E.Godz

by Robert Asprin

  "What?" Teddy Tumtum's glass eyes almost bugged out of his head. "I must have a really big ball of loose stuffing in my ears. I could swear I just heard Peez Godz admitting defeat. That's not the girl I sleep with talking! So the witch-queen blew you off; so what? You've got those Egyptian guys on your side."

  "Oh, please, that bunch of idiots?" Peez sighed. "That's not a religion, it's an extended frat party, a bunch of Baby Boomers trying to hold onto their youth with both hands and no holds barred on looking ridiculous. Why follow the Grateful Dead when you can mummify them?"

  "Now who's being sarcastic?" Teddy Tumtum asked, folding his chubby arms.

  "Doesn't it bother you, Teddy Tumtum?" Peez asked.

  "Doesn't what bother me?"

  "The fact that the Chicago group is about as spiritual as a sack full of tacos. At least Fiorella seems to believe that what she does is something more than just an excuse to wear funny costumes, get together with her old college pals, and party."

  "Right, because she's got an excuse to wear sexy costumes, get together with a bunch of new people, and party."

  "Oh, come on!" Peez exclaimed. "You know that's not true. She really does care about raising the power of the old earth magic. I can't vouch for her followers—for some of them, it probably is just an excuse to let it all hang out—but for Fiorella— It's not like that for her. I can tell. For her it's about real power, and she didn't want to have anything to do with me. I'm not worthy."

  "And Dov is?" Teddy Tumtum snorted, then melted into more of his stomach- churning baby-talk mode. "Duzzums Peezie-pie need a dweat big warm mooshy dollop of self-esteem, hmmmm? Izzums all droopy-woopy 'cause 'ums t'ink dat nasty ol' baby bruvver got the chops an' 'oo doesn't?"

  Just as Peez felt drops of syrup crystallizing on her eyelashes from all the sweet talk, the bear did an instant presto-changeo from goopy guru to boot camp drill sergeant and barked: "So ****ing what if he does, woman? He does not matter! Repeat: Dov Godz does not matter, what he may or may not be doing does not count, as far as you are concerned he does not exist from this second until the glorious moment of triumph when your mama passes full and complete control of E. Godz, Inc. into your hands. Do you copy that, soldier?"

  "Soldi—?"

  "I said, do you copy that?!"

  "Sir, yes sir!" Peez barked back.

  "I can't heeeeearrrrr youuu!"

  "Sir, yes sir!"

  "Now you rise up, you get some coffee into your sorry gut, and you march yourself right out of this hotel room and off to your next battle. And that is a battle which you will win, is that clear?"

  "But I—"

  "I said, is that clear?"

  "Sir, yes sir!"

  "Good. Now move 'em out!"

  Fully under Teddy Tumtum's control, Peez snapped to attention, slapped the bear to Right Shoulder Arms, and marched out of her hotel room on the double. Just as the door swung closed behind them, she shook off his charismatic spell long enough to say, "Coffee's not a bad idea. Know where I could get some?"

  "You want to know where you can get coffee in Seattle?" The sound of a teddy bear plotzing from shock echoed through the hotel corridors.

  * * *

  Martin Agparak was not having a good workday. Because of the nature of his craft, he labored in a more-or-less open-air situation. The tools of his trade were sheltered from the weather in a series of watertight cupboards that were in turn mounted on the back wall of a large shed. The shed itself looked as if it had encountered a giant with a chainsaw who had sawed it neatly in half, right along the rooftree, leaving it with the same three-wall construction favored by dollhouses everywhere. Martin's actual workspace was outside the halved shed, a suitably huge open area roofed only by a tarp. It was just what he needed.

  The problem in general was, when you worked out in the open like that, some people considered it to be a likewise open invitation to no-holds-barred kibitzing. They refused to understand that you could be distracted and that you did not want to listen to their ongoing stream of unwanted conversation.

  The problem at the moment was that not all such clueless people were, well, people.

  "So then she says to me, she says, 'Do you know where I could get some coffee around here?' and I say to her, I say—"

  "Teddy Tumtum, shut up." Peez picked up the garrulous bear and tossed him back over one shoulder. He landed in a big pile of sawdust.

