before he became a bit of the construction company. After Sally he began taking Julia out to lunch until he too disappeared inexplicably. He was on good terms with Roy.
CHAPTER XXIV
A SINISTER POLICEMAN.
When Sally was supposed to meet Catlin in the cabin one time she came across a sinister policeman. He told her she was very pretty and Catlin's only weakness so they would follow her to the ends of the earth or until Catlin was caught. When Catlin put in an appearance Sally called but to him to go away again. There was a shot but no one was hit. The sinister policeman arrested Sally with the memorable words, "You just helped a convicted murderer escape, sweetheart." He has not been heard of since.
CHAPTER XXV
ERIC WESTON, D.A.
Weston Was the D.A. who prosecuted Catlin into a hole in the ground and recommended that he be electrified or electrocuted, whichever is more fatal. He did this only to appear impressive and to further his political career, not because he honestly believed Catlin to be guilty. In time, he too vanished.
CHAPTER XXVI
CECILE de POULIGNAC.
Cecile was engaged to a lion but did not marry him. Instead she moved into a new apartment and encouraged Jamie. Since she had every appearance of being a nice girl he married her. Unfortunately she was marrying him only for the money she assumed he would one day inherit. When it became apparent that Sandy was the actual heir she set about attempting to poison Jamie so as to be able to marry Sandy. Jamie was never actually poisoned to death, but he and Cecile did divorce and she did marry Sandy. Eventually Sandy divorced her for no particular reason. Nobody liked Cecile very much and all of Bay City wandered along suspecting her of just about every crime committed within a fifty-mile radius. She was some form of artist for a bit and laid claim to Cass Winthrop's days although his nights were Felicia's; when Felicia found out about Cecile she spent a good deal of time calling Cass darling and being icily polite to him in elevators, etc. Cecile's father Louis was some sort of art thief and her mother Eleanor was a countess. Despite this fact Cecile was practically penniless and was constantly trying to marry or borrow money. Donna promised to give her a lot or money if she would suck up to Peter; she did it with a vengeance and would have married him but he threw her over at the last possible second in favour of hospitalization and a little blonde nurse. She had in Cass a constant hanger-on and he missed her sorely when she went into the Tunnel or Love and neglected to come out. When he eventually found her on Majorca she was pleased to see him but went off on a yacht with a very rich man all the same.
Everyone else is either unmemorable or still in Bay City.
CHAPTER XXVII
RACHEL DAVIS MATTHEWS CLARK FRAME CORY CORY CORY. THE MARRYING KIND.
Rachel is memorable for having been married six times, largely to Mac. She had three children; in spite of the odds being heavily in Mac's favour, only Amanda was his. Rachel's hobbies were painting still life, marrying Mac, sculpting, divorcing Mac, and impersonating hookers in bars.
CHAPTER XXVIII
JAMIE FRAME. A BAD HUSBAND.
Jamie Frame was the cause of Bad Wives in Bay City; the women he married took to wearing tight jeans, attempting to poison him, etc. His first wife Was Blaine Ewing, who once spent a day in an abortion clinic pretending to be pregnant. It is not known what she hoped to gain by this. His second wife was Cecile de Poulignac, who threw him over for Sandy Cory, who was practically his brother and a failed gigolo besides. Sandy in his turn threw Cecile over for Blaine. Both Cecile and Blaine became better wives when married to Sandy, a1though Cecile continued to be a Bad Woman. After writing an inflammatory novel, Jamie was mistaken for a criminal by MJ, due to the fact that he was wearing a Lacoste shirt in the police station.
CHAPTER XXIX
MJ MCKINNON.
MJ was a good woman and the cause of the McKinnons: Ben, Kathleen, Vince, and Cheryl, who was invisible. She is memorable for understanding the psychology of clowns better than any other police detective in Bay City.
CHAPTER XXX
CASS WINTHROP.
Cass is memorable for having the middle name Cadwallader and being the cause of most of the memorable dialogue in Bay City. He is thus a Good Thing, although Cecile did not appreciate him as she should have.
CHAPTER XXXI
WALLINGFORD. A GOOD FRIEND.
Wallingford had only the one name; it is thus natural that he should have been friends with Cass. He was friends with just about everyone in Bay City except the memorable Tony the Tuna, who was the cause of Krystle Lake.
CHAPTER XXXII
HUNTER BRADSHAW.
Hunt is most memorable for being the cause of racism in Bay City and masquerading as an Old Roman. He spent a great deal of time conjugating foreign verbs and pursuing blondes. His best friends in the world were called Skip, Buffy, and Deirdre. This fact is not surprising.
CHAPTER XXXIII
CARL HUTCHINS.
Carl Hutchins picked up Felicia on purpose in Paris and returned to Bay City with her in order to have nightmares about his father and a paper cutter. He had been married to Donna and (after Felicia threw him out) could not seem to break the habit, but he fell out of favour as a result of giving her incriminating jewellery, etc. Carl was a Bad Man and the cause of Emily Benson.
CHAPTER XXXIV
MAISIE WATKINS.
Maisie was the cause of Smiley's and very predatory. She preyed on Catlin very successfully and had him paint a great many bedrooms, etc., until he decided to be a party to Donna's stableboy fixation instead.
CHAPTER XXXV
DONNA LOVE.
Donna had an affair with Catlin in order to celebrate Peter's engagement to Cecile, who had a very good memory. This was the cause of Donna's stableboy fixation and the revelation that she was Marley's mother.
CHAPTER XXXVI
CATLIN EWING AND SALLY FRAME. A FORGETFUL COUPLE.
Sally once led a wicked life as a blonde pretending to have sex with men in trailers, etc. She left town for a while, only to forget herself and return as a sweet brunette. She became engaged to Peter Love; his sister Donna objected to her poor memory and drew Peter's attention to the fact that Sally had forgotten her own son. Peter saw reason and very cleverly managed to get himself disengaged from her. Sally became engaged to David. Catlin arrived in Bay City, but since he had forgotten his own name he was going about under the alias Josh Peterson, lurking in unlit hospital corridors, pushing Donna off bales of hay, etc. Catlin and Sally met in Smiley's, and their similar memories formed a Bond. Catlin was very pleased when she failed to marry David, and when David was murdered he confessed to the crime in order to protect her. By the time Sally reminded him that she was not guilty it was Too Late, and she was unfortunately unable to remember who was. During Catlin's trial Sally was asked if she loved him; having considered the matter she said not. At the cabin however she remembered that that was the Wrong Answer. When Catlin arrived she rushed into his arms, uttering the memorable chiasmus "You knew, you came; you came, you knew," Catlin and Sally were the cause of Majorca, where they spent a great deal of time pretending to fall off cliffs, wearing other people's clothes, etc. When Emily was revealed to be the murderer they forgot their troubles with the aid of a broom and vast quantities of whipped cream. They were the cause of Bay City being memorable and thus a Good Thing.
And now, the next part of Another World.