That Mystery Floating Alongside

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  “The side of the ship made an opaque belt of shadow on the darkling glassy shimmer of the sea. But I saw at once something elongated and pale floating very close to the ladder. Before I could form a guess a faint flash of phosphorescent light, which seemed to issue suddenly from the naked body of a man, flickered in the sleeping water with the elusive, silent play of summer lightning in a night sky. With a gasp I saw revealed to my stare a pair of feet, the long legs, a broad livid back immersed right up to the neck in a greenish cadaverous glow. One hand, awash, clutched the bottom rung of the ladder. He was complete but for the head. A headless corpse! The cigar dropped out of my gaping mouth with a tiny plop and a short hiss quite audible in the absolute stillness of all things under heaven. At that I suppose he raised up his face, a dimly pale oval in the shadow of the ship’s side. But even then I could only barely make out down there the shape of his black-haired head. Howev...

Finished Reading: A Time To Die

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Finished Reading “A Time To Die: The Untold Story of the Kursk Tragedy” by Robert Moore. This is the well-researched and reported account surrounding the August 2000 Russian submarine disaster in the Berents Sea. The author concisely explains all the reader needs to know about submarine warfare, mechanics and lifestyle as well international tension, philosophy and chain of command. While the story is tragic both above and below the waves, the reader should not miss point we are human beings with lives that matter. There’s a time and place for politics, but compassion can be more powerful. 


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