Murder in Cormyr (10 page)

back of Rolf’s trousers and lifted, throwing Rolf off balance and propelling him straight ahead toward the front door. Rolf’s head smashed the door open, and the roofer’s body followed it through, given extra impetus by the flat of the mallet laid to his posterior.

“Come back when ye’re in not such a dark mood!” Shortshanks cried. “This is a happy tavern!” Then without a smile he pulled shut the door and glared at me. “And you—don’t be so free with your cheese!”

The dwarf reacted not at all to the howls of laughter from his clientele. He simply went behind the bar and stowed his mallet, and I continued to massage my sore jaw. Rolf, I thought, was a person who would kill a body just as soon as look at him. I wondered what Mayella saw in him. But sometimes women are like that, showing a fondness for the most bestial types. It would not have been beyond such a wretch to have lopped off Dovo’s head for the sheer joy of it.

I toyed with the idea of following him, but I liked not the thought of what he might do if he caught me spying on him. No, I decided, that might best be left for another day.

My nearly full Golden Sands had been spilled in the scuffle, so I ordered another, and decided I would return home to Benelaius after it was emptied.

Grodoveth and Tobald were finally finished eating, and I noticed that Grodoveth signed the bill, which Sunfirth entered into the account book kept behind the bar. From Grodoveth’s appearance at the Bold Bard the night before, and from his sense of comfort and the fact that he had his own account there, I assumed he frequented the place often. And that account book, I realized, would tell me precisely when Grodoveth had been in Ghars.

There was no way, I well knew, to leisurely examine the book there in the tavern. But if I could get it out of the

tavern…

The book was small enough to easily hide beneath my cloak, if I was able to get it in the first place. A distraction would be ideal, but I dismissed the idea of tossing another cheese. The tosser and the tossee fall under equal scrutiny, and I wanted the attention drawn away from me and my end of the bar.

So I pondered while I paid my bill and finished my brew. Then I remembered some little friends of mine.

Two trips to the necessary room in one evening of drinking excites no curiosity, and when I returned to the common room my capacious sleeves were not quite as roomy. I waited until Sunfirth was behind the bar, and then, when no one was looking, I allowed six small mice to run out of my sleeves onto the bar top, and another half dozen to take their chances on the floor.

The effect was more than I had hoped for. Sunfirth gave a cunning little scream and began slapping at the mice with her bar rag, shouting a wordless “Ah! Ah! Ah!” with every blow.

“Vermin!” yelled Shortshanks, who was in front of the bar. “Vermin in my tavern!” He dove behind the bar, nearly knocking over Sunfirth, grabbed his mallet, and proceeded to play whack-a-mouse on the tavern floor while Sunfirth played slap-a-rat on the bar, and the patrons cheered.

In the midst of this merriment, no one noticed yours truly, the founder of the fun, slip behind the bar, slide the account book into my once again empty sleeve, and sidle off into the night. The account book joined Dovo’s cloak and hat in my saddlebag, and I untied Jenkus, mounted him, and rode south out of town.

I had scarcely gone fifty yards when I heard the sound behind me of people coming out of the Bold Bard. At first I thought my theft had been discovered, and that a posse of barflies was coming in hot pursuit. But then I saw that they were only patrons who had had enough excitement for one night and were seeking another watering hole, heading for the more respectable bars of the two inns in town, or the scruffier environs of the Swamp Rat.

Among the escapees were the unmistakable figures of round Mayor Tobald and massive Grodoveth, who mounted their steeds and, instead of heading toward the mayor’s dwelling just north of town, rode south in my direction. That meant, I surmised, that they were heading to the Swamp Rat, and I spurred Jenkus on, thinking to stay well ahead of them and be at the swampside tavern long before they arrived. There were many things that I didn’t like about Grodoveth, and I wanted to observe him further, particularly near the spot where Dovo’s murder had taken place.

I arrived at the Swamp Rat without incident. A couple of anxious drinkers had galloped past me on the way, but I met no one headed toward Ghars. As I have said, the Swamp Rat was a less than elegant establishment. Sawdust and crushed oyster shells littered the floor, as did one or two heavy imbibers. The lights were as low as a goblin’s belly, and jars of greenish pickled eggs sat on the bar, looking about as appetizing as ogre eyeballs.

