Friday Fiction: Slavery's Ghost (Part One)

Slavery's Ghost

 

     It was July of 1839. Robert Bellamy of the Department of Extranatural Affairs stood in a cemetery in Philadelphia in the early hours of the morning, next to the mound of a new-filled grave. Although the Fourth with its fireworks and guns was long past, the air still smelled of black powder, and in the heat and the haze that was already gathering, it seemed to him that the sky itself might catch fire at any moment.

     He took out an object that looked like a pocket watch, as was customary in this sort of Bureau affair. The dial was marked in twelve sections like the hours, but inside the case, instead of hands and a steadily ticking mechanism, a single wooden needle floated on a pool of mercury. He pushed the knob, releasing the needle: it floated lazily. He nodded in satisfaction and wrote a number down in a little notebook.

     Then Bob Bellamy did something that was not required Bureau procedure. He bent his head and said an earnest prayer for his deceased fellow investigator. Then he put his hat back on and left the grave, its copious floral tributes already withering in the hot, stagnant air.

     A half-hour later found him in the outskirts of the city, being guided up the stairs of a neat, modest three-story building by a neat modest maiden of thirty or so.

     "I hope you don't think I put Opa up here to get him out of the way," she panted, her broad fair face coloring with the effort. "This is the way he wanted it. He said it helped him think."

     "I completely understand, Miss Jandt. You're sure there are no family papers I might take away by accident?"

     "Ah, no, he put me in charge of all that years ago. Up here there is nothing but his work and his research library, and he told me it was all for the Bureau. What would I do with it?"

     She reached out and took his arm, stopping him. They had reached a door at the top of the stairs.

     "You will take care of it, won't you? For all the ten years since he retired, he worked on his files and analyses. His observations, his speculations, his conclusions. He talked of them constantly, though I never could make head or tail of it. All this will be preserved, won't it? It will be ... useful?"

     Bob smiled and patted her hand.

     "Ma'am, your father was one of the best agents we ever had. Mr. Frobisher, our first Director, spoke of him often, and held him up to our esteem as a model operative. I imagine his writings will be studied for decades to come. Set your mind at rest, Miss Jandt; his life was well-spent in service, and his legacy is secure in our hands."

     She relaxed and dropped her hand.

     "Then I will leave him to you," she said simply. "There is a bell by the door. Ring it when you are done, or if you need anything. Go gently among his remains, Mr. Bellamy." She turned and descended the dimness of the stairwell.

     Bob opened the door and stopped short. For a brief second it had seemed a ghostly figure hung before him; the next second it had resolved itself into a rather skillful portrait done in the Rembrandt style, hanging on the wall opposite. He would have laughed at himself if the occasion were not so solemn. It was obvious to him that he had been half-expecting some manifestation of just that kind.

     The picture was of Gus Jandt, exactly as he remembered the old man from years ago. A square head made squarer still by a prickly brush cut; piercing light eyes behind small, square steel spectacles perched on a broad blunt nose. An almost geometrically cut suit fell from his broad shoulders. The only bit of fancy among these severe planes was his neck-stock, that fell from his chin to his waistcoat like a waterfall plummeting between granite shelves.

     The room was well-lived in, but immaculately clean. Glass-enclosed bookcases, a trim roll-top desk with a wheeled padded chair, an iron stove in one corner, a bed like a camp cot with a small, sturdy table next to it. On the table, a pair of glasses, obviously the original of the portrait's, and an empty ceramic mug.

     Bob felt a wash of guilt, as if he were an intruder somehow caught in the sight of the spectacles. To cover this confused emotion, he went quickly over to the desk and settled down to business. The sooner he was done, the better. He opened a desk drawer.

     It was full of files, bound up and labeled. He had never seen more orderly kept records. They were classified by phenomenon, and each case marked Verified, Inconclusive, and Disproved. The Disproved were by far the thinnest cases but the most abundant category. All six of the desk drawers were full, but not crammed; they were, after all, only Jandt's own investigations. Bob thought of the files back at the Bureau and shook his head. They could certainly use a going over with the old man's method, but the idea of the labor involved made him shudder. He made a few more notes on his pad, then began to unpack the drawers onto the faded red carpet.

     When he got to the bottom of the fifth drawer, he stopped. There was a file, sitting hidden horizontally under the vertical dossiers. He drew it out, puzzled at the anomaly. There was no listing of phenomenon, no indication of its status. It was simply labeled "Tacenda," and under that, in neat red ink, "Burn This."

     Bob sat down in the wheeled chair, hunched forward, and considered the file in his hands. It was not particularly heavy. It was not sealed with wax; a flip of a string would undo it. Common decency dictated that it be destroyed unread. Professional curiosity urged that it be examined at least once. Bureau policy demanded it be turned over to the director, who would make his ruling on it. Bob sat perfectly still, hardly breathing, while his conscience struggled with the trilemma. The argument was shattered by a small crystal chime from his pocket.

     He drew out the little device and popped it open. It chimed again. He released the needle, and the wooden pin was suddenly twirling around on its mercury ocean like a top being unwound. He looked at in amazement. He had never seen one act quite like this before. It didn't look like it was ever going to slow down. He closed the case and carefully set it on the desk. He looked at the file.

     Bob wasn't sure, exactly, how the doohickey was supposed to work. All agents were issued one of them these days and told how to use them. But whether they reacted to some unknown dicta of the world around them, or to subtle messages from the agent himself, he had never been told. But the instructions were clear: if the needle moved, something interesting was afoot. Keep your eyes open and investigate.

