by Neil Clarke
Mark after mark placed feet on painted footprints, squared their shoulders and threw—but none seemed blessed with Trouper’s luck. Children began throwing tantrums instead of projectiles. One sniveling whelp kicked up such a stink that Marx gave both boy and mother a few ducats to go and see the Marx Brothers’ Rocket-Powered Penny Farthings. This one tactical freebie was all it took; a deluge of 5p’s avalanched across the countertop, and into Marx’s purse.
More stones were launched the crow’s way amid showers of minor coins; the first of these missed, but the latter staunchly met their target. “Sorry, matie,” Marx said to one sour-breathed contestant, whose chest heaved against his sweat-soaked shirt after another pebble hurtled wide of its mark. “Your robust bear-huggers are just too strong for this game! You threw that one so quick, I reckon an African cheeter couldn’t have caught it.”
“C’mon, Marx. Give me a rehash. I’ll slip you a free strudel next time you come past my bakery,” said the blubbery man through his long mustachios. Marx walked behind the counter, tilted his bulk forward on the orrery’s concealed pedals, and said, “Tell you what I’ll do for you, matie: if you win on the next go, I’ll give you back every penny you’ve gambled. Guaranteed. Peg this wretched bird with all your impressive might and you’ll have more dough than you could ever knead at that bakery of yours.”
Marx’s tongue kept flappin’ until he got his way; such smooth words never did the marks any good. Bitter smoke billowed from the street vendors’ burners, following the losers home. Nightwatchmen changed shifts, grunting salutations and beating billies against enhanced meat-hooks, as adrenaline levels bloated the carnival’s nihilistic avenues. [“To see now, how a jest shall come about!” laughed the dancing girls, “I warrant, an I should live a thousand years, I never should forget it —”] The disgruntled baker turned away from Marx’s stall, stuffing his remaining two guineas into a ragged pocket. He nearly tripped over the fox wheeling its way up to the target.
Dressed in a chrome yellow top hat and matching damask suit, the fox was a dapper fellow, every inch a gentleman. The spiked wheels of his wicker invalid’s chair sought purchase on the midway’s greasy cobblestones; they skidded nauseatingly, and moved forward at an inchworm’s pace. No matter if it took until morning for his master to reach his goal, the fox’s kettledrum construct would not interfere. Only when he was contentedly puffing away on a mahogany pipe, his wheeled chair jauntily parked on the scuffed painted footprints, did the housebot approach. He draped a Burberry rug across his master’s immobile copper knees, tucking it gently between the chair’s arms and the fox’s atrophied hindquarters, then stood off to his left-hand side.
The fox’s eyes never wavered from their prize as he asked the bot to analyze the odds of his winning this game.
A slender ticker tape chugged out of a slit beneath the construct’s speaker box. He tore it against his serrated teeth, and passed the results over to his master. “Immeasurably in your favor. As usual, Sir.”
“Hey there, cowboy.” Marx rearranged his features until they imitated a passably charming grin. He released a burst of steam from his top hat as he spoke.
The crow eyeballed the fox from his lofty perch. Those who balanced on wheels instead of legs were such simple targets. Weaker than children, and less confident. “Come have a go,” he said, flicking the gear to the corner of his beak and projecting his voice for all to hear. “In fact, what’s say we give him TWO goes for free, on accounta his poorly condition? Don’t that sound fair, Robin?” he asked, seeking and receiving the showman’s nod.
The fox tapped his pipe on the chair’s padded arm, watched its sticky contents combine with the sludge lazily seeping around his wheels. [“— let them measure us by what they will, We’ll measure them a measure, and be gone . . . ”] He flicked a shred of tobacco off his lap, and gently cleared his throat.
“Indeed, I will take two shots, as you’ve so kindly offered, Mr. Black,” said the fox.
It took a second for the crow to realize the fox was addressing him. Not ‘bird’, not ‘jackdaw’, not ‘scoundrel’, no. He was Mr. Black.
