273. The Ring and the Pelican

 273. The Ring and the Pelican

My mission was relatively simple. Manolus, who had been returned to the mortal world, managed to get to all the way to Sherbanania, though he had been dropped off in Cochinchina. He physically attacked his mother, all by himself and without the least help, and watching her roll down the stairs of the hut of parliament, proclaimed himself king. Upon seeing this happen, Jane’s opposition rallied against Manolus and cast her son off the throne before he could sit on it. Both Jane and Manolus fled to the chestnut grove, where Jane began to cackle with all her might. I do not know if Alpin heard her or not, but some Leafies did, and thinking Mum’s tropical garden was a haven for exiled Sherbananian rulers, they took her to Petey. Since he was still suffering amnesia, he received her well. Mum was in this garden at that moment, and she sympathized with Jane and allowed her to live in the gardener’s bungalow with Petey.

Manolus did not wait to be aided by anyone. Since he was more familiar with the fay world than his mother, he advanced all he could within it. At some point he ran into Jarjobolim, a spirit of great size and strength but scarce intelligence, of whom it is said despectively that if you put his brain in a butterfly’s head it would still have room to rattle. Without hesitating for a second, Manolus  entered this spirit through a nostril  and placed his own brain in the almost empty space in Jarjobolim’s craneum, thus turning into a formidable being, enormous and evil.

“We have to pull off the spirit that covers him,” my uncle Gentlerain said to me. “And we have to do it before seven days pass, for the insignificant imbecile with always inapposite ideas that is Manolus, thanks to this fusion, has attracted the attention of a member of the Vicious Villains Society, who means to introduce this rude beast full of cursedness to his fellows during their Annual Assembly. Should Manolus be accepted as a new member, that superbrat will have found the support he needs to raise havoc wherever he wishes to. I have no intention of returning Jane to Sherbanania. I want to be done with this problem. But I would rather not visit the Manolus-Jarjobolim tandem on the Sherbananias. We are going to remove him and his mother from Sherbanania forever and in this way put an end to our unhappy relationship with Sherbanania. All those who entered into contact with us will not be allowed anywhere near that place again. The locals will be able to get on with their lives without our intervention, just as they did before you and Alpin came upon them.

“How does one pull of a spirit that covers one externally?” I asked. I had never even heard such a thing was possible before. “I suppose it won’t do to just ask Jarjobolim to leave.”

“No. Nor to order Manolus to let him go either. But we are not going to skin anyone alive, we´re not brutes,” said my uncle. He took from one of his pockets a ring of gold with a large stone of red jasper and said to me, “We´re going to draw foolish Jarjobolim into this ring, and leave Manolus uncovered. Then our people will jump on that brat and carry him off to hell, where he has well proved he belongs. He has been asking for this from the start, and I should have made short work of him and not given him many chances to improve his conduct. I’m done with his making fools of us. If the devils below can manage to make him of use to them, in that use he shall be employed, and if not, he can boil in a cauldron. Let’s put an end to the whole Sherbananian affair once and for all.”

“And what am I to do?”

“Stick Jarjobolim in the ring. You, trying to go unnoticed, must get behind the hybrid and point at the nape of its neck with this ring. The ring will do the rest. It will absorb Jarjobolim, who will remain trapped in there. And we will spring on Manolus, who will have been left uncovered.”

It sounded so easy that I wondered why I had to be the one to do this. ¿Was my uncle only trying to find me a job because I had lost mine?

“You said it would be dangerous.”

“And it is, but it won’t be, because if something goes wrong we will step in. We are not going tol et anything happen to you, no matter how much noise we make and how much unwanted attention we attract. We need you to do this because we want to go unnoticed if possible. If twenty or thirty of us jump on the monster, someone is bound to notice and word will get to the press. We don’t want another little scandal. We find them most annoying. We hate being accused of interfering in mortal affairs.  If we can avoid raising a row, we will do so. But should we need to, to keep ypu safe, be sure we’ll do just that.”

 “The thing is I don’t even remember what Manolus looks like. Have you a picture of him?”

“It is Jarjobolim you will be seeing. I don’t think you remember him either. You saw him in the shape of an apple, among many others, in the Pookah’s orchard. He was the largest apple around, but I don’t even think you noticed him. In any case, he doesn’t look that way anymore. You saw him lying on the ground among other spirits, fast asleep and waiting to come to when I changed those apples back into the beings they were before the Pookha bewitched them. But you don’t remember that look of his either, do you?”

“No. I know all that happened, but I don’t recall the details. How can I recognize him?”

“He is large, but also small. He will be alone, even if he isn’t alone. Believe me, you will know who he is the minute you spot him. He is a bad lot and that will be evident.”

“So I point the ring at the first rascal I see?”

“Well, yes. You count with three advantages. Firstly, you have moved among mortals before. Secondly, he is not likely to recognize you at all, whereas he is well acquainted with us because he has been jumping all over us and raking us over coals for all he is worth. And lastly, your are always quiet and discreet. We will set you in the very spot where he will be. The problem is that you will have to get close to him. From behind. From up front, he would defend himself. You will do this well, Arley.”

