In the garden, he brushed away the broken glass from the place in the grass nearest the low stone plinth. While Diane watched curiously, the Master knelt and placed the sock on the grass, and held his hands over it, as if he were warming them.
She stared at the sock when he moved his hands away. It looked no different than it had before. In a moment, it began to twitch. Diane checked for a breeze, but the air was fairly still. In any case, it couldn’t have made the sock do what it did next.
As if it had been pulled by a magnet, the sock started to slide along the ground, very slowly and jerkily at first, and then with increasing speed.
“Ah, I was not expecting such a strong response,” the Master said, rising swiftly to his feet and trotting after the sock. “This is fery gut. Keep an eye on it.” It disappeared around the corner of the garden and under the bushes toward the road. They ran after it.
“I’ve heard of laundry walking by itself, but this is the first time I’ve ever seen it,” Diane admitted.
The Master, who was rather fond of Diane but did not show emotions easily, grunted a bit at her witticism. The matter was too serious to admit humor. They grey sock, moving as fast as a snake, had gained the rock, and was already yards ahead of them when they emerged from the garden. Diane, with her longer legs, paced the sock as it took a sharp right at the bottom of the road and slid across to the left side.
“Where’s it going?” she shouted back to the Master, who was huffing to catch up. The wind, now coming in off the sea, whisked away his words. “What?”
“Follow it!” the Master called. “Don’t lose it! It is taking us to Meester Doyle!”
O O O
Holl felt in much better spirits this morning. Perhaps it was just the arrival of the Master which gave him confidence, but he had an indefinable feeling that Keith Doyle was alive, well, and not too far away. Mr. Michaels had driven him inland several miles, and they had explored the narrow tracks which led off the main road. Keith was nowhere in sight, and no one they met had seen anyone answering to his description. Michaels seemed concerned for him. Holl, preoccupied with organizing his thoughts, put off his attempts at cheerful conversation.
Instinctively, Holl knew that they were going the wrong way. As soon as they had circled back through Garynahine and were once again approaching Callanish from the south, the fragmented senses he had thought too scrambled to do him any good suddenly pulled together. They were now going the right way. He could almost imagine he heard the American student’s mind somewhere ahead.
“I think we’ll find him in this direction,” Holl suggested.
“How the blazes do you know that?” Michaels demanded, slewing his gaze left at the vivid young face next to him.
“Only a feeling,” Holl answered absently. He could sense the Master’s strong personality nearby. It was on a vector to intersect with the way they were driving. Fairly soon, he and Michaels would pass by him. ‘Triangulation’ was what they called this process, and it seemed to be working. “I think he’s near the sea. I think he’d head for the water.”
They drove back into Callanish by the lower road, which took them past the public telephone booth, and the intersection that led to the farm. Before too long, he noticed a fall of blond hair deep in the field to the left.
“Stop! That’s Diane,” Holl said. Michaels pulled to the side of the road, and the Little Person jumped out. Once he stood up, he could see the Master. They were climbing over a hillock of peat. Another moment and they would have been out of sight on the other side. He pushed through the wires of the fence and ran to them.
“What news?” Holl shouted.
They looked up at the sound of his voice. Michaels had parked the car, and was climbing over the fence to join them. Quickly, Diane picked up the topographical map she was carrying, and pretended to sight it down over the edge of the sharp fall of the land to her right.
“Keith Doyle is here,” the Master announced.
Holl leaned under the lip of rock and shouted into the dark tunnel entrance he found there. “Keith Doyle! This way. Come out, Keith Doyle.”
O O O
Keith clambered up further into the fall of pebbles, and drew his legs out of the stream’s flow. With blind hands, he patted the mossy wall over his head, seeking an escape from the underground riverbed. He knelt suddenly in a trickle of water traveling across his shelf. There had to be a way back to the source, perhaps big enough for him to fit through. Hopefully, he followed the flow upstream. About five feet from where he had washed up was a large opening. The sides were rough, but it was more than adequate in size. He leaned through it, prepared to crawl onward.
