story-to-pack: add the corpora and the catalogue v2/v3
Fourteen corpora split and classified: aesop, bierce, chekhov, holmes, keefe, lawson, lorimer, maupassant, nobody, plaintales, poe, torchy, wallingford and winesburg, each with its splitter and the hand-written groups and pages; catalogue v2 and v3; and the shared splitters gutenberg_chunks.py, se_split.py and se_build.py. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com> Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_019rwKTmug58sEsJ72AuWsEi
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# Notes: Torchy stories 19-35, *On With Torchy* (1914) (chunks 246-480, 235 records)
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I wrote every record by reading each scene in full. No inference was used and no grouping was done.
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Below are the recurring situations I noticed, as input for the grouping pass. The chunk ids are
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examples, not complete lists.
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## Recurring situations
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1. **A guardian bars the young man from the girl, and he schemes to get near her anyway.** He
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uses ruses and aliases (249-251, 255), a menial disguise (404-406, 409-413) and a friendly
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house where he can meet her (472-478). The guardian always wins the last round: she walks
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in on them (258), unmasks him (423-424) or arrives to take the girl away (478).
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2. **The guardian prefers a richer rival, and he is rejected for being poor and "nobody".** The
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favoured rivals appear at 251 and 421, the rich rival at the girl's side at 406 and 415-416,
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and "he's poor ... isn't anybody" at 476. He feels far below her world at 397, 407 and 479.
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The girl secretly stays loyal: the hidden keepsake (257), the hidden photo (475) and a secret
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channel for letters after the guardian intercepted them (473, 478).
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3. **The boss's relative hands his personal or social chores to the junior.** He is sent to
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entertain a supplier (276-277), stand in at an art sale (327), escort a guest (341), wait late
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for a message during a billiards match (382) and investigate a family marriage (430-431). These
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are often dodges, and the junior sees through them (326-327, 341, 353).
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4. **Sent as the boss's representative, far above his rank.** He is a negotiator told to announce
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that he is the office boy (444-447). He is also an art "expert" coached in stock phrases
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(328, 331), an investigator (456-457), a host (277-278) and a spy (431, 438). He usually
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succeeds by common sense or luck rather than by the brief he was given.
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5. **Handling the boss's temper and moods.** The boss sends a rash insult that nobody dares stop
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(314-315). The junior is sent in *because* he cheers the boss up (316-318), and his cheeky
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remark becomes the boss's own line (323). The junior also has to fit unwanted callers into the
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boss's day (301).
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6. **The junior at the door misjudges visitors by their looks, and the reversal that follows.**
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He sneers at a humble foreigner who turns out to be a war hero (354-355, 364-366). He plans a
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cold welcome for wards whom the boss adores (302-306) and brushes off a ragged "old friend"
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(383-386). The mirror image is 440-441, where he correctly spots an important visitor.
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7. **The junior beats a pompous supervisor or expert.** The supervisor's fraudulent investigator
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is shown up by common sense (263-272). The same supervisor is snobbish about waiters and gets
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his comeuppance (357, 363, 366). The junior shoos him out on the boss's behalf (322).
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8. **The boss's family's private troubles land on the junior.** These include the wards' car
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accident (310-313), the rich widow cousin's romance (454-469), the goddaughter's troubled
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marriage (429-439), the son-in-law's quarrel over a tie with his wife (470-471, 480) and a
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disgraced former friend of the boss's relative who begs and then blackmails (386-396). The
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junior is often kept on as a witness (388-389).
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9. **Befriending or coaching a colleague on the same low rung.** He is paid to befriend a
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snobbish rich newcomer and report on him (290-300). He is invited home by a timid clerk stuck
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in a dead end (367-381). Both times the junior's advice or push transforms the colleague
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(296-299, 380-381), and in 300 the change is undone by the paying parent.
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10. **Snobbery towards humble people is exposed.** A rich newcomer sneers at lunch counters and
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boarders, then befriends them (293-294, 298-299). The supervisor sneers at waiters (357, 366).
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A stranger's humble kindness turns out to be the real key: the window cleaner (269-272) and
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chocolates for a farmer's child (448, 451-452).