     He unwound the thread, opened the file, and started to read.

 

     I am going to assume [it began] that if you are reading this you know something of the Department of Extranatural Affairs, or the Bureau of Shadows, as it is sometimes theatrically called. I will state for the record that I am Augustus A. Jandt, Agent Number #05 of the same, and have been an operative of the Department since its inception. This case and my conclusions are a personal memorandum of an investigation that was kept out of the official record, and I think, if you persist in reading it, you will discover why.

     I have no notes, but I recall well enough it was a day early in June in the year 1823. In our enterprise, there are certain busy times of the year, but I was enjoying the balmy lull between what we call the Darkest Days and the High Summer Madness. I was sitting in my office, amusing myself with a study of Olaus Magnus' Historia de Gentibus Septentrionalibus, when Mr. Ballentine Frobisher, my old friend, and the Director of the Department, entered without even a courtesy knock.

     "Prepare yourself," he told me, waving some letters high in the air. He plucked one out and handed it to me for inspection. It dripped with official vernissage. "For a trip to Charlottesville. Mr. Monroe's government is feeling the pinch and is questioning the necessity of continuing the Bureau. So we are going to see the President."

     "I beg your pardon," I said, "Would not a trip to Washington be in order then? I believe that is where President Monroe is at present."

     "I don't mean our current Caesar. I mean the President, the man who established our Bureau. We are going to Monticello to see Mr. Jefferson."

     "I do not understand the necessity of my presence," I replied. I do not enjoy travel, even under the most pleasant circumstances. "If Mr. Jefferson will not listen to you, who have such history with him, what could I possibly accomplish?"

     "This is where the mystery of Providence steps in to help us." He handed me a second letter; a simple paper folded twice. "Mr. Jefferson, our enlightened progenitor, our rationalist philosopher of natural law, is being haunted by a ghost."

     Frobisher looked at me, a grin twisting his sour face.

     "You, Gus, are my best investigator, and it is your efforts that can save or doom the Bureau."

(To Be Continued)

Friday Fiction: King Korm (Part 1)

          Korm looked into the wavy running glass of his wonky mirror, a cheap apprentice work that his madra had purchased years ago for a penny. He nervously checked his beard. It was his Third Beard and had come in much thicker than anyone who had seen his wispy First or Second Beard had expected. In fact, it was so long and bushy that it made his skinny profile look uncannily like an upright walking broom. He stroked his whiskers’ bristly length. The beard was problematic.

          Morgs have a complex relationship with their beards. The males calculate their lives’ seven stages by the changes in the growth, and over the ages certain beliefs had sprung up and grown entrenched about what your beard meant about you. Korm had never really given these beliefs much credence, perhaps in part because his sparse early growths had not augured particularly well. And then, almost overnight, this.

Boys who had ignored his puny frame before were suddenly in the mood for a fight, challenging him like young goats ready to butt heads. Girls who had never spared him a second glance now slowed as they passed him by, gazing long and speculatively. Korm flinched under all this attention; he simply didn’t know how to handle the change. Especially because, underneath it all, he knew he was exactly the same Morg that he was before. And it was all going to get worse, he knew, because with the Third Beard came the King’s Camp Service.

Morgs are the farmers of war; they consider, say, an infestation of Ogres as much a nuisance as a plague of locusts, and with as much stolid straightforward facing the problem and weary shouldering of the burden. They have little romance of war but admire a good warrior as they would admire someone who handles the farm well, with care and sacrifice. To this end there is the King’s Camp.

Once the Third Beard was upon you, no matter what pathway of life you chose, there was a year when you left your family, your town, and even all personal possessions behind you and reported to Camp. There were drills, weapons classes, and (the only thing that even vaguely appealed to the scholarly Korm) the history of great wars. The rest of it all sounded as deadly dull as possible to the young Morg, and he tugged his beard in frustration at the thought.

“Now, now, boy, that won’t make it grow any longer, you know. And don’t you think it’s already long enough?”

Korm whirled around at the creaking, unexpected voice, his claws hastily dropping to his side.

“Uncle Akko!” he yelped. “I didn’t hear you come in.”

The elderly Morg waved a fragile, weightless paw dismissively and came tapping all the way into the room, leaning on his curling black cane. His twisted right leg dragged the floor behind him. Technically, Akko was Korm’s grandmother’s cousin; but as their closest living relative he had taken the boy and his mother Tessa under his wing. And now he had even outlived poor Tessa, dead for five years in the last outbreak of Barek’s Breath. Well, perhaps it was the Will of Shyreen. At least, that’s what Akko tried to tell himself during the dark watches of the night.

“I understand, I understand,” he wheezed, moving over and sitting with a sigh on the rumpled bed. “Believe it or not, even an old Witness with a bad leg had his moments of vanity in his youth.”

“It’s not vanity,” Korm began. “Far from it. I just wish everyone would stop looking at me, and … and smirking …” He threw up his hands helplessly.

Akko wagged a crooked forefinger.

“But you can’t tell me that somewhere deep inside there isn’t a part that’s not secretly pretty pleased with yourself, eh?” He laughed at Korm’s dumbfounded look. “Camp will knock some sense into you, though.”

Korm groaned inside.

“And then you can settle down to learning the Way of the Witness in earnest,” the old Morg said, pride in his voice. He rubbed his bad knee mechanically. “I may not have much, but that is one legacy I can hand on to you.”

