Unusual Suspects: Stories of Mystery & Fantasy

by Dana Stabenow

  “Did the girrl,” a voice like a scythe on a whetstone said from the shadows, “really vanish at the same time the imps arrived?”

  Alf started at the sound of the voice. Like the other peasants, he’d sensed the stranger sitting next to the fire, but he couldn’t exactly say when the fellow had arrived. It was more like one minute the figure wasn’t there, and the next minute it was. The stranger wore a traveling cloak pulled tight around him and a slouch hat jammed down on his head so that only his eyes showed. The eyes glowed oddly in the fire-light, while the rest of the figure seemed to gather darkness to it in a disquieting way.

  The peasants all looked to Alf.

  “She did thet, your honor,” he said with a peasant’s habitual deference. “I come home from th’ fields one night, an’ she was missin’, and th’ imps was there.”

  The figure made a noise like nails being shaken in a tin can.

  “And was there anyone unusual in the neighborhood?” it asked.

  “Not thet I could say,” Alf said. He reached out and wrapped a big hand around his stout, thornwood walking stick. “Mebbe your honor could tell us why ye’d be wanting t’ know.”

  Seeing Alf take his walking stick in hand, his cronies casually produced weapons of their own. Among them they had three cudgels, a dirk, a dagger, and a rusty cleaver, not to mention Alf’s walking stick. No one walked around unarmed after sundown, not even in a place as civilized as Daughnting Underhill.

  The same nails-in-a-tin-can noise issued from the figure.

  “Now, now, gentlemen,” it said. “There’s no need for concern. My name is… call me Marlowe… and I’ve been dispatched from… Spam… to collect payment for various services and to return the creatures you call imps, who escaped from my master. And, of course, I’m willing to pay in gold for your help in this matter.”

  When they heard the word “gold,” the peasants relaxed their grips on their weapons.

  “I don’t know as what we could help ye much,” Three-Finger Brown said. “But fer gold…”

  The figure rolled its head in a way that made the hair on Alf’s neck stand up straight. No human neck could make such a motion, he thought.

  “I believe I could usse the hhelp of Alf Worthy,” the figure said. “And you gentlemenn could come alongg aass well. We’ll meet tomorrow eveningg at his ffarm, just afterr ssunset.”

  “Shouldn’t yer honor start in daylight?” George asked. “So as to see better?”

  The peasants all looked at George as if he’d grown another head.

  “That’s the most intellergent thing I’ve ever heard ‘im say,” Jeb said to general nodding.

  The figure made the nails-in-a-tin-can noise, and said, “I’m afraid nott. I don’t llike the ssun, and I have some… collecting… to do thiss evening.”

  The statement was followed by a noise like the crack of doom, and something wet hit Alf in the side of the head. He turned quickly to see Vera standing over the tray containing their mugs and a widening puddle of beer.

  “Whot’s thet?” the landlord, Wilf, called from the back of the pub. Wilf could hear lost profits from a mile away.

  “Never mmind,” the figure called back. It seemed to be waving signs in the air with hands that, in the dim light, looked like they had too many fingers. “In ffact, why don’t you ggentlemen go home, and I wwill hellp Vera cleann up?”

  No one wanted to comply. The peasants were still nearly sober, and Wilf never left the pub before locking up to prevent pilferage. Vera, pale as a ghost, seemed to like the idea least of all. But she said nothing, and the men, Wilf included, soon found themselves outside the pub saying their “g’nights” and “go safely’s” as if getting home was the most important thing in the world. Alf stood for a moment enjoying the cool night air as the others walked off. So he was the only one to hear, from inside the pub, what might have been a gasp, a cackle, and a muffled scream.

  With a fearsome grunt, Alf shouldered the final burlap sack of oats onto his cart. Just past midday, and the load was ready for transport to the castle. The new seed the majordomo had delivered in the spring was performing even better than promised. Alf reckoned he might be able to get three full crops in the year instead of the three crops in two years the old seed had produced. And if, as some whispered, the improved yield was the work of the court magician, what of it? Alf hadn’t done anything magical himself.