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11. **A loose tongue or an honest report changes everything, for better or worse.** Idle chatter
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exposes a secret studio (333-334), and an honest report ends a paid arrangement (299-300).
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A culprit's confession wins favour (312-313), and owning up to spying wins an ally (438). An
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honest dependent defies his benefactor and wins him over (335-337).
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12. **Small sabotage or trickery to buy time with the girl.** He stays behind while his rivals
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fetch gifts (255). He secretly disables the rival's engine, then "fixes" it and is praised as
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indispensable (419-422).
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13. **A benefactor or guardian controls a dependent young adult.** An invalid uncle forbids his
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niece's husband to paint (334-337). An aunt keeps her nephew at dull work and matchmakes for
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him (370-375). A father banishes his son to a clerk's stool (295), then removes him (300).
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Elders matchmake (372, 428).
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14. **A dispute is settled by play or a personal gesture, not by argument.** Indoor golf settles
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a boardroom feud (321-325). A box of chocolates wins a right of way (451-452). A tournament of
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suitors is sidestepped by simply staying behind (254-256).
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## Torchy's standing per story
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He is the office boy ("office-boy-de-luxe") throughout this volume, with no promotion. His
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standing below is how much trust and reach he has in each story, not his title.
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| Story | Title | Standing | Why |
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| --- | --- | --- | --- |
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| 19 | Chancing It For Vee | low | banned suitor, disguised as "Claude", ejected by the aunt |
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| 20 | Pulling A Sleuth Stunt | low | door boy under suspicion; solves the mystery and gets no reward himself |
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| 21 | When Ira Showed Some Pep | middle | trusted stand-in host with an expense account for the boss's relative |
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| 22 | Torchy Bugs The System | low | peer of a junior clerk, paid five dollars a report |
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| 23 | Breezing By With Peggy | low | fits callers into the boss's day, runs errands, phones for help |
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| 24 | Gloom Shunting For The Boss | middle | sent to the sick boss because he can manage his mood; his idea settles a feud |
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| 25 | Torchy In On The Draw | middle | "commissioner" with full power to buy for the boss's relative |
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| 26 | Gladys In A Double Bill | low | escort errand; the girl calls him one of the boss's "young men" |
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| 27 | Late Returns On Popover | low | sneering doorkeeper; eavesdrops and is sent out |
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| 28 | Merry Dodges A Dead Heat | low | weekend guest of a low clerk; the peer story |
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| 29 | The Passing By Of Bunny | middle | trusted with money and kept as a witness in a private affair |
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| 30 | The Glad Hail For Torchy | low | outside looking in at a rich resort; hides in a lobster boat |
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| 31 | Aunty Flags A Rosy One | low | disguised as the rival's boat hand; unmasked by the aunt |
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| 32 | Cutting In On The Bliss | middle | sent alone to judge a family marriage, and advises the husband |
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| 33 | Being Sicced On Percey | middle | the boss's named representative in a railway negotiation; his report shapes strategy (the highest stakes in the volume) |
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| 34 | How Whity Gunked The Plot | middle | independent investigator with expense money for the boss |
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| 35 | Torchy Gets A Through Wire | low | pestered by children, rejected by the aunt as "not anybody"; he says he will speak to Vee only when he is "in business for myself" |
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## Notes for the grouping pass
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- **Stories 30 and 31 are one two-part story.** The postcard, the lobster boat and the hired boat
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hand in 30 lead straight into the picnic, the fog and the unmasking in 31.
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- **There are two different Marjories.** In 23, Marjorie (Peggy) Chandler is the boss's young
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ward. In 25, 26 and 35, Marjorie is Mr. Robert's married sister, wife of Ferdy. The nieces
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"Peggy and Jane" in 35 are yet another Peggy.
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- **Nearly every story has two strands**, an office errand and the Vee courtship. Only 19, 30, 31
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and 35 are mainly about Vee, and 26 touches it at the end. In the office stories, the
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predicament follows whichever strand carries the scene.
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- **Many predicaments share a frame.** "Someone junior" is sent, trusted or overlooked by "the
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boss" or "the boss's relative". The grouping should split them by what the junior faces (a
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snob, a pompous expert, a family scandal, a stubborn outsider), not by the frame they share.
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