Six Seconds of Darkness
By Octavus Roy Cohen
O’Brien’s eyes followed the man with interest as he walked across the room toward the little door that opened into his private office. Barrett Rollins radiated strength and physical ability in every well-knit line of his stocky figure. His unusual breadth and depth of chest conveyed an impression of lack of height to which a tape measure quickly gave the lie. Nor was his face that of the average plain-clothes man; the eyes were a bit too close-set, perhaps, but they were level eyes—eyes blessed with the rare faculty of penetration. The brain behind those eyes was alert and ruthless.
He had worked himself to his present position as chief of the plain-clothes force by sheer ability. A little political pull may have helped here and there, but that assistance had been inconsiderable. He was an efficient man, the greatest testimony to which was the unanimous praise of his worst enemies—who, by the way, numbered legion. He was a martinet—unbending, inexorable, heartless. His third degree was a classic.
Larry O’Brien chuckled softly as he chewed the stub of a dilapidated cigar.
“And to think of him? he remarked, “bein’ squeezed between the thumb and forefinger of a little, undersized runt of a reformer like Edward Hamilton. Hamilton’s said he’s ready to turn things loose an’ tear them up, and he never makes a statement unless….”
The telephone on his desk jangled sharply. Farris groaned audibly as he lifted himself from the depths of his swivel chair, and the sergeant motioned him back to rest.
“I’ll be after answerin’ it myself,” he said, lifting the receiver: “Police headquarters.”
From the other end of the wire came the curt, incisive tones of Police Commissioner Clement Hall, the real czar of the department under the city’s new form of government.
“Sergeant O’Brien?”
“Yis, sor. Misther Hall, isn’t it?”
Genre: Thriller | Mystery/Detective
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Octavus Roy Cohen
Octavus Roy Cohen (1891–1959) was an early 20th-century American writer specializing in ethnic comedies. His dialect comedy stories about African Americans gained popularity after being published in the Saturday Evening Post. They were adapted into a series of short films by Al Christie featuring actors Charles Olden, Spencer Williams Jr., Evelyn Preer, and Edward Thompson.
Biography
Cohen was born on June 26, 1891, in Charleston, South Carolina, to Octavus and Rebecca Cohen (née Ottolengui). He pronounced his first name oc-tav’us, as in have. Through his mother, he was the cousin of Rodrigues Ottolengui, who also wrote crime fiction. He received his secondary education at the Porter Military Academy, now the Porter-Gaud School, and graduated in 1908. He went on to Clemson College (later renamed Clemson University) and graduated in 1911 with a degree in engineering.
Career
Between 1910 and 1912, he worked in the editorial departments of the Birmingham Ledger, the Charleston News and Courier, the Bayonne Times, and the Newark Morning Star.
He became famous for his stories about African-Americans in The Saturday Evening Post. In 1913, he was admitted to the South Carolina Bar and practised law in Charleston for two years. Between 1917 and his death, he published 56 books, including humorous and detective novels, plays, and collections of short stories. He also composed successful Broadway plays and radio, film, and television scripts.
As a mark of his success, on March 20, 1923, Cohen bought the “Redin-Cohen” house, a Tudor Revival-style home in Birmingham, Alabama. While in Birmingham, he was known to host local writers and journalists to discuss fiction writing. In the late 1930s, he moved from Birmingham to Harlem, New York, and then to Los Angeles to pursue a film career.
Personal life and death
He married Inez Lopez in October 1914 in Bessemer, Alabama. They had one son, Octavus Roy Cohen, Jr. His wife died in 1953. He died of a stroke on January 6, 1959, in Los Angeles and is buried at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California.
Works
His most notable creation was “Florian Slappey”, a fictional black detective who appeared in print (in the Saturday Evening Post) and a series of short films in the 1920s. These were “ethnic comedies” following the bumbling investigations of Slappey and his travels from Birmingham, Alabama, to Harlem, New York. They were later assembled into a stage play, “Come Seven”, with Slappey played by Earle Foxe for 72 performances. A second detective stage play, “The Crimson Alibi”, featured a white detective, David Carroll.
Octavus Roy Cohen
