A twentieth century author names Mickey Spillane was best know for his mystery novels about private eye Mike Hammer. Mickey was a WWII Air Force veteran. He flew fighter planes, and was an instructor during the war. Before the war he worked with a couple other young men writing comic books. After the war ended he did the same.
Until 1947 when he decided he needed a thousand dollars to build a house. He wrote the novel “I, The Jury” and sold the handwritten manuscript for a thousand dollars. The book eventually became a best seller.
Mickey was a great salesman. He promoted his writing and himself whenever possible. As part of this image, he always wore black and white. A black shirt with white pants, or the opposite, and a white tie with the black shirt, and again the opposite. By the time he died at the age of 87, everyone who knew him would wear black and white to any occasion involving him.
He lived in Murrells Inlet, South Carolina in a house he designed that sat on the edge of the inlet marsh. His first house in town was destroyed by hurricane Hugo in 1989. Therefore the new house was built to withstand such storms.
Mickey was a cat lover. He feed every stray that found its way to his home.
Not long before he died, Mickey informed his wife that if he could find a way to return after he passed, he would and do it in a way that she’d know it was him. Several weeks after his death, a black and white cat appeared on the house’s marsh side porch. This was a cat that no one had seen before that day.
Since the door was always open to allow the many cat’s Mickey and his wife cared for to come and go as the cat’s wanted, the black and white, without hesitation walked into the house, climbed the stairs to the floor where Mickey had an office. Once there the cat took a pair of Mickey’s reading glasses in is teeth and carried them down to where Mickey’s wife sat on the porch. The cat then presented the reading glasses to her.
This is a true story.