I wasn't born yesterday.
The third letter? It is addressed direct to me in prison here.
And--it's a curious letter, indeed. Let it here be seen whole:
Dear Howard:
The discipline of a lifetime now collapses like the fabled walls of Jericho. Who is Joshua, and what is the tune his trumpets play? I wish I knew. The music that has worked such havoc against such old walls is not loud. It is faint, diffuse, and peculiar.
Could it be the music of my conscience: That I doubt. I have done no wrong to you.
I think the music must be an old soldier's itch for just a little treason. And treason this letter is.
I here violate direct and explicit orders that were given to me, were given to me in the best interests of the United States of America. I here give you my true name, and I identify myself as the man you knew as "Frank Wirtanen."
My name is Harold J. Sparrow.
My rank at time of retirement from the United States Army was Colonel.
My serial number is 0-61134.
I exist. I can be seen, heard, and touched almost any day, in or around the only dwelling on Coggin's Pond, six miles due west of Hinkleyville, Maine.
I affirm, and will affirm under oath, that I recruited you as an American agent, and that you, at personal sacrifices that prove total, became one of the most effective agents of the Second World War.
If there must be a trial of Howard W. Campbell, Jr., by the forces of self-righteous nationalism, let it be one hell of a contest!
Yours truly,
"Frank"
So I am about to be a free man again, to wander where I please.
I find the prospect nauseating.
I think that tonight is the night I will hang Howard W. Campbell, Jr., for crimes against himself.
I know that tonight is the night.
They say that a hanging man hears gorgeous music. Too bad that I, like my father, unlike my musical mother, am tone-deaf. All the same, I hope that the tune I am about to hear is not Bing Crosby's "White Christmas."
Goodbye, cruel world!
Auf wiedersehen?
Mother Night is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously.
Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright (c) 1961, 1966 by Kurt Vonnegut
Copyright renewed 1989, 1994 by Kurt Vonnegut
Cover illustration by Kurt Vonnegut. Copyright (c) 2000
Kurt Vonnegut/Origami Express, LLC. www.vonnegut.com
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Dial Press Trade Paperbacks, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
DIAL PRESS and DIAL PRESS TRADE PAPERBACKS are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc., and the colophon is a trademark of Random House, Inc.
Originally published in hardcover in the United States by DelacortePress/Seymour Lawrence, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., in 1966.
eISBN: 978-0-44033907-6
www.dialpress.com
The Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. Trust came into existence after the death of Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., and is committed to the continued protection of his works.
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Kurt Vonnegut, Mother Night
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