The Bone Magician

by F. E. Higgins

  ‘The answer is probably right under your nose,’ said Juno lightly and somewhat cryptically.

  Pin stopped. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘You’ll see.’

  She wants me to find out her secret, thought Pin excitedly, but when pressed Juno wouldn’t be drawn. She continued rummaging and eventually he became anxious. ‘I think you should stop,’ he said. ‘Some of these cupboards are private. Even I don’t go in them.’

  ‘OK, said Juno, ‘but look at this. It wasn’t in the cupboard; I found it behind it.’

  She held out the glittering contraption and Pin paled and took a step back.

  ‘What is it?’ asked Juno. ‘What’s wrong?’

  Pin felt his heart constrict in his ribs.

  ‘Fiends!’ he whispered. ‘It’s a Friction Stick.’

  For a second they were both silent, each realizing at the same time what this unwitting discovery might mean. ‘Oh Lord,’ said Juno quietly. ‘Do you think—’

  But before she could finish her question they both looked up at the sound of footsteps crossing the floor above.

  ‘Mr Gaufridus,’ hissed Pin. ‘It has to be. Quick. We must hide.’

  Pin grabbed at Juno’s arm, pulled her into the workshop and dragged her into the nearest coffin, coincidentally Mr Albert H. Hambley’s, managing to slide the lid into place just as the door swung open.

  Out of all the coffins in the room to use as a hiding place, Pin had certainly chosen the best. Its generous sizing meant that he and Juno fitted in quite comfortably side by side. The lid was a tight fit but Pin sent up a silent prayer of thanks that he had taken the time earlier that day to drill the holes for the name plate and the handles. Not only did they provide a stream of refreshing cold air, but also he and Juno could see out into the workshop.

  Mr Gaufridus did indeed enter the room and began to engage in some of those activities that people prefer to do when they think they are on their own. He picked his nose and then he scratched under his arm and tugged at his underwear, which had been causing him some trouble these last few days. But once he had adjusted himself to his satisfaction, he went straight into the Cella Moribundi.

  ‘Pin,’ he called, ‘are you in there?’ The door closed behind him.

  ‘I think I’m going to sneeze,’ whispered Juno. ‘It’s so dusty.’

  Pin rummaged in his pocket and found his handkerchief.

  ‘Cover your nose with this,’ he said and handed it to her in the darkness.

  ‘Can we escape?’ Juno’s voice was low and muffled.

  ‘I don’t know if we have time.’

  Pin was right for Mr Gaufridus emerged at that very moment carrying what was unmistakably the Friction Stick. Pin felt Juno’s hand tighten around his and knew that she had seen it too. Mr Gaufridus stood right in front of the coffin and, although his expression gave nothing away, Pin suspected that he was wondering why the lid was on. Juno squeezed her eyes tightly shut, anticipating the removal of the lid, but Mr Gaufridus merely shook his head and went to the workbench where he examined the stick carefully. Then he held it up and turned the handle and Pin and Juno watched in horror as sparks began to fly around the room. Whatever doubts they might have had were gone in an instant. Each was now utterly convinced that they were in the same room as the Silver Apple Killer.

  Then the unthinkable happened. Pin coughed. A small cough, hardly discernible in fact. Mr Gaufridus didn’t even hear it. Neither did he hear the second. It was the third cough, the loudest, that caused all the trouble.

  Mr Gaufridus froze on the spot and looked straight at the coffin. He approached slowly, brandishing the Friction Stick. Inside their morbid hiding place Pin and Juno were completely helpless. Mr Gaufridus came closer and closer. Pin waited until he was only a footstep away, then shoved the lid violently outwards with his foot. Mr Gaufridus fell backwards against the bench and, for the first time since he had known him, Pin thought that he looked ever so slightly surprised.

  ‘Run,’ shouted Pin, hauling Juno out by her cloak. ‘Run for your life!’

  A couple of streets away Aluph Buncombe was also in something of a hurry. He was wagging his finger and talking crossly to himself. ‘Never again,’ he said over and over. ‘Never again.’ All thoughts of visiting Coggley were gone from his mind as he turned into Squid’s Gate Alley and practically ran to the lodging house. As he let himself in he thought he hadn’t ever been so glad to step inside that door as he was at that very moment. He took the stairs in four strides and rushed into the kitchen. As one, Beag, Benedict and Mrs Hoadswood looked up.