  Sawdust, like rain and coffee, was everywhere.

  Martin Agparak watched the bear's trajectory and ultimate soft landing dispassionately. "Sounds like one of Edwina's creations," he remarked. "Same kinda pushy."

  Peez felt her face color up. "That's not how I would describe it," she said.

  "Sure. She's your mother." Martin leaned back against the trunk of what had once been a towering pine tree. When Peez had first come into the glorified lumberyard that served as his studio, he'd been in the process of removing the last of its bark. Her visit had forced him to put off beginning the real work. He wasn't too pleased by the interruption and he didn't mind showing his displeasure by being rude.

  "If you find her style to be so abrasive, why have you signed on with E. Godz, Inc. in the first place?" Peez asked somewhat sharply.

  Martin shrugged. He was a young man in top physical condition, and the Mariners singlet he wore to work in showed off his muscular arms to advantage. A simple shrug from him should have been poetry in motion, but his attitude reduced the poetry to a men's room wall limerick.

  "Because I can use the contacts that membership gives me," he said. "You know the old saying about us Eskimos: We got thirty-seven words for snow but not one for networking."

  Peez's brow creased. "I thought you called yourselves Inuit. I thought that Eskimo wasn't—"

  "Was, wasn't, was again, who cares?" A pair of safety goggles was perched atop his head. Now he pulled them back down over his eyes and turned his back on Peez, the better to study the log before him. "That's the sort of thing that bothers the folks whose ancestors were actually native to this place; not me. As an Eskimo, I'm a real out-of- towner. I'd call myself Tinkerbell if it gave me a bigger market share."

  He pulled a piece of chalk from the back pocket of his skin-tight jeans and made a few preliminary markings at one end of the log. Peez recognized the stylized face of Raven. Moving down the log, Martin Agparak sketched in quick succession the images of Bear, Wolf and Salmon, then paused for a moment at the bottom of the severed trunk, thought long and hard, then added the final face.

  "What—?" Peez peered at the chalked lines, trying to recognize which spirit the young Inuit artist had chosen to invoke for his totem pole in the making. Try as she might, she couldn't figure the last one out at all. "What is that supposed to be?"

  "Huh?" Having finished the drawing, Martin was now over at his workbench, selecting a chainsaw of the proper size with which to begin the actual carving. "Oh. I guess you don't have kids." He popped on a pair of soundproof earphones. "If you did, you wouldn't just recognize that one, you'd probably be trying to kick the crap out of it." He found the saw he wanted and revved it up. "Don't worry; it'll look much more familiar once I paint it purple."

  Peez stood there dumbstruck, staring at the now-recognizable face that would be the base of Martin's totem pole. "Purple ..." she repeated, locking eyes with that vapid, grinning, irrationally irritating icon of toddler TV. Martin ignored her and began to carve.

  "Yow!" said a voice by her ankle. It was Teddy Tumtum who had managed to pull himself out of the sawdust pile and across the floor to rejoin his mistress. "Am I seeing things? Do my glassy eyes behold that heinous purple blobosaurus on a totem pole? Naaahh, can't be. I must be hallucinating. I blame myself for chug-a-lugging that quadruple espresso before we came in here. Those lemon twists will get me every time."

  Martin stopped his chainsaw. "What did you say?" Amazingly enough, he had heard Teddy Tumtum's words even through the earphones. Or perhaps it was not so amazing after all: Peez had lifted the A.R.S. o
n the little bear when she entered Agparak's open-air studio. As heir presumptive to the E. Godz, Inc. empire, Peez could tote Teddy Tumtum along as a bespelled Object of Great Power, but as a plain old ordinary-looking teddybear? No. Not if she wanted to maintain her credibility with her potential supporters as a serious contender for the corporate throne. Teddy Tumtum's ability to talk was the gift of magic, and as such, stronger than any sound-blocking device available to mere mortals.

  "I said that anyone who'd put that thing on a totem pole is probably wanted by the FBI for a slew of lesser crimes against nature and humanity," Teddy Tumtum replied sweetly.

  Martin set down the chainsaw and took off his earphones. "Look, I'm doing this job for a big computer company exec who does have children. If I showed you the down payment check, you'd choke on your own stuffing. How about taking a look around, seeing some of my other pieces before you get all bent about this one?"

