Barnabas Tew and The Case Of The Missing Scarab

by Columbkill Noonan

  “To say the least!” said Wilfred.

  “And how, exactly, did she kill everyone?” asked Barnabas, peeping from behind his fingers.

  “Well, she’s a cow-woman, you see,” said Bes. “So, you know, with her horns.” He made stabbing gestures with his hands held atop his head, causing his tongue to swing violently back and forth. “And of course there were her hooves.” Now he balled up his fists and punched them in the air. Barnabas and Wilfred cringed in their seats. “So,” said Bes brightly. “If you’re ready, I’ll take you to her right now!” Unceremoniously he rose and collected their cups, even pulling an unfinished sweetmeat from between Wilfred’s fingers. “Shall we?” he said.

  “Splendid,” said Barnabas sadly, shaking his head, not pleased at all at the prospect of interviewing yet another bloodthirsty god. Still he could see no reasonable way to refuse to go, and so, sighing, he stood up and motioned for Wilfred to do the same. Together, they followed Bes out of the tree house so that they might be delivered to Hathor, the angry cow goddess of the desert.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Once outside, Bes reached out with his long arms and scooped up Barnabas and Wilfred so that they were lifted entirely off of the ground. “Oh my!” exclaimed Barnabas. His cry was cut off as Bes began to whirl in circles (quite sickeningly, thought Barnabas) and rose like a cyclone up into the air. A mighty noise sounded as Bes began to fly, creating a great vortex of air that sucked in leaves and insects and even a startled bird or two.

  They flew in this fashion, spinning and twirling in Bes’ arms, until at last they began to descend. They landed in the midst of a great desert that was covered almost entirely with yellow sand and punctuated here and there by prickly green cacti.

  Bes deposited them carefully down upon the sands, where they, feeling very ill indeed, promptly fell upon their bums. “Well, here you are then,” said Bes jovially. “I suppose I’ll be off. Unless you’ll be needing a ride back…”

  “No, no, that’s quite all right,” Barnabas managed to squeak. He was finding it quite difficult to maintain control of his lurching stomach, and he had no wish whatsoever to repeat the experience. A quick glance towards Wilfred (who looked quite green about the gills, so to speak) confirmed that his assistant felt the same.

  Barnabas tried to look around and take in their new surroundings. A great marble palace stood directly in front of them, rising majestically from the warm desert sands. Barnabas was certain it must look quite pretty if only the world would stop spinning around it.

  He shook his head, closed his eyes, and then opened them again. Finding that the dizziness had yet to pass, he groaned and repeated the process until at last he began to feel himself steady a bit.

  “Well,” he said to Wilfred, “that was exceedingly dreadful.”

  “Quite,” moaned Wilfred, whose voice was muffled due to the fact that he had somehow managed to bend himself almost entirely in two from the cross-legged position in which he sat so that his face was nearly buried in his lap.

  “Are we agreed then,” said Barnabas, “to politely decline if Bes is ever disposed to offer us a lift again?”

  “Yes, please,” said Wilfred, lifting his head and blinking rapidly.

  Barnabas, feeling nearly recovered, drew his legs up beneath him. He carefully stood up, and slowly turned so he was pointed in the direction of the palace. Finding that he had regained his equilibrium, he proffered a hand to Wilfred. “Shall we?”

  Wilfred nodded, grasped Barnabas’ extended hand, and rose laboriously to his feet. He closed his eyes and swayed a little, arms out to his sides for balance. Barnabas waited patiently until Wilfred had steadied himself, then led the way to the great shining palace.

  Copious amounts of sand fell from their robes as they climbed the hard, polished steps to the entrance. They had, after all, just been sitting in the sand, and once one gets sand in one’s robes, it tends to take an absurdly long time for one to get it all out again. Therefore, the sand slid and bounced and clattered about their feet with each step they took up the stairs. The cow-headed guards, who had watched as they were rather ignominiously deposited upon the ground by Bes, snickered in amusement.

  Reaching them, Barnabas held his head high and mustered all the dignity he could, considering the incredible amount of sand that still slid from his robe to puddle at his sandaled feet. “We are here to interview Hathor,” he said with as much grandeur as was possible. “We are on official business. We were sent by Anubis and have been brought here by none other than Bes.”

