Many years ago (perhaps as many as 30), I read a short story in which a man told of how as a boy he had accompanied his father and his father’s boss, P.T. Barnum, when they went to see a purported angel which was being kept on a farm. It turned out that the “angel” was actually a man who had naturally had wings. I believe he worked at a Coast Guard lighthouse.
For a long time I have had the feeling that this story was by Stephen Vincent Benet–it seems like something he could have written and, besides, I read a lot of his work back then. I have been unable to locate the story though. Can anyone tell me who wrote this story, what it is called, and where I can find a copy?
I also have dim memories from about the same time of a story with a kind of Thorne Smith quality. It was narrated by a woman who was a witch and who possessed a formula for a flying ointment–I believe it was something which had passed down in her family for generations. Someone villainous finds out and coerces her into sharing it, but she neglects to tell him that one needs a broomstick or similar object with which to steer. After applying the ointment he shoots out of a window, never to be seen again.
I had the idea this might have been in an anthology edited by Alfred Hitchcock, but my search along those lines came up with nothing. Can anyone provide information on this story?