“Yahoo!” He let out a shout of delight, which echoed in the cavern. On the other side of the opening he could see the golden lines of mosslight, banking the narrow cataract of water. The magic was gleaming more brightly than ever. He was never more glad to see anything in his life. It seemed the stream had not dragged him out of his way. He had probably been paralleling the airway all along.
Hands and knees straddling the cataract, he scurried along the floor of the cavern. Every muscle protested.
“Boy, after this, a marathon actually standing up would be a piece of cake!”
The passage twisted and wound upward in a more sinuous, smoother fashion and at a gentler angle than had any of the tunnels he had been in yet. Keith had a hopeful suspicion, but was trying to keep from believing in it, in case it was another disappointment. In a few more turns, there was a glimmer of light ahead of him, not the gold of mosslight, but the genuine white glow of sunlight. Excitement spurred him the rest of the way. His hands and knees slipped painfully into the stream bed once and again, but he splashed his way out and kept going.
What if the bright light was a decoy, he thought suddenly, stopping him in mid-crawl. What if the bodach had decided to keep him running around in circles for the rest of his life, which wouldn’t be long, stuck underground as he was. Confused and exhausted, he collapsed down full length on the wet stone.
Holl’s voice intruded itself into his consciousness, almost like a sound heard in a dream. “Come out, Keith Doyle.” It had to be an illusion, but he was willing to grasp at straws. With one more effort, he pushed himself forward.
He emerged into the brilliant day. The moss under his hands changed suddenly to cress and then to warm grass. The sky seemed blinding white at first, but resolved through a squint into blue. Keith drew a huge breath. He was out! Grateful and exhausted, he threw his hands out in front of him and flopped onto the grass. The wind sang Hallelujahs in his ears. In a moment he would get up, he promised himself.
Something smooth under his hand moved. He thought it was a stone, but stones usually didn’t move by themselves. Nervously, he raised his head to look. In front of him was a shoe. A woman’s casual shoe. There was a woman’s leg in it, and another one with a matching foot and leg beside it. He raised his head further. At the top of a much foreshortened body surrounded by a corona of tossing white light was a face that he knew. It was Diane. There were tears in her eyes as she stooped down to him.
Surprised, he stuttered out a greeting. “H-hi, there.” His voice sounded rusty in his own ears.
“Hello, sailor,” she returned, relieved to find him safe, but quick enough to throw him a line. “Buy a girl a drink?”
Snappy retorts having to do with money, women, and liquor swirled through him mind, but because of the creature’s mocking curse, none of them would go anywhere near his mouth. In the effort to say something, anything, in reply, Keith passed out.
Michaels joined the others in jubilation as they gathered up their lost lad, patting him on the cheeks to bring him back to consciousness. The young man’s clothes were torn and wet, and the red waves of his hair lay plastered to his head. There were streaks of moss on his clothed and skin, but he was alive. Michaels found he was as relieved as the rest to find that Danny O’Day was all right. The youth had been abducted, all right, by one of his scummy
compatriots, and then pushed out into one of these littoral caves. Can’t trust ’em even when you have to work with ’em, he thought. Good thing they’d been there waiting when the youth crawled out of his hidey-hole. Sun blinded as he was, he’d have fallen smack over the precipice only a few feet beyond the cavern mouth.
“Meester Doyle,” Mr. Alfheim said patiently, as they raised the youth to his feet, “I see I find you as I have always found you, prostrate and half in, half out of trouble.”
Michaels chuckled. “Come on,” he said. “It’s only a few hundred yards back to your B&B. I’ll give you a lift.”
The young man seemed astonished. “D’you mean after all that I’m walking distance from the garden?” he croaked.
As he helped hand the young man into the car, Michaels gave him a quick pat down. Nothing on him. In fact, his clothes had been half torn off him, leaving no way to tell if there had been a drop or not. There was no money on the lad, not a coin—literally empty-handed except for a broken stick. Time to report back to the chief. So long as O’Day had been recovered alive, he had to remove himself and go back to observation. His well-being was no longer Michael’s concern. He’d already jeopardized his cover enough.
In a daze, Keith, kept upright by Diane on one side and Holl on the other, wiped his shoes carefully on the mat.