  ‘By Jove,’ cried Aluph with relief, ‘I’m glad to see you all.’

  ‘Mr Buncombe,’ exclaimed Mrs Hoadswood, ‘are you all right?’

  ‘Perhaps he told one of his lovely ladies the truth for once,’ began Beag, who was picking at the remains of a platter of pork, but when he saw his friend’s state of disarray and the expression on his face he stopped.

  Aluph slumped dramatically across the table. ‘If only it was a lovely lady, Beag,’ he said. ‘If only! The time I’ve had, you wouldn’t believe it.’

  ‘Tell all,’ said Benedict, leaning forward from his chair by the fire. ‘We like a good story in this house.’

  ‘Well,’ said Aluph as he shrugged off his long coat and placed it carefully over the back of a chair (whatever the circumstances he never draped, always folded), ‘I received an invitation from, of all people, Deodonatus Snoad. He wanted me to read his head. I accepted, of course. I thought it might be interesting. But now I think I am lucky to have got out of there alive. The man is a lunatic.’

  ‘Hmm,’ mused Beag, ‘I had always thought him a little eccentric perhaps, but a lunatic? Perhaps he hides his true self behind the written word.’

  ‘You should just be grateful that he hides himself,’ said Aluph with feeling and a visible shudder.

  ‘What do you mean?’ asked Mrs Hoadswood, halting her stirring.

  Aluph adjusted his necktie. ‘Well, he’s an odd chap if ever I saw one. He keeps his room dark and covers himself up, but I soon found out why. The man is a monster. He belongs in the same cage as the Gluttonous Beast.’ He wiped his hand across his brow rather dramatically, leaving a shining streak across his forehead.

  ‘What’s that on your head?’ asked Benedict.

  Mrs Hoadswood came over for a closer look. ‘It’s all over your trouser leg too.’

  ‘I think it’s ink,’ said Aluph dismissively, anxious to continue with his tale of woe. ‘Such an unpleasant man.’ But before he could go on there was a terrible crashing and banging upstairs and seconds later Juno came rushing in.

  ‘Help! I need help! Pin’s being attacked by the Silver Apple Killer.’

  The kitchen emptied in seconds. Everyone ran out on to the street where, sure enough, Pin was on the ground grappling with Mr Gaufridus. Beag dived in and took his arms and Aluph managed a leg. Pin jumped to his feet and stood over his employer, who looked a little confused (or was it angry?), holding the Friction Stick an inch away from Mr Gaufridus’s nose.

  ‘Behold!’ proclaimed Pin with the sort of flourish Aluph would gladly have employed over the river. ‘The Silver Apple Killer.’

  Mr Gaufridus struggled to raise himself off the ground.

  ‘If I could just speak for a moment,’ he spluttered. ‘Perhaps I can explain.’

  Beag eyed him, a lethal potato in his hand. ‘Go on.’

  ‘I’m not the killer,’ insisted Mr Gaufridus. ‘I make the Friction Sticks.’

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Revelation

  Shortly afterwards Mr Gaufridus was seated at Mrs Hoadswood’s table enjoying her generous hospitality. He was still panting from the effort of chasing Pin and Juno all the way to Squid’s Gate Alley, not to mention the wrestling match in the snow. Pin, Beag, Juno and Aluph had all apologized, and Mr Gaufridus had been most gracious, if deadpan, in his acceptance. Benedict, who had not actually taken part in the capture, merely watchi
ng from the sidelines, was examining the Friction Stick.

  ‘That’s an old one,’ said Mr Gaufridus, setting down his ale. ‘I made it as an aid to my work. But then I thought it might have other uses, so I decided to sell them through the Chronicle. It was only this evening that I realized perhaps the two, the Friction Stick and the Silver Apple Killer, might be connected. That’s why I came back to the shop.’

  ‘How many have you sold?’ asked Aluph.

  ‘Oh, not many,’ said Mr Gaufridus. ‘Three or four perhaps, but I cannot tell you to whom.’

  ‘Why ever not?’ asked Pin in despair. ‘One of your customers must be the Silver Apple Killer.’

  ‘I know why not,’ said Aluph slowly. ‘The Friction Sticks are sold via the Chronicle. When I purchased mine I left the cash and was given a ticket. All I had to do to collect the stick was to hand over the ticket. I never gave my name.’

