“Sir Mumphrey is within, milady,” Chives intoned, opening the doors to the Chinese Room.
Elizabeth Zemo entered slowly. Her thighs hurt. Her body hurt. She felt like one huge but very relaxed bruise. It had been wonderful, more than worth the encounter she was about to have with Sir Mumphrey.
The master of Wilton Manor was dressed in a smoking jacket and slippers, but his bearing was almost as stiff as a regimental drum major’s. He was looking at her as if she were some sort of weasel or badger who had been caught in a henhouse and who deserved a quick drowning. She gazed coolly back at him, giving nothing away.
“I would appreciate an explanation, Baroness.”
“I know of nothing that I need to explain, Sir Mumphrey. You asked to see me; if you have a concern, you need to explain it to me.”
“Harrumph,” was the Englishman’s only response, and silence fell over the room again.
Juvenile, thought Elizabeth. The ominous silence; almost as predictable as that good cop/bad cop act they tried yesterday.
Finally, Sir Mumphrey conceded. “Well, seein’ that you are goin’ to brazen this out, I’ll be blunt. You broke your word to me, Baroness, by giving young Donarson an enchanted gift, and then exploitin’ his passion for snooker. Not to mention taking him for about half the treasury of Ausgard.”
”Oh, that? A boy that big needed a full size gift. And I knew he’d want to play for me, so I had a one-night enchantment applied to it in Ausgard. The table’s fine, now, and I forgave the debt when he left – this morning. He was so worried about having that hanging over his head when he was going hunting with Donar, poor boy.’
“Be that as it may, you promised me that none of the gifts were harmful. Because of those false pretenses, I am compelled to withdraw my hospitality and ask you to leave at once.”
“That’s your privilege, but frankly, Sir Mumphrey, you should be kicking yourself out of the house.”
“I say, what?”
“False pretenses, you say? Placing us and the manor under an enchantment to cut us off from the world? Allowing Grimpenghast to substitute a Hero Feeder for one of your guests and allowing him to kill off seven more? Staging a murder? Setting up a farce of an inquiry and allowing suspicion to fall on me? Risking the remainder of your guests’ lives? I’d say Harley’s snooker table hardly counts as a deception against all that.”
“What I did was to save the Lair Legion and to assist Xander in repelling dark forces from the Parodyverse. Your little machinations aren’t comparable.”
“So the