My Cardboard Balcony

I Wrote A Tragedy by Belinda Roddie I wrote a tragedy about a man who killed his wife and then proceeded to marry his stepdaughter, who secretly wanted to run away with a duchess betrothed to a slimeball with lots of cash that had been hoisted from rogue pirates, who now were approaching the quaint, quiet town that served as the typical setting. I could have let the simple lovers join the pirate crew and sail off on their boat. I could have made the sleazy duke poison the wife murderer, and then he would keel over, very dead. That would have been a happier ending. But, no. Not today.

"He's rather easygoing, isn't he?" the professor asked about the dean as the latter leaned his shoulder against the wall, sipping from his glass of cider through one side of his mouth and smiling with the other. "Oh, yes," replied the registrar. "He's just come from another university. Known as 'Mister Chill' by the students. They miss him dearly, but their loss is our gain."