The fox feigned interest in the kaleidoscopic projections whirling around Marx’s tent while the crow fluffed and preened his feathers.
Then he opened fire.
“Shot the first: a question. How did such a magnificent creature—genuine Corvus corone, pure flesh and bone, not a single enhancement—how did such a miraculous being come to be shackled and used as a cyborg’s lackey?”
The crow spluttered, and nearly swallowed the gear in earnest.
“Shot the second,” the fox continued, undaunted. “An offer. Work for me.”
The crow cocked his head, and waited for the punch line.
“Let me set the terms,” said the fox, “for I am sure you will find them suitably appealing.”
“First,” he said, “I will prohibit you from participating in any specimen of show—even though it would be an absolute delight to hear your dulcet tones raised in song, Mr. Black, old chap.”
“But, no. No singing today. Instead, I would like to employ your golden sense. What does Mr. Marx pay you? Some flattering mirrors in front of which you might preen? Perhaps some chymical bird-feed?”
The crow kept silent.
[“True, I talk of dreams,
Which are the children of an idle brain,
Begot of nothing but vain fantasy . . . ”]
“I will offer you a gentleman’s fare, Mr. Black,” the fox continued, quietly. “I am not interested in paying carny’s fees for such a one as you are. Sneer all you like at the term, Mr. Marx; you cannot deny that you have treated this dark angel as nothing more than a lowly carny.”
“I need a partner, Mr. Black, for a somewhat more lucrative . . . oh, let’s call it a venture, shall we? Your guile, your cleverness, your wit: these are exactly the assets I need for this undertaking. You are far too intelligent for this braggart’s show! In fact, the show’s very success hinges on your intellect. Don’t think I didn’t see you exchange the false gear with the real, earlier— ”
— the crowd stirred, grumbled as they fondled their weightless pockets —
— Marx fumed, “That’s enough out of you, cowboy— ”
“ —indeed without your finesse, there would be no Robin Marx! And how does he repay you? By tying you to a moldy planet and shoving a gear down your gullet?”
[“Ay, while you live, draw your neck out of the collar . . . ”]
“What horror will he perform next? Are you a crow, Mr. Black? Or are you a soiled dove, blackened much as this city has been of late, by too many trips up Marx’s sooty arse?”
The paralytic’s got a point, thought the crow.
He spat the gear out, propelling it with fury, loosening his tongue to ingratiate hisself to his new employer. The crowd dispersed like exhaled smoke. [Ladies, dames, raised their voices, “To move is to stir; and to be valiant is to stand; therefore, if thou art mov’d, thou runn’st away . . .”]
The tiny gear negotiated a haphazard path across the cobblestones, before spinning to a halt at the housebot’s burnished feet. Before Marx could shift his frame off the counter, the bot had dropped a silk handkerchief onto the gear, collected it, and polished it properly. Then he lifted his master’s damask coattails, exposing the clockworks inset in his narrow russet back.
Half of the works were still, while the other portion whirred out their quotidian functions. The bot gently laid the gear into the fox’s lower back, and used his index finger to screw it into place.
“What do you want me to do, boss?” asked the crow, his eagerness to escape the ramshackle orrery hanging like a painful chandelier from his brief question.
“Why, you’ve already done it, old chap,” said the newly mobile fox as his lower legs sprang to life. “You really have done it!”
[“O, Wilt thou leave me so unsatisfied?”]
Yipping like a newborn pup, the fox switched his tail into overdrive. He spra
ng out of his redundant chair, blew the crow a grateful kiss as he sped past, fleeing the scene before he could get slicked.
[“What satisfaction canst thou have to-night?” chimed the sideshow dames as the Johnnies were ejected from their parlors. The women’s laughter was harsh and raw.]
