by Gene Wolfe
The three players still sat at their table. They had been joined by a fourth, a new Randolph Carter. As the door flew wide the fourth player turned to look, but he had no face.
She whispered, “This is Hell, isn’t it? I’m in Hell, for what I did. Because of what we did. We’re all in Hell. I always thought it was just something the Church made up, something to keep you in line, you know what I mean, sir?”
She was not talking to him, but he nodded sympathetically.
“Just a game in the pope’s head. But it’s real, it’s here, and here we are.”
“I’d better take you to your room,” he said again.
She shuddered. “In Hell you can’t pray, isn’t that right? But I can—Listen! I can pray! Dear G—”
He had wanted to wait, wanted to let her finish, but the sword, Sacnoth, would not wait. It entered her throat, more eager even than he, and emerged spent and swimming in scarlet blood.
The faceless Randolph Carter rose from the table. “Your seat, young man,” he said through no mouth. “I’m merely the marker whom you have followed.”
Afterword
There is a daydream, I believe, common to all of us who read mysteries. We are in a small group that is somehow isolated. A member of our group is murdered, and it is we who determine the identity of the killer.
In the course of a life that has now grown lengthy, I have known three people who have actually been murdered. In one case, an old schoolmate was shot by her third husband. In another, a wealthy young woman who often came into my father’s café was murdered. Her husband was tried, acquitted, and subsequently murdered himself. The third was so fantastic that were I to describe it you would feel sure I was lying. There is a book about it: Eros, Magic, and the Murder of Professor Culianu. You will find my friend Jennifer Stevenson’s name in the index; Jennifer introduced me to Ioan Culianu.
You see that I have excuses for my interest in murder, but if I had none I would be just as interested. At one time, I considered designing a board game based on serial murders; that game never really took shape, but this story came out of the idea.
And When They Appear
Now Christmas is come,
Let us beat up the drum,
And call all our neighbors together,
And when they appear,
Let us make them such cheer,
As will keep out the wind and the weather.
—Washington Irving
Concerned about Sherby, and himself as well, House sent forth both Kite and Mouse.
If you had seen Mouse, you would have seen nothing. That is to say, you would have told yourself, and quickly convinced yourself, that you had seen nothing, so swift did Mouse scurry over the snow. You were not present, but an owl saw Mouse and swooped down upon her, huge winged and silent as death, for owls are too wise ever to tell themselves that their eyes did not see what their eyes have seen. Its talons closed about Mouse, and a thin blade shot out. The blade was intended for fingers, but it worked well on talons. The owl shrieked, and flapped away upon wings that were silent still, leaving a claw-tipped fraction of itself bleeding on the snow.
Mouse squeaked (a sound too faint for human ears) as the blade retracted; this was the first time that it had been used since Mouse had been made, and the selflubricating bearings it pivoted on were dry.
Kite soared higher than the owl ever had, so high that he saw Lonely Mountain whole. He saw the tracks of cars and people in the snow where a bridge crossed the Whitewater, and directed Mouse toward the great, domed doughnut that was the Jefferson house. That was how Mouse found Kieran Jefferson III (principal operating officer of the Beauharnais Group) dead next to his Christmas tree with his brand-new Chapuis express rifle still in his hands. Mouse told House about it right away.
“I have decided to have a Christmas party,” House told Sherby. “I’ve thought the whole thing over, and decided it is the right thing to do.”
“I’d like to see my mom and dad,” Sherby told House. Not because it had anything to do with the party, but simply because the thought, filling his mind, had popped from his mouth as soon as he opened it. Sherby was still in his yellow pajamas, having worn them all day.
“And so you shall,” House assured him, knowing full well that what it meant had nothing to do with what he meant.
“Not holos.” Sherby could not read House’s mind, but he had known House all his life; if he had been able to read House’s mind, it would have made no difference.
Nor could House read Sherby’s. (The big steep steps down and down into the basement, the heavy door of the cold storage locker that Sherby could not open without House’s help.)
