2. What kind of government did they have, Democracy or Dictator?
3. Did you ever really shoot a dear?
Thank you. My report is due May 12.

Yours truly,

WENDELL DIXON

One of 19 letters enclosed in a single packet from Lancaster Valley High School, California.—VB

Dear Mr. Harrison Shepherd

My heart is full of happiness, just knowing you are holding this letter in your hand. Thank you for being an author. You have gotten me through a lot of sad times, when my mother died especially. Sometimes I do everything I can just to get through the day, so I can curl up at night with my favorite book. When life is humdrum or just plain old sad I know you will take me away to the place where troubles are forgotten. When I get a letter back from you my life will be complete. Thank you, thank you.

Yours,

ROXANNE WILLS

All correspondence answered in the same week received, insofar as possible. No photographs or inclusions.—VB

June 6, 1947

Dear Frida,

Diego’s telegram has terrified me not a little. He seems to believe the doctors nearly killed you, so I fear for all concerned. But for you, above all. I’m determined today to send a cheerful letter, to give you a little picknick from your worries, as you have done often for me. You’ll find in this package your birthday present. Don’t be too disappointed: it’s only another book, which I hope will amuse you. If not, blame yourself, you should have left me a cook.

I am trying to begin a new story that will be about the Mayans, I think, and the fall of civilizations. Everyone wants a happy ending this time, so this should be just the ticket. But the writing proceeds slowly, when life is filled with such thrilling distractions. Only last week I purchased a packet of clothespins, and a new billfold. (The shopgirl informed me it has a secret pouch.) The Roadster and I “Make a Date to Lubricate” every 30 days at the garage on Coxe Avenue. A new appliance shop has opened down the street! And right now I am spying out my study window into the treetops where a gigantic bird is pecking a hole. I wish you could see the creature: its red hair stands straight up, as mine does on Mondays. Goodness, the wood chips fly, this thing is the size of an ox. And you were worried my life was dull.

I never want for company. The neighbor boy Romulus seems to prefer my house to his own, now that summer is here and he is paroled from Grade Six. With hands shoved deep in overall pockets he wanders around the house coveting things, but is not a thief. He asks. He particularly wants the little carved idol from Teotihuacán. I haven’t told him it’s a stolen object. Instead I gave him a fountain pen and an old fedora and he pretends to be Edward Murrow, using a Doomsday voice to interview the cats. I also offered to give him a cat, the useless black one I call Chisme, but he won’t take it.

My stenographer comes Monday through Friday to answer mail and telephone, for over a year now. My wonderful amanuensis. She works at the dining room table. With each fresh day’s mail piled high there, we pray: “For what we are about to receive may the Lord make us truly thankful.” She is a whiz, I have known her sometimes to get through nearly a hundred letters from readers in a day, typing up a kind little note in answer to each. She hauls it all to the post office in a gigantic leather satchel she found somewhere, such as might have been used by the Pony Express: over her shoulder she slings it, and off she goes, does Violet Brown. I can’t help thinking you would appreciate the irony of her name, for she is a dove-gray little bird. And something like the mother I need, commanding me to leave the house for fresh air at least once daily, if only to the corner for cigarettes. Lately she has stepped up the program: I am to undertake some level of social adventure each week. Going to the movies by myself is acceptable (Mrs. Brown is lenient), and not too bad if I slip in after the house has gone dark. The purpose of the outings is to overcome my dread of the world and all things in it. Now the magazines are saying I have a punctured eardrum, which is helpful. If the world howls too loudly, I can pretend I don’t hear.

Please send word you are recovering. Diego’s telegram was a shocker. He seems extremely angry, not only with your doctors but also the world and Every Damn Gringo in it, myself included. You might let him know, Truman did not consult me before committing to defeat the Communists in Greece and Turkey. Secretary of State Marshall has announced a new plan for European assistance that won’t thrill your husband either. Frida, you understand men. How are these leaders different from the boys I used to watch at school, trying to make up their teams for football? Before this war we had six great players on the grass. Now only two are left standing. Naturally those two will be rivals, and try to get the rest to line up on their side. Dimes and candy will help, sure.

I struggle to understand why Diego supports Stalin now, after working so closely with Lev, and even seeing him murdered. What rational motives could cause Diego to make this change? “It’s a revolutionary necessity,” he said, but how am I to know what that means? Betrayal, as the means to an end? Nearly every day I wake up shocked at how little in this world I comprehend. Perhaps Diego is right, and despite all my years of serving brilliant men I am only a dumb gringo. I shall try to keep to the task I seem to know: writing stories for people who believe if you throw a rock, it could roll uphill. If your husband says I am an idiot on the subject of politics, certainly he should know. So don’t ask me about the peaceful atom, or how to raise the birth rate in France.

For your amusement I enclose a newspaper review, a favorite from the last round. I take it as proof I am no literary great, but Mrs. Brown says it proves my books are about Important Things. Diego may take it as written proof that someone here besides myself opposes Truman’s shocking turn against the rising proletariat. But mostly it proves nothing. You know reviewers, they are the wind in their own sails. I should like to write my books only for the dear person who lies awake reading in bed until page last, then lets the open book fall gently on her face, to touch her smile or drink her tears.

I’m not brave, as you are. However badly broken, you still stand up. In your Tehuana dresses, in your garden, with the pomegranate trees bending toward you to open their red flowers. No matter what happens, you will still be at the center of the world. Your friend,

INSÓLITO

The New York Weekly Review, April 26, 1947

Author’s Second Strike Hits the Mark

by Donald Brewer

Do not mistake Harrison Shepherd for a literary great. His stories are full-to-brimming with lusty, bare-chested youths. The settings are glamorous, the plots chest-heavers. You may not admit it to your friends, but somehow you can’t put them down.