Murder Most Merry

GRIST FOR THE MILLS OF CHRISTMAS – James Powell

The tabloid press dubbed the corner of southern Ontario bounded by Windsor, Sarnia, and St. Thomas “The Christmas Triangle” after holiday travelers began vanishing there in substantial numbers. When the disappearances reached twenty-seven, Wayne Sorley, editor-at-large of The Traveling Gourmet magazine, ever on the alert for offbeat articles, penciled in a story on “Bed-and-Breakfasting Through the Triangle of Death” for an upcoming Christmas number, intending to combine seasonal decorations and homey breakfast recipes (including a side article on “Muffins from Hell”) with whatever details of the mysterious triangle came his way.

So when the middle of December rolled around, Sorley flew to Detroit, rented a car, and drove across the border into snow, wind, and falling temperatures.

He quickly discovered the bed-and-breakfast people weren’t really crazy about the Christmas Triangle slant. Some thought it was bad for business. Few took the disappearances as lightly as Sorley did. To make matters worse, his reputation had preceded him. The current issue of The Traveling Gourmet contained his “Haunted Inns of the Coast of Maine” and his side article “Cod Cakes from Hell.” marking him as a dangerous guest to have around. Some places on Sorley’s itinerary received him grudgingly. Others claimed no record of his reservations and threatened to loose the dog on him if he didn’t go away.

On the evening of the twenty-third of December, and well behind schedule, Sorley arrived at the last bed-and-breakfast on his prearranged itinerary to find a handwritten notice on the door. “Closed by the Board of Health.” Shaking his fist at the dark windows, Sorley decided then and there to throw in the towel. To hell with the damn Christmas Triangle! So he found a motel for the night, resolving to get back across the border and catch the first available flight for New York City. But he awoke late to find a fresh fall of snow and a dead car battery.

It was midafternoon before Sorley, determined as ever, was on the road again. By six o’clock the snow was coming down heavily and aslant and he was still far from his destination. He drove on wearily. What he really needed now, he told himself, was a couple of weeks in Hawaii. How about an article on “The Twelve Luaus of Christmas”? This late they’d have to fake it. But what the hell, in Hawaii they have to fake the holidays anyway.

Finally Sorley couldn’t take the driving anymore and turned off the highway to find a place for the night. That’s when he saw the “Double Kay B & B” sign with the shingle hanging under it that said “Vacancy.” On the front lawn beside the sign stood a fine old pickle-dish sleigh decorated with Christmas tree lights. Plastic reindeer lit electrically from within stood in the traces. Sorley pulled into the driveway and a moment later was up on the porch ringing the bell.

Mrs. Kay was a short, stoutish, white-haired woman with a pleasant face which, except for an old scar from a sharp-edged instrument across the left cheekbone, seemed untouched by care. She ushered Sorley inside and down a carpeted hallway and up the stairs. The house was small, tidy, bright, and comfortably arranged. Sorley couldn’t quite find the word to describe it until Mrs. Kay showed him the available bedroom. The framed naval charts on the walls, the boat in a bottle, and the scrimshawed narwhal tusk on the mantel gave him the word he was looking for. The house was ship-shape.

Sorley took the room. But when he asked Mrs. Kay to recommend a place to eat nearby she insisted he share their dinner. “After all, it’s Christmas Eve,” she said. “You just freshen up, then, and come downstairs.” Sorley smiled his thanks. The kitchen smells when she led him through the house had been delicious.

Sorley went back out to his car for his suitcase. The wind had ratcheted up its howl by several notches and was chasing streamers of snow down the road and across the drifts. But that was all right. He wasn’t going anywhere. As he started back up the walk someone inside the house switched off the light on the bed-and-breakfast sign.

Sorley came out of his room pleased with his luck. Here he was settled in for the night with a roof over his head and a hot meal and a warm bed in the bargain. Suddenly Sorley felt eyes watching him, a sensation as strong as a torch on the nape of his neck. But when he looked back over his shoulder the hall was empty. Or had something tiny just disappeared behind the lowboy against the wall? Frowning, he turned his head around. As he did he caught the glimpse of a scurry, not the thing itself, but the turbulence of air left in the wake of some small creature vanishing down the stairs ahead of him. A mouse, perhaps. Or. if they were seagoing people, maybe the Kays kept rats. Sorley made a face. Then, shaking his head at his overheated imagination, he went downstairs.