“You must write the invitations,” House told Sherby. “I can’t manage that. I think we should invite Santa Claus first of all. That will get things off to a fine start.”
“I didn’t see Santa Claus last night,” Sherby objected. “I don’t think he’s real.”
“You fell asleep,” House explained gently, “and since he’s very busy on Christmas Eve, and had dropped in without an invitation, he didn’t awaken you. His busiest day is over now. He always relaxes on Christmas Day. He sleeps until dark, then eats a big dinner. He will be in a relaxed mood, and may very well come.”
“All right.” Enthusiasm comes easily at Sherby’s age, and often arrives unbidden; Sherby’s showed plainly on his face.
“You mustn’t expect more presents,” cautioned House, who had no more. “Santa gave away all the toys he had yesterday.”
“That’s okay,” Sherby said. “I like real things better than toys anyway.”
Then he went into the Learning Center, where House showed him how to make the letters, sometimes projecting hard ones (like M and Q) right onto the drawboard where Sherby could trace them. Sherby wrote:
DEAR SANTA
PEOPLE MUST ASK YOU LOTS AND LOTS OF QUESTIONS MINE IS
WILL YOU COME TO OUR HOUSE ON LONELY MOUNTAIN FOR A PARTY TONIGHT
BRING THE ELFS IF YOU WANT TO
SHERBY
“That’s a good one,” House told him, “and while you were writing it I had another good idea. Let’s invite all the rest of the Christmas people too. There are a great many of them, live toy soldiers, the Nutcracker, and countless others.”
Sherby looked down sadly at the light pen, which felt very heavy in his fingers. “I don’t want to write a whole bunch more of these,” he said.
“You won’t have to,” House promised. “Only one.”
So Sherby wrote:
ALL XMAS PEOPLE ESPCIALLY CHILDREN ARE INVITED TOO EVEN THE GRINCH
SHERBY
He had no sooner laid down the light pen than House’s doorbell rang. Sherby ran to answer it, knowing that House was quite capable of doing it himself—and would too if the visitor were left standing outside for what House (who as a rule did not have a great deal of patience) considered an excessive length of time.
This visitor was not Santa Claus at all, and did not even look as though he might be much fun. He was an old man with granny glasses and wisps of white hair sticking out from under his tall beaver hat. But he wore a green greatcoat and a red cravat, and cried, “Hallo!” so cheerfully, and smiled with so many twinkles that Sherby got out of the way at once, saying, “Would you like to come in?”
“What’s today, my fine fellow?” inquired the old man as he stepped into House, beating the snow from his greatcoat in blizzards. (It melted as it reached the floor, but left no puddles there.)
“Christmas,” Sherby told him.
“Not Christmas Eve!” For a moment, the old man appeared quite frightened.
“No, Christmas Day. The night of it.” House groaned as even the very best houses do on cold nights, and Sherby added tardily, “Sir.”
“Ebenezer,” said the old man, and offered Sherby his hand in the most friendly fashion possible.
“No, sir, my name’s Sherby,” Sherby told him. And was about to shut the door (since he was getting cold and Hous
e had not yet done it) when he caught sight of a man in foreign garments, wonderfully real and distinct to look at, with an ax in his belt, leading a little black donkey laden with wood up the moonlit drive.
“It’s Ali Baba,” the old man explained. “Dear old honest Ali Baba! He did come to see me one Christmas, my boy, just like this. Now it’s your turn, and I’ve brought him to you, not only for his entertainment and yours, Sherby, but in order that you may know a great secret.”
He twinkled more than ever when he said this, and Sherby, who liked secrets more than almost anything else, asked, “What is it?”
The old man crouched until their eyes were nearly at a level. “You think that I am House,” the old man whispered. “And so I am.”
“You’re a holo,” Sherby told him.
“Light projected upon air, Sherby?” The old man leaned closer. “Light’s wondrous stuff, but it cannot speak. Or think.”
“That’s House,” Sherby acknowledged.
