The Shortest Way to Hades

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This page is an exception to the rule that my friends J.T. and J.B. never appear on the same side of anything. Those that follow are dedicated to them jointly, in gratitude for their kindness and encouragement and innumerable drinks in the Corkscrew.

Cost candor what it may, I will not deceive my readers. By some whim of the publishers, and despite my own protests, the ensuing narrative is to be offered to the public in the guise of a work of fiction. Well, I will have no part in so gross an imposture: what follows is not some ingenious invention, but a plain, unembellished account of actual events, of interest, I fear, only to the more scholarly. Some of my readers, perhaps many, having expected to find in these pages diversion rather than instruction, will now hasten back to their booksellers to demand indignantly, it may be with threats of legal action, reimbursement of the sum so ill-advisedly expended. So be it: such readers will give me credit, I hope, for having enabled them by my prompt confession to return the volume unread and in almost pristine condition; and I for my part (for publisher and bookseller I cannot speak) would rather forgo the modest sum which would accrue to me from a sale — very modest, meager might be a better word, one might almost say paltry — would infinitely rather forgo that sum than think it obtained by deception.

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