  ‘And if you were intending to use it for murder you wouldn’t have given your real name anyway,’ said Benedict. ‘How disappointing.’

  Mr Gaufridus stood up and brushed himself down. ‘I’m sorry I can’t be of more help.’

  ‘You look awful,’ said Pin, noticing for the first time how dishevelled he was. And what was that glistening streak across his head?

  ‘Oh, it’s been a night and a half,’ said Mrs Hoadswood. ‘Poor Mr Buncombe has had a terrible time too.’

  ‘Oh yes,’ said Aluph, ready to take up exactly where he left off previously. ‘I was with your friend Deodonatus Snoad.’

  ‘He’s no friend of mine,’ snorted Pin, still staring intently at Aluph’s forehead.

  ‘I went to read his bumps,’ continued Aluph, ‘and what an unpleasant experience that was. He had the most peculiar lump on the side of his head, enormous.’

  Beag looked at Pin and then at Aluph and then at Pin again. It was as if a light had come on in his head. ‘By the holy!’ he exclaimed.

  ‘Fiends!’ said Pin simultaneously.

  ‘Aluph, where exactly was this lump?’ asked Beag.

  ‘On his head, I told you.’ Aluph was a little irritated by these interruptions.

  ‘Right or left?’ asked Pin urgently.

  Mrs Hoadswood looked up from her pot and Benedict set down the Friction Stick.

  Aluph thought for moment. ‘On the right.’

  ‘Your right or his right?’

  ‘Both,’ said Aluph. ‘I was behind him. Why?’

  ‘My potato,’ breathed Beag triumphantly.

  Pin reached out and ran his finger across Aluph’s forehead and held it up in front of him. ‘And look—’

  ‘By Jove,’ whispered Aluph, and his face drained, ‘and by Zeus.’

  For Pin’s finger gleamed with silver.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  ‘Nature creates nothing without a purpose’

  –Aristotle

  Deodonatus Snoad pulled his cloak tight at the neck and wrapped his scarf around his face. His hat was right down over his ears. The wind had taken on an almost evil chill that cut through bare skin and froze your bones to the marrow. The snow had turned to solid ice on the pavements and the soupy sludge that normally ran slowly down the centre of the road had, like the Foedus, thickened with the cold so much that it no longer flowed.

  ‘Lord above,’ muttered Deodonatus, and his breath froze instantly on the inside of his scarf. Despite such an exhortation, it would be wrong to think that Deodonatus had any belief in a Higher Being. He had concluded long ago that life as he knew it proved without doubt that God did not exist. Human existence was merely a pot of random luck from which was ladled, with complete disinterest, a spoonful of good, bad or indifferent.

  It was Aluph Buncombe who had helped him decide in the end. He didn’t quite know what had come over him, to show himself to a fool like Buncombe. It was a long time since he had revealed himself in such a way. ‘I suppose I just wanted to know for sure,’ he thought sadly, ‘to see whether anything had changed.’

  He scurried along, a little like a rat, close to the wall and then crossed the road to the Bridge and went on to the Nimble Finger. He walked quickly across the back of the inn, stopping only to loosen his scarf before addressing Rudy Idolice who sat as usual in his chair beside the curtain.

  ‘I’m here to see the Gluttonous Beast.’

  Rudy, half asleep, didn’t look up. ‘That’ll be sixpence.’

  ‘I do not have to pay,’ said Deodonatus quietly.

  ‘Wot?’ Now Rudy was wide awake. He shuffled upright in the chair. ‘Oh, it’s you. Same difference. Everyone has to pay, no matter how often you’ve been.’

  ‘But I’m your best customer,’ said Deodonatus throatily. ‘You’ve benefited greatly from me – now it’s my turn, don’t you think, my old friend?’ He pulled aside his scarf and grabbed Rudy by the throat, drawing him up to his face. Rudy was rendered momentarily speechless, then his eyes grew wide and his befuddled brain cleared.

  ‘Bloody ‘ell,’ he said. ‘It’s Mr Hideous!’

  Deodonatus smiled crookedly and with his free hand he reached into Rudy’s waistcoat pocket and withdrew a large iron key. Then he threw Rudy roughly to the floor, where he lay quite still, and descended into the cellar.

