Scoundrels' Jig (The Chronicles of Eridia)
Page 17
* * *
Bastard Jack, alas, had no more lessons to learn. After the two barmaids and the Snowman vanished, he had just sat there in the dentist’s chair, moaning softly and occasionally begging someone, anyone, to please just kill him.
His body was one writhing mass of pain beyond anything he had ever imagined. Even the sluggish air currents felt like acid on his flayed face. His whole body felt wrong; it felt mangled and alien, as if he had been torn apart and put back together with half the pieces missing. Maybe that was what had happened. He couldn’t exactly remember. Maybe nothing had happened. Maybe there had always been nothing but pain.
No, wait: He remembered the man in the mask, the man with the funny talk and the suspenders and the scalpels.
He emitted a small piteous moan at the horrible memories. Why couldn’t they have stayed forgotten?
Two figures appeared in the still-open doorway, one of them holding a lantern.
Jack couldn’t tell who they were—the light was too bright for his one remaining eye, making it squint and tear up—but they weren’t the Snowman and that was all that mattered.
“Kuh—kill nge,” he croaked.
“I do believe that is Bastard Jack, Mr. Stone,” said the thinner of the two figures.
“I do believe you are correct, Mr. Sand,” said the shorter, portlier figure.
The two men stepped into the room, the short fat one raising the lantern to get a better look at Jack.
“Kill nge,” Jack said again. A tear slid from his eye and trickled onto the raw red meat of his cheek. It stung.
“This appears to be the Snowman’s handiwork,” Mr. Sand said, ignoring Jack’s pleas.
“Interesting,” Mr. Stone said. “I never would have guessed that the Snowman kept his lair so far from Bangle. I would have wagered it was perhaps in one of Bangle’s abandoned buildings, or in the woods nearby.”
Mr. Sand shook his head. “No, had it been in the town’s general proximateness, the constables no doubt would have found it long ago.”
“A logical assessment, Mr. Sand. However, I am far more concerned with the rather alarming fact that, although this is clearly the Snowman’s lair, we do not have the slightest notion of the Snowman’s whereabouts.”
Mr. Sand nodded. “That is an alarming thought, Mr. Stone. Though it is, of course, entirely possible that he is not in his lair, but is out, say, hunting for new victims to entorturate.”
“Or he might be right behind us, Mr. Sand.”
“Um…”
Both of the men whirled around as if expecting to find the Snowman creeping up behind them with a knife in his hand. When they saw no one there, they relaxed. A little.
Mr. Sand grunted. “I think perhaps we should—”
From far off in the building came a faint bang.
Bastard Jack emitted a low, frightened mewling sound.
“Oh, dear,” Mr. Sand whispered.
Frowning with grim determination, Mr. Stone raised his fists. “If necessary, I shall use deadly force. During my otherwise disastrous stint in the army, I learned a dozen different ways to kill a man. And despite what some assert, I am fairly certain that the Snowman is indeed a man. If he crosses me, I shall make certain that that excrement-eating coituser rues the day.”
More sounds echoed down the sanitarium’s corridors: another bang, then a susurration of voices. One of them sounded like a woman’s.
Mr. Stone and Mr. Sand looked at each other in confusion.
“That is almost certainly not the Snowman,” said Mr. Sand.
“A victim, perhaps?”
They listened. The voices in the distance seemed to be holding a calm, casual conversation, though neither Mr. Sand nor Mr. Stone could make out any words.
“I have a suspicion that we are not the only uninvited guests the Snowman has tonight,” Mr. Stone said.
Boots banged on the stairs. Whoever was in the building was ascending to the second floor. Three distinct voices—two men and a woman—could now be discerned.
“Hm,” said Mr. Sand. “I’ll wager that these newcoming individuals are none other than the Yellow Pawns.”
“I will not take you up on that wager,” said Mr. Stone, “for I fear you are correct.”
“I think, then, that our most prudentive course of action would be to hide.”
Mr. Stone stiffened with a frown. “I do not hide, my good man. I was a soldier. Hiding is not a word in my lexicon.”
“Then perhaps we should wait in ambush until they leave.”
He nodded. “That is a brilliant idea, Mr. Sand.”
They softly shut the door to the room, but despite a careful search could find no way to lock it from the inside.
“Let’s just hope they aren’t the intrudinous sort,” Mr. Sand said. He dimmed his lantern until its light was too feeble to be visible through any gaps around the door. Then the two men pressed their ears to the door and listened. Jack emitted another soft whine.
Off in the distance the three sets of footsteps clomped along the hallway leading to the T-junction. Doorknobs rattled wherever they passed.
“None of them are open, Brother Tantora,” said the voice of a young man.
“Keep trying,” said Brother Tantora.
“This does not bode well,” whispered Mr. Stone.
Mr. Sand just shook his head.
The three Yellow Pawns stopped at the T-junction. After a pause, Brother Tantora grunted and said, “Try these, too.”
“Oh, coitus,” said Mr. Stone. “Our ambush shall soon be discovered.”
“Get over on this side of the door,” Mr. Sand said. “It opens inward, in this direction. Perhaps if fortunateness smiles upon us, they shall not think to look behind it.”
“A fornicatingly feeble plan,” Mr. Stone muttered as he joined Mr. Sand. “But better than none, I suppose.”
Mr. Sand turned off his lantern, plunging the room into pitch blackness, and the two men waited in anxious silence.