Korm nearly groaned out loud at that. Being a Life Witness, though a vocation perfectly suited to Akko, did not appeal to the young Morg. He had grown up observing his uncle performing his duties, and while the old fellow derived great emotional satisfaction from the Rituals, Korm felt that there must be more to learn about the world than was contained in the Book of Signs.

Every Morg knew that there were great powers that overlooked their lives. There was the shadowy, all-powerful Morlakar Shyreen, creator and judge. There was Mother Ortha, whose most immediate manifestation was the world itself. There were the Yorn, potent spirits of craft and callings, that aided you in your pathway of life. And there was Mog Gammoth, Father and First of All Morgs, who surely watched over his children.

Every Morg believed this for a certainty. But as these powers were seldom if ever seen, they had Life Witnesses.

Life Witnesses put some skin on their beliefs. A Witness stood in place of any or all these Powers, and in their person presided over the important events of a Morg’s life. A birth, a marriage, a business contract, an oath, even a death was not considered properly accomplished if a Witness didn’t attest to it; if the deed were not appropriately Seen. There were a few Witnesses who through their style and presence had grown rich and patronized in the upper echelons of society. Others were like Uncle Akko.

Everyone, from the King on the White Throne to the beggar in the street, needed a Witness at some time or another. When summoned, a Witness was expected to go, no matter what he was doing. As a boy Korm had accompanied his uncle more than a few times in the dead of night to the home of some wretchedly poor family to greet a squalling red newborn or close someone’s eyes for the last time, and come home with no more than a bag of beans or even (on more than one occasion) a pretty or unusual stone. A Witness had to go, but a Witness had to be paid something, no matter how worthless.

Korm didn’t mind that. The attention and the dignity which Akko gave to each case added a certain nobility to his uncle in his eyes, as if in those moments the old Morg were going beyond himself to serve. If it were allowed, Korm was fairly sure his uncle would do the job for nothing. No, it was something else.

Korm had read the Book of Signs back and forth before he was out of his First Beard. He was precocious that way, and he remembered everything he read. He had found several passages that made no sense to him, and several things that seemed flat out contradictory to his straightforward mind. When he asked his uncle for clarification, Akko had counseled faith and patience, but had no answers. That led Korm to more reading beyond the battered old volume of ritual, and that set the boy on a whole-hearted quest through History.

Korm looked around their shabby apartment. It was far too small now that he had the world in his head. But the schools that taught the knowledge he sought, while quite reasonable, were still far beyond their means. If he could reach a certain level, there were scholarships that could carry him on. But could he even ask his uncle if he might try to pursue it, and break the old Morg’s heart? It was such an easy, easy trade-off: his dreams and the rest of his life for a simple but assured trudge along a steady groove until you laid down in your grave.

There was one good thing about Camp, Korm thought gloomily. It was a nine-month chunk of time that stood between him and a final decision. He groaned now despite himself, quietly.

Uncle Akko reached out a comforting claw and patted the young Morg’s back.

“Don’t worry,” he said. “It will all be over soon.”

 

Notes

I loved writing Tales of the Morgs, mostly because I felt I knew Korm and Roth, who starred in most of them, and that I knew the character of the Morgish race instinctively, although I had to write the stories to exactly find out a lot of the details of their lives. I had always had an idea about the cultural significance a Morg's beard had to him, but the idea of Life Witnesses, a semi-religious office, first entered the mythos here.

Korm started out, 45 years or so ago, as basically Cornelius from The Planet of the Apes, scholarly, kind-hearted, and a little timid. He, and his history, have developed since then. Here, in King Korm, we have the earliest look at him as a young Morg trying to figure out his destiny. Next would be Korm’s Master, in which you might say he starts college. In Korm and the Lost Library he goes on an adventure and comes of age. There is a glimpse of him in Thron as one of the old king’s court, and of course he is one of the ‘fellowship’ in the unfinished epic Goldfire. He visits our own world in A Friend You Haven’t Met. As a very old Morg he helps untangle the threads in the The Peculiar Wooing of General Roth. And in Aftermath, he has … moved on.

Which doesn’t mean he won’t appear in any more stories. If I can think of another good one where he fits.

Friday Fiction: Just Noodling

 

It might go something like this.

“Timmy!” his mom called. The boy jerked out of a waking dream and lowered the Kindle. He had been reading a Young Adult Fantasy, the fourth in the series. It was, admittedly, a rather poor offering; there had been diminishing quality since the first volume. But he was like that; he had invested a lot of time, and intended to follow it to the end, whatever the journey.

“Coming, Mom!” Timmy set the device down on the bed without much regret. The longer he could put off the last page, the longer he could put off having to find something else to read. He ran a hand through his black flop of hair then tugged his striped shirt down. He had been lying in bed in his shoes already, so it was only a short hop to get to the living room.

Mom was there, already in her coat, purse over her arm, putting a floppy brown knit hat over her auburn hair. Timmy looked at her curiously.

“Are you going somewhere?”

“We are going somewhere,” she said firmly, reaching into her purse and fishing her keys out. “We’re going to help Granny clean out one of her storage units. She’s doing one of her random purges again, downsizing.” She smiled. “And you are my muscle. Get your coat.”

Timmy groaned and hung his head. “Do I have to go? Why don’t you take Gabe?”

“You know he’s got football practice. And you’re just slouching around the house. A great big thirteen-year-old like you should be doing something, even if it’s only playing video games online like your uncle.”

