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-- OR -- Mr. Jabez Wilson, pawnbroker and man of the world, guest-writes for this issue courtesy of free-lance literary agent Brad Keefauver. |
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Letter from Mr. Jabez Wilson To the Members of the Dark Lantern League, their friends, guests, and service-people: The pawnbroker shop of Jabez Wilson of Coburg Square does not secure household loans with a gasogene. You might have heard this before, but it is important nonetheless. Attend and heed. I, Jabez Wilson, will not lend you money on a gasogene for one reason and one reason alone: I do not want your gasogene. Why is it that do I not want your gasogene? Mr. Vincent Spaulding, my former assistant, seemed to be attempting to corner the gasogene market during his time in my shop. Gasogenes are devices for putting gas bubbles into water and creating soda water to be mixed with whiskey, gin, or some other intoxicating beverage. At least, that is the purpose that I understand them to be used for. With Mr. Spaulding, I am not sure. The effects of a gasogene explosion, as are not uncommon, might have been multiplied by the exploding of multiple gasogenes. Was this Mr. Spaulding's goal in collecting gasogene after gasogene during his time in my employ? Was he intending to explode my entire shop, if not all of Saxe-Coburg Square? We may never know, as Mr. Spaulding disappeared during the night Scotland Yard caught that burglar breaking into my shop from the sewers. Apparently the thought that my pawn shop was not proof against a determined criminal was too frightening for him and he never returned. I suspect he continues his gasogene collecting elsewhere, and I fully expect to one day read of a massive explosion in Birmingham or Tudbury-Goldhill, and read his name as one casualty of the tragic event. If you would like to buy a gasogene, however, I assure you that the current stock of gasogenes in my shop is completely safe and entirely explosion-proof. |
