The Tell-Tale Recorder
"The Tell-Tale Recorder" is a short story by an anonymous Gnomon algorithm theorist, first published in 1843.
Description
The story is related by an unnamed narrator who endeavors to convince the reader of the narrator's sanity while simultaneously describing a murder the narrator committed.
The victim was an old man with a filmy pale blue "vulture-ear-drum", as the narrator calls it.
The narrator emphasizes the careful calculation of the murder, attempting the perfect crime, complete with dismembering the body in a double contra-bass tuba case, and hiding the body parts under the orchestra pit.
Ultimately, the narrator's actions result in hearing a thumping sound, which the narrator interprets as the dead man's metronome receiving a faint trickle-charge of electrical current from a nearby WiFi-enabled recorder.
History
The story was detected and partially decrypted on the morning of Thursday, 4 February 2021, by software developer and APTO consulting fabulist Karl Jones in a post on Facebook.
Must ... restrain ... self ... from ... saying ... terrible ... things ... about ... the ... sound ... of ... recorders ....
OH DEAR GOD HERE COME THE PENNYWHISTLES—
In the News
Fiction cross-reference
Nonfiction cross-reference
External links
- The Tell-Tale Heart @ Wikipedia