RICHARD S. WHEELER – The Witness.

Signet, paperback original; 1st printing, July 2000.

RICHARD WHEELER The Witness

   If you’re as old as I am, you might remember radio programs such as Suspense, Inner Sanctum or The Whistler, all of which opened with an all-seeing, all-knowing narrator — The Man in Black, Raymond, or the never named Whistler. These fine gentlemen were never part of the story, or if so, it was seldom, but it was their wry comments that always spurred the listener’s interest onward.

   In The Witness, it’s western postmaster Horatio Bates, the Observer, who tells this story and makes a small but still significant role in it — the first of others to come, perhaps. Who knows more what goes on in small towns such as Paradise, Colorado, circa 1890, than the man through whose offices all the mail flows?

   Bank accountants are also privy to many secrets, and Daniel Knott is no exception. Amos Burch, the banker, founder of the town and its primary benefactor, is the man who Knott sees late at night, in his office, with a woman, not his wife.

   Knott is promoted, no quid pro quo stated, but it’s certainly understood. But when Amos Burch’s wife seeks a divorce, she needs a witness. And an honest man.

   Burch, being a desperate man, turns to desperate measures. What follows is a small but powerful morality tale, the issues being honor, honesty and justice — and not all of them seem to be compatible with each other.

   It’s also an old-fashioned sort of tale, flawed only by one character’s reaction to an ensuing development, one quite opposite to what I had expected. But given a tiny measure of suspended disbelief, here’s a book that can be read (if not devoured) in an evening’s time.

— September 2000 (slightly revised)



[UPDATE] 07-15-08. I’m not sure whether a book called Restitution (Signet, 2001) is the next book in the series or not, but it has the same cover design and mentions The Witness on the front cover. Whether there were others, I do not know.

RICHARD WHEELER Restitution