Nancy Gates

            On Sunday morning I memorized the seventh verse of “Les frères” by Boris Vian. There are eight verses to go. 

            I published “Tears of Saké”, my translation of “Made in China” by Serge Gainsbourg on my Christian’s Translations blog. Tomorrow I’ll post the lyrics on Facebook and then I’ll start learning his song “Ghetto Blaster”. 

            I played my Kramer electric guitar during song practice for the final session of four. 

            I weighed 86.1 kilos before breakfast. 

            I worked on researching pagan references from the novel Pearl: 

            Marianne’s mother salutes magpies. A single magpie has been regarded as a portent of doom since time immemorial—possibly stemming from the suggestion that the magpie was the only bird not to sing to Jesus as he died on the cross, which gave it a reputation for meanness. To avoid bad luck after meeting a magpie, people keep the bird happy by saluting or waving to show respect. Some also believe that greeting the bird with the words: ‘Good morning, Mr. Magpie, how are Mrs. Magpie and all the other little magpies?’ further pushes away bad luck. The number of magpies one sees at once are significant: One for sorrow / Two for joy / Three for a girl / Four for a boy / Five for silver / Six for gold / Seven for a secret never to be told. 

            I weighed 86.2 kilos before lunch. 

            In the afternoon I took a bike ride downtown and back. 

            I weighed 85.9 kilos at 17:30, which is the heaviest I’ve been in the evening since March 7. 

            I was caught up on my journal at 18:50. 

            I continued to research the novel Pearl. 

            Marianne’s mother references Ella Wheeler Wilcox (November 5, 1850 – October 30, 1919). Her works include the collection Poems of Passion and the poem "Solitude", which contains the lines "Laugh, and the world laughs with you; weep, and you weep alone." In 1884, she married Robert Wilcox. Not long after their marriage, they both became interested in Theosophy, New Thought, and Spiritualism. Early in their married life they promised each other that whoever died first would return and communicate with the other. He died in 1916 and she was overcome with grief, which became more intense as week after week went without any message from him. It was at this time that she went to see Max Heindel, the leader of the Rosicrucians in California. He explained the effect of intense grief and assured her that she would come in touch with the spirit of her husband when she learned to control her sorrow. He said her husband's spirit was waiting to show itself to her when the turbulence of sorrow would be quieted. 

            Marianne’s mother also talked of abductions of humans by faeries. Fairies would also take adult humans, especially the newly married and new mothers; young adults were taken to marry fairies instead, while new mothers were often taken to nurse fairy babies. Often when an adult was taken instead of a child, an object such as a log was left in place of the stolen human, enchanted to look like the person. This object in place of the human would seem to sicken and die, to be buried by the human family, while the living human was among the fairies. The human mother would be taken back to the fairy world to breastfeed the fairy babies. However, in some stories, changelings who do not forget return to their fairy family, possibly leaving the human family without warning. The Queen of Elfland's Nourice, depicts the abduction of a new mother, drawing on the folklore of the changelings. Although incomplete, it contains the mother's grief and the Queen of Elfland's promise to return her to her child if she would nurse the queen's child until it can walk. 

            I made pizza on naan with pumpkin seed butter, Basilica sauce, bacon, and five-year-old cheddar. The pumpkin seed butter didn’t fit with the other ingredients. I had the pizza with a beer while watching episode 12 of Amos Burke: Secret Agent. 

            In an MX3 office in Washington run by Mr. Moody, the elderly Moody seems to have had a heart attack. Three members of the fire department arrive but it turns out they are imposters. They blow open the safe to take a file containing the profiles of every MX3 agent. The thieves demanded $7 million in diamonds for the return of the roster, which MX3 paid, but they would have photographed the files. Burke says if they were foreign agents they would have taken the files behind the Iron Curtain right away, so this must have been the work of traitors. The Head Man at MX3 tells Burke they’ve created a cousin in Georgetown named Mrs. Sylvia Kellogg to provide a place for Burke to stay. Burke goes to the scene of the crime to talk with Moody. He shows him the film footage of the robbery. One of the thieves bumps his knee and is limping afterwards. They can see from the blow ups of the faces that the men were wearing masks but made to look like ordinary people and not Halloween masks or the kinds that blur facial features. Each mask only reaches to within a few centimetres of the ears leaving a space of real skin. Moody shows Burke how the safe emits an invisible but slightly radioactive gas that stains the skin and under a special light will show as black. After lighting the fuse they carelessly left behind a book of matches from the Embassy Club. Burke is given an Embassy Club card. At the club Burke is greeted by Hank Cassidy who knows him from when he was a cop. Burke joins his table where he meets Mark Hodges and Louise Hovey. A columnist named Robert Benbow walks by and Hank invites him to join them. Disdainfully referring to Mark and Louise, Benbow says he never drinks with lobbyists. Mark is called away and Burke notices he’s limping. 

            Burke gets a lead on who might have made the masks and goes to his studio. He finds him with a knife in his back. Then Burke is stabbed by Hodges with the antler of a reindeer. Hodges goes back to his hotel and packs. Louise comes home and wonders what’s going on. Burke arrives wounded but with his gun pointed. Louise surprises him by lunging long enough for Hodges to get his gun. They take Burke to a car, Louise gets in the back, with Burke in the front passenger seat. When Hodges is opening up the driver’s door Burke kicks it and Hodges falls back under a passing truck and dies. Burke checks and sees Hodges has a radioactive spot near his ear. 

            Burke gets his wound treated by Sylvia’s physician Dr. Freestone. Then he goes with Sylvia to Arlington Cemetery where Moody left the diamonds. They meet Benbow who goes to his son’s grave every day and it’s six graves away from the diamond drop. Both Hodges and Benbow are from Indiana and both were connected to Sylvia’s late husband. 

            Burke sees Benbow at a White House press conference. While Benbow is taking notes Burke stands behind him and shines the radiation detector. There is a black spot near Benbow’s ear. Burke follows Benbow to his gym and confronts him in the locker room. Benbow fires a gun. They exchange fire. Benbow disarms Burke and is about to hit him with a club when Sylvia shoots and kills Benbow.

            Burke watches the film footage again and notices that the two taller thieves let the shorter one through the door first as they are leaving. That’s a courtesy that men tend to extend to women and not to any shorter person. Burke thinks the third thief is female and what’s more it may be Sylvia. 

            Burke goes with Sylvia to Freestone’s office and finds the diamonds in a lamp. Freestone walks in, sees Burke and runs. Burke pursues him and shoots him in the back in the parking garage. Moody and his man arrive and Burke and Syvia leave. Then Freestone gets up, unharmed. Burke takes Sylvia home and tells her he’s leaving because the case is closed. Sylvia goes to the Embassy Club to meet Hank Cassidy and sell him the MX3 files. She gets $10 million and they have a drink. Burke enters through the back door. Burke knocks over some things in the kitchen and then takes out the head waiter when he comes to check. Then he shoots Cassidy. Sylvia asks Burke to let her go. Burke tells her it’s too late because Cassidy and the waiter had no intention of letting her keep the money. She realizes the drink was poisoned and dies. 

            Sylvia was played by Nancy Gates who had her own radio program while still in high school on a local station in Dallas. She was signed to RKO when she was fifteen. Her first film role was in Hitler’s Children in 1943. She co-starred that same year in The Great Gildersleeve, then the next in Gildersleeve’s Bad Day. As an adult she co-starred in Target Hong Kong, Comanche Station, and Check Your Guns. In 1960 she left film acting to be with her family but still made guest appearances on television.