The truth is I am not the arrogant type. Not in vain is my totem animal the hare, who passes unnoticed in the grass until it suddenly leaps up to disappear again. No, I am no lion or tiger, no eagle or hawk. But if my uncle needed a hare, I was ready to serve.

“Now, get yourself a coat,” Uncle Gen advised me, “the day is splendid here, but where we are going the rook is flying low.”

I snapped my fingers and my warmest coat appeared on me.

“Any other little something I should know?”

“The ring doesn’t work if you make yourself invisible. And we wouldn’t be able to help you if we couldn’t see you. So, from behind, Arley, and go unnoticed.”

“Understood.”

I was going to stick the ring in my pocket, but I decided not to, because I hadn’t emptied my coat pockets since I had last used the coat, which was when I had gone Up North. If I left the ring among all the stuff in a pocket, I might not be able to find it as quickly as I might need to. So I slipped it on my finger and it shrank to size. Uncle Gen asked me if I was ready and I said I was, and he transported me to a much populated city, or to the center of one, given the crowd of people around me. Following my uncle’s instructions, I walked with the crowd for about four minutes, trying to observe everything that surrounded me without  anyone’s noticing I was doing that. Suddenly, I saw someone drop to the ground. The people next to the old man who had fallen picked him up, mostly to get him out of their way and left him sitting on a bench in front of a grocery store. I was tempted to go help, but I knew it wasn’t the right moment for that. Again suddenly, I saw another person slip sideways and drop down  subway stairs. And I realized these falls were not accidental. A large fellow was advancing, and every twenty people he passed, he would push his foot in the way of the twenty-first and trip that person up.

“You!” I thought, and I got as close to that fellow as I could, from behind, and I waited till he had counted twenty so I could catch him while he was absorbed in tripping his next victim. He was so large I couldn’t easily reach the nape of his neck to point at it  at such short distance, not without flying, but I tried, and I raised my arm, and when I did, the fellow suddenly veered and turned on me. He must have seen me from the corner of his eye. He made a grab at me, but I am very fast. I jumped backwards, stuck my hand in my pocket so he wouldn’t see the ring and at the same time grabbed all I had in the pocket and cast it at his eyes. And something unexpected happened. He got swallowed by a pelican.

I mean the tiny wooden pelican my northern grandfather had carved and given me when I left his home up north. I didn’t even remember I had it in my pocket.

And that was odd too, because I am almost always quite neat and always empty my coat pockets before hanging my coats and put the stuff there was in the pockets exactly where it should go.

The pelican hadn’t grown. It was still wee as wee. It had simply opened its mouth and sucked the entire monster in. Yes, Manolus too. And the wooden bird returned to my hand without my having to fetch it. And then something made me disappear and appear in a place where I had never been before. It was a cafeteria in a building with many floors and I was surrounded by several people and there were more standing behind those, all with crystal balls floating before them. And these people behind the ones that surrounded me began to clap, and I didn’t realize this was for me until  Uncle Gen tapped my shoulder and said, “Brilliant, Arley! Two clowns with one bird! Very well done! Hand me that pelican.”

I handed him the bird, but I said my paternal grandfather had given it to me and that I would like to have it back once they had drawn Manolus and Jarjobolim from within it. If I hadn’t given it great importance before, now I really valued it.

“Here’s the ring,” I said, returning it to Uncle Gen.

“You can keep that. You know what it is for. Ah, my stepfather, yes, he carves marvellous stuff. But he is so frugal with words that he gives these things away without giving explanations or instructions. Thankfully, they know how to function on their own. Of course we will return the pelican! Be careful with that, will you? We want it back,” said Uncle Gen, to the fellow who took it from him to extract those it had swallowed, and to me he said, “Well, we got one thing done today, didn’t we? You and I can leave now. Come on! To my godparents Christmas bazaar!”

“Generoso and Dadivosa’s?”

“Yes, take this,” he answered, handing me a  wad of bills. This was mortal money, and he explained what it was for, “This is not your pay. We’ll pay you for your service today on the twenty-first. This is for you to spend at the bazaar. It doesn’t matter what you buy. Just be sure to spend all of it. And you can keep whatever you acquire. My godparents will be grateful. They also serve refreshments, so we’ll have tea and sandwiches and such there. Listen, there will be all kinds of people present. Outworlders and even mortals. The profits are for such. Try not to attract too much attention. You did that very well before. The hybrid saw your reflection in the screen of an automated teller machine and turned when you raised your arm. But it wasn’t necessary for us to intervene. You were quicker than we were.”

“I really had no idea what I was doing when I cast the stuff in my pocket at the creature.”

“But you did that. It’s called instinct. If you hadn’t had the bird, you would at least have gained a few seconds. We would not have needed more to come to your rescue.”

“You’re being kind to me.”

“No, it wasn’t beginner’s luck. That is how we all work. Which is why this profession is hazardous.”