“They’re just about hopeless,” Diane said, looking at the worn shoes. The toes were nearly worn away, and something had ripped off the metal buckles. She squeezed Keith’s arm. His hands were still half-balled-up, probably a muscular spasm of some kind, and he was clutching a piece of old stick. She was trying not to cry at the pitiful picture he made. “So are your clothes. You look half dead.”
“I feel great,” Keith insisted, smiling brilliantly at her. He made his way unsteadily into the house.
“Is that you, Keith dear?” Mrs. Mackenzie called from the sitting room.
Keith cleared his throat with difficulty. He remembered he hadn’t had anything to drink in hours. “Yes, ma’am.”
The door to the front room swung open. Instead of the patient face of Mrs. Mackenzie, Keith was confronted with the furious countenance of Miss Anderson. Professor Parker appeared under her arm, and studied Keith with sympathetic eyes. Keith goggled at them.
“Where have you been?” the teacher demanded. “I have had the Educatours office calling every few hours wondering if you had been found! When you hadn’t reported to the site for two days or been seen by any of the others, I came here. Mrs. Mackenzie told me that young Holl had been beside himself because you took it into your head to go wandering in the moonlight two days ago. Your irresponsibility has caused a great deal of inconvenience and worry for a lot of people. I’ve been concerned for you, too, but the contract you signed specified that you would behave with care because Educatours is responsible for your welfare while you are part of one of our groups!”
Keith tried to explain where he had been, with an occasional astounded glance back at the Elf Master, who was standing in the doorway, out of the line of fire. He still couldn’t believe the little teacher was there with him. Miss Anderson let him get out half a sentence, and then started her lecture off anew. Educatours couldn’t be responsible for such inconsideration. If he had been seriously hurt or killed, the company was liable for damages to Keith’s family.
He waited for her to run down, and tried to apologize when she paused for breath. “I got lost, Miss Anderson. I’m sorry. I don’t know this area at all.” He started to put down the bit of old stick in his hand. Holl reached out to take it from him, but Professor Parker beat him to it with a swift grab that surprised both of them.
“Miss Anderson!” the archaeologist yelped. “Look here!” With careful fingers, he brushed away the traces of mud caking the flat stick. A pattern of lines began to emerge. “Forgive me making a mess of your rug, Mrs. Mackenzie,” Parker said without looking up. “What a wonder! It’s a comb! Horn, with sawn bone teeth inset. Dear, dear, dear, look at it! This is a very important find. It’s contemporary to the Cairns, I’m certain of it, and in such fine shape. Yes, look at those markings. How fortunate it isn’t broken.”
Miss Anderson stopped her tirade, and looked down curiously at the object the professor was holding. “Keith, where did you find this?”
“In a … a streambed,” Keith said carefully, not wanting to explain how his adventure actually began. “I guess I forgot I was holding it.”
“He found the underground tunnel system on the shores west of here,” Holl explained, pointing out the location on his map for the two Big People. “He must have become turned around down there after he found it.”
“That was very dangerous,” Miss Anderson said sternly. She had been somewhat appeased by the find of the comb, but was still concerned for her company. “Even if you are an expert spelunker, you could have died down there.”
“I was fine, until one of the tunnels flooded behind me,” Keith said truthfully, hoping he appeared to be more of a hero than he looked. His stained and torn clothes looked even more pitiful in daylight than he had feared. His jaw was aching in the cool air, and his eyes were going nuts trying to keep out the blinding light of midday.
“Off you go to bed, then,” Miss Anderson ordered. “I will tell everyone that you are back. Everyone has missed you greatly. I hope we can expect you back on the site in a day or so? Going into caverns without a helmet, hmp!”
She exited magnificently. Parker followed her out, chuckling and cooing over the comb, now cradled protectively in a handkerchief.
Stripping off his sodden, torn clothes, Keith staggered through a hot shower and collapsed into his bed. The softness of the mattress and pillow came up to meet his shoulders and head. He scrunched his fingers into the clean sheets, and grinned with pure pleasure.
“No moss,” he said happily.