But they did serve ale, cheap ale at a cheap price, and that was the Swamp Rat’s chief attraction, along with its location, as far as the local farmhands were concerned. I ordered a light ale, which Hesketh Pratt, the owner and sole worker, presented with less than a flourish, but with a smarmy smile on his ratlike face. He was the perfect man to own a tavern called the Swamp Rat. With the first sip of my ale, I knew that its lightness was due to added water. Shortshanks had been right on that count.

After I had removed a small bug from the surface of my glass and taken a few more sips, Grodoveth and Tobald entered. Tobald smiled and hailed me. “Ah, young Jasper! Had enough of the old rat race in town, have you? Rat race? Eh?”

I smiled and nodded. “One more before home and sleep, Mayor. I pray little fuzzy things don’t haunt my dreams.”

Tobald chuckled and sat nearby with Grodoveth, who had been watching me with an emotionless face. I in turn sat and watched Grodoveth, by way of a smoky mirror over the bar. There was little else to do. The Swamp Rat’s patrons were sturdy farmer types whose conversation this night mostly consisted of:

“Hear about that, what’s ‘is name, that feller whut died.” “Devo, was it?”

“Nah, ‘T’wasn’t that… ah, Dovo.”

“Aye. Quite a thing.” “Aye. Murdered he was.” “Aye. Quite a thing.”

“Don’t know what this world’s comin’ to.” “Aye. Don’t know.” “So how’s the barley?”

It could go on like that for hours. At least I had one stroke of luck, if you can call it that. I learned that Farmer Bortas, one of those who Shortshanks told me had seen Dovo’s fake ghost, was sitting in the corner with two other rude tillers of the soil. I went over and introduced myself as Benelaius’s servant. His crinkly old eyes lit up.

“Benelaius’s lad, are ye? Sure and it’s good to have a wizard in our midst, a fine gentleman like that, though I never met ‘im mysel’. You met ‘im, Rob? Will?”

Rob and Will clutched their pipes firmly in their jaws and shook their heads. “Don’t cotton to wizards mysel’,” Will stated out of a corner of his mouth. “Seems unnatural, like.”

“Aye,” agreed Rob.

I figured the only way to get into all of their good graces was to buy them drinks, so I made the offer and they accepted, ordering a pitcher of Shadowdark ale, the most pricey beverage the Swamp Rat served.

“Thankee, young man,” Farmer Bortas said heartily, but the two others merely nodded their thanks, apparently not “cottonin’” to wizards’ servants either.

“So I understand,” I said, getting to it, “that you saw this phony ghost that this fellow who got killed was playing?”

A cloud gathered on Bortas’s face. “Aye, I saw it all right—or I saw him, the cheap faker! Scared me and my good wife out of a week’s sleep, it did. She still wakes up screamin’, ‘0, ‘tis the ghost, ‘tis the ghost!’ and I has to tell her no, it ain’t the ghost, he’s back in the swamp. Now I guess I’ll be tellin’ her there weren’t no ghost to begin with.”

“What was he—this Dovo chap—doing when you saw him?” I asked.

“Hauntin’. My wife seen ‘im first. She grabs me by the arm and says real sharp, ‘Look!’ and I look and there he is. T’was about a quarter mile west of here, where the road curves down closest to the swamp. His face is all green and glowin’ and he starts moanin’ and walks toward us slow like, swingin’ his axe back and forth. Fair gave me the willies, it did. How’s I to know it wasn’t real? So’s I put the whip to old Ned and we tuck off down the road and didn’t slow down till we gets here. We runs inside and tells ‘em all what I seen, and a whole bunch of us goes back to where I seen it—Rob ‘n Will, you was both there, wasn’t you?”

“Aye,” said Rob and Will in unison.

“But there weren’t nothin’ there. Not a blessed thing. Like that man just sunk into the very earth.”

“You searched around then?”

“Oh aye, we searched—just to the edge of the swamp, mind. It took enough gumption just fer us to go that near the swamp at night. But we found nary a thing.”

“Was he carrying anything other than the axe?” I asked, remembering the pieces of broken lantern glass.

“He could’ve had an oliphant in his other hand for all I knew. I just saw that axe a-swingin’, and that was enough for me and the missus.”

“But nothing else… glowing?”

“Just his face. Like a corpse it was.” He shook his head with a mixture of disgust and regret “And like a corpse he is now, sure enough. Met up with someone who played a trick right back on ‘im, rest his soul.” Then he beamed at me again. “But lookin’ at the bright side, we got no ghost spookin’ around anymore.” A similar sentiment, I thought, to Shortshanks’s.