  He picked up his whip and cracked it next to the ox’s ear. With a low moan, the beast surged against the wooden yoke, and the cart creaked forward. As he walked, Alf reached into the big pocket of his tunic and removed the lunch Elspeth had prepared. Elspeth was usually a fine cook, but that day she’d burned both the bacon and biscuits she’d used to make his meal.

  Maybe she was distracted by their daughter’s disappearance, or the prospect of help from the Spamish Marlowe. When he’d told her about the encounter in the pub the night before, she’d fingered her throat, as if something hung there, and spent the night tossing and turning.

  Women, Alf thought. Who could figure them?

  When Alf reached the high street to the castle, the first thing he saw was Elspeth, drinking tea with a group of women at a table in front of Rumsfeld’s Dainties and Finery. Alf recognized Rumsfeld’s wife, Mavis, who had, until the past year or so, borne the marks of regular beatings; Letty Stone, whose recent marriage put paid to the common opinion that she was too homely to find a husband, and the Bartholomew sisters, who no longer attracted the attention of loungers and layabouts as they once had.

  Alf tipped his cap to his wife and her friends but didn’t stop. He’d never get the ox going again amid all the distractions of the village. Among the people walking along the street he saw Vera, moving as slowly as an old woman toward the women seated at the table. As he watched, Vera sat and began talking rapidly. The other women put their hands to their mouths. Vera held her hands more than a foot apart. A gasp went up from her listeners. Still talking, Vera made a motion as if to simulate a tail, and Elspeth and the others began fanning themselves with their hands.

  I wonder what that’s about, Alf thought, as the women were lost from sight.

  The rest of Alf’s day was typical for a peasant of Tharp. The castle’s quartermaster tried to give him short weight for the oats, and the blacksmith insisted that the new plow he’d ordered cost four florins and not the three they’d agreed to. He lost a half hour alongside the road, prying a stone from the ox’s hoof, and when he finally reached his home, he found his farmyard boiling with imps mounted on rats, using tines from his best pitchfork to joust with one another and try to stick his pigs. The sight of him flailing away with a broom while the rat-mounted imps dodged and skittered made even the distracted Elspeth laugh.

  Alf was just finishing his dinner of burned chicken and undercooked garden vegetables when his cronies began to arrive. They sat around his fireplace drinking his tea and listening to Cheney tell a story intended to impress his listeners with how important he was to the governing of Tharp.

  “Where’s thet curst Marlowe?” Alf asked, interrupting Cheney’s tale.

  “I am herre,” the scythe-on-a-whetstone voice said from the darkest corner of the hut.

  All of the peasants gave a start, and Elspeth squealed and put her hand over her mouth.

  “Crom, man,” Alf said, invoking Tharp’s warrior god, “don’t do thet. It’s, it’s unnacheral. You liked to scare th’ wits out o’ me wife.”

  “No, no,” Elspeth said in a shaky voice, “it’s all right.”

  “Yess,” Marlowe grated, “it musst be, mussn’t it?”

  Alf started to ask the Spamiard what he meant, but before he could get a word out, Marlowe was standing at the door to the hut.

  “If we are to find yourr daughter, we should be ggoing,” he said.

  The others passed through the low door, but Alf lingered.

  “Is all well wi’ you?” he asked his wife.

  “Yes, yes,” Elspeth said. “Find Brittney, an
d all will be well.”

  As he went through the door himself, Alf thought he heard Elspeth whisper something. It sounded like, “Debts must be paid,” but Alf couldn’t be certain.

  The group spent most of the night stumbling around the countryside. George was pursued by a pack of dogs and One-Eye Simmons fell into the creek. Alf was grateful that the nearly full moon shed enough light to prevent serious injury, but it illuminated nothing in the way of clues to his daughter’s whereabouts.

  “I’ll never see me Brittney again,” Alf said in despair, as they neared his farm once more. The promise of sunrise cast a pinkish glow over the bucolic scene of tidy huts and tidy farms. “I still suspect my Elspeth knows where the girl is. She’s keepin’ a secret of some sort, anyways.”

