{"product_id":"2940013748828","title":"The Killer and the Slain","description":"I, John Ozias Talbot, aged thirty-six years and three months, being\u003cbr\u003ein my perfectly sane mind, wish to write down this statement.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI do so entirely and solely for my own benefit and profit--in fact,\u003cbr\u003efor the quietening of my disturbed mind.  It is most improbable\u003cbr\u003ethat anyone other than myself will read this document, but should\u003cbr\u003eanything happen to me and I die without destroying this writing, I\u003cbr\u003ewish the reader, whoever he or she may be, to realize fully that no\u003cbr\u003eone could conceivably be of a more complete mental sanity and\u003cbr\u003ehonest matter-of-fact common sense than I am at this moment.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt is because I wish to show this self-evident fact to myself and,\u003cbr\u003eif need be, to the whole world (after my death) that I write this\u003cbr\u003edown.  There will be many minute and apparently insignificant facts\u003cbr\u003eand details in this record because CIRCUMSTANTIAL FACTS are in this\u003cbr\u003ematter the thing!  I have suffered during these preceding months\u003cbr\u003ecertain experiences so unbelievable that were I NOT sane, and were\u003cbr\u003emany of the facts not so commonplace, my sanity might be doubted.\u003cbr\u003eIt is NOT to be doubted.  I am as sane as any man in the United\u003cbr\u003eKingdom.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBecause in the course of this narrative I confess to a crime this\u003cbr\u003edocument will be kept in the greatest possible secrecy.  I have no\u003cbr\u003edesire to suffer at the hand of the common hangman before I need.\u003cbr\u003eThat I do not myself FEEL it to be a crime matters nothing, I am\u003cbr\u003eafraid, to the Law.  One day, when the important elements in such\u003cbr\u003ematters are taken into account rather than the unimportant, justice\u003cbr\u003ewill be better served.  But that time is not yet.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI was born in the little seaside town of Seaborne in Glebeshire on\u003cbr\u003eJanuary 3rd, 1903.  I am married and have one son aged ten.  I\u003cbr\u003einherited my father's business of Antique and Picture Dealer.  I am\u003cbr\u003ethe author of four books, a Guide to Glebeshire and three novels--\u003cbr\u003eThe Sandy Tree (1924), The Gridiron (1930) and The Gossip-monger\u003cbr\u003e(1936).  The last of these had some success.  I was born in a\u003cbr\u003ebedroom above the shop, which is in the High Street and has, from\u003cbr\u003eits upper windows, a fine view of the sea and the now neglected and\u003cbr\u003etumbledown little harbour.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI was the only child of my parents and adored by them.  Some have\u003cbr\u003esaid that they spoiled me.  It may be so.  I worshipped my mother\u003cbr\u003ebut had always a curious disaffection to my father.  This was\u003cbr\u003epartly, I can see now, physical.  He was an obese and sweaty man\u003cbr\u003eand would cover my face with wet slobbery kisses when I was small,\u003cbr\u003eand this I very greatly disliked.  My mother, on the other hand,\u003cbr\u003ewas slight and dapper in appearance, and the possessor of the most\u003cbr\u003ebeautiful little hands I have ever seen on any woman.  Her voice\u003cbr\u003ewas soft and musical, marked with a slight Glebeshire accent.  She\u003cbr\u003ehad something of the gipsy in her appearance, and liked to wear gay\u003cbr\u003ecolours.  I remember especially a dress made of some foreign\u003cbr\u003ematerial--silk of many brilliant shades--that I used to love, and I\u003cbr\u003ewould beg her to show it me as it hung in the cupboard in the\u003cbr\u003ebedroom.  My father, when they woke in the morning, would always go\u003cbr\u003edownstairs to get breakfast ready (he worshipped my mother), and\u003cbr\u003ethen my mother would take me into her bed and I would lie in her\u003cbr\u003earms.  Never, until I married, did I know such happiness.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMy father was successful in his little business--successful, that\u003cbr\u003eis to say, for those easier, more comfortable days--and we lived\u003cbr\u003every pleasantly.  His great passion was for the buying of old and\u003cbr\u003eapparently worthless pictures.  He would clean them with the hope\u003cbr\u003ethat something by a Master might be discovered.  He did, indeed,\u003cbr\u003emake one or two discoveries--a Romney portrait and an Italian Pietà\u003cbr\u003eby Piombo were two of his successes.  But his main business was\u003cbr\u003ewith visitors and tourists.  He visited all the local sales and\u003cbr\u003esometimes went quite far afield.","brand":"WDS Publishing","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47083170660592,"sku":"2940013748828","price":0.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940013748828_p0.jpg?v=1763589739","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940013748828","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}