  One of the guards managed a straight face, although the struggle not to laugh showed in his eyes. “We know,” he said. “We saw you arrive.” The corners of his mouth twitched.

  “And just what, pray,” said Barnabas tightly, “is so amusing?”

  “Nothing, sir,” said the first guard, staring carefully straight ahead, his face a mask of careful nonchalance.

  The other guard, however, was not nearly as stoic as the other, and had a bit of a mischievous streak. “Yes, indeed we did,” said he. “We saw you land just there.” He pointed at the place where the sand bore two indentations roughly the size of Barnabas and Wilfred’s hind ends.

  Barnabas turned to look where the fellow had pointed. His motion caused a small whirlwind of sand to waft up around him. Two loud giggles escaped the guards.

  “Oh yes,” said Barnabas indignantly. “I suppose you two could have managed a better landing.” He sniffed, offended.

  “Very sorry, sir,” said the first guard, not looking at all sorry, really.

  “I should say so!” retorted Barnabas. “This is most unprofessional.”

  “Very sorry,” repeated the guard, whilst the other continued to snicker uncontrollably. “Hathor is just inside. Please make yourself at home and she will be with you directly.” He turned to open the door, and though Barnabas and Wilfred could see his shoulders shaking with scarcely controlled mirth, the guard managed to usher them into the palace with some degree of decorum. “Two visitors for Hathor,” called the guard into the large antechamber in which they now found themselves. “Sent by Anubis and brought here directly by Bes.”

  That statement brought on a second fit of laughter from the second guard, so that the first one, finding his fellow’s mirth contagious, had to shut the door hurriedly to avoid laughing directly in their faces.

  “Well I never!” exclaimed Barnabas. “The rudeness! The affront!”

  “I suppose we may have looked quite amusing, landing the way we did,” offered Wilfred, trying to smooth over the situation.

  “And I suppose they would have managed a graceful landing, eh?” demanded Barnabas.

  “I think that no one could,” said Wilfred soothingly. “Still, they are just guards and beneath our notice. Let them laugh a bit.”

  “You are a more patient man than I, Wilfred,” said Barnabas. “I simply cannot bear the course behavior of people such as that. It is shameful.”

  “Most shameful,” agreed Wilfred.

  “And to think that they are making fun of us when they themselves have the heads of cows instead of proper heads!”

  Wilfred, finding it prudent to avoid pointing out the fact that Barnabas and Wilfred themselves were currently in possession of animal heads of their own, nodded.

  “Being laughed at by cows, can you imagine?” continued Barnabas. He opened the door behind them a crack so that he might address the still-laughing guards outside. “Where are your bells, you silly cows?” he sniped. “Did you lose them whilst you were being milked, Bessie?”

  A woman’s voice interrupted Barnabas before he could give the guards what-for any further. “You find it amusing to make fun of cows?” she asked, her voice quiet but commanding.

  Barnabas whirled, hurriedly letting go of the door so that it slammed shut behind him. A large woman, seven foot tall or more, was walking towards them slowly. She wore a shimmering robe of brown, white, and black, and atop her shoulders was the enormous head of a c
ow.

  The regality of her bearing, the authority in her voice, and the soft glint of danger in her wide brown eyes led Barnabas to know that this woman could only be Hathor.

  “Oh!” he gasped as she approached and stopped to stand only inches from him and Wilfred, her brindled robe swirling as she leaned in to look closely at him.

  “Well, do you?” she demanded, her nose nearly touching Barnabas’ own.

  “Dear me, no,” said Barnabas hurriedly, his whiskers twitching violently with nervousness. He had seen enough of angry gods in this place and had no wish to find out what this Hathor might do if he annoyed her enough. “It’s just a turn of phrase, I suppose. Of friendship! Yes, it is a friendly phrase!”

  Hathor frowned. “A phrase of friendship, you say?” She narrowed her eyes. “Do not think to toy with me or to deceive me,” she warned.

  “No, really, I meant it quite nicely!” insisted Barnabas. “As in, ‘here, would you like a nice bell?’ It’s all meant in politeness, you see.”