“And that”—the old man pointed through the doorway and out into the moonlit night—“is Ali Baba. I brought him with me so that you could learn that there is a vagrant magic in Christmas still, after all these years. You have not as long to learn it as I had, perhaps.” He straightened up. “May he bring his donkey in? I know it isn’t regular, but the poor donkey would be uncommonly cold, I’m afraid, standing out all evening in the snow.”
Ali Baba, who was close enough to overhear them by this time, grinned at Sherby in such a way as to guarantee that the donkey was housebroken.
“Okay,” Sherby said, so Ali Baba brought his donkey in with him, and with the donkey, a little bare-headed man in sandals and a brown habit like a lady’s dress, with a rope around his waist.
As they left the vestibule and went down the hall to the family room, Sherby tried to touch the little man’s back, but his hand went right through like he knew it would.
A fat man in livery came in with a tray of drinks that Sherby could not drink, hors d’oeuvres that he could not eat, and a carrot for the donkey. Ali Baba had begun to unload it and build a big fire in the fireplace when the doorbell rang again.
This time it was twelve stout young men with clubs, and a thirteenth who wore a fox skin hanging down his back, with the fox’s face for a cap, so that it looked as though the fox were peering over his head. All thirteen shouted: “Hail, Squire!” to Sherby; then they performed a dance to the rapping of their own clubs, coming together by sixes and striking their clubs together, while the fox (so Sherby thought of him) leaped and whirled among them.
When they were finished, the twelve with clubs ran past Sherby into House, each wishing him a merry Christmas. The fox seemed to have vanished, until Sherby closed the door and discovered that the fox was watching over his shoulder. “A glorious Yuletide to you, Young Squire,” the fox said.
Sherby turned very quickly and backed away from him, and although he knew the fox was fake, the door that stopped him from backing farther was very solid indeed.
“I’m Loki,” the fox told him, “the Norse personification of fire. I seek to steal the sun, and you’ve just seen me driven forth in order that the sun may return. I creep back in, however, as you also see. It’s my nature—I am forever creeping back in. Will you not wish me Good Yule in return?”
“It’s not Yule,” Sherby said. “It’s Christmas.”
“Christmas for some, but Yule for all. Yule means ‘tide,’ and tide means ‘time,’ ” the fox told him. “This is the time of winter solstice, when day begins to lengthen, and ancestral spirits must be placated. Did you know you had ancestral spirits?”
Sherby shook his head.
“We are they,” the fox told him, and as the fox spoke, someone seemed to pound the door so violently that the blows shook House.
Two young men stood on House’s porch, and five more were hauling an enormous stump across the snow. Six young women and three dogs followed them, and a seventh young woman rode the stump sidesaddle, one leg hooked about an upthrust root. She cried, “Faster! Faster!” when she saw Sherby standing in the doorway, and there was a great deal of laughter, barking, and shouting.
“House would like you to get to know all of us,” the fox explained, “but Kite says there isn’t time for more than a glimpse. Even so, you’ll remember this Christmas as long as you live.”
The seven young men pushed and pulled their Yule log into the vestibule, where the young woman dismounted. “Merriment all through the house,” she told Sherby, “as long as the log burns. But you’ve got to save a brand to light the next one. Roast pig and peacock pie.” She hurried away in the direction of the kitchen.
“The boar’s for Frey,” the fox whispered. “Frey rides a boar with golden bristles, a dwarfgift. When he left Asgard to dwell amongst men as Fridleef, King of Denmark, his folk served him a boar at Yule to show they knew him. The apple in its mouth was the sun he had brought back to them. Finding himself discovered, he mounted the roasted boar and rode back into the sky.” The fox pointed through the open doorway. “Now look yonder, and see the type of your holly wreath.”
There was a wheel of fire rolling down the mountain.
“House’s holos can’t reach that far,” Sherby said, but the fox had vanished.