  The nails-in-a-tin-can noise issued from Marlowe.

  “That’ss not her ssecret,” he grated. “She hass other concerns…”

  His voice trailed off and he stopped walking, turning to face a fenced paddock that held a pair of horses. One was a white stallion; the other as pretty a bay mare as Alf had ever seen.

  “Are these yourr beastss?” Marlowe asked.

  “No,” Alf said.

  “But this is yer field, Alf,” Three-Finger said, “what you said you was lettin’ lie fallow fer a season.”

  “True enough,” Alf said, “but they’s not me horses.”

  This occasioned a good deal of shrugging and head scratching among the peasants. Even Marlowe rubbed his chin, if that was what it was.

  “Verry interesting,” he said at last. He resumed walking, and the peasants followed.

  “I’m certainn you gentlemenn hhave thingss to do,” he said, as they reached Alf’s gate. The other peasants nodded and mumbled and left amid a volley of “see yer’s” and “best to the missuses.”

  “Now what will we do?” Alf asked as the odd pair trudged up his lane.

  “I believe you shouldd spendd the day keeping watch on those horsess,” Marlowe said, “while I will sstay here and interrogate yourr wife.”

  “Not on yer life,” Alf said indignantly. “Nobody inter, inter, interrogates me missus but me.”

  Marlowe put a hand on Alf’s arm. The fingers didn’t feel exactly like fingers.

  “It meanss to ask questionss,” Marlowe said. “Iff I am to find yourr daughter, I must ask questionss. And ssomeone must watch the horsess to see who is interested in tthem.”

  Alf didn’t like the plan but couldn’t think of what else to do. He flung the door open and Elspeth sat up in bed.

  “I need breakfuss, woman,” Alf barked. “And this here Spamiard wants t’ interrrogate you.”

  Elspeth put her hand to her mouth.

  “Yes, dear,” she said bravely. And although she looked pale, Alf couldn’t help but notice as she rose from the bed that she had bathed and tied ribbons in her hair. Marlowe refused food and sat silently while Alf ate and Elspeth prepared a lunch.

  “Keepp a close watchh,” Marlowe told Alf, as the peasant stood at the door. “Returnn at duskk with any newss.”

  The door closed, and Alf thought he heard the bolt shoot home. And as he turned to walk down the lane, he could have sworn he heard Elspeth say, “Oh, my,” in a very small voice.

  Alf spent the morning sitting in a copse at the edge of the field, watching the horses gambol. The stallion seemed to have breeding on its mind, but the mare was having none of it, snapping and kicking up her heels every time the stallion approached. If someone had set them into his field to breed, Alf thought, they were going to be disappointed.

  After he ate his lunch, Alf drowsed, wondering what, if anything, Marlowe was getting from his interrogation of Elspeth. The heat of the day and his lack of sleep combined to make him nod off, but he awakened with a start each time, determined to do his part to find his daughter.

  Still, he wasn’t really sure if he was awake or asleep when an old man in a white robe appeared out of nowhere at the edge of the field. The figure stood, running its hands through its long, white beard, and Alf could faintly hear it speaking.

  “Oh, you fool, you young fool, what have you done?” the old man said.

  The stallion seemed to toss its head at the man’s voice and trotted off in pursuit of the mare. The figure stood there, dithering, then vanished as suddenly as it had appeared.

  “Thet ain’t nacheral,” Alf said, and wondered if he should be off to tell Marlowe what he had seen. But the Spamiard had said to wait until dusk, and Alf did, slogging home with the setting sun at his back.

  He found Elspeth sitting at the table in their hut, her ribbons askew and a dreamy smile on her face.

  “Where’s th’ Spamiard?” he asked.

  “Hmm?” Elspeth said.

  “The Spamiard,” Alf said. “The odd feller wi’ too many fingers?”

  “Oh, yes,” Elspeth said, shaking herself as if awakening from a dream. “He said he had to report and that he would be back later. You should wait.”

  All through dinner, Alf caught his wife staring into space, “actin’ all loony goony,” as he explained it to his cronies later. But she insisted that nothing was wrong, and the arrival of Marlowe, suddenly there in the same, dark corner, cut off his questions.