  He gestured at the small army of finished and half-finished totem poles standing guard at various points under the big tarp. The timeless features of Bear and Whale, Wolf and Raven shared poles with the leering features of sports stars, politicians, pop idols, and other celebrities. One pole featured none of the old spirit animals. After Agparak had carved in all the members of one particularly testosterone-challenged boy band, there simply wasn't enough room.

  "This is what you do?" Peez gasped. "But—but I thought your carvings were intended to raise the power!"

  "I'd rather raise the rent. Hey, there's all kinds of beliefs in this world, all kinds of totems. Who are you to judge?"

  "You mean we came all this way across the country to talk to a sellout?"

  Agparak gave her a hard look. "No, you came to talk to me, the representative of one of E. Godz, Inc.'s most profitable subsidiaries. I happen to know that my contributions account for a major chunk of your yearly income, with unspecified significant growth potential predicted within the next fiscal year. Translation: I'm teaching my little brother how to use a chainsaw without cutting his foot off."

  "Thank you," Peez said coldly. "The translation was not necessary. Neither were the financial buzzwords. I studied the reports: I know what you're worth to the company on paper."

  "Same way I know what I'm really worth to you, right now." Martin Agparak had large, perfect teeth. When he smiled it was like facing a friendly grand piano. "Too bad about your ma, but that's the way it goes, sometimes. She was one sharp cookie. I guess you have to forgive a little pushiness if it gets the job done. So—" He tilted his safety goggles back up, then removed them entirely and twirled them around one finger by the elastic. "You want something from me, I want something from you, I'm on deadline with that totem pole and you probably have another plane to catch: Let's talk."

  "Well, someone around here doesn't seem to need a chainsaw to cut to the chase," Teddy Tumtum commented. "Do we talk out here or do we go someplace where we don't have to breathe wood?"

  "Hush, Teddy Tumtum," Peez said, picking the little bear up by the scruff of his neck and sticking him in the crook of her arm. "I can handle this myself." She turned to Agparak. "What he said." She indicated the bear. "We both want to talk, but I'm not going to do it out here."

  "So where do you want to talk, angel?" Martin said with a lift of his upper lip.

  "Gee, I don't know," Peez replied, deadpan. "Think we could find somewhere around here that serves coffee?"

  * * *

  Peez lay back among the pillows in Martin's bed and stared at the ceiling. "I blame the espresso," she announced.

  "Espresso?" Teddy Tumtum leaned over the top of the headboard, a mischievous glint in his eyes. "From where I was standing it looked more like cafe au lai—"

  "Shut up!"

  "Why? You've got nothing to be ashamed of. You're a grown woman. You ran a medical history viewspell on him before you jumped into anything. You sounded as if you were having a good time. And perhaps most important, you never once made any puns about Agparak's personal totem pole. Good girl! Points to you for self-restraint, and help yourself to the biscotti. You earned it."

  "But I've never done anything like that in my life!" Peez whined. "I'm a virgin, for Vesta's sake!"

  "Um, not to point out the obvious, but not any more, you're not."

  "I don't even like him! He's snide and opportunistic and mercenary and—!"

  "You called?" Martin Agparak came back into the bedroom carrying a tray. It was laden with a pair of cappuccino cups large enough to drown kittens. He set the tray down on the night table, sat on the edge of the bed, and offered Peez a frothy cup. "Was it good for you, too?" he asked with a roguish look worthy of Teddy Tumtum.

  Peez groaned and buried her head under the goosedown comforter.

  Martin looked to Teddy Tumtum for aid and comfort. "What's her problem? I didn't think I was doing anything wrong, not pressuring her into it, not rushing things. You were there, you saw! It was creepy having you hanging off the back of the bed the whole time, watching us, but still, you did see what was going on. If she wasn't behaving like a consenting adult, she was doing a damn fine imitation. I thought she was enjoying it!"

  "Trust me, she was," the bear said.

  "So what's wrong now?"

