Mothman and Something for the Dark Illustrations

 

As noted as an addendum on a recent post on Edward D. Hoch's story "Something for the Dark," the tale originally appeared in the June 1968 issue of Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine. 

The original illustrations, in the style that appeared in AHMM for the better part of 20 years or more, further evoke the mothman allusions. 

Favorite Short Stories: Something for the Dark By Edward D. Hoch

To identify one sub-category of Edward D. Hoch's fiction is to spoil a bit, I suppose. Hoch excelled at
all varieties of mystery from the locked room to the procedural to the cozy and more. His cadre of sleuths included a cowboy, a spy, a country doctor and the representative of a bureau devoted to apprehensions of fugitives. 

The collection Ellery Queen's Grand Slam (Popular Library 1970) includes a Hoch trifecta divided by mystery technique, whodunit, howdunit, whydunit. 

But there's also a significant portion of Hoch's work that falls in the realm of the fantastic uncanny alongside The Hound of the Baskervilles or the the more recent Scooby Doo. The supernatural is seemingly present in the mystery, but the solution is rational with clues neatly placed along the way to look like phenomena.

Clearly Hoch read widely in probably scientific and technical journals, mining for tidbits to serve his ongoing, incredible output. Thumbprint scanners in their infancy might provide a reason for one of thief Nick Velvet's unique pilfers, for example, and all manner of devices or small details might serve Simon Ark tales and many others.

Ark, alleged to be a coptic priest thousands of years old, tended to be called in when high strangeness seemed at hand. Even with a bit of mysticism sometimes mixed in, Ark's cases always proved to have a logical explanation.

SEE ALSO: Favorite Short Stories - The Judges of Hades by Edward D. Hoch

That same style is on display in what's maybe a bit of an obscure Hoch tale, "Something for the Dark." From what I can tell it appeared only in the Alfred Hitchcock Presents collection Stories that Go Bump in the Night (Random House, 1977), though its roots seem to be the 1960s. That hints it may have been in a magazine earlier. 

The collection's one of a long series of anthologies spawned by the Alfred Hitchcock Presents TV series, offering tales in a similar vein. 

The hero's not Ark nor one of Hoch's many series characters but magazine writer Steve Foley, though he works for Neptune Magazine, which bears the same name as the publishing house for which Ark's unnamed friend and case-narrator works.

Maybe it started out as an Ark tale. (Occasional signs of Hoch's experimentation turn up in mining his cannon. The September, 1959 Double-Action Detective features a more traditional hardboiled private eye named Simon Ark narrating and solving "The Case of the Naked Niece.")

In "Dark," the human-interest angle on reports of a man's encounter with what might be called a strange cryptid piques Foley's interest. While on a camping trip with his wife, the man spied a winged creature sounding a lot like Mothman though described as similar to Lewis Carroll's Jabberwock.

Circulation's lagging at Neptune, and an October issue is coming up, so his editor dispatches Foley to Pennsylvania for details from Walter Wangard and his wife Lynn. 

Sounds maybe a little like Woodrow Derenberger, noted for encounters with alleged alien Indrid Cold in proximity to Mothman sights.

Turns out the creature may have winged away with the couple's dog.

SEE ALSO: Birds, Mice and Frozen Goldfish Bowls

Foley's skeptical, but a trip back to the woods and the spot of the initial sighting gets spooky, and Walt's overcome by something unseen not far from where their dog's found buried. 

For a magazine feature writer, Foley's as attuned to detail as any classic sleuth. As events seem to overwhelm Walt Wangard, Foley pieces together a different interpretation of events, drawing on a bit of science and an inconsistency or two that Sherlock himself might have noted.

It's not a terrifying tale, but it has a creepy factor and a satisfying solution. It shouldn't be overlooked by Hoch fans nor those who enjoy a tale with a few clever twists. 

ADDENDUM

Poking around a bit, I see that "Something for the Dark" appeared in the June, 1968 issue of Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine. Mothman sightings and related incidents occurred in 1966 and 1967. See illustrations from that publication here. 

SEE ALSO: Favorite Short Stories: The Emissary by Ray Bradbury

Original Publication Sites: Scars and Blue Murder

I get periodic reminders my memory is not what it used to be. 

My story "Scars" originally appeared in the online magazine Blue Murder. It's in the ebook collection Scars and Candy from Crossroad Press. I read a few flash stories from that collection the other day at the Fantasy/Sci-Fi Focus Facebook group and was reminded. 

I'm not sure the issue number any longer, and shifts from one computer to the other over the years have lost any contributor's e-copy I had.

It's a good lesson on the need to keep good records, I guess. 

The story was first submitted to the Hot Blood series, and it resulted in a freak-out rejection from Michael Garrett, I believe, and not Jeff Gelb, over something implied but not implicitly stated in the story. 

It went to some other mag of the time where it chilled one editor but not the second reader it seemed, who took it in better stride than the HB editors at least.

I don't recall Blue Murder batting an eye. Shows what a crapshoot the whole submission process is, I guess.

Wish I still had a copy of the original. I found a few others around on Planet PDF and discovered several friends in the contents pages, but haven't run across myself.

Maybe it'll turn up. At least the story's preserved in Scars.