  “Do you hhave anythingg to reportt?” Marlow rasped.

  Alf told him about the behavior of the horses and the appearance and disappearance of the old man.

  “Sso,” Marlowe said as Alf finished, “it is justt sso. Under… questioning… your wife rememberss a well-dressed youngg man spendingg much time chatting with yourr daughter.”

  “Elspeth?” Alf said.

  “I had forgotten, Alf, truly,” his wife said. “Master Marlowe helped me remember.”

  She gave the figure a smile that might have made Alf wonder if he hadn’t been so intent on trying to make sense of what had happened to his daughter.

  “Do nott blame yourr wife,” Marlowe grated. “I am afraidd there iss magic involved.”

  The word made Alf shiver, but he squared his shoulders when the Spamiard said, “I must to the castle, thenn, to see if thiss unfortunate business cann be rrepaired.”

  “I’ll be goin’ wi’ yer honor,” Alf said, surprising everyone, himself included, with the words.

  “Oh, Alf, no,” Elspeth said.

  “She’s me daughter,” Alf said stubbornly.

  Marlowe and Elspeth exchanged a look Alf couldn’t interpret.

  “Verry welll,” the Spamiard said. “I mustt travel differently than I hadd anticipated, but you may have some purpose to serve in this matter yett.”

  So Alf found himself walking along the road, through the silent village and into the castle. For some reason, no guards challenged the pair and, within the castle, people hurried past them in the hall as if they weren’t there.

  The apartments they entered were austere and smelled of sulfur and other things Alf couldn’t identify. Their darkness was relieved only by a faint light from the far end. Marlowe led Alf across the room, navigating around obstacles the peasant couldn’t even see. What they reached was another door, open just a crack, from which spilled the light and the sound of a man’s voice chanting sonorously.

  “Be carefull,” Marlowe said, and led Alf into the next room.

  The old man Alf had seen in the field sat facing them, nose buried in a book. Beakers and tumblers sizzled and smoked, and what might have been an owl seemed to be boiling in a pot on a brazier. He continued chanting, as if unaware of the presence of others.

  “A little late forr that spelll, is it nott?” Marlowe said.

  The old man started and stared at the intruders.

  “Well, well,” he said pleasantly. “An afrit, if I’m not mistaken. A minor enough demon. And this fantastic creature with you is… ?”

  It took Alf a moment to realize that the old man was referring to him.

  “I’m a peasant,” he said indignantly. “Name’s Alf Worthy. I delivers oats t’ this here castle.”

  The old man
waved a hand dismissively.

  “A peasant,” he said. “How boring. But what brings this afrit from the domain of Ali Ben Salim?”

  Marlowe made his nails-in-a-tin-can noise, and Alf realized the… whatever he was… thought that was what a laugh sounded like.

  “Right directionn,” Marlowe said, “wrong dimensionn. But no matter. It appearss your educational effortss have gone amiss. Or is that nott your apprentice capering aroundd in Alf Worthy’s field.”

  Alf made a noise of astonishment.

  “There’s naught but horses in thet field,” he said.

  The old man and Marlowe looked at each other.

  “Aren’t very bright, are they?” the old man said.

  Marlowe laid a hand on Alf’s arm.

  “Thiss will go fasterr if you are silentt,” he said. Then, to the old man, “Unless I amm much mistakenn, there is a substantial paymentt to be made if this error is to be rectifiedd.”

  The old man cocked his head to one side and smiled.

  “I’m surprised that your master, whoever he might be, didn’t send a more powerful representative,” he said. “This is a bit above your pay grade, isn’t it?”

  Marlowe laughed again

  “I wass in the neighborhood,” he said, “on business.”

  “Really?” the old man said. He looked thoughtful. “Collecting for kitchen magic, perhaps?” His voice contained what sounded to Alf like a sneer. “Well, lust was always the weakness of the afriti, wasn’t it? Still, a wise demon would have chosen a better collector for high magic.”

  Marlowe rotated his shoulders, if that was what they were, in a shrug.