  Wilfred, seeing Barnabas struggle and, further, seeing that Hathor was far from believing his rather flimsy subterfuge, stepped in. “Indeed, it is so,” he said, bowing gallantly to their hostess whilst preparing to lie through his teeth. “In our country people commonly ask others if they’d like a bell. It’s a greeting of sorts.”

  “Huh,” said Hathor dubiously. “Seems a silly sort of thing to say.” She sighed and pulled back a bit so that Barnabas let out a breath of relief. She turned to walk towards a chaise longue that stood at the far corner of the room, beckoning for Barnabas and Wilfred to follow. “Still, I suppose different peoples do have all sorts of odd customs, so I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt.” She whirled about dramatically, bristling her eyebrows up and down so that Barnabas quickly sucked back in the breath that he had just let out. “For now.”

  Seeing their nervousness, she laughed. Barnabas and Wilfred looked wide-eyed at each other, alarmed. Clearly this woman was enjoying toying with them, and they knew that they must be extremely vigilant in order to avoid offending her again. And they knew all too well by now how very difficult it was to avoid trespassing upon the unpredictable sensibilities of yet another capricious god.

  “So,” began Barnabas carefully once Hathor was seated comfortably upon her chaise, “Bes brought us here so that we might ask you, very respectfully of course, if you know anything about the disappearance of Khepre.”

  “You mean to accuse me of kidnapping Khepre?” Hathor demanded, her eyes narrowing once more.

  “Oh no,” said Barnabas quickly. “Never that, my fair lady!” He cleared his throat nervously. “I only meant… I mean, that is to say…Well…”

  “Out with it!” demanded Hathor.

  “Only that perhaps you might know something regarding persons of interest,” squeaked Barnabas.

  “And who, may I ask, are they?”

  “A god named Montu,” said Barnabas. “Probably you’ve never heard of him. He’s not terribly important anymore from what I hear. Terribly sorry to have wasted your time. We’ll just be seeing ourselves out…”

  “Nonsense!” said Hathor. “Of course I know Montu. In fact, here he is right here. He was passing through on some business of his own and stopped in to pay his respects. You can speak to him yourselves.” She snapped her fingers and waved to a man across the room, beckoning him. “Montu, dear,” she said sweetly. “These two visitors would like to ask you some questions.”

  Barnabas and Wilfred’s eyes widened in dismay as Montu walked towards them. Wilfred leaned in to Barnabas to whisper ironically, “How lovely. Another falcon. If only we had been turned into something, oh, I don’t know….”

  “A bit less dinner-like?” supplied Barnabas. Wilfred nodded.

  Soon enough said falcon had joined them, and Barnabas swallowed noisily as he took in the predatory way that Montu looked from himself to Wilfred and back again. “Well?” squawked Montu. “What do they want with me?”

  “Mind your manners,” corrected Hathor in a tone one might use to reprimand an ill-behaved child. Barnabas saw Montu bristle at the insult and thought that he might argue with the formidable cow goddess, but the falcon-headed god merely pressed his beak shut and inclined his head in deference to Hathor.

  Hathor motioned to Barnabas, inviting him to question Montu for himself. So Barnabas cleared his throat and put his hands behind his back, affecting a posture that he thought must appear very official and lawyerly-like.

  “We have reason to believe,” he began, speaking in a stentorious voice as he paced back and forth sedately before Montu, “that you are harboring refugees from the household of none other than Khepre, someone with whom you have been known to be at odds in the past, and, moreover, someone who is now currently missing.”

  Barnabas paused, waiting for Montu to respond. Unfortunately, however, he had stopped at the apogee of the ellipse that he had been describing on the floor so that he was turned to face almost entirely away from everyone. Also, no one was quite certain if he had asked a question, exactly, and so no one spoke.

  “Well, what say you?” demanded Barnabas, shooting a dramatic, penetrating glance over his shoulder at his falcon-headed quarry. He waggled his eyebrows up and down in a way such as he imagined Sherlock Holmes doing whilst confronting villains. The effect, however, was far from intimidating, considering Barnabas’ current mousy appearance.