Timmy yanked his fuzzy red jacket off the coatrack by the door.

“Why doesn’t he help Granny? After all, he lives with her.” He grumpily thrust one arm into a sleeve.

“Now, now, you know how your Uncle Jimmy is.” She looked mournful. “Sweetest guy in the world, of course, but useless at taking directions. Trying to get him to work drives Granny to distraction.” She watched Timmy trying helplessly to catch his other sleeve, half turning in a circle, then grabbed him and tucked his arm in. “Maybe when we’re done you can play some of his games with him while I visit with Granny.”

“Hooray,” he said flatly. He looked out the window. “It’s raining!”

“Not yet.” She ran her fingers through his hair, flattening down a cowlick. “Go to the bathroom before we leave. They don’t have any facilities at the storage units.”

Minutes later they were on the road in the SUV, driving through the misty atmosphere that beaded on the windshield, mildly obscuring the way ahead but not quite heavy enough to merit the wipers. Mom was headed to the outskirts of town, rather than to Granny’s house. She explained that they were to meet there to work on emptying the storage unit and then lug the contents away, mostly in a rented van that Granny was bringing.

They came to the complex, a series of concrete units with sliding metal doors, surrounded by a security fence. It was rather isolated, surrounded by winter-weary fields and hackberry trees blackened and shedding with cold. But there was Granny, waiting at the gates in a fifteen-foot U-Haul.

Timmy always thought that Granny looked the least like a stereotypical Granny he had ever met. Most grandmothers he knew had receded into a comfortable frumpiness or into a painful artificial mockery of youth. But Granny looked only a few years older than Mom, slim, wiry almost, just a few creases around her eyes and a touch of grey in her long brown hair. Her age showed itself mainly in her authority and her assurance.

Now she leaned out the truck window and called into the office, “Alright, Mr. Jackson, they’re here now!” The gate crawled open mechanically and with a flash of brakelights she pulled in, Mom following her carefully a vehicle length behind. Timmy looked back to see the chain-link gate trundle shut behind them.

Granny parked at a unit near the back of the lot and hopped out; she was wearing a black scarf tightly knotted over her hair and sunglasses. She seemed impatient of the few minutes it took Mom to park behind her and the two of them to hop out.

“Okay, what’s the project here?” Mom looked around. “I don’t remember this storage company.”

“You wouldn’t. Cecily and George helped me pack this one here. It was after your Uncle Samuel died.”

“Uncle Samuel?” Timmy asked skeptically. “Who’s he? I never heard of him before.”

“You met him though, when you were only about one and a half,” Mom explained. “He was Granny’s older brother. You probably don’t remember, but it was him who gave you Owlie.” She smiled. “We used to call him Uncle Sam-Sam.”

“Really?” Owlie had been his constant companion when he was smaller, the partner of a thousand imaginary adventures. He’d had it so long he never thought of where it came from; it seemed to have always been there. A hollow plastic owl, the paint a little worn here and there, it rested now high on a shelf in his bedroom.

“We just packed his stuff away after he passed.” Granny got out her keyring and bent down to the lock. “Nobody seemed to want it, and somehow it didn’t seem right to get rid of it right away.” With a heave she raised the clattering door. “I haven’t given it a thought for over ten years, except for a bill every month, but now I’ve got to make economies.” She brushed her hands and looked wryly into the shadowy recess of the unit. “I guess we’ll have either a bonfire or one hell of a garage sale.”

Timmy gazed into the unit through a haze of dust that the raising of the door had set dancing in the air of its passage. Inside, the room was half-full of blue plastic bins. They looked old-fashioned, not quite the same kind you could buy now-a-days. Somehow the thick layer of dust and cobwebs floating in the corners made them seem piratical, or relics from ancient times.

Granny groaned.

“And they all weigh a ton, too. We’re in for a hard one.”

“Really? What’s in them?”

“You remember your Uncle Sam-Sam. Books. Thousands of books.”

Timmy blinked.

“Books? You mean real books?” It seemed unbelievable. The last retail bookstore had gone out of business five years ago. He remembered; it was in all the papers. E-books had finally driven them out of existence. There were still barely touched shelves in the library, but mostly people ‘borrowed’ downloads. They had been completely eliminated from schools.

There were still a few used bookstores here and there, but compared to the pennies being charged on downloads, their prices were exorbitant. But Timmy still coveted books; he had three treasured hand-me-down volumes of his own, and something about their feel in his hands and the smell of the paper and the connection to the past thrilled some deep part of him.

“Can I look at them?”

“We’re not going to go digging around just yet,” Granny said briskly. “First we have to clean all these up and get them loaded. Today’s the last day on the rent. When we get them out of here … we’ll see.”

She reached into the van and pulled out a couple of brooms. They all put on battered cotton gloves and then set in to work.  Mom sent Timmy to damp a few hand towels at a faucet at the side of the building. When he got back, she and Granny had wrestled down a bin from the top of a pile, the blue lid gray with dust. They swept it off and Timmy ran the wet cloth over it. Then he hopped up into the van and they raised the bin over the tail. He shoved the heavy container to the back, and then the whole process started again.

The sun lay low in the west and evening shadows lay long before they were done. Timmy had rinsed the rags several times by then; they smelled heavily of sour dust and damp. Mom and Granny were covered with powdery gray. They had filled the van to the top, mother and son heaving the containers into stacks, and now were shoving the last few into the back of the SUV.

