title: The Muttering Retreats
author: Jerome Arthur
description: Jerome Arthur grew up in Los Angeles, California. He lived on the beach in Belmont Shore, a neighborhood in Long Beach, California, for nine years in the 1960s. He and his wife Janet moved to Santa Cruz, California in 1969. These three cities are the settings for his ten novels.
zlib_text:  
  
   
  1 
    
    
  Cenotaph 
  Road 
  Cenotaph Road - 01 
  Robert E. Vardeman 
  
   
  2 
    
  CHAPTER ONE 
    
  Silence fell over the crowd in the Dancing Serpent as the six grey-clad soldiers 
  marched into the room. Their boot heels hit the wooden planking with an ominous 
  rhythm, a rhythm that spoke of doom and destruction and misery. The six arrogantly 
  studied those in the smoky barroom, saying nothing. The tension rose until a man 
  taller than the six strode into the room, his broad shoulders brushing the doorjambs as 
  he entered. 
  “Drinks for all!” the man called out in a loud, booming voice. The bartender 
  sighed and began putting the heavy glass bottles of potent liquor onto the bar. The 
  others in the room relaxed, and soon nervous laughter echoed through the once-noisy 
  establishment. The grey soldiers were not here to kill. Not this time. 
  In the corner of the room at a small table, a low conversation went on, neither 
  participant taking much notice of the intrusion by the soldiers. Dar-elLa