  Wilfred saw Barnabas’ efforts to appear authoritative and intimidating, and whilst he inwardly applauded any efforts that Barnabas made to behave with more confidence, he also saw the dismissive expression on Montu’s face and wished heartily that his employer had been able to pull it off just a bit better.

  Montu smirked and chuckled. “Well, what off it?” he asked, his tone somewhat belligerent.

  “Aha!” exclaimed Barnabas. “So you admit to taking in some of Khepre’s servants?” He tried to bristle his eyebrows even more dramatically, and Wilfred looked down at the floor to avoid seeing the spectacle.

  “Well, why ever wouldn’t I?” said Montu, shrugging.

  “Because Khepre is your sworn enemy, that’s why!” cried Barnabas.

  “Sworn enemy might be overstating things a bit,” said Montu. “I needed a servant. The woman came to me, and so I hired her.”

  “But you don’t deny that Khepre was instrumental in your deposition from the heights of the pantheon to your current, well, less lofty state?”

  Montu bristled, clearly offended. “Now you listen here!” he snapped. “I’m still a god, and a falcon besides. What are you? A detective? And a mouse, no less. A quite tasty one, I’m sure.”

  “Now, now, Montu,” interrupted Hathor. “That’s quite enough. Apologize to our guest, who is merely doing his job.”

  “But I don’t want to,” said Montu petulantly.

  “Do it anyway,” commanded Hathor.

  Montu looked down at his talons and mumbled under his breath.

  “What?” said Hathor. “We can’t hear you.”

  “I said I’m sorry,” said Montu in a tone that suggested he was not in the least bit sorry at all.

  “Hmmph,” said Barnabas, unmollified.

  Hathor sighed. “You can go now, Montu,” she said, waving him off dismissively. “Ugh. What a trial these older gods can be. Ridiculous egos that must be placated every moment of the day.” She rolled her eyes. Montu, who had not got very far, heard what she said and turned back to glare at Barnabas and Wilfred. He snapped his beak in the manner of a raptor snatching up a meal, then pointed a wing significantly at them before striding off.

  Barnabas and Wilfred cringed at the obvious threat as Montu stomped off in a temper, his sharp talons slapping and scratching along the marble floor. Hathor, however, seemed oblivious to their discomfort.

  “So, will that be all?” she asked, contemplating her hooves, obviously bored now and hoping to be rid of them.

  “Well, ah, I suppose so,” said Barnabas.

  “Unless you have
anything helpful to add?” asked Wilfred, without much optimism that she would.

  “I’m sure that I don’t,” said Hathor. “You’ll be on your way, then?”

  “Of course,” said Barnabas, bowing slightly to the lady and turning on his heels to stride off with as much dignity as he could muster. Wilfred followed, but he nearly collided with his employer’s back as Barnabas stopped abruptly and turned back around.

  “Yes?” said Hathor with another sigh.

  “I don’t want to presume on your hospitality,” he said, “but we could certainly do with some assistance with transportation. I’m sure that Anubis would be most grateful for any help you might give us, to facilitate the completion of our work.”

  “And where will you be going?” asked Hathor. She still looked down at her hooves as though bored, but Wilfred thought that her disinterest suddenly seemed a bit feigned. He also saw a keen glint in her eye as though she were a good deal more interested in where they might go than she wanted them to know.

  “Oh, I think that we will go back to Bes, to see if he has any other ideas,” said Barnabas lightly.

  “Very well,” said Hathor. “See Faas outside. He will see to lending you a chariot.” With that, she stood and walked off with no further ado. The interested light had gone from her eyes the moment Barnabas said they would go back to Bes, and Wilfred wondered what it all might be about.

  Barnabas called out their thanks to the back of the retreating goddess, and then he and Wilfred let themselves out of the grand palace. Luckily Faas proved easy to find, as he was standing just outside and had a nametag on his robe. They told him their needs, and he summoned a chariot immediately.

  They climbed into the chariot. “Where am I taking you?” asked the driver.

  “To Bes’ house,” said Barnabas, nodding to Faas in thanks. The driver clicked the reins and they were off.

  Wilfred, doubting if they would get any further information from Bes, at last ventured to say, “Are you quite certain we should go back to Bes? I feel as though he has told us everything he knows…”