“That’s the truth,” announced the box beneath his ill-kempt arm.
Intrigued, the muskrat stood on his tiptoes and leaned forward. “Now what have you there, traveler?”
“For All-Tails’ sake, don’t listen to it! Don’t pay any attention to it. Pretend it’s not there.” The coati’s expression verged on mania, the muskrat thought.
“You can’t do that.” The light within the box throbbed. “You can’t ignore the truth.”
“The truth?” The muskrat was shobering fast. “What does it mean, the truth?”
“It detects lies and gives the truth.” The coati was almost sobbing. “Always. Whether you ask the truth of it or not.” Water ran down his long snout and dripped from his black nose. “That’s all it does, is tell the bedamned truth.”
The muskrat nodded discerningly. “Now I undershtand your unfortunate condition, shir.”
“Can you help me?” the coati whispered weakly.
“Not I. This ish a matter for greater shkill than ever I posshesshed. But I know of another who might. A wizard of great shkill and experience. He dwells far to the shouth of here, a turtle named—”
“NO!” screamed the coati with sudden force. “I can’t go to him, though I almost would. You see, I stole this from him.”
Again the muskrat nodded. “Are you sure he didn’t curse it on you? I cannot believe from what I have heard of hish reputation that thish Clothahump would be sho foolish ash to deal with anything sho dangeroush.”
“Well, he did. I did steal it from him.” A little (but just a little) of Chamung’s old arrogance crept back into his voice.
“Ah. And you owe your present shituation to forces he has shent in purshuit of you?”
“No,” mumbled the coati miserably. “It’s all the fault of this damnable device. I don’t have the skill to manage it. I don’t know that anyone does.”
“Maybe you should get out of my shop.” The muskrat began to edge surreptitiously toward the curtain. “If the great Clothahump was sho afeared of thish thing that he allowed it to be shtolen, then it is tar beyond my shimple shkiils to mashter.”
“You’re my last hope.” Chamung was begging again. “I can’t go on. I’ve tried abandoning it, leaving it behind, even throwing it into a deep ravine. It follows me wherever I go: sleeping, eating, everything.”
“Once you get attached to the truth,” the box declared, “you can’t just walk away from it”
“You see to what pitiful state I, the great Chamung, king of thieves, am reduced.”
“You’re certainly in a bad way.” The muskrat interrupted his retreat.
“Truth,” quipped the box.
“There may, just may, be one way.” The shopowner was considering the Veritable thoughtfully.
A flicker of life brightened in Chamung’s eyes. “Anything! I’ll do anything.”
“There are tales of a passhage. A means of travel between our world and another. Rumors, gossips, hearshay. If you could enter that passhage and leave this infernal apparatus on the other shide . . .”
“Yes, yes?” the coati prompted him.
“It ish true that you cannot abandon the truth. But it is shometimes posshible to give it away.”
Chamung turned violently on the Grand Veritable. “Well? Does the small fat one speak the truth?”
“He does,” the box reluctantly admitted.
Upon a promise of a lifetime of devoted servitude (which covenant the muskrat thoughtfully had the Veritable verify), the small wizard (semiretired) mounted and led an expedition far to the south of the river Tailaroam, beyond the Lake Region and the Morgel Swamps. There, after a long and most arduous journey, they succeeded in abandoning the Grand Veritable in the far reaches of a certain cave.
Many days passed in retracing then: difficult route until the coati was convinced the curse of truth had been lifted from him, and true to his promise he remained in the service of the shopowner until the day he died, of an excessive imbibulation of a certain high-proof booze.
* * *
In the lightless pitch-black recesses of that singular cavern the Grand Veritable languished, barely active, until one day a pair of children much younger than Squill, Neena, or Buncan stumbled upon it. They wore old blue jeans and carried waterproof flashlights, for the cave was often full of water at that time of year.
Being well-trained children, they did not touch the box but instead brought their grandfather to see it. He was accompanied by their guide, who promptly pushed his hard hat with its carbide lamp back on his head and scratched at his receding hairline.
“Don’t recall ever seein’ that in here before. Damn teenagers is always dumpin’ then- trash around.” The old man tilted his head back, blinking as drip water splashed La his eye. “Must’ve fallen down through a sinkhole or natural pipe.”
The other man played his light over the device’s metal exterior. “Wonder what it is.”
His eldest grandson spoke up. “If it doesn’t belong to the people who own the cave, Grandpa, does that mean we can keep it?”
“Well, Ah dunno.” He looked at their guide.
The old man shrugged. “Looks like junk to me. I’d be beholden to you if you’d get rid of it for me.”
The visitor nodded, bent to examine the battered machine more closely. “Looks like some kind of measuring device. See heah.” He wiped grime from the large glass plate. “Hey, you know what? This is an old polygraph.” He chuckled. “Something Ah sure don’t need in my business.”
“Is it broke, Grandpa?” asked the other boy.
“Ah’m sure it must be, dumped heah like this in the wet and dark. But it’s almost an antique. Spruced up, it might be kind of fun to put in the office. Sure to get a few laughs from the staff.”
He was a big man, even for a Texan, and with the guide’s assistance was able to wrestle the device over to the main trail and back to the cavern’s entrance.
When the prize had been loaded in the back of the visitor’s minivan and the children were in the tiny store buying candy, the guide couldn’t help querying his guest. After all, it wasn’t every day he escorted a private party into Ae far reaches of the cave.
“If you don’t mind my askin’, mister, just what is it you do?”
“Ah’m a state senator,” the big man replied, his distinguished appearance only slightly muted by the dirt streaking his face. “From down neah Corpus.” He patted the muddy metal box fondly. “Can you imagine the kick my colleagues will get from seein’ this in mah office?”
“A lie detector in the Legislature?” Seeing that he was to be allowed in on the joke, the guide permitted himself an easy, agreeable chuckle. “Good thing it don’t work, ain’t it, Senator?”
The big, white-haired visitor smiled. “Now, suh, don’t believe everything you read in the papers, especially the local ones. Most o’ those ol’ cliches aren’t anythin’ moan than that: cliches. There’s a many good folk workin’ up in Austin, an’ a good bit o’ truth an’ honesty prowlin’ the halls o’ yoah state capital.”
Unseen by either man, the box in the back of the minivan began to glow ever so softly.
Son Of Spellsinger Page 42