Mrs. Kay fed him at a dining room table of polished wood with a single place setting. “I’ve already eaten.” she explained. “I like my supper early. And Father. Mr. Kay. never takes anything before he goes to work. He’ll just heat his up in the microwave when he gets home.” The meal was baked finnan haddie. Creamed smoked haddock was a favorite Sorley had not seen for a long time. She served it with a half bottle of Alsatian Gewurtztraminer. There was Stilton cheese and a fresh pear for dessert. “Father hopes you’ll join him later in the study for an after-dinner drink,” said Mrs. Kay.

The study was a book-lined room decorated once again with relics and artifacts of the sea. The light came from a small lamp on the desk by the door and the fire burning in the grate. A painting of a brigantine under sail in a gray sea hung above the mantel. Mr. Kay, a tall, thin man with a long, sallow, cleanshaven face, heavy white eyebrows, and patches of white hair around his ears, rose from one of two wing-backed chairs facing the fire. As he shook his guest’s hand he examined him and seemed pleased with what he saw. “Welcome, Mr. Sorley.” Here was a voice that might once have boomed in the teeth of a gale. “Come sit by the fire.”

Before sitting, Sorley paused to admire a grouping of three small statues on the mantel. They were realistic representations of pirates, each with a tarred pigtail and a brace of pistols, all three as ugly as sin and none more than six inches tall. A peglegged pirate. Another with a hook for a hand. The third wore a black eye patch. Seeing his interest. Mr. Kay took peg leg down and displayed it in his palm. “Nicely done, are they not? I’m something of a collector in the buccaneer line. Most people’s family trees are hung about with horse thieves. Pirates swing from mine.” He set the statue back on the mantel. “And I’m not ashamed of it. With all this what-do-you-call-it going round, this historical revisionism, who knows what’s next? Take Christopher Columbus, eh? He started out a saint. Today he’s worse than a pirate. Some call him a devil. And Geronimo has gone from devil incarnate to the noble leader of his people. But here, Mr. Sorley. Forgive my running on. Sit down and join me in a hot grog.”

Sorley’s host poured several fingers of a thick dark rum from a heavy green bottle by his foot, added water from the electric teakettle steaming on the hearth, urging as he passed him the glass, “Wrap yourself around that.”

The drink was strong. It warmed Sorley’s body like the sun on a cold spring day. “Thank you.” he said. “And thanks for the excellent meal.”

“Oh, we keep a good table, Mother and I. We live well. Not from the bed-and-breakfast business, I can tell you that. After all, we only open one night a year and accept only a single guest.”

When Sorley expressed his surprise, Mr. Kay explained, “Call it a tradition. I mean, we certainly don’t need the money. I deal in gold coins—you know, doubloons, moidore—obtained when the price was right. A steal, you might say. So, yes, we live well.” He looked at his guest. “And what do you do for a living, Mr. Sorley?”

Sorley wasn’t listening. For a moment he thought he’d noticed something small move behind Mr. Kay, back there in the corner where two eight-foot-long bamboo poles were leaning, and was watching to catch sight of it again. When Mr. Kay repeated his question Sorley told him what he did and briefly related his adventures connected with the aborted article.

Mr. Kay laughed like thunder, slapped his knees, and said, “Then we are indeed well met. If you like, I’ll tell you the whole story about the Christmas Triangle. What an evening we have ahead of us, Mr. Sorley. Outside a storm howls and butts against the windows. And here we sit snug by the fire with hot drinks in our fists, a willing taleteller and...”

“... an eager listener,” said Sorley, congratulating himself once again on how well things had worked out. He might get his article yet.

Mr. Kay toasted his guest silently, thought for a moment, and then began. “Now years ago, when piracy was in flower, a gangly young Canadian boy named Scattergood Crandal who had run off to join the pirate trade in the Caribbean finally earned his master-pirate papers and set out on a life’s journey in buccaneering. But no pantywaist, warm-water pirating for him, no rummy palm-tree days under blue skies. Young Crandal dreamed of home, of cool gray summers plundering the shipping lanes of the Great Lakes, of frosty winter raiding parties skating up frozen rivers with mufflers around their necks and cutlasses in their teeth, surprising sleeping townspeople under their eiderdowns.