About the Author
Lisa L Hannett hails from Ottawa, Canada but now lives in Adelaide, South Australia—city of churches, bizarre murders and pie floaters. Her short stories have been published in Clarkesworld Magazine, Fantasy Magazine, Weird Tales, ChiZine, Shimmer, Steampunk II: Steampunk Reloaded, The Year’s Best Australian Fantasy and Horror (2010 & 2011), and Imaginarium 2012: Best Canadian Speculative Fiction, among other places. She has won three Aurealis Awards, including Best Collection 2011 for her first book, Bluegrass Symphony(Ticonderoga Publications). Midnight and Moonshine, co-authored with Angela Slatter, will be published in 2012. Lisa has a PhD in medieval Icelandic literature, and is a graduate of Clarion South. You can find her online at lisahannett.com and on Twitter @LisaLHannett.
A Woman’s Best Friend
Robert Reed
The gangly man was running up the street, his long legs pushing through the fresh unplowed snow. He was a stranger; or at least that was her initial impression. In ways that Mary couldn’t quite define, he acted both lost and at home. His face and manner were confused, yet he nonetheless seemed to navigate as if he recognized some portion of his surroundings. From a distance, his features seemed pleasantly anonymous, his face revealing little of itself except for a bony, perpetually boyish composition. Then a streetlamp caught him squarely, and he looked so earnest and desperate, and so sweetly silly, that she found herself laughing, however impolite that was.
Hearing the laughter, the man turned toward her, and when their eyes joined, he flinched and gasped.
She thought of the tiny pistol riding inside her coat pocket: A fine piece of machinery marketed under the name, “A Woman’s Best Friend.”
The stranger called to her.
“Mary,” he said with a miserable, aching voice.
Did she know this man? Perhaps, but there was a simpler explanation. People of every persuasion passed by her desk every day, and her name was no secret. He might have seen her face on several occasions, and he certainly wasn’t the kind of fellow that she would have noticed in passing. Unless of course he was doing some nasty business in the back of the room—behaviors that simply weren’t allowed inside a public library.
As a precaution, Mary slipped her hand around the pistol’s grip.
“Who are you?” she asked.
“Don’t you know me?” he sputtered.
Not at all, no. Not his voice, not his face. She shook her head and rephrased her question. “What do I call you?”
“George.”
Which happened to be just about her least favorite name. With a reprimanding tone, she pointed out, “It’s wicked-cold out here, George. Don’t you think you should hurry home?”
“I lost my home,” he offered.
His coat was peculiarly tailored, but it appeared both warm and in good repair. And despite his disheveled appearance, he was too healthy and smooth-tongued to be a common drunk. “What you need to do, George . . . right now, turn around and go back to Main Street. There’s two fine relief houses down there that will take you in, without questions, and they’ll take care of you— ”
“Don’t you know what night this is?” he interrupted.
She had to think for a moment. “Tuesday,” she answered.
“The date,” he insisted. “What’s the date?”
“December 24th— ”
“It’s Christmas Eve,” he interrupted.
Mary sighed, and then she nodded. Pulling her empty hand out of the gun pocket, she smiled at the mysterious visitor, asking, “By any chance, George . . . is there an angel in this story of yours?”
A gust of wind could have blown the man off his feet. “You know about the angel?” he blubbered.
“Not from personal experience. But I think I know what he is, and I can make a guess or two about what he’s been up to.”
“Up to?”
She said, “George,” with a loud, dismissive tone. “I’m sorry to have to tell you this. But there’s no such thing as a genuine angel.”
“Except I saw him.”
“You saw someone. Where was he?”
“On the bridge outside town,” he offered. “He fell into the river, and I jumped in after him and dragged him to shore.”
The man was sopping wet, she noted. “But now what were you doing out on the bridge, George?”
He hesitated. “Nothing,” he replied with an ashamed, insistent tone.
“The angel jumped in, and you saved him?”
“Yes.”
That sounded absurd. “What did your angel look like, George?”
“Like an old man.”
“Then how do you know he was an angel?”
“He said he was.”