Granny dusted herself off and shoved the brooms and towels into the front seat of her van.

“All right, let’s get moving,” she said briskly. “It’s almost five.”

“Where’re we headed?” Mom asked.

Granny sighed.

“It’ll have to be my garage, I guess. And I just got it cleared out! But this junk isn’t staying there long, if I can help it.”

Timmy stood at the back door of Mom’s vehicle, shifting the last bin into place. He stared at it. It came to him suddenly that he was owed at least a little peep into this one, just a quick raise of the lid before they started out. He had been hoisting them all day. Mom and Granny were doing some last-minute gabbing. He reached out furtively and with a little cracking sound he popped the plastic lid up.

Notes

This is just a bit of writing I started this week. The story is loosely set about ten years in the future, when books might start becoming exotic artifacts, and characters are loosely extrapolated from my own family. LOOSELY. It has no title as yet and may indeed never come to any sort of conclusion; I'm just seeing where it might go, if anywhere. It's based on one of my constant fantasies: having a fabulous hoard dropped on me as a kid.

The odd thing is that one day after I started writing my sister Susan (on whom 'Granny' is kind of based) actually started a new clean-out project on one of her store-rooms, working on my nephew's old books and toys. Daffy Duck: "Am I ... a wizard?!"

The Lord of the Rings: The Muster of Rohan (Part One)

 

The Tale

‘Now all roads were running together to the East to meet the coming of war and the onset of the Shadow. And even as Pippin stood at the Great Gate of the City and saw the Prince of Dol Amroth ride in with his banners, the King of Rohan came down out of the hills.’

          The day is going down as they break out of the mountains into hills and the sighing fir-woods below. They follow the falling water to the bottom of the gorge and find the land of Harrowdale before them. The river Snowbourne flows down towards Edoras; to the right is the mountain Starkhorn, blue in the East but stained red in the West by the sunset.

Merry gazes in wonder at this strange land. To him it seems skyless, with steep tree-clad hills on either side. He always had liked the idea of mountains, at least marching along the borders of old tales, ‘but now he was borne down by the insupportable weight of Middle-earth.’ He wants to shut the immensity out with a cozy little room with a fire.

Merry is very tired; they have ridden for three days, slowly but with little rest. Sometimes, when the road allowed, he had ridden at Theoden’s side, telling him tales about the Shire, with the King telling him in turn tales of the Mark and its ‘mighty men of old’ in exchange. But most of the time he has ridden behind Theoden in silence, listening to the ‘slow sonorous speech’ of the Riders behind him, trying to understand it. It seems to have many familiar words, spoken in strange accents, but he cannot piece together the meaning. ‘At times some Rider would lift up his clear voice in a stirring song, and Merry felt his heart leap, though he did not know what it was about.’

But here at the day’s end he feels lonelier than ever, and wonders what Pippin is doing, or Aragorn and Gimli and Legolas. Then with a guilty start he remembers Frodo and Sam as well. He started on this adventure to help Frodo! They are more important than any of the rest, and they must be hundreds of miles away on their journey, if they are even still alive. He shivers.

Notes

Only a couple of pages of this chapter, but I think I must start slowly to position myself again and begin cranking the machinery up after my vacation, as it were. We are given a smooth transition from Pippin (who has had the last two chapters) in the soon to be besieged City to Merry, who is riding with an army to war.

Also in contrast Merry certainly seems closer to his ‘liege-lord’ than Pippin is to Denethor; Pippin’s dialogue with the Steward of Gondor has been to extract information, while Merry and Theoden have been exchanging tales. Tolkien says that some Riders are amused at the little figure of the Hobbit on his stubby grey pony talking familiarly with the King on his great white horse.

It is his contact with the Rohirrim that sparks a scholarly curiosity in Merry. Elsewhere Tolkien states that the Hobbits’ speech bears the same relation to Rohirric as our Modern English does to Anglo-Saxon; the ‘real’ languages are transposed to those of our world. Tolkien clearly means that our reaction to Anglo-Saxon should be like Merry’s: a recognition of ancient kinship, a dim but stirring echo of the past. Perhaps he is even describing his own feelings on being introduced to Anglo-Saxon. Merry’s interest and familiarity with the language of Rohan leads him to writing (among other books) Old Words and Names in the Shire, described as a ‘short treatise’, showing the relationship between the two.

Merry’s remembrance of Frodo not only shows his concern with his cousin and his quest, but jogs our memory too, and places all the pieces on the board in relationship to each other. Little touches like this keep us in mind of Frodo and Sam and the greater mission amid the hurly-burly of war.

Friday Fiction: The Case of Ambrose Abernathy (Part One)

 

THE TESTAMENT OF AMBROSE ABERNATHY

 

     Ambrose Abernathy burst into the director's office, jowls quivering. He was a small man, just short of being a dwarf, but every inch was shaking with outraged dignity. He slammed a sealed folder crookedly onto the edge of the dark oak desk.

     "No more!" he said. He swept off his bell crown topper and ran a trembling hand through his hair. His long curls flew like wings on either side of his thinning scalp. He struck his walking stick firmly on the floorboards. "I am done, do you hear me, Frobisher? Finished! I will not take this, this mockery any longer. I resign!"

     Mr. Frobisher, the longtime director of the Department of Extranatural Affairs, looked up with a rheumy eye. He had been having quite a pleasant nap until the diminutive agent had come storming into his presence. The old man, now well into his nineties, made sure to dress himself in the very latest fashions, though his body always seemed to be crumbling down inside his clothes. He stretched his neck up out of his collar on ropy wattles and peered out under a bushy white thicket of eyebrows.

