Return of the Wordmonger

by Stephen Lomer

  “Yes, Your Majesty,” they chorused.

  They left the room and walked toward the north wing in silence. Once they were safely out of earshot, Dick blew out a deep breath.

  “Well that was fun,” he said.

  Weatherbee suddenly turned and grabbed Ms. Fits, pulling her into a tight bear hug.

  “What was that for?” she asked as he released her.

  “The way you spoke up in there,” Weatherbee said. “You were so poised, so confident. I’m very proud of you.”

  “Oh, well,” Ms. Fits said, her cheeks turning pink. “I’m angling to be the youngest inspector in the history of Her Majesty’s Royal Typo Brigade.”

  “And you,” Dick said to Ewan. “Your speech was pretty impressive. Are you angling for my job?”

  “Yeah, you could be the oldest lieutenant in the history of Typo Squad,” Big said.

  “And you could be the biggest pain in the—” Ewan began, but was interrupted by Anne, who had followed them out of the library.

  “Hello?” she called. They all turned.

  “Hello, Anne,” Ewan said, his face lighting up. “Erm—I mean, Your Majesty. What can we do for you?”

  “I was wondering if I might help you.”

  “Help us?” Dick asked. “How?”

  “Well, as Ewan may have let slip, I am immune to typos. Oh, I shouldn’t say immune, actually. I have a hideously embarrassing tic, I’m afraid.”

  “It can’t be any more embarrassing than the tattoo Ewan has on his saggy old ass cheek,” Big said with a grin.

  “Two things, Agent Whig,” Anne said quickly, with a blossoming smile. “First, the tattoo to which you refer is in no way embarrassing. And second, Ewan’s ass cheeks are quite firm.”

  Big made a terrible retching sound as everyone laughed. “My fault,” he wheezed. “I set myself up for that one.”

  “I realize I don’t have the training and experience that you all have, but I know this palace and a great many of the people in it,” Anne said. “I believe I can be an asset to your team.”

  Ewan turned to Dick. “What do you think?”

  “Well, if you’re truly immune, I think it’s a great idea. Yes, by all means, join us.”

  He paused and smiled.

  “And Anne . . . if you wanted to spend more time with Ewan, all you had to do was say so.”

  The team regrouped in their suite.

  “I checked with the captain,” Dick began. “Those two guards outside the royal chambers—the ones with the axes—said no one but royal family members entered or exited the chambers last night. Aside from me, of course.”

  “Whelp, that’s that,” Big said. “Dick is the Wordmonger.”

  “How is that possible?” asked Ewan, ignoring Big. “For that to be true, the Wordmonger would have to be a member of the royal family.”

  “Well it isn’t me,” Anne offered. “And it can’t be Edwin, you saw what happened to him when he saw a typo. As for Ermengarde, I love her, but her sewing machine’s out of thread, if you take my meaning. That leaves the king and the queen consort, who are even less likely culprits than I am.”

  “I still say it’s Wrenchley,” Big said.

  “Will you get off that already?” Dick said irritably. “I know you want it to be Wrenchley, but he’s had a solid alibi for everything that’s happened so far.”

  Big didn’t look convinced, but said no more.

  “Anything else, Dick?” asked Weatherbee.

  “Yes. They’ve tripled security around the royal chambers, and guards will be posted throughout the palace around the clock. Maybe something they should have done right from the start, but I think a typo that close to the royal family really shook the captain’s tree. We’re going to have two guards right outside in the hallway if we need them. And we’ll all be performing regular patrols as well. I’d say we’re as prepared for the Wordmonger as it’s possible to be.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Dick sat by the window in his bedroom later that night, staring at the twinkling London skyline but not really seeing it. He glanced at the small carriage clock on the bedside table and saw it was creeping up on two in the morning. Dick couldn’t sleep.

  In spite of everything that was happening within the palace, he wasn’t thinking about the Wordmonger. He was thinking about Thea.

  He hadn’t realized their cell phones would be confiscated. He had also foolishly thought that they’d catch the Wordmonger on the first day, and he’d be back in the States before he had the chance to miss her. But so much time had already passed and they didn’t seem any closer to figuring out who the Wordmonger was, much less apprehending him.