“So with his wife’s dowry Crandal bought a ship, the Olson Nickelhouse, and sailed north with his bride, arriving in the Thousand Islands just as winter was closing the St. Lawrence. The captain and his wife and crew spent a desperate four months caught in the ice. Crandal gave the men daily skating lessons. But they were slow learners and there were to be no raiding parties that winter. By the end of February, with supplies running low, the men ate the captain’s parrot. And once having eaten talkative flesh, it was a small step to utter cannibalism. One snowy day Crandal came upon them dividing up the carcasses of three ice fishermen. He warned them, ‘Don’t do it, you fellows. Eating human flesh’ll stunt your growth and curl your toes!’ But it was too late. Those men were already slaves to that vile dish whose name no menu dares speak.”

As Mr. Kay elaborated on the hardships of that first year he took his guest’s glass, busied himself with the rum and hot water, and made them both fresh drinks. For his part, Sorley was distracted by bits of movement on the edges of his vision. But when he turned to look, there was never anything there. He decided it was only the jitters brought on by fatigue from his long drive in bad weather. That and the play of light from the fire.

“Now Crandal knew terror was half the pirate game,” continued Mr. Kay. “So the loss of the parrot hit him hard. You see, Mr. Sorley, this Canadian lad had never mastered the strong language expected from pirate captains and counted on the parrot to hold up that end of things. The blue jay he later trained to stride his shoulder hadn’t quite the same effect and was incredibly messy. Still, pirates know to go with the best they have. So he had these flyers printed up announcing that Captain Crandal, his wife (for Mrs. Crandal was no slouch with the cutlass on boarding parties), and his cannibal crew, pirates late of the Caribbean, were now operating locally, vowing Death and Destruction to all offering resistance. At the bottom he included a drawing of his flag, a skeleton with a cutlass in one bony hand and in the other a frying pan to underscore the cannibal reference.

“Well, the flyer and flag made Crandal the hit of the season when things started up again on the Lakes that spring. In fact, the frying pan and Crandal’s pale, beanpole appearance and his outfit of pirate black earned him the nickname Death-Warmed-Over. And as Death-Warmed-Over the Pirate he so terrorized the shipping lanes that soon the cold booty was just rolling in, cargoes of mittens and headcheese, sensible swag of potatoes and shoes, and vast plunder in the hardware line, anvils, door hinges, and barrels of three-penny nails which Crandal sold for gold in the colorful and clamorous thieves’ bazaars of Rochester and Detroit.”

“How about Niagara Falls?” asked Sorley, to show he knew how to play along with a tall tale. He was amused to detect a slur in his voice from the rum.

“What indeed?” smiled Mr. Kay, happy with the question. He rose and lifted the painting down from its nail above the mantel and rested it across Sorley’s knees. “See those iron rings along the water line? We fitted long poles through them, hoisted the Olson Nickelhouse out of the water, and made heavy portage of her around the falls.”

As Mr. Kay replaced the painting Sorley noticed that the group of three pirates on the mantel had rearranged themselves. Or was the strong drink and the heat from the fire affecting his concentration?

“Well,” said Mr. Kay, “as cream rises, soon Crandal was Pirate King with a pirate fleet at his back. And there was no manjack on land or sea that didn’t tremble at the mention of Death-Warmed-Over. Or any city either. Except for one.

“One city on the Canadian side sat smugly behind the islands in its bay and resisted Crandal’s assaults. Its long Indian name with a broadside of o’s in it translated out as Gathering Place for Virtuous Moccasins. ‘ But Crandal called it ‘Goody Two-Shoes City’ because of its reek of self-righteousness. Oh, he hated the world as a pirate must and wished to do creation all the harm he could. But Goody Two-Shoes City he hated with a special passion. Early on he even tried a Sunday attack to catch the city by surprise. But the inhabitants came boiling out of the churches and up onto the battlements to pepper him with cannonballs with such a will that, if their elected officials hadn’t decided they were enjoying themselves too much on the Sabbath and ordered a ceasefire, they might have blown the Olson Nickelhouse out of the water.”

Here Mr. Kay broke off his narrative to poke the fire and then to stare into the flames. As he did, Sorley once again had the distinct impression he was being watched. He turned and was startled to find another grouping of little pirate statues he hadn’t noticed before on a shelf right at the level of his eye in the bookcase beside the fireplace. They held drawn dirks and cutlasses in their earnest little hands and had pistols stuck in their belts. And, oh, what ugly little specimens they were!