     "Why, Mr. Abernathy, whatever is the matter?"

     "I joined this organization because I believed! I wanted to test that belief, to prove to society what I felt to be true in my heart, that an unseen world moved, invisibly, side by side with that which was verifiable with the common senses. But case after case I find only frauds and fakes, the chicanery of rogues and the misperceptions of fools!

     "Mr. Frobisher." There were almost tears in his eyes. He held his gloved hands out imploring. "Mr. Frobisher, I know there are wonders all around us. The other agents speak of them unceasingly, wearily, ploddingly. They seem jaded with marvels, bored with the outré monde. I sense the weird in my blood, fugitive, forever fleeing when I turn to pursue. Why am I never given such a case? Is this persecution?"

     "This case." He stabbed the file on the desk dramatically with his forefinger. "This last case is the final straw. You remember what you assigned me? A haunted opera, a walking ghost. By the time I arrived, a gang of nosey juveniles had already apprehended the culprit, a disgruntled singer out for revenge. Their slobbering hound actually had the disguise in his jaws.  It was a sheet, just a plain white sheet, from a bed! I took the criminal off their hands, ready to turn him over to the police, and through gritted teeth had to congratulate the hooligans on a job well done. As I turned away, I swear I could hear their dog grumble some kind of insult in its throat!”

     The tears squeezed out and trickled down the agent's flushed cheeks.

     "Mr. Frobisher, when even the brute creation seems to be mocking your efforts, it's time to quit, before madness ensues."

     Frobisher retracted his neck and appraised Abernathy from the caverns of his clothing, his ancient wrinkled hands netted in a knobby cluster. He saw that the little man had more tears standing in his eyes, and that his bushy, grey-streaked mustache was puffing in and out with indignant frustration, the breast of his waistcoat heaving up and down like an unquiet sea. The old lawyer cocked a bristling eyebrow.

     "If that is what you wish," he finally croaked, "I shall of course accept your resignation. But before I do, I would entreat you to pursue one last mission, to be sure that your decision is not undertaken in the heat of passion."

     He bent down to his desk creakily, like a tired spider, and with some difficulty opened a stiffly groaning drawer. Slowly, almost enticingly, he drew out a slim folder. Abernathy could see it was the pale pink color reserved for puzzling cases that had been investigated but not resolved. Almost involuntarily he raised his brows and sniffed, taking a half-step forward before stopping himself.

     "Why?" he said angrily, drawing back, striking a tragic pose. "Why should I put myself through such demeaning torture again, like a drunkard clutching the bottle for a farewell drink? 'Twere best to have done, once and for all."

     "Let us be pragmatic, not dramatic." The old lawyer placed the folder gently, squarely in the middle of his desk, like a delicate prize. "It may be you will change your mind, once you settle down. It may be you will realize the worth of exposing frauds, amid the chance of a true revelation. How many paying jobs will afford you that opportunity? And, in this economy, where will you find a job that pays so well?"

     "My aspirations ... my hopes ...," Abernathy stammered angrily. "Filthy lucre ..." His voice faltered into silence and his eyes fixated on Frobisher's fingers, which were now caressing the folder with an almost silken touch, as if they were tracing invisible signs and circles on the cardboard cover. He looked up into the old man's face.

     "If I take this one last case," he said sternly, "Then I can go, without hindrance?"

     "You won't hear another word from me against it," Frobisher answered sweetly. "I'll take this meeting as your two weeks’ notice, give you a letter of recommendation, and tell you hale and farewell. Hell, we might even throw you a good-bye party." He nudged the pink folder forward slightly with his fingertips.

     Abernathy hesitated and chewed his mustache, his soft brown eyes darting up to the ceiling, down to the folder, then up again to his director's reasonable, smiling expression.

     "You never can tell," Frobisher said. "This could even be the seventh wave that lifts the boat. This could be, at last, the revelation you hope for."

     The words hung in the air for a long moment. Then the little agent strode forward and snatched up the file with a disgusted sneer, as if to prove that it was not this last blandishment that had broken his resolve.

     "I'll take this case," he said, voice quivering. "And then I'll be back to resign." He turned and headed for the door, then twisted around. "In case you're wondering, I'd like chocolate cake and brandy punch. For the farewell party. I'll be back in a twinkling after resolving this ... this so-called mystery." He stomped out, slamming the door after him.

     Dust tinkled from the rafters in the aftershock, glinting in the afternoon sun. Frobisher settled back into his chair, shutting his weary eyes.

     "Maybe you will." He chuckled dryly. "Maybe you will." In a moment he had drifted off onto wild seas of speculation. A moment after that he began to snore.

 

     Three weeks later Mr. Frobisher, accompanied by his long-time secretary Mr. Williams, appeared at the St. Thomas' Hospital for the Indigent Poor in answer to a telegraphic summons. An unknown patient, deposited anonymously and with no identification, had recovered senses and health enough to finally make himself known as Mr. Ambrose Abernathy, and to ask that Frobisher be notified of his location.

     The neat, wiry Williams, slim writing case in hand, held the heavy oak door of the infirmary open as Frobisher shuffled into the cavernous room, his tapping cane rousing echoes as he entered at a tortoise pace. The place was lined with iron beds covered in cotton mattresses; despite the flowers and the tang of soap in the air, there was also a recurring waft of human decay. The sister in charge rose.

