For Clayton Rawson

For
Clayton Rawson

Dear Clayt:
I offer you this little story because of our mutual interest in tricks and impossibilities. For the sake of verisimilitude much of the action has been made to occur in real places. It is hardly necessary to add, however, that there is no William Rufus College at Southampton University, no hospital at Backfield; and that, though Lepe Beach does very much exist - it may be reached by bus from Southampton - both Satan's Elbow and Greengrove, like the characters of the story itself, have no existence in Hampshire and could not exist anywhere outside of my own distorted fancy.
Yours as ever, John Dickson Carr
Lyminton, Hants, September 1964

Dear Clayt:
I offer you this little story because of our mutual interest in tricks and impossibilities. For the sake of verisimilitude much of the action has been made to occur in real places. It is hardly necessary to add, however, that there is no William Rufus College at Southampton University, no hospital at Blackfield; and that, though Lepe Beach does very much exist - it may be reached by bus from Southampton - both Satan's Elbow and Greengrove, like the characters of the story itself, have no existence in Hampshire and could not exist anywhere outside of my distorted fancy.
yours as ever,
John Dickson Carr
Lymington, Hants, September 1964