  "Well, I'm no mind reader, but I've been with her a long time, so I kind of understand the way she thinks." Teddy Tumtum motioned for Martin to lean closer, then shielded his mouth with one fluffy paw and whispered in the artist's ear, "I think she's afraid you'll think she only slept with you to get your support."

  "I am not," Peez's muffled voice came from under the covers.

  "Good, because it'll take a lot more than that to earn my backing," Martin said. He drank half his cappuccino in one gulp, then peeled the comforter off Peez. "I've got to admit, girl, you got my number: I am mercenary. That's what it takes to survive, these days. So I like to eat on a regular basis, so sue me. Man does not live by coffee alone, not even in Seattle. The future of E. Godz, Inc. is a part of my future; my economic future. The new head of the company can make or break that future for me. I'm not about to give my vote to one candidate over another just because she's good in bed."

  "It's not just your future we're talking about here, you selfish— What did you say?" Peez stopped in mid-scold, letting the comforter drop unheeded.

  "He said you were good in bed," Teddy Tumtum repeated in a stage whisper that might be heard throughout Martin's one-bedroom apartment. Peez grabbed him by one leg and threw him across the bedroom. He splatted against a poster for the previous year's Seattle International Film Festival.

  "Hey! Why'd you do that?" Martin protested. He retrieved Teddy Tumtum and held him against his chest. "What'd he do to you?"

  "Told her the truth about herself once too often," Teddy Tumtum replied in a melodramatically weak voice. He gave a few tubercular coughs, for added effect, then added: "That's a hanging offense with Ms. Peez Godz."

  Peez glowered at the pair of them. "You're both unspeakable brutes!" she announced. Then she burst into tears.

  The bespelled bear and the Inuit sculptor exchanged a look whose meaning transcended all borders of race, place, time, and even species. It contained the cornerstone truth of the Universal Male Language, which was, roughly translated into mere words: I don't know what's the matter with her. Do you know what's the matter with her? I don't know, but I'm sure as hell not going to ask her. Asking always makes it worse, and she'll only complain that if we really cared about her, we wouldn't have to ask, we'd know. Okay, so in that case let's just wait it out. I mean, shoot, she can't cry forever, can she?

  And lo, within five minutes Peez had in fact stopped crying, thus proving that some truths really are eternal.

  Martin gave her a tissue.

  Peez wiped her eyes, blew her nose, and handed it back, then sheepishly asked, "Was I really good in bed, or were you just saying that?"

  "Trust me." Martin smiled. "And for a first-timer, too!"

  "I've read a lot."

  "I wish you'd gi
ve the name of that library to some of my other girlfriends." When she flashed him a wounded look, he raised both hands and said, "Aw, come on. Don't tell me you think that—"

  Peez turned her head away. "This is just the sort of heedless, reckless, careless thing my brother would do."

  "Not with me, he wouldn't," Martin said.

  "If it meant getting your backing, he would."

  The sculptor grabbed her by both shoulders and made her look at him. "Peez, you're a smart woman, and no matter what the glossies say, brains really are better than beauty for getting you what you want, in the long run. So stop acting stupid, okay? I didn't sleep with you because I wanted preferential treatment with E. Godz, Inc. and you didn't sleep with me because you were hoping to turn me into one of your corporate allies. What I do want is someone who can help me get my carvings into the big-name, high-ticket art galleries back East. I'm not throwing my support behind either you or your brother until I've seen proposals from both of you showing me you've got the plan and the power to get me what I want. Clear?"

  "Very." For a wonder, Peez found herself smiling and she felt as if the weight of the world had been lifted from her shoulders. Her head rang with happy thoughts, though she couldn't tell whether she was getting the most enjoyment out of the one exulting He said I was good in bed! or the one that proclaimed He said I wasn't like my brother at all!

  Peez extended her hand to Martin and shook his firmly. "I'll get that proposal to you ASAP, Mr. Agparak. I'm sure you'll find that my plans for the future placement of your artwork will meet all your needs. Thank you for doing business with E. Godz, Inc. We hope for your repeat business soon."

  "How about now?"

  * * *

  In the taxi on the way to the airport, Teddy Tumtum stuck his head out of Peez's carry-on bag and remarked, "Well, that little expedition gave a whole new meaning to Another satisfied customer!"