New World Writing 17. [antikvár]

ARNO KARLEN The Níght Season . . . and the sound of a driven leaf shall chase them; and they shall fali when none pursueth. -Leviticus 26:36 A moment of pure peace succeeded the crash. The nőise of the radiator as it crumpled against the telephone pole, the tinkle of the windows as they shattered, the nearly inaudible patter of fragments of glass spraying out from the windshield and falling on dead leaves, the shearing of metál- all these lasted no more than a moment. When they ceased, the frogs and night bugs briefly arrested their calls as though attending a further interruption of their business. It was then that the two-lane country highway, black except for the road light that stood at the top of the hill ahead, knew complete repose. But nothing further happened. The stillness remained for a moment and the frogs and Arno Karlen, twenty-three years old, has studied at the New School in New York, the Sorbonne in Paris, and Antioch College in Ohio. Four of his stories were published last year in Short Story 2.