The Stranger - Max Frei [21]
The newcomer flashed his dark eyes, and raised his eyebrows so high that they disappeared under his turban. He covered his face with his hands in a theatrical gesture, and wailed, “I see you as in a waking dream, O marvelous barbarian, and I fear that your image will haunt me in my nightmares!” Then he turned a complete pirouette on the shaggy carpet, as though it were made of ice, and collapsed into an armchair, groaning from the exertion. After that, he froze as still as death (he even seemed to stop breathing), and studied me with a penetrating gaze, unexpectedly serious and somehow empty, completely at odds with his recent acrobatics.
I realized I had to greet him in some manner, too, so I covered my eyes with the palm of my hand, as one is supposed to do. But all I could utter was: “Okay.”
Melifaro grinned and unexpectedly (as everything he did was unexpected) winked at me.
“You, Sir Max, are quite a guy! The future nocturnal backside of our ‘Venerable Head.’ Don’t worry, I’m his diurnal backside, have been for sixteen years now. A person gets used to everything, you know.”
“It’s just a matter of time before the reputation of our office is toppled once and for all in the eyes of Sir Max!” Juffin hurried to intervene. “All my labors will turn to dust. He’ll realize that I’m a humble director of a Refuge for the Mad and rush back to the Barren Lands, suddenly seeing the advantages of life in the fresh air.”
I blinked helplessly.
“Was that everything you knew?” Juffin asked me. “No more news?”
“That wasn’t enough for you?”
“Of course it wasn’t, old chap!” Melifaro retorted. “They failed to tell you where the fellow disappeared to, what happened to him, and who’s to blame in all of this. And they didn’t take the trouble to bring the criminal to justice. So now we have to do their work for them!”
“Melifaro! Sir Max has already figured out that you’re the wittiest, the most irresistible, and the most magnificent of them all. He is beside himself with joy, having discovered the very source of the glory and might of the Unified Kingdom. And now we’re going to get down to work,” Sir Juffin commanded, somehow very calmly and tenderly. Melifaro snorted, then started issuing instructions.
“Max, you’re coming with us. Three is a crowd. I signed an order granting Sir Lonli-Lokli and his magic hands five Days of Freedom from Chores, and he wisely left town yesterday morning. Melamori is relieved of duty, as her influential daddykins missed her. And Sir Kofa Yox is keeping watch at our Pleasure Factory by the Bridge, instead of methodically chewing a steak in some Sated Skeleton or other, the poor bloke. But we ourselves will have a little snack, otherwise Sir Melifaro will lose the ability to think once and for all. And you are always up for that, as far as I’ve been able to find out, aren’t you?”
We snacked abundantly, but in great haste. Sir Melifaro, by the way, attempted to make it into the Guinness Book of Records in that category of strapping fellows who consume sources of nourishment in huge quantities before you could say Jack Robinson.
All the while, he regaled us with questions, asking me whether it was difficult to get along without sun-cured horsemeat, and asking Sir Juffin whether it might be possible to get a sandwich with the meat of some pickled mutinous Magician or other. (I was able to appreciate this joke only later, when Sir Kofa Yox gave me a comprehensive lecture about the most enduring urban legends.)
We walked over to Sir Makluk’s house in silence. Sir Juffin was thinking troubled thoughts, Melifaro whistled a tune absently, and I waited expectantly for my first slice of true adventure. I’ll say right off that I got much more than I had bargained for.
The usual man in gray admitted us