     "Mr. Abernathy, please," the director said, his voice husky in deference to the hushed atmosphere. The scrawny little nun led the gentlemen to an occupied bed about two-thirds down the chamber. It was as well she did, for neither could have identified him. The patient's head was swathed in bandages and at one point his moustache seemed to have been shaved off, the paler skin testifying to its recent denudement. The rest of the body was swaddled like an Egyptian mummy. Frobisher looked down and wondered if they had found the right man.

     Williams turned to the sister.

     "Do you have any chairs? We may be here some time, and the Director, as you see ..." He gestured, as if to indicate his superior's obvious decrepitude. The older man scowled.

     "This way, please," she whispered, and led the secretary back out into the hallway. Frobisher watched them go sourly, thinking that Williams would be just as happy as he for a place to squat while they conducted this business. No reason to bring age into it. When he turned back, he found himself looking into the unmistakable liquid brown eyes and the trembling lip of Ambrose Abernathy.

     "Ah! Abernathy! How are you doing, my boy?" he husked.

     The little man's jaw worked back and forth, like a machine trying to start up, followed by a squeaky whimper that finally pushed out broken words. His eyes squinted in pain, tears squeezing onto his bandaged cheeks.

     "Oh, Mr. Frobisher!" he managed. "The horror! The... horror...!"

     The old man leaned forward and lightly patted the patient with a bird-like claw. The little man winced and squirmed at the gentle weight.

     "There, there, Abernathy, you're safe enough now. We'll take your report and you can tell me all about it, as soon as Williams gets back with those chairs."

     "But, sir, the security of the nation ... perhaps the safety of the entire world..." The bandages wobbled in terror.

     "Can bloody well wait till I get a seat under my hunkers. Where the hell ... Oh, there you are, Mr. Williams. You can put my chair up here at the head (yes, I'll take the one with the cushion, damn ye), and you be sure yours is in the light. Set up your tablets and let's get this man's report so he can rest."

     Abernathy's eyes boggled as the secretary, with an officious little smile, fussily began to set up the chairs, then carefully helped lower the director into his seat, and started to remove writing materials from his battered brown portfolio with careful precision. The little agent writhed on the bed with impatience.

     "Mr. Frobisher," he spluttered. "My report is quite urgent..."

     "Everybody always thinks so," Frobisher said, dismissively waving his hand. "It's always, 'O, brave new world,' ... Well, 'tis new to thee', son, not to me. Are you all set up, Mr. Williams? Good! Then you can go ahead and start, Mr. Abernathy, and begin at the beginning, please."

     The old man leaned forward into Abernathy's face, hands cradled on his cane, eyes hooded like a vulture. Williams looked up and gazed expectantly at him, pencil poised mid-air to take notes. The little man froze for an instant in the sudden attention, then swallowed and blinked, and began to unfold his tale.

 

     He had arrived by coach at the small southerly township of Ashbourne early in the afternoon of October the seventh. By the time he had procured directions to the Kindermass house and found his way to its location, lost in the straggling town outskirts almost three miles away, the sun was already touching the hilly horizon and shadows had started to gather.

     It was an old farmhouse, obviously fancy in its day, that had been overtaken by Ashbourne's sprawling growth. There was an ancient well, about half-way up the overgrown front yard. Desperately parched from his dusty walk, Abernathy had paused, balancing his case kit on the stone lip, and tried to draw up a much-needed drink.

     Here the first of his misfortunes befell him, for a stray knock from his elbow as he struggled with the rusted machinery sent the leather case plunging into the darkness below, scraping and bumping the sides until it landed out of sight with a dry, distant crash.

     For a moment he was overcome with loss. The case kit held all the supplies for any contingency an agent might encounter: salt, rowan twigs, a Bible, an ash stake, a crucifix, holy water, candles, chalk, a gun loaded with silver bullets, a pint of rum, a horseshoe, a five-pointed talisman of green soapstone, and a small explosive device of great power. He had carried it on every mission for eight years.

     The next moment he damned the case and consigned it to oblivion. Good riddance. He had lugged it around for eight long years and never used its contents once; it was practically mint condition. It wasn't even his, in any real sense; it was Bureau property, and as such not even his financial concern. Agents lost their kits or bits of them all the time, just to have them replaced by the department.

     He raised himself up from where he had been gazing down the well's abyss, tugged his coat straight, removed his hat and ran a hand through his sweaty hair. He headed on up to the house, thirst unassuaged but chin held high.

     He could barely make his way to the front door through the profusion of potted plants that crowded the covered porch. He knocked firmly but politely, and while he waited for his summons to be answered he looked around. He noticed that a slow, cooling wind had started to blow, stirring the fronds and tendrils of the congested greenery. He turned his head and saw that a long line of grey clouds had started crawling up behind him. He removed his handkerchief and blotted his streaming face.

     That's about right, Abernathy thought. A nice breeze, just in time to do me no good whatsoever.

     The rattle of the doorknob turned his attention quickly back. The door swung open, and he jumped in horror. He was looking into a bug-eyed, slobbering face with fangs sticking out of whiskered jaws. The next second his gaze re-focused and he realized he was staring at an overweight pug, tucked tightly under the arm of a tall, bony woman in a frilly dress. His eyes tracked upward, and he found himself being examined by skeptical blue eyes set over a blade-thin nose and puckered mouth. An iron-grey bun topped it all. He swallowed.