A young man came in with a spray of mistletoe, which he hung from the arch between the vestibule and the hall. “Do you see the white berries?” the young man asked. “Each time a girl gets kissed under the mistletoe, she’s supposed to pull off one berry. When the last berry is gone, the mistletoe comes down.”
Everybody explains, Sherby thought, but nobody explains anything I want explained. House doesn’t know.
Sherby went out into the snow. It was cold, and tickled his bare feet in a very chilly way, but it was real, and he liked that about it. He walked clear around House and his five-car garage, until the ground fell away in icy rocks and he could look down into the shadowed valley of the Whitewater at the foot of Lonely Mountain. He could have seen the same things by looking out of the big picture window in the family room, but looking like this, with no glass between himself and the night and the cold, made it real.
He shivered, wishing that he had worn his blue bathrobe, and wiped his nose on his sleeve.
Down in the valley there was a little dot of red light where something was burning, and House was flying Kite over it, a speck of black against the bright stars. The fire was probably a bonfire or a campfire, Sherby decided, and there would be people around it cooking hot dogs and marshmallows. He shivered again; House might fix real food if Sherby asked. He looked up at the picture window, then went a little farther down the slope where he could see it better. It was dark, and there was no smoke rising from the chimney.
Climbing back up was harder than going down had been, and once he slipped and hurt his knee. When he got back to the front door, a small black and white horse with no one to ride him was coming up the drive. He stopped and turned his head to look at Sherby through one wide, frightened eye.
“Here, pony!” Sherby called. “Here, pony!”
The little horse took a hesitant step forward.
“Here, pony!” Sherby recalled the donkey’s hors d’oeuvre and dashed into the vestibule, down the hall past the roaring family room, and into the kitchen.
The fat man in livery was there, talking to a plump woman in an apron as both put deviled oysters wrapped in bacon into little cups of paper lace. “Yes, Master Sherbourne,” the fat man said, “what can we do for you?”
“I just wanted a carrot,” Sherby told him. “A real one.”
The big vegetable drawer rolled forward, and a neat white compartment was elevated twenty-six centimeters to display two fresh carrots. Sherby snatched one and sprinted back to the porch, certain that the little horse would have gone.
He had not, and he cocked his ears in a promising fashion when Sherby showed him the carrot.
“You will require a halter of some sort, I am afraid,” a heavily accented voice behind
Sherby said.
Sherby turned to find a very tall man wearing a very tall hat of starched gauze standing in House’s front doorway.
“That is good, what you do now,” the tall man said. “You do not look at him.” The tall man fingered his small, round beard. “We men—even boys—there is exousia in the eyes. He is afraid of that, poor little fellow.”
Sherby put his other hand in front of his eyes and peeped through his fingers. Sure enough, the little horse was closer now. “My bathrobe’s got a long belt. Usually I step on it.”
The tall man nodded sagely. “That might do. Go and get it, and I will watch him for you.”
When Sherby returned, the tall man was standing beside the little horse’s head. “You are very young yet,” he told Sherby. “Can you tie a knot?”
“I think so,” Sherby said.
“Then give him that carrot, and tie your belt about his head while he eats it.”
Sherby was afraid of the little horse’s big teeth at first, but the little horse took the carrot without biting him and munched away, seeming quite content to let Sherby tie the blue terry-cloth belt of his bathrobe around his neck, though it took three tries to get the knot right. “He smells like smoke,” Sherby said. “I’m going to call him Smoky.”
“His stable burned, poor little fellow, so it is a good name for him. My own is Saint Nicholas, now. It used to be Bishop Nicholas. I was Bishop of Myra, in Lycia; and though I am not Santa Claus, Santa Claus is me.”
Sherby was looking at Smoky. “Do you think I can lead him?”
“I am sure you can, my son.”
Sherby tugged at the blue terry-cloth belt, and the little horse backed away, his eyes wide, with Sherby stumbling and sliding after him. “I want him to come in,” Sherby said. “My feet are cold.”
“You are learning now what I learned as a parish priest,” Saint Nicholas told him.