March 18, 2005 | Friday Bicycle Blogging

I missed out on St. Paddy's day blogging, but I noticed Hit & Run's Jesse Walker pointing to Allen Barra's tribute in Salon to the great Irish writer Flann O'Brien.

I've been an O'Brien fan for years, but not enough of one to be part O'Brien.

Here's an excerpt from his brilliant dark comic whodunnit The Third Policeman (affiliate link).

"There is one puzzle,' I remarked, 'that is hurting the back of my head and causing me a lot of curiosity. It is about the bicycle. I have never heard of detective-work as good as that being done before. Not only did you find the lost bicycle but you found all the clues as well. I find it is a great strain for me to believe what I see, and I am becoming afraid occasionally to look at some things in case they would have to be believed. What is the secret of your constabulary virtuosity?'

He laughed at my earnest inquiries and shook his head with great indulgence at my simplicity.

'It was an easy thing,' he said.

'How easy?'

'Even without the clues I could have succeeded in ultimately finding the bicycle.'

'It seems a very difficult sort of easiness,' I answered. ' Did you know where the bicycle was?'

'I did.'

'How?'

'Because I put it there.'

[...]

'Did you ever discover or hear tell of the Atomic Theory?' he inquired.

'No', I answered.

[...]

'Michael Gilhaney,' said the Sergeant, 'is an example of a man that is nearly banjaxed from the principle of the Atomic Theory. Would it astonish you to hear that he is nearly half a bicycle?'

"It would surprise me unconditionally,' I said.

'Michael Gilhaney,' said the Sergeant, ' is nearly sixty years of age by plain computation and if he is itself, he has spent no less than thirty-five years riding his bicycle over the rocky rocksteads and up and down the hills and into the deep ditches when the road goes astray in the strain of winter. He is always going to a particular destination or other on his bicycle at every hour of the day or coming back from there at every other hour. If it wasn't that his bicycle was stolen every Monday he would sure to be more than half-way now.'

'Half way to where?'

'Halfway to being a bicycle himself,' said the Sergeant.

Posted by Ryan Singel at March 18, 2005 10:24 AM

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