Alpin parted for the high and mighty castle of
the Greed King of Ravagedland with the disputed hen under his arm. He could not
trust Jane and her starving children not to eat the hen before he had returned
with the promised provisions. It was not that he meant to reserve it to eat
himself. It was because the poor hen, terrified by all the threats on her life
she was hearing had shat a little on the arm of Alpin’s polka dotted T-shirt.
Being under the spell of the Púca, Alpin thought this tiny excrement smelled
like the perfume of oriental nights, for now he was only attracted to what was stinky
and rotten and shied away from anything that was not stained or infected. He
thought the chicken smelled so good that he was enchanted with her and his
subconscious mind had decided to keep her for a pet, though he was not entirely
aware of that decision yet.
Intrigued by Alpin, for she had never known
anyone like him, fearing for him a little, for something dreadful could
perfectly happen to him up at the castle and also fearing he might not return
with the promised food, Jane Doe dared to follow him uphill. Behind her lagged
her flock of undernourished kids, who still had enough life in them to feel
curiosity.
And behind them lagged I, wondering if all this
might not lead me to Alpin.
The stranger impressed the ridiculously dressed
Royal Guard strongly. They took him for some sort of spiritual leader and he
made it to the great hall of the Greed King, who was busy tasting a fastuous
meal that was a general rehearsal of that he was to enjoy on Christmas Eve.
Petey and the Sheriff were watching him eat.
“I want two dozen hens and a pair of cocks, a
sack of potatoes, seven onions and garlic. I’m not scared of garlic. It’s to
make a Spanish omelette with. Oh, yes. Olive oil and salt too. I might think of
something else, but start by bringing me all I’ve asked for while I keep
thinking. What are you waiting for? I have spoken. Do you want me to eat up
everything there is spread out on this table to prove I am serious? I can do it
faster than the quickest of you all can blink. I have spoken!”
And that is when I began to think the stranger
might be related to Alpin.
But it was not as easy for Alpin to devour the
food as it would have been had he not been under a spell. There was no spoiled
or rotten dish among the show of delicacies. The oysters were fabulously fresh
and even the blue cheeses did not smell bad enough to tempt his new taste. The
enchanted Alpin sighed, determined to make an effort and eat all he could, when
the mysterious voice that had been following him whispered some sound advice:
“The locusts will do it! Locusts! Locusts!
Locusts!”
At first Alpin thought there might be an exotic
Chinese dish with locusts in the menu, but he soon realized what the whispering
was about. He shook his floating hair and the locusts that were nesting in it
dashed out and fell like a biblical curse on the table.
It was the Sheriff of Bananawood that
understood the sort of danger Alpin posed. Rasputin, he was thinking. Moses and
the plagues of Egypt. Alien attack. All these foretold the fall of regimes.
The Greed King, however, was not impressed by the stranger.
“I’m not
giving you the hole of a doughnut!” he hissed, smiling cynically, though it was evident Alpin did not need to be
given anything. He could take what he wanted for himself. “Off with his head!”
laughed the king. “Nobody threatens me! Off with-”
It was the first time I
saw grave mortal violence.
Because of the sheriff’s intervention, the
Greed King had become a puzzled, headless ghost. As he groped under the table
trying to find his head, the Sheriff put his hand on Petey Pepperpot’s
shoulder.
“Look here, Petey,” said the sheriff, “on this
throne thou shalt sit, this crown thou shalt wear.” He picked up the ex-king’s crown and shook it
a little and put it on Petey’s head. “All thou shalt command, but what I order
thee thou hadst better do! The king is
dead! Long live the king!”
By then the defunct Greed King had found his
head. He still had only one idea in it.
“I have hands,” he said. “I can take it with
me! I must get to the treasure room before they do!”
“I don’t make or break kings,” said the
sheriff, “but I keep the peace and enforce law and order, because that is what
I pay myself for.”
The sheriff wiped his sword with the tablecloth
and kept it in its sheath.
“The late king wanted a showdown with this
stranger,” he said, “and it looked like we would be much the worse for it. We
must give our visitor what he asks for while it is little and in this way
encourage him to leave as fast as possible, for holy men are nefarious for
governments and as for aliens, the further off in space they are, the better.”
The sheriff then turned to Alpin.
“Mr. Alien,” he said, “you’ve seen how things
have changed here. We are going to give you the chickens and the potatoes and
even black garlic, if you prefer the odourless kind. And as for this...lady,
who I believe is the root of the problem and I presume you want to help, I will
find her a post in my kitchen and her kids won’t go hungry again, since there
are always lots of leftovers there. You see how you have solved the problem you
came here to fix.You needn’t intervene in our affairs any further. Tomorrow is
Christmas Eve and I’m sure they are waiting anxiously for you back home in your
spaceship. We’ve come to the end of the story and the kids will eat happily
ever after off my own dirty dishes, which are very fine. So please leave the
same way you came or any other of your choice, but go. Goodbye, goodbye, yes,
that is the way out.”
It took the sheriff no time to give Jane
everything Alpin had asked for.
Only then did Alpin turn to her and say, “If
you are happy with this deal, Jane, I am done here. But if you need me, summon
me. Cackle and I’ll come. That’s all you need do. I told you I wasn’t just
anybody. I’m taking this chicken with me, because now you have a brood of your
own. Remember not to eat them. Just their eggs. As long as you do that, you’ll
be fine.To my hair, my gallant locusts. We’re out of here!”
I couldn’t believe it. If the hairy fellow in
his twenties was Alpin, he had done a good deed for the first time in his life.
And he had a pet he doted on. There was no recognizing him.
As he went hopping daintily down the hill, I
showed myself to Jane. I identified myself as a sympathizer of her benefactor
and made her the gift of two recipes, so she could make good use of the
neighbouring chestnuts.
One was for chestnut flour to make chestnut
bread with. This was inexpensive, food for the poor. The other recipe was of
food for the rich. She would know how to make marrons glacés. Both recipes were
delicious and would always taste so when she cooked them.
Before I left I asked her two questions. The
first was why the bananas were all frozen. She said the Greed King sold almost
all the food the land produced to foreign kingdoms. He froze the bananas to
keep people from stealing them. Only he knew how to unfreeze them once they
were already sold. He did not sell the chestnuts because he couldn’t see them.
They were in the fay part of the surroundings. She said she had never seen them
herself until I had pointed them out to her. I said she would always be able to
see them, just as she saw me. But she had to be reasonable as to the amount she
took from the forest.
The second question I asked her was if she had
seen another odd being that day, a little boy. She replied that she had not. I
decided I would ask the fay stranger if he had seen Alpin. After all, being one
of us, he might have more information than the mortals. But I had to be
careful. We are not all friendly.
As I left, I thought that Jane was at least a
little better off than she had been. I
tried to console myself thinking that. But Alpin and I had done something we
should not have done lightly.We had meddled with mortals. It is said to bring
bad luck, to rob one of one’s capacity for feeling happiness. In time, we would
see if Petey improved conditions or not. For the meantime, I chased downhill
after the fay man, hoping he could help me find Alpin.
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