  Dick couldn’t help but smile as he came to the realization that he really, genuinely missed Thea. It wasn’t the same without her sense of humor, her positive attitude, and her place by his side in their own bed. He wondered what she was doing at that moment, and if she missed him, too.

  A soft knock brought him back to the moment. He rose, crossed the room, and opened the door a crack. Standing there in a pink silk dressing gown was Ms. Fits.

  She was barely recognizable. She had taken out all of her silver earrings, gotten rid of the ebony lipstick and smoky eye shadow she always wore, and slicked her blue-streaked black hair back and away from her forehead. There was simply no denying it—she was beautiful.

  “Sorry, did I wake you?” she asked softly.

  “No, I was up,” he said. “Is everything okay?”

  She nodded. “Listen, there’s something I need to tell you.”

  Oh God, Dick thought, as Big’s words flashed across his brain. Better watch it, boss. Ms. Fits has taken a real shine to you.

  “Oh?” he asked, and swallowed hard. “What’s that?”

  She sighed. “I suppose you already know that the inspector is my father.”

  “Oh. Yeah. He told me that night at the Rough Draught.”

  “Well . . . the thing is, he’s been telling me for a while that it was time for me to grow up and take my Typo Brigade responsibilities more seriously. But I never really saw the point. You know? Most of the time we just sit in our headquarters and sip tea. I can’t even recall the last typo emergency we responded to.”

  “Sitting around and sipping tea would make a nice change of pace for us back home.”

  Ms. Fits smiled. “Well, anyway, since we’ve been here, since I’ve had a chance to watch you and your team in action, I see how important what we do really is. And how seriously it needs to be taken. I mean, you nearly got stabbed in the line of duty, and you were up and right back at it.”

  “Officially, I did get stabbed,” Dick said, touching the wound on his neck that was still healing.

  “I stand corrected. You did get stabbed in the line of duty, and you were up and right back at it. And . . . well, we were all briefed on you before you arrived, and I know that you lost your lieutenant in the line of duty.”

  “Tanka,” Dick said thoughtfully.

  “Yes. And also that your brother Chicago became Anton Nym. And yet, despite all that, you get up every day and you do this job and you’re just . . . exceptional at it.

  “So I guess what I’m getting at is that you’ve inspired me to be better. To do better. And that’s my plan going forward. So thank you.”

  Dick smiled. “You’re entirely welcome. So this is your new grown-up look?”

  Ms. Fits ran a hand through her hair. “Yeah.”

  “You look amazing,” Dick said.

  Ms. Fits grinned from ear to ear, and even blushed a bit. “All right, well, I should get to bed. Good night, Dick.”

  “Good night, Ms. Fits.”

  She turned to walk back across the main room to her bedroom, then paused and turned back. “Call me Hissie.”

  “All right. I will.”

  As they stood there smiling at one another, Dick saw movement out of the corner of his eye. A piece of paper slipped under the door from the hallway beyond.

  “What’s t
hat?” Dick asked, and he crossed to the paper and picked it up, Hissie right behind him.

  He unfolded the page and saw the words SHAME ABOUT THOSE TWO GAURDS, ISNT IT?

  His tic triggered immediately and he felt the room tilt as a drunken sensation swept over him. He reached for the wall to steady himself when an apocalyptic noise filled the room. Hissie had read the note over his shoulder and her own tic had been triggered: a top-of-her-lungs, banshee-like wail louder than any noise Dick had ever heard a human make.

  Dick fell sideways and landed hard on the floor, covering his ears and trying desperately to keep the room from spinning. He saw the other bedroom doors fly open as Weatherbee, Big, Siya, and Ewan emerged to see what was going on. Weatherbee took one look at the situation and ducked back into his bedroom, emerging with a pillow from his bed, which he immediately pressed to Hissie’s mouth. Rather than fight it, she nodded and looked at him with grateful eyes. With the noise deadened, Big and Ewan ran to Dick and knelt beside him.