Holl sat on the edge of the other bed and watched his Big friend’s face. “Mrs. Mackenzie has bought the story that you went treasure hunting for the dig and lost yourself, my lad, and she’s making you tea and a hot meal. Now, what really happened to you?”
With the help of a pad of paper and a pencil, and a lot of humorous sallies at his expense by Holl, Keith managed to explain his problems while avoiding any references to the three conditions of the curse. He discovered he couldn’t actually mention the curse either, but Holl guessed the problem from the context.
“You’ve come to no real harm,” Holl announced at last, very amused. “What a thing for a lad like you to be unable to speak of three of the pleasures in life. But a typical Gaelic curse. Those … bodach have a sense of humor.”
“I don’t think that could have been a bodach. They’re supposed to be beneficent, and this one sure wasn’t,” Keith said emphatically. “Ooch.” He clutched his jaw.
“‘Bodach’ means not only ‘old man,’ but ‘spectre’ or ‘bugbear,’ if you’d read up on the Gaelic, Keith Doyle. In any case, it was something that you Big Folk can’t classify with ease. And why do you expect beneficence, surprising a millennia-old hermit entity with a flash camera in the middle of the night?” Holl was enormously relieved, but not above taking a little of his anxiety out on Keith to teach him a lesson. “He’s probably never been so taken aback in his long life. By the way, you owe me a few pounds sterling, too. Your pictures came out. I’ve got them right here.” He showed the two frames to the red-haired youth, whose eyes widened with excitement. They showed Keith’s quarry turned captor, standing up from a crouch, and then coming toward the camera with it’s skinny arms outstretched. Both were perfectly in focus. Keith was jubilant.
“Thanks, Holl! Those pictures are worth a mi—a mi—” Keith stammered. The word ‘million’ was stuck in the top of his mouth like peanut butter, and his tongue couldn’t dislodge it.
Holl grinned. “Yer welcome, widdy.” He got up to go.
“And Holl? It’s nice to see you back in one piece again.” Keith tugged the lobe of his own ear significantly and smiled. Holl retu
rned his smile, and closed the door behind him.
***
CHAPTER TWENTY
Diane and the Master looked up as Holl joined them in the sitting room. The fire was turned on, warming the room pleasantly. Holl spread out his chilled hands before it’s glow. Two of the cats got up to salute the knees of his trousers with their cheeks.
“He’s tucked in and resting,” Holl announced. “He won’t need anything but a quick trip to the dentist. All his fillings are gone, but there’s nothing wrong with him that a meal and a sleep can’t fix.” He explained the details of the bodach’s curse.
“So,” said the Master. “Ve must now study how best to dispose of the curse. I observe that it comprises the classic forms of three prohibitions.…”
“Wait!” Diane interrupted him, outraged. “How can you sit and analyze it so coldly when it’s Keith’s welfare we’re talking about?”
The Master eyed her over the tops of his spectacles. “Analysis vill help us to determine the structure, and perhaps suggest the means of ridding him of it. It appears to be no more than a geas, a prohibitive statement, vhich exacts a penalty for violations. In any case, this vun is not harmful. Fery Gilbertian, this bodach. The punishment seems to haf done no more than fit the crime.”
“Thank God,” Diane sighed, and then sat straight up. “Say, Holl, I never thought of him until now; where’s your friend Mr. Michaels? He didn’t come in with us.”
Holl looked surprised. “You’re right!” He ran to the window, and glanced up and down the road for the car. “He just went off. I never had a chance to give him my thanks for his help.”
“Where did he come from?” Diane pressed. Holl frowned thoughtfully at her.
“I … I don’t know. He came up to help me when I needed transportation. I never questioned where he came from. Should I have?”
“No, he seems to have been a nice man,” Diane said, hoping she wouldn’t have to eat her words later. “He seemed to know a lot about looking for missing persons.” It all seemed a little too convenient. Diane couldn’t get over wondering how Michaels had known what Keith looked like, without ever having met him. Was Keith in some kind of trouble? She wondered if Michaels wasn’t some sort of official, but she kept her misgivings from the Little Folk.
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