The Godwulf Manuscript

by Robert B. Parker

We were trying to stay alive; we didn’t have time to be that goddamn unhappy.”

“Freedom of the press is a flaming sword,” I said. “Use it wisely, hold it high, guard it well.”

Guile, I thought, guile before force. I had been thinking that more frequently as I got up toward forty.

“The things people do to one another,” I answered. “That scares hell out of me.”

Marblehead is north, through the Callahan Tunnel and along Route 1A. An ocean town, yachting center, summer home, and old downtown district that reeked of tar and salt and quaint.

the drive to Marblehead is among the worst in Massachusetts. It is only barely possible to reach Marblehead from anywhere, and the drive from Boston through the Callahan Tunnel, out Route 1A through East Boston, Revere, and Lynn is narrow, cluttered, ugly, and long.