“Then, early one December,” Mr. Kay continued, “Crandal captured a cargo of novelty items from the toy mines of Bavaria. Of course, in those days toys were quite unknown. Parents gave their children sensible gifts like socks or celluloid collars or pencil boxes at Christmas. Suddenly Crandal broke into a happy hornpipe on the frosty deck, for it had come to him how he could harm Goody Two-Shoes City and make it curse his name forever. But he would need a disguise to get by the guards at the city gate who had strict orders to keep a sharp eye out for Death-Warmed-Over. So he changed his black outfit for a red one with a pillow for fatness, rouge for his gray cheeks, a white beard to make him look older, and a jolly laugh to cover his pirate gloom. Then, on Christmas Eve, he put the Olson Nickelhouse in close to shore and sneaked into Goody Two-Shoes City with a wagonload of toys crated up like hymnals. That night he crept across the rooftops and down chimneys and by morning every boy and girl had a real toy under the Christmas tree.

“Well, of course, the parents knew right away who’d done the deed and what Crandal was up to. Next Christmas, they knew, they’d have to go and buy a toy in case Crandal didn’t show up again or risk a disappointed child. But suppose he came next year, too? Well, that would mean that the following year the parents would have to buy two toys. Then three. And on and on until children no longer knew the meaning of the word ‘enough. ‘

“Curse Crandal and the visit from the Olson Nickelhouse,” the parents muttered through clenched teeth. But their eavesdropping children misheard and thought they said ‘Kris Kringle’ and something about a visit from ‘Old Saint Nicholas.‘ As if a saint would give a boy a toy drum or saxophone to drive his father mad with, as if a saint would give a girl a Little Dolly Clotheshorse doll and set her dreaming over fashion magazines when she should be helping her mother in the kitchen.” Mr. Kay laughed until the tears came to his eyes. “Well, the Pirate King knew he’d hit upon a better game than making fat landlubbers walk an icy gangplank over cold gray water. And since the Crandals had salted away a fortune in gold coins they settled down here and started a reindeer farm so Crandal could Kringle full-time with the missus as Mrs. Kringle and the crew as his little helpers.” Mr. Kay looked up. “Isn’t that right, Mother?”

Mrs. Kay had appeared in the doorway with a red costume and a white beard over her arm and a pair of boots in her hand. “That’s right, Father. But it’s time to get ready. I’ve loaded the sleigh and harnessed the reindeer.”

Mr. Kay got to his feet. “And here’s the wonderfully strange and miraculous thing. Mr. Sorley. As the years passed we didn’t age. Not one bit. What did you call it, Mother?”

“The Tinker Bell Effect,” said Mrs. Kay, putting down the boots and holding up the heavily padded red jumpsuit trimmed with white for Mr. Kay to step into.

“If children believe in you,” explained Mr. Kay, as he did up the Velcro fasteners, “why then you’re eternal and evergreen. Plus you can fly through the air and so can your damn livestock!”

Mrs. Kay laughed a fine contralto laugh. “And somewhere along the line children must have started believing in Santa’s little helpers, too,” she said. “Because our pirate crew didn’t age either. They just got shorter.”

Mr. Kay nodded. “Which fitted in real well with their end of the operation.”

“The toy workshop?” asked Sorley.

Mr. Kay smiled and shook his head. “No, that’s only a myth. We buy our toys, you see. Not that Mother and I were going to spend our own hard-earned money for the damn stuff. No, the crew’s little fingers make the counterfeit plates to print what cash we need to buy the toys. Electronic ones, mostly. Wonderful for stunting the brain, cramping the soul, and making ugly noises that just won’t quit.”

“Hold it.” Sorley wagged a disbelieving finger. “You’re telling me you started out as Death-Warmed-Over the Pirate and now you’re Santa Claus?”

“Mr. Sorley, I’m as surprised as you how things worked out. Talk about revisionism, eh? Yesterday’s yo-ho-ho is today’s ho-ho-ho.” Mr. Kay stood back and let his wife attach his white beard with its built-in red plastic cheeks.

“But where does the Christmas Triangle business fit in?” demanded Sorley. “We’ve got twenty-seven people who disappeared around here last year alone.”

“Copycats,” insisted Mr. Kay. “As I said. Mother and I only take one a year, what we call our Gift from the Night. But of course, when the media got onto it the copycats weren’t far behind. Little Mary Housewife can’t think of a present for Tommy Tiresome who has everything, so she gives him a slug from a thirty-eight between the eyes and buries him in the basement, telling the neighbors he went to visit his mother in Sarnia. Little Billy Bank Manager with a shortage in the books and a yen for high living in warmer climes vanishes into the Christmas Triangle with a suitcase of money from the vault and reemerges under another name in Rio. And so on and so on. Copycats.”

