The Fat Man_ A Tale of North Pole Noir - Ken Harmon [30]
named for a sled?
Then U. Who handed me a note.
A dilly of a note.
U. Who
Gave me a real dilly of a note.
“This paper got here just before you,
Like they knew you were coming. It smells of perfume.”
I could not believe the words that I read
But the quick little letter filled me with dread.
“Run your pucker to the Forest of Mistletoe!
Shut up! Now! Go! Put your lips together and blow!”
CHAPTER 13
Somebody Waits for You
THE MARSHMALLOW WORLD GAZETTE
Do You Hear What I Hear?
Gossip with Butternut Snitch
The grapevine is ripe with rumors of elf-in-exile Gumdrop Coal’s whereabouts. Talk around the eggnog-cooler is that the outlaw elf is behind Kringle Town’s new crime spree. Some rubberneckers claim that they saw “Gumdrop-Dead” snatch a purse from the bishop’s wife, and others said Coal gave some nosy sugarplums double vision. Since there are rumors that the “Ghost of Christmas Panic” is planning more trouble, Candy Cane has convinced Santa to give the Tin Soldiers marching orders. Speaking of Kringle Town’s eye Candy, no one has heard “boo” from scoop siren Rosebud Jubliee. Honchos say she is covering the Gumdrop elf-hunt from the field, but I have also heard that someone has pulled some Xanadu voodoo to hide Jubliee’s button from danger. Is the love light beaming? Stay tuned!
The road to the Forest of Mistletoe was as bleak as prom time for the homely. I kept to the shadows and alleys, read news out of trash bins and pinched a bite to eat from the scraps wrapped in the headlines that were calling for my head. So far, they were still looking for me in Kringle Town proper, but I was pretty sure that was Cane’s doing. He was setting me up to take the fall for Raymond’s murder and the girl who knew how to tell a story was in on the fix. If Cane were trying to put the Fat Man on a permanent diet, he’d need help and I suppose he offered to buy Rosebud a newspaper to play with. So she trots her cute little self to Whoville, gives Lou Who the come-hither for his mailbox. They get the Red Ryder, kibosh Raymond, give Lou the sweet sayonara and the trail is colder than a North Pole outhouse. What they don’t count on is that I’m on to them, so they leave the little note to meet them in the woods where there would be nobody around. Pretty nifty. If I went to Bert or Santa with this story, I’d sound guilty and like I was the top nut on the fruitcake. They only choice I had was to take the bait and see if I could wiggle off the hook later.
The Forest of Mistletoe was the perfect place to tuck someone in for the big sleep. Lost in all the pucker talk, mistletoe is sometimes called the “vampire” plant because that’s what it is. Mistletoe attaches itself to a tree or shrub and sucks the life out of it. Think about that the next time some cute tomato gives you the come-hither standing under the twig. In the Forest of Mistletoe, the botany isn’t satisfied simply dining on trees. It wants blood and is partial to the sweet life-smack that pumps through elf veins. Many a short-round has gone into the Forest of Mistletoe on a dare, but none has ever come back. You might find an elf carcass, shriveled like a popped pimple, lying at the edge of the forest, but that was about it. There were crazy tales that some didn’t die but survived as some kind of mutant vampire elf. Rural and conspiracy elves claimed to have seen little monster dwarfs tearing through the bracken, thirsty for fresh blood. There was also talk that roving bands of elf vamps swooped down on the Isle of Misfit Toys on dark and haunted nights and feasted on the forgotten playthings. The tales sounded like something from Dingleberry’s By George Adventures, so I didn’t believe any of it. But when you stood in front of a wall of trees that was as dark as the inside of a chimney with the damper closed, it did take some of the starch out of your tights.
There was a sad excuse for a trail leading into the woods and I’m not too proud to admit that I took my time hiking it. The gloom that rose up before me was about as comforting