The Machinery of Night

Could It Be the Magic?

The Houston Chronicle reports today (Aug 3, 2002 p 41A --- sorry, no link, and no Google results) that a man named George Viswanat Rupan died in a fire at the boarding house where he'd lived for 20 years. He'd turned his room into a "small fuel depot", and was found with a loaded 9mm handgun and two extra clips of ammo.

Some of his neighbors had seen skinhead literature in his room, "including a picture of a swastika over which was scrawled, 'Implants to rule the world'." He was sometimes seen in his back yard, surrounded by candles and wearing a long black robe and a feathered headdress.

But this is not the scary part.

The scary part is that every Friday night he would crank his stereo way up...and play Barry Manilow.

What horrors would be summoned from the unplumbed depths of Hell by Manilow songs? Would it be a beautiful but foul she-demon who can kiss you and stop you from shaking? How about a writhing Gorgon with faded feathers in her hair and her dress cut down to there? Or did Rupan intend that 9mm bullet for the banshee Music, who wrote those songs?

We'll never know. And perhaps that's for the best.