  “Typo,” Dick managed to blurt out as he pointed in the general direction of the piece of paper. “Under the door.”

  Weatherbee handed the pillow to Hissie to hold against her own mouth and threw open the double doors that led to the hallway, Siya at his heels. Big and Ewan helped Dick to his feet and guided him out as well.

  The long, wide hallway was empty, except for the bleary-eyed staff members standing in the doorways of their own rooms, tying their robes and looking baffled.

  “Did any of you see anyone in this hallway?” Siya cried in a surprisingly strong voice, and Dick could see them all shaking their heads.

  Hissie stopped screaming and joined them outside the room. She had only been there a moment when she said clearly, “Oh, shit.”

  Dick looked drunkenly at her, then followed her gaze. He felt the effects of his tic drown under a surge of adrenaline at the sight of two members of the King’s Guard, their bright red jackets contrasting sharply with the dark blue carpet, lying in heaps on the hallway floor.

  Despite his size, Big was the first to reach them. On the floor between them was a slip of paper. Big picked it up.

  “Fuckstick!” he shouted. “Ass shit!”

  Siya ran to his side and grabbed the slip of paper from him, and without looking at it, flipped it over and placed it back on the carpet, face down. She put her hand on his back and rubbed it.

  “Cock stuffer! Pussy bait!”

  “It’s okay,” Siya said soothingly. “Get it all out.”

  Weatherbee ran over to the guards and put two fingers to the neck of one, then the other. He stood and called to a young blonde in the doorway of the next room down from theirs.

  “Alert the captain of the King’s Guard,” he commanded. “They’ve been murdered.”

  The days following were chaotic, to say the least.

  The captain of the King’s Guard was beside himself and demanded answers from every member of Typo Squad and Her Majesty’s Royal Typo Brigade, but none had any answers to give. He nonetheless grilled each for hours, demanding every detail of the night in question.

  The two pieces of paper—the one slipped under the door and the one found by the dead guards, which Big had told them read YOUR SERVISES WILL NO LONGER BE REQIRED—had been carefully preserved and shipped off to the same specialized forensics lab that had studied the two signs, but the results came back the same. There had been no fingerprints and no fibers, and as there were no known handwriting experts who were immune to typos, that was a dead end as well.

  The word that deaths had taken place within the walls of Buckingham Palace had somehow reached the press, and they were relentless in their pursuit of any scrap of information. They had set up a massive encampment of tents across the street, with cameras pointed at the palace night and day.

  Dick was disconsolate, and knew the others were as well. They had failed at the very thing they had been brought in to prevent. They spoke very little and picked listlessly at their meals, which were retrieved mostly untouched.

  The only pleasant conversation came a few days after the murders. During breakfast, Weatherbee looked up at Ms. Fits. “I’ve been meaning to say, your new look is lovely.”

  She smiled and said, “Thanks, Dad.”

  “Dad?” Big and Siya chorused.

  “Yes,” Weatherbee said proudly. “Ms. Fits is my daughter.”

  “Hissie,” she said. “You can call me Hissie now.”

  Dick saw tears sparkling in Weatherbee’s eyes. “Your mother would be very pleased with that.”

  Hissie reached over and took his hand, squeezing it.

  They patrolled the palace alone and in pairs, past the grim-faced guards that had been posted seemingly everywhere, past the servants and staff members who met them with accusatory glances as they passed. The frustration and fear hung low and thick in the air.

  Anne acted as a liaison between the team and the royals.

  “My mother was quite emotional as she wrote letters of consolation to the families of those poor guards,” she said. “Ermengarde is sad because my mother is sad. Edwin has locked himself in his room, terrified of what he might do if a typo reaches him. And my father, of course, has no idea what’s going on.”

  After another long and fruitless patrol, Dick and Weatherbee met the others in the shared room. Everyone looked exhausted.

  Dick rubbed his eyes and said, “Okay. That’s enough for tonight.”

  Everyone rose from the table and bade each other goodnight. Weatherbee, Hissie, and Siya retired to their respective bedrooms. As she closed her door, Siya smiled over her shoulder at Big, who smiled back. Dick shook his head.

