The Purple Knight of the Ozarks

Table of Contents

Part One: The Quest Begins

• Prelude: A Rainy Night in Darkest Indiana
• First Interlude: From the Desk of T. Allen McQuary
• Chapter One: A Bright Young Man in a Dull Small Town
• Chapter Two: A Nearly Painless Digression on Journalism in the late 1800s
• Chapter Three: Ka-whang!
• Chapter Four: Mack's Triumph Among the Presbyterians

  The Purple Knight takes Cincinnati by storm

• Second Interlude: Notes from the Desk of a Real Scatterbrain

  Further discoveries from the archives, including McQuary's own promotional materials and newspaper accounts

• Chapter Five: Our Hero Travels to Springfield

  Go east, young man!

• Chapter Six: The Offices of the Springfield Leader

  Mack seeks answers in the city and encounters an angry editor

• Chapter Seven: At the Admiral Bimbo Inn

  Mack and M.S. Glenn get acquainted

• Chapter Eight: The Zoo Park Send Off

  Wherein Otis Bulfinch vows his revenge

• The Third Interlude: From the Desk of T. Allen McQuary

  McQuary's own account of life on the road, selling booklets and charming girls

• Chapter Nine: How Mack Made It Work

  Yes, Virginia, there is a Purple Knight

• Chapter Ten: How Glenn Made It Work

  Behind the scenes with the man running the con from Missouri

• Chapter Eleven: How Claude Made It Work

  A Note From Claude at Anthropic

• Chapter Twelve: The Road Along Big Sandy

  Girls, thieves, and other stories

• Chapter Thirteen: Our Hero Receives a Lesson in Local Lore

  The legend of the Hatfields and McCoys at a Kentucky inn

• Chapter Fourteen: The Purple Knight Tells a Whopper

  How to make bank with other folk's stories • November 14, 1897 • Pikeville, Kentucky

• The Fourth Interlude: From the Desk of T. Allen McQuary

  A meditation on mortality, memory, and the ghost of Billy Simpkins • July 28, 1948 • Galena, Missouri

• Chapter Fifteen: Otis Bulfinch Has a Dream

  One good cartoon deserves another • February 20, 1898

• Chapter Sixteen: The Purple Knight Upsets the Charleston Country Club

  Say what you mean and mean what you say • January 3, 1898 • Charleston, South Carolina

• The Fifth Interlude: From the Desk of T. Allen McQuary

  A confession from the Purple Knight • October 21, 1947

• Chapter Seventeen: What Actually Happened in Charleston, South Carolina

  Mack's triumphant entry, the Fox sisters, and the seance on King Street • January 6, 1898 • Charleston, South Carolina

• The Sixth Interlude: From the Desk of T. Allen McQuary

  An inconvenient haunting • October 31, 1947

• Chapter Eighteen: The Resurrection of Billy Simpkins

  A seance goes terribly wrong when the planchette writes on its own • January 8, 1898 • Charleston, South Carolina

• Chapter Nineteen: Mardi Gras in New Orleans

  Absinthe, Mahogany Hall, and the crowning of King Comus • February 22, 1898 • New Orleans, Louisiana

• The Seventh Interlude: From the Desk of T. Allen McQuary

  A confession: the truth about the Indrani and the stories McQuary told

• The Eighth Interlude: From the Desk of Otis Bulfinch

  Otis presents his evidence

• Chapter Twenty: Hoot and the Hog

  Night One — Mack tells Captain Trotter a tale of superstition and bad luck aboard the steamer

• Chapter Twenty-One: The Pyramid

  Night Two — Captain Trotter tells of a mysterious black pyramid that rose from the Pacific and the purple figure inside