Notes

The title of The Case of Ambrose Abernathy (aka The Testament of Ambrose Abernathy) can refer to three different things: the case he investigates, the case that he loses down the well, and himself as a case studied by the Bureau of Shadows. Abernathy himself is loosely based, at least in appearance, on Nathaniel Hawthorne, whose portrait graces the head of this tale.

Reference is made, of course, to Scooby Doo, the early cases of which always turned out to have a natural explanation. Abernathy’s loss of his investigating case recalls a similar disheartening loss by Dr. Ambronsius in The Fearless Vampire Killers.

The story itself turns out to be rather Lovecraftian in form, with its hint of cosmic horror and miscegenation. It is also one of the lengthier Tales of the Bureau of Shadows, and must be broken into several parts. It was quite a marathon to write.

 

The Lord of the Rings: The Passing of the Grey Company (Part One)

The Tale

We return to the time and place Gandalf and Pippin parted with Merry. The hobbit joins Aragorn, Gimli, and Legolas. They are all ready to ride. They will go with King Theoden to Edoras, who, after the Nazgul sighting, wants to leave right away under the cover of night to oversee the muster of the Riders of Rohan to go to the aid of Minas Tirith. But he is not sure if that is his road.

Legolas and Gimli declare that they will go with him wherever his way takes him, and Merry begs to go along too. He doesn’t want to be left behind like baggage. Aragorn thinks he will be safer with the Riders. Merry recalls he did promise to tell the King all about the Shire. Aragorn thinks it may be long before Theoden sits in peace in his house to listen to tales.

The company departs; twenty four horses, with Legolas and Gimli riding double on Arod and Aragorn and Merry on Hasufel. The King’s Company have not ridden far past the Fords of Isen when they hear a band of horsemen approaching. Theoden calls a halt and they wait. Aragorn dismounts and stands at the King’s side. Merry feels more like baggage than ever. If there is a fight, what can he do? He can’t flee heedlessly into the wild fields, to be lost again. ‘He drew his sword and tightened his belt.’

They can see dark shapes approaching in the moonlight, horses and riders, spears glinting, uncountable in the dim light but no less than their own company. When they are fifty paces away, Eomer calls for them to halt and asks who rides in Rohan? The pursuers halt, and one man comes forward, hand held open in token of peace. Rohan, did he say? That is good news indeed. They have been looking for Rohan.

Well, you’ve found it, Eomer replies. But none ride here except by King Theoden’s leave. Who are you? ‘Halbarad Dunadan, Ranger of the North I am.’ They are seeking Aragorn, son of Arathorn. They heard he was in Rohan. Aragorn joyfully cries that he has found him. He rushes forward and embraces the newcomer. This is a welcome if unexpected surprise!

Merry is relieved. Not need to die defending the King yet. He had feared some last trick of Saruman. He sheathes his sword.

Aragorn introduces them as kinsmen of his from the North. Halbarad says there are thirty with him, all that could be gathered quickly, but also the sons of Elrond, Elladan and Elrohir ride with them. All are here to answer his summons.

Aragorn replies he sent no summons, except in thought, wishing they were here. He asks Theoden if they may ride with his company, and Theoden gladly agrees. If these kinsmen are anything like Aragorn, they will be ‘a strength that cannot be counted by heads.’

As they ride together, Elrohir (Elrond’s son) tells Aragorn that his father sends this word of advice: ‘The days are short. If thou art in haste, remember the Paths of the Dead.’ Aragorn replies that he’ll really need haste before he takes that road. They will not speak more of it under the open sky.

Aragorn asks Halbarad what he is bearing. It is a tall staff with a furled black cloth bound with many thongs. It comes with a message from Arwen, Lady of Rivendell, Elrond’s daughter. ‘The days now are short. Either our hope cometh, or all hope’s end. Therefore I send thee what I have made for you. Fare well, Elfstone!’ Aragorn now knows what it is. He asks Halbarad to hold it for him for a while yet. ‘And he turned and looked away to the North under the great stars, and then he fell silent and spoke no more while the night’s journey lasted.’

Bits and Bobs

The Grey Company is of course the name given to Halbarad, the Dunadan Rangers, and the sons of Elrond, cloaked in Elven-grey, as they ride to Aragorn’s aid. Halbarad might mean (hal high + barad tower) in Sindarin. Elladan means (el elf + adan man), referring to his mixed heritage through Elrond to Earendil; Elrohir also means (el elf+ rohir knight, man); the brothers were twins, just like their father Elrond (who chose to be Elven) and his twin Elros (who chose to be mortal), first King of Numenor. This makes them distant relatives to Aragorn. They too will have the choice whether to remain Elven or to be human.

Aragorn says he sent no summons; who actually called the Grey Company will be revealed shortly. The Paths of the Dead are mentioned as a possibility; such a name of ill-omen is not good to speak ‘under the open sky.’

Merry begins his journey towards courage to stand in battle; he has been courageous before, but not in this particular way. We are reminded of Arwen, not mentioned since Rivendell; she will come to play an increasingly obvious part in Aragorn’s path of destiny, not least by inspiration. Arwen calls him Elf-stone, ‘Elessar’, which will become his kingly name, after the green and silver brooch Galadriel gave him in Lothlorien.

Arwen’s use of ‘Fare well!’ as two words reminds us of the origin of the word ‘farewell’, not simply as a way of saying goodbye, but as a wish that one will travel (fare’) safely (‘well’) and to a purpose.