“Father’s right. We only take one,” said Mrs. Kay. “That’s what our agreement calls for.”

Mr. Kay nodded. “Last year it was an arrogant young bastard from the SPCA investigating reports on mistreated reindeer. Tell me my business, would he?” Mr. Kay’s chest swelled and his eyes flashed. “Well, Mother and I harnessed him to the sleigh right between Dancer and Prancer. And his sluggard backside got more than its share of the lash that Christmas Eve, let me tell you. He was blubbering like a baby by the time I turned him over to my scurvy crew.”

“I don’t understand,” said Sorley. But he was beginning to. He stood up slowly, utterly clearheaded and sober. “You mean your cannibal crew ate him?” he demanded in a horrified voice.

“Consider the fool from the SPCA part of our employee benefits package,” shrugged Mr. Kay. “Oh, all right,” he conceded when he saw Sorley’s outrage. “so my little shipmates are evil. Evil. They’ve got wolfish little teeth and pointed carnivore ears. And don’t think those missing legs and arms were honestly come by in pirate combat. Not a bit of it. There’s this game they play. Like strip poker but without the clothes. They’re terrible, there’s no denying it. But you know, few of us get to pick the people we work with. Besides, I don’t give a damn about naughty or nice.”

Sorley’s voice was shrill and outraged. “But this is hideous. Hideous. I’ll go to the police.”

“Go, then,” said Mr. Kay. “Be our guest. Mother and I won’t stand in your

way.”

“You’d better not try!” warned Sorley defiantly, intending to storm from the room. But when he tried he found his shoelaces were tied together. He fell forward like a dead weight and struck his head, blacking out for a moment. When he regained consciousness he was lying on his stomach with his thumbs lashed together behind his back. Before Sorley’s head cleared he felt something being shoved up the back of his pant legs, over his buttocks, and up under his belt. When they emerged out beyond the back of his shirt collar he saw they were the bamboo poles that had been leaning in the corner.

Before Sorley could try to struggle free, a little pirate appeared close to his face, a grizzled thing with a hook for an arm. little curly-toed shoes and a bandanna pulled down over the pointed tops of its ears. With a cruel smile it placed the point of its cutlass a menacing fraction of an inch from Sorley’s left eyeball and in language no less vile because of the tiny voice that uttered it, the creature warned him not to move.

Mrs. Kay was smiling down at him. “Now don’t trouble yourself over your car, Mr. Sorley. I’ll drive into the city later tonight and park it where the car strippers can’t miss it. Father’ll pick me up in the sleigh on his way back.”

Mr. Kay had been stamping his boots to get them on properly. Now he said, “Give us a kiss, Mother. I’m on my way.” Then the toes of the boots hove into view on the edge of Sorley’s vision. “Good-bye, Mr. Sorley,” said his host. “Thanks for coming. Consider yourself grist for the mills of Christmas.”

As soon as Mr. Kay left the room, Sorley heard little feet scramble around him and more little pirates rushed to man the ends of the bamboo poles in front of him. At a tiny command the crew put the cutlasses in their teeth and, holding their arms over their heads, hoisted Sorley up off the floor. He hung there helplessly, suspended front and back.

The little pirates lugged Sorley out into the hall and headed down the carpet toward the front door. He didn’t know where they were taking him. But their progress was funereally slow, and, swaying there, Sorley conceived a frantic plan of escape. He knew his captors were tiring under their load. If they had to set him down to rest, he would dig in with his toes and. somehow, work his way to his knees. At least there he’d stand a chance.

Sorley heard sleigh bells. He raised his chin. Through the pane of beveled glass in the front door he saw the sleigh on the lawn rise steeply into the night, Christmas tree lights and all, and he heard Mr. Kay’s booming “Yo-ho-ho-ho.”

Suddenly Sorley’s caravan stopped. He got ready, waiting for them to put him down. But they were only adjusting their grips. The little pirates turned him sideways and Sorley saw the open door and the top of the cellar steps and smelled the darkness as musty as a tomb. Then he felt the beginning of their big heave-ho. It was too damn late to escape now. Grist for the mills of Christmas? Hell, he was meat for the stew pots of elfdom.