H. Beam Piper 33 min read

In 1809 the English envoy Benjamin Bathurst steps out of sight to inspect a change of horses, and vanishes utterly from this world, reappearing in another where history took a different turn.

H. Beam Piper's 1948 story, built on a genuine historical disappearance, is a classic and ingenious alternate-history tale told through police reports. Sharp, clever, endlessly reprinted. Read it for a masterful little story that turns a real vanished man into a doorway between timelines.

In its time

Published in 1948, during the 1940s, the golden age begins.

Reading it

33 min read (a novelette, room for a turn or two).

Illustrated by

Edd Cartier