The ironic parable often has a moral, though typically, that moral is turned on its ear. The brevity of “The Chaser” allows little room for psychological realism, plot, or character development. What the story does contain is a twist both sharp and unexpected, and simultaneous well telegraphed from the beginning in retrospect.

John Collier is updating the late 19th-century genre of the “parlor story.” Often told around a campfire or near a fireplace, such stories have uncomplicated structures and clear hooks that tweak the attentions of their audience, and which evoke a strong, discernable reaction of fear or laughter. Such stories live continuously in an oral tradition, most commonly in the form of jokes.

Either Alan Austen is an immensely gullible person, or, at least, his lack of imagination makes him vulnerable in love, commerce, and crime. He immediately believes in the working effects of a love potion sold in a nondescript shop, from a proprietor recommended from an outside source.

Alan’s self-absorption means that he cannot disentangle love from lust, and cannot conceive that overwhelming passion that never ended would cost him and his beloved their freedom.