  Deodonatus was awash with a feeling of something like contentment, as if he had come to the end of a long journey. He knew that what he was about to see was far more repulsive than he ever was (at least that was what he liked to think: Aluph’s inadvertent comparison had upset him quite badly). He could hear the snuffling of the Beast in the darkness. He went to the front of the cage and looked in. The Beast was at the back. Deodonatus began talking to him softly, and slowly the creature shuffled forward, a bone in one hand, a piece of meat in the other and a mouthful of something else. He came forward, stopping a foot or two short of the bars, and looked straight at Deodonatus, sniffing the air like a dog.

  ‘Hello, my old friend,’ said Deodonatus softly. ‘I’ve got good news. After all these weeks of coming in here to see you, to bring you some comfort, I finally know what I’ve got to do. I’m only sorry it’s taken so long. You see, I know how you feel. Haven’t I been in a cage myself? Trapped behind bars not of my own making. I’ve tried to help you, in my own way, but I made a mistake. I could have gone on forever. Those people out there, they are never going to understand. They could fall into the Foedus one and all and still they wouldn’t know why. But it doesn’t matter now. Tonight your torture is over. I am going to save you. You will be free to avenge your tormentors.’

  He took the key and placed it in the lock. The Beast’s ears pricked up at the sound and his heart quickened. He sidled right up to the front of the cage, to face this man who had tormented him with his whispering for so long. Then, choosing his moment, with lightning speed he pushed his arm through the bars and took Deodonatus’s stubby neck in his hand and squeezed it the way he squeezed flesh off a bone. When he finally let go, Deodonatus Snoad slid down the outside of the cage and lay deathly still.

  The Gluttonous Beast wasted no time. How often he had dreamed of this! Bending his wrist he deftly turned the key and opened the door. He knelt beside his motionless tormentor and took his scarf and wrapped it around his own neck. Next he yanked off the hat and put it on his own head, pulling it down until it fitted tightly and tucking his ears in. With a little more difficulty he relieved Deodonatus of his cloak and wrestled it awkwardly over his shoulders. He looked down at Deodonatus and reached out to touch his glistening silver hair. Then he looked up the stairs and stretched his lips in what could only be described as a sly grin.

  Shortly afterwards the Gluttonous Beast slipped quietly through the tavern. He paid no attention to the crowds in the bar, and they paid no attention to him. Outside on the pavement he stopped and sniffed the air. How refreshing it was. All that talk of the stinking river, he could hardly smell it at all! He turned into the alley at the side of the Nimble Finger and loped, quite gracefully it must be said, towards the river. Then, remarkably nimb
ly for a beast of his size and girth, he leaped over the wall, turning on one hand to drop lightly on to the ice. Then with barely a backward glance he slid away on his flat leathery feet towards the coast, using Deodonatus’s cane as a sort of ski-stick.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Pin’s Journal

  Something utterly dreadful has happened, a betrayal of the very worst kind. I can still hardly believe it. Juno has gone and right now I am so full of hate for her that I don’t know what I would do if she returned. But I vow to find her, even if she has left this city. For I have to know if it’s true.

  The last time I saw her was in the kitchen when she gave me my handkerchief back.

  And this is yours too,’ she said, handing me a small‘ white flower. ‘It was in your hanky.’

  I was a little embarrassed. ‘It’s one of the flowers I found on my mother’s grave,’ I explained. ‘I put them in my pocket and forgot about them.’

  I remember thinking at the time that she looked at me strangely. I thought she was going to say something else, but then Aluph started talking about Deodonatus and I turned to listen. By the time he finished his remarkable account Juno was gone.

  I went to her room, but there was no sign of her. I looked under the bed and was shocked to see that her trunk was gone too. I could think of only one reason why she would take it: she was not coming back. I sat down, utterly confused. Only an hour or two earlier, at Mr Gaufridus’s, she seemed to hint that she wanted the two of us to travel together. And now this. Perhaps she discovered I had looked in her trunk, but surely she would have talked to me first, not just taken off.

  As I sat there a movement up in the corner caught my eye. It was the brown spider and he was shaking his web as manically as ever. I had thought him merely part of my dream after I sniffed the potion. Maybe it’s Juno’s herbs, I mused. They’ve addled his brains.