Welcome to the Wakefield Doctrine (the theory of clarks, scotts and rogers)
This is the Six Sentence Story bloghop.
Denise is the host.
She maintains only one rule to the writing of a Six Sentence Story: a) the length of your story come out to exactly six sentences and 2) to involve the week’s prompt word
This week we return to the Whitechapel Interlude for our next installment, disguised as a Six Sentence Story. If you haven’t been following along, you would enjoy this week’s Six more after reading at least the previous two chapters.
Another bonus! The last walk-on we did, (courtesy of our guest author, Ford at (the) Atomic Mage), was so much fun, I asked our host, Denise, if she would grace us with her rhetorical presence this week for a walk-on. Go on over to her Six. Enjoy.
The prompt word:
PAWN
“If the Devil is chasing you, run as fast as you can, however, have you cause to stalk Satan, run only as fast as he can,” once again, the teachings of the Order manifested as a memory of Brother Abbott singling me out in a room full of acolytes, “Brother Anselm, your face tells us you don’t believe you can outrun the Great Deceiver, this is a failure of faith, not ability; look up Isaiah 40: 29-31 this evening and bring your thoughts to us on the morrow.”
My assignment this day: to confirm the whereabouts of a time traveler of whom I had no memory of a face, appearance, or voice, only a single, still image of the ceiling of a room in St. Pancras hotel; nevertheless, I now stood on the sidewalk, opposite the gilded and carved entrance to Chiltern Court, on my right, the trees in Regent’s Park bloomed an anemic russet, mute reminder that summer had abdicated it’s palsied reign and winter approached under false grandeur of blue skies.
Marylebone Road was every bit a moat to cross, lacking only a watercourse full of clinging vines and predatory animals, there were, however, an excess of dark-blue uniformed men standing around the entrance to the building I needed to access; the very practical wisdom of my teachers whispered: “The secret to stalking lies not in hiding yourself from your prey, rather, it is to become an innocuous feature in their everyday world.”
As I crossed the cobblestone roadway, I saw Sarah standing to the left of the grand entrance, speaking to a man who was easily two meters in height and fourteen stone, if an ounce; he was scribbling in a notepad, while looking at everything other than my friend, which made him a policeman or a journalist.
Folding my scarf over a discarded box I’d recovered from an alleyway off Porter St., keeping it close to my side, every bit a messenger’s satchel, I crossed Marylebone Road; as I approached the marble-and-gilt facade of the residence of my quarry, Sarah laughed loudly and, pointing at something further up Baker Street, moved her companion’s attention, two spaces in the opposite direction of my approach; of course, the pawn is never aware of the player’s hand.
My own focus, as hostage to my friend’s gesture as the other pedestrians in the area, failed me as I stepped into the lobby at the same moment as another; I collided, mid-threshold into the building, with a woman, small in stature, religious in dress.
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This seems like good advice: “The secret to stalking lies not in hiding yourself from your prey, rather, it is to become an innocuous feature in their everyday world.” I’d probably hide nonetheless. That man two meters in height reminds me of a short Nephilim. Another good observation: “the pawn is never aware of the player’s hand”
thank you, Frank… part of the fun of this writing thing is to find cool bits of advice and information (or, failing that, to make it up)
lol
It would appear Anslem and Sarah make a good team. But! Can they catch up to the time traveler? When they do, then what?!
Pleasant rhythm and flow.
I did enjoy the tie in with the Bible verse.
Brilliant that D is making a walk-on this week, look forward to that. I have the feeling some of her characters are already making their presence known in your own episode this week? 😎
I like the visuals of ‘running with the devil’ at the beginning, and the description of Marylebone Road is excellent.
I thought it was funny* how Sarah laughed out loudly which made me lol, lol 😁
“summer had abdicated it’s palsied reign” – v nice.
Viva The Whitechapel Interlude!
*in a funny mood
yeah, me too! (We were talking about it, the walk-on, and the analogy* of music improvisation… jamming in the parlance**) carries the promise of all participants deriving pleasure from the process and the product.
Google walked from St. Pancras to Baker Street… the setting (both original to the times and those buildings that remain) would supply a Six10 Sentence Story, ya know?
* or….metaphor….simile… never could keep those straight in my head lol
** I suspect, in my younger days, had I said from the stage, ‘in the parlance’… I would have felt the wind of eyebrows raising themselves in question….
The pawn is never aware of the player’s hand …. Some of them choose to do the same thing, even if they are aware of the player’s hand.
willing pawns, indeed. (Arguably worse than the player, their knowledge and submission held often as an excuse from responsibility)
Beautifully paced and beautifully phrased, what atmosphere! I’m really enjoying this. Looking forward to reading Denise’s walk on.
As do I
Thanks enjoying the writage as well.
I like the hostage usage . Great wording
Thanks, Paul
A brilliantly woven suspenseful tale. “that summer had abdicated it’s palsied reign and winter approached under false grandeur of blue skies.”
was an artful and striking description too.
All ’round great work!
Thank you, Susan. Fun to assemble the wordage
Once again, sir, your imagery drew me into the scene.
Excellent
Thank you.
Always leaves me wanting to know what is next.
Stalking the devil! Now that’s a perplexing thought!
and, if you are… you certainly don’t want to catch up too quickly
Since I’m new to this challenge, I’m just gradually feeling my way in to the continuity and the story – and the ‘walk-on.
About to backtrack and catch up because the suspense of this episode has me wondering … Such excellent descriptions too. I can see it all.
Welcome to the Six Sentence Story ‘hop.
At any given time, a number of us, (at the Six Sentence Story), will create what amounts to a serial Six; (this is, more often than not, a result of being blessed with characters that..well, they kind of insist that they have more to say…lol)
I will admit to being a bit of a habitual offender in this regard… you will, on alternate weeks, find installments to two serial stories, ‘the Whitechapel Interlude’ and next week there will be an installment of ‘the Case of the Missing Fig Leaf’*
As to the business of walk-ons…welll! As the skill of my most recent two walk-on authors make clear, the fun in this is to match the feel of the original story and branch the narrative off from there. (Denise, our host, has the perfect description of this in, “Pick out or introduce a secondary character in the base story…and follow them home”. Ford, having a background in music, tends to liken the process to musical improvisation (i.e. ‘jamming’) where others add musical ideas that, unless witnessed, would totally sound like a part of the original song)
Funny thing about walk-ons… the Whitechapel Interlude sprang from a walk-on I did a couple of years ago. One of the others wrote a standalone Six that involved time travel and took place in Victorian London. In response to my comment, (about how much I enjoy that particular genre), he replied, “I’d love to see your take on this”…and I was, like, all ‘where’s my wikipedia and google maps…I am there, no doubt about it**
Funny how some comments catch us in a chatty mood…lol
Hey, if after reading the Whitechapel Interlude’ you’re feeling like walk-ons sound like fun, let me know.
*if you detect similarity an/or seeming overlap in the stories… it’s true! ayiiee! once an idea lays claim, then they’re the devil to get rid of …(the common factor appears to be ‘the Order of Lilith’)
** phrase borrowed from Jules Winfield in ‘Pulp Fiction’
Love ’em all! 😊