From: StoneOx17@aol.com
Date: Sat, 19 Oct 2002 13:37:04 EDT
Subject: Re:   (urth) PEACE: Smart's relatives 

Roy C. Lackey writes:

> More than once in the course of the Tilly tale, Smart remarks upon how  
> handsomely Tilly had paid him. He's a liar. He knew Tilly less than a week,
> and I doubt that he was paid by the day, because he mentions a 
> "salary" (151). I doubt that Smart ever collected a nickel from him.

I agree he's a liar, but I think that's not all he's lying about.  I think 
Smart lived with Tilly for at least six months.  Correct me if I'm wrong 
about either Gulf coast weather or seasonal fruit, but in the Tilly tale, 
oranges are locally in season (and thus it's winter) and it's 90 degrees 
after midnight (and thus it's summer).  Wolfe certainly knows about 
orange season (recall oranges in Den's Christmas stocking) and also 
about Gulf coast weather (Wolfe went to college in Texas).  I don't 
think this is an oversight ... I think it's a deliberate clue, as was 
Hannah's supposed trip to Boston in the diary written by Gold.  Tilly 
died at least six months after Smart arrived, this makes Smart the 
chief suspect in Tilly's poisoning.

Of course, Smart is likely lying about the handsome salary as well, 
to explain where all the money he got from taking over Mr. Tilly's 
carney medicine business came from.  After all, even if he kept the 
books in the pharmacy's regular business honestly, I don't see why
he would have kept records of having prescribed illegal medicines.  

- Stone Ox 

--