TEXT FILE NUMBER E 1.0: EXCERPT FROM ARTICLE BY MALACHI DONNER, WRITING AS MISS BELLE VUE, IN THE LAST PRINTED ISSUE OF THE ARCHANGEL CHRONICLE
LOCATION: TOWNSHIP OF ARCHANGEL, WASHINGTON STATE
DATE: OCTOBER 25, 1950
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Hello, Eligible Ladies in Archangel land, and welcome to this week's edition of Bachelors on the Beach, a catalogue of the most eligible bachelors who have found themselves washed up on the shores of our little lake. I am your faithful writer, Miss Belle Vue, wordsmith to the heart-hurt and romantically woebegone, here as your herald in these trying times, and I hope that this article finds you happy as a clam in the sand. Or rather, happy as a clam in the sand, and hungry for a succulent snippet of suspense, because have I ever got a zinger for you! If you've just found yourself exclaiming "Hey, that's me!" after reading that line, then I pray you read on.
Just last night, I was made aware of the entrance of someone who just might be the most dashing bachelor ever to grace the shores of our sleepy little ville. This young buck's presence was brought to my attention by my most Confidential Source just as the young man darkened the doorstep of the opulent Lakeside Hotel. "Never," my Confidential Source told me through bated breath, "has one such as him been seen in this sleepy ville." Being told as much, I made my way to the Lakeside myself so that I might get even the tiniest glimpse of this handsome specimen. I was skeptical, of course, being told that such a man could exist at all, but the breathlessness I heard over the phone line from my Confidential Source had my heart in a flutter as to the possibilities.
I came to the Lakeside Hotel just a lickety split–so fast that I may have shaved half an inch from the points on my most eye-grabbing red heels with just the speed of my steps. I found my Source collapsed into a great leather chair in the hotel lobby, a cold towel across her forehead and a glow in her cheeks the likes of which struck me as fevered. She could speak only a few words, make even fewer gestures, but what I pieced together pointed me to the guestbook laid out like a gospel on the altar of the hotel's front desk. I made my way to it, my long fingers stroking the pages in reverence, for I knew that in it was scribed the name of the man who'd left my Source a smoldering mess. My eyes found the most recent entry and I committed it to memory before stealing back across the lobby to speak it into my Source's ear. Upon hearing the words leave my lips her body gave a sharp quiver, and she sank even deeper into the chasm of the seat. Only then, was I sure of who I was after.
Knowing now the room and the name, I made my way to the upper floors of the hotel where I knew my prey would be found. Now, I know some of you reading this may at once think me a woman of threadbear moral fiber in my seeking out such a man outside the custody of a chaperone, but believe me when I say my intent was only to lay eyes on this Adonis.
I arrived at the door in so short a time that the muscles of my legs burned as though I'd just finished a foot race from the town square to the Grand Coulee Dam. I knocked, arm trembling in trepidation at what I might find. Footsteps padded along the lush carpeted floor from beyond the wooden slab, each padding sound like the thrum of my heart. Tumblers tumbled inside the lock as my prey opened it from the inside. And then, slowly, without so much as a creak, the door swung inward and I laid eyes on the creature who'd left my Source aquiver.
What I saw beyond that doorway was such a striking young man–tall, pale, his skin just a shade brighter than African ivory and his hair an inky black, that I might have gone the way of my Source had I not steeled myself for the sight. I say, if any of our town's young women fancy a Transylvanian Count, then they have never struck so much pay dirt. The man confirmed his name as the one my Source had seen after I breathed (rather than questioned) after it. His smile was the most roguish of curves as he said it, and combined with his velvet voice it paved the way for making my knees a whole mile weaker than seconds before. I managed to pull my senses about me long enough to ask what he was doing in town, to which he answered that he was there on business at the Navy Research Center down by the lake.
Now, hardly an Archangelian soul is naught familiar with the constant comings and goings of mysterious men from Uncle Sam's newest vacation house in our fair township. But if you have been living under a rock these past few months, or just haven't given a hoot in heck about the G-men, then I'll give lay out the details here tout suite. The Navy Research Center does its trade in the most secret of secrets. It makes the Manhattan Project look like a secret handshake amongst naughty school children. So when I found out that this tall, dark, and handsome was also a spy, well I couldn't trust myself to be in his presence a second longer lest I throw myself into his arms and beg him to take me away. I wobbled back down the hall, shouting thanks for his time all the way before gathering up my now-partially recovered Source and dragging her along with me.
And so, ladies, if you happen to come across such a man around town, I hope that you can stand his charms better than I did. But fair warning, for a man such as RAYMOND ABRAMOV is likely to leave you in the same sorry state as he left us.
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