The conversation changed to farming then, but I noticed that Grodoveth and Tobald were standing up, Tobald brushing crumbs off his shirtfront. I strained to hear what they were saying over Farmer Bortas’s droning about oats, and caught Grodoveth saying,”.., too tired to ride back. I’ll just spend the night here.”

And Tobald replied, “Well, I’ve got to get up early and help Barthelm. Are you sure? I hate riding back alone–-“

Then Bortas said something, but I just managed to catch Grodoveth’s words: “… no more ghost. What’s there to be scared of?” He turned to Hesketh Pratt. “I’ll be staying here tonight.”

Hesketh bowed deeply and licked his lips, I supposed, at the thought of a paying lodger. “Very good, Lord Grodoveth. I’ll show you upstairs–-“

“I’ll find it,” said Grodoveth, and clapped a hand on Tobald’s shoulder. “Sleep well, my friend. I know I shall.” And so saying, he went upstairs with a candle that Hesketh handed him. Tobald paid Hesketh for the drinks and, giving me a farewell wave, went outside.

I excused myself from the somnolent discussion, left enough on the table to pay for the drinks, fearing that Benelaius would be annoyed by my profligacy, and went to the door. Hearing hoofbeats, I peered out and saw that Tobald was indeed heading west toward the road to Ghars, looking uneasily about him.

There was no one else outside, so I stepped across the road and looked up at the six second-floor windows. A candle gleamed through the thin curtain that covered one of them, and the shadow’s flickering told me that someone was moving inside. After a few minutes the light went out, leaving the window in utter darkness. I waited another minute, and then walked around to the back of the tavern.

There was only one door that led to the outside from the kitchen, and two windows. Only one small second-story window looked out on the swamp, so I figured the upstairs back consisted of a poorly lit hall.

I remained for another half hour, going from front to back, but Grodoveth’s room remained dark, and no one came out of the tavern save for Farmer Bortas and his friends. I stayed in the shadows so they didn’t see me.

After their departure, Jenkus and I started for home. It was perhaps a mile from the Swamp Rat to Benelaius’s cottage, and I confess I started to drowse almost the instant I was in the saddle. Jenkus’s walking gait is very soothing to the weary soul, and I was nothing if not weary.

I suppose I dreamed the footsteps before I actually heard them. But when they came into my waking mind, I knew that I had not heard the like before. It sounded like two or three horses running behind me with loose shoes, a jittery, clattery kind of sound. But after each clatter was a great thud, so that I knew there was great weight falling on the road. It was a constant da-da-BOOM, da-da-BOOM behind me, and from the sound of it, it was getting closer and closer.

Jenkus had significantly increased his speed on his own, but I spurred him nonetheless before I looked around. When I did look around, I spurred him harder.

It was pitch-black, and we were keeping to the road more by instinct than sight, but I was able to see against the sky behind me what looked like a small mass of men and horses riding all together. Men and horses? Say rather ogres on oliphants. I swung my head around and didn’t dare to look back again.

But I did call back to them, “What is it you want?” thinking that if they cried out, “Your purse!” or “Your life!” they would be less frightening. But there was only silence except for the da-da-BOOM, which now sounded to me like a drum beating my death knell.

Now I dug my heels into Jenkus’s flanks, and he responded wonderfully. I think he was even more frightened than I. He whinnied frantically and put on a burst of speed that ruffled my cloak and blew my hair straight back. I clung to the reins with one hand and the saddlebag with the other, not wanting to lose my ill-gotten evidence.

If we outdistanced the party behind, we would be safe at

Benelaius’s house, thanks to that spell of protection, one of the few spells he had cast since his retirement. It would keep out anything evil unless it were specifically invited, and I certainly didn’t intend to invite whatever was behind me.

Whatever it was, it was falling behind, giving me the leisure to think about what it could be. A band of brigands, the same ones who might have killed Dovo the night before? No, there weren’t enough footprints for a band. Then maybe a posse mistaking me for the killer? Hardly— I’d surely have known about any posse that had formed.

Or was it even, I thought with a chill that shivered me from neck to seat, the ghost of Fastred, tired of such foolishness in his name, galumphing along on hands and feet of razor-sharp axe blades?

Well, whatever it had been, it was gone now. I heard those thunderous, ratcheting footfalls no more. Jenkus and I were making thunderous footfalls of our own. I tried to pull him back to a trot as we neared the safety of the cottage, but he would have none of it, continuing to gallop until I pulled him up hard right by the stable door.