“And after you rescued him . . . what happened? Wait, no. Let me guess. Did your angel make noise about earning an aura or his halo—?”
“His wings.”
“Really? And you believed that story?”
George gulped.
“And what did this wingless man promise you, George.”
“To show me . . . ”
“What?”
“How the world would be if I’d never been born.”
She couldn’t help but laugh again. Really, this man seemed so sweet and so terribly lost. She was curious, even intrigued. Not that the stranger was her type, of course. But then again, this was a remarkable situation, and maybe if she gave him a chance . . .
“All right, George. I’m going to help you.”
He seemed cautiously thrilled to hear it.
“Come home with me,” she instructed him. And then she turned back toward the old limestone building that occupied most of a city block.
“To the library?” he sputtered.
“My apartment’s inside,” she mentioned.
“You live inside the library?”
“Because I’m the head librarian. That’s one of the benefits of my job: The city supplies me with a small home. But it’s warm and comfortable, with enough room for three cats and one man-sized bed.”
Her companion stood motionless, knee-deep in snow.
“What’s wrong now, George?”
“I don’t,” he muttered.
“You don’t what?”
“Go into the homes of young women,” he muttered.
“I’m very sorry to disappoint, but I’m not that young.” For just an instant, she considered sending him to a facility better equipped for this kind of emergency. And in countless realms, she surely did just that. But on this world, at this particular instant, she said, “You need to understand something, George. You are dead. You have just killed yourself. By jumping off a bridge, apparently. And now that that’s over with, darling, it’s high time you lived a little.”
Reverence has its patterns, its genius and predictable clichés. Many realms throw their passions into houses of worship—splendid, soothing buildings where the wide-eyed faithful can kneel together, bowing deeply while repeating prayers that were ancient when their ignorant bodies were just so many quadrillion atoms strewn across their gullible world. But if a world was blessed with true knowledge, and if there were no churches or mosques, temples or synagogues, the resident craftsmen and crafty benefactors often threw their hands and fortunes into places of learning. And that was why a small town public library wore the same flourishes and ornate marvels common to the greatest cathedrals.
George hesitated on the polished marble stairs, gazing up at the detailed mosaic above the darkened front door.
“What is this place?” he whispered.
She said, “My library,” for the last time.
George was tall enough to touch the bottom rows of cultured, brightly colored diamond tiles, first with gloves on
and then bare fingers.
“Who are these people? They look like old Greeks.”
“And Persians. And Indians. And Chinese too.” She offered names that almost certainly meant nothing to him. But she had always enjoyed playing the role of expert, and when the twenty great men and women had been identified, she added, “These are the Founders.”
“Founders of what?”
“Of the Rational Order,” she replied. “The Order is responsible for twenty-three hundred years of peace and growth.”
George blinked, saying nothing.
She removed her right glove and touched the crystal door. It recognized her flesh, but only after determining that her companion was unarmed did the door slowly, majestically swing open for both of them.
“I can answer most questions,” she promised.
Like an obedient puppy, George followed after her.
Sensing her return, the library awakened. Light filled the ground floor. Slick white obelisks and gray columns stood among the colorful, rather chaotic furnishings. Chairs that would conform to any rump waited to serve. Clean, disinfected readers were stacked neatly on each black desk. Even two hours after closing, the smell of the day’s patrons hung in the air—a musky, honest odor composed of perfumes and liquor, high intentions and small dreams.
“This is a library?”
“It is,” she assured.
“But where’s the books?”
Her desk stood beside the main aisle—a wide clean and overly fancy piece of cultivated teak and gold trimmings. Her full name was prominently displayed. She picked up the reader that she had been using at day’s end, and George examined the nameplate before remarking, “You never married?”
She nearly laughed. But “No” was a truthful enough answer, and that was all she offered for now.
Again he returned to the missing books.
“But our collection is here,” she promised, compiling a list of titles from a tiny portion of the holdings. “You see, George . . . in this world, we have better ways to store books than writing on expensive old parchment.”