  Ewan and Anne had taken each other’s hands and were looking deep into one another’s eyes, as though they were the only ones in the room. Dick and Big both turned and hurried off to their own bedrooms.

  Dick had just turned off the light and had one leg already in bed when he heard the soft rattling of a doorknob. He felt a surge of adrenaline and crossed to his door, opening it just a crack as softly as he could. He saw Big tiptoeing across the main room toward Siya’s door. Dick ran across the room, snagging Big by the collar of his pajamas.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” Dick hissed.

  “I was, uh, just checking . . . on the weather,” Big whispered unconvincingly. He gestured at the window. “And as you can see, it’s still raining. Just like always.”

  “Checking on the weather.”

  “Yep. That and nothing else.”

  “But Siya’s room is farthest away from the window. Why were you were moving toward Siya’s room if you were checking on the weather?”

  “Oh, well,” Big whispered, shrugging. “You’ve seen ’em. They drive on the left side of the road over here. I’m bound to have difficulty with direction.”

  Dick folded his arms.

  “Okay, yes, fine, I was going to Siya’s room. But only to ask if I could borrow her teddy bear.”

  Dick stared.

  “I forgot to tell her to not let the bedbugs bite?”

  Dick’s eyes narrowed.

  “Oh, all right!” Big whispered. “I was going over there for the exact reason you think I was going over there. Happy?”

  “Big—”

  “Dick, c’mon,” Big said. “Siya is totally into me. I find that very attractive in a woman.”

  “With everything that’s going on . . .” Dick said, but he trailed off as Big’s eyes suddenly went wide. “What?”

  “Look!” Big hissed, and Dick followed his line of sight to the main door.

  A piece of paper had been slipped under the door while they’d been talking.

  “Check it!” Dick hissed. Big retrieved it and read what was written there.

  “Fucknuggets!” Big said, jamming his hand over his mouth to deaden the sound. “Jizz dumpster!”

  Dick held his finger up to his lips and Big nodded. Dick opened the main door silently. He and Big leaned out and looked down the hallway. At the fa
rthest end, they just caught sight of the hem of a red robe turning the corner.

  Don’t spook him! Dick mouthed wordlessly to Big, who nodded. They burst into the hallway on the balls of their feet and sprinted softly to the end. As they turned, Dick spotted a tall man in a red bathrobe making his way along toward a stairway landing.

  “Freeze!” Dick cried, and the figure stopped suddenly.

  “Turn around!” Big shouted, and the man did so.

  “Evening, chaps,” said King Edmund as he turned, retying the belt around his red robe. “What’s all the ruckus?”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Dick stood there like a statue for a few long moments, unable to believe the scene he and Big had found themselves in, and then out of the corner of his eye saw Big bow his head. Dick followed suit and they both said, “Your Majesty.”

  The king looked around, an easy grin on his deeply lined face, and then at last it seemed to come to him. “Oh, you mean me!” he said, delighted. “Yes, of course. I was a Majesty before you lads were born. Now then, what’s going on? I thought I heard shouting a moment ago.”

  “Yes, you did,” Big said. “That was us.”

  “Well you don’t want to be making a racket like that at this hour!” the king chastised them. “You’ll wake the whole bloody palace!”

  “Your Majesty,” Dick said, taking a tentative step forward, “I need to ask you a very important question.”

  “Do you indeed?” the king asked, still with that benign smile that seemed to indicate he had no idea what was going on. “Well you’d better crack on, then. I’m certainly not getting any younger.”

  Dick stole a quick glance at Big, who nodded in encouragement.

  “Did you slip a piece of paper under a door at the other end of that hallway?” Dick asked, pointing in the direction they’d come.

  “Oh, indeed, yes,” the king said, putting his hands in the pockets of his robe and nodding serenely.

  Dick was trying to decide which of many follow-up questions he should ask next, but approaching footsteps interrupted his thought process. Two members of the King’s Guard rounded the corner and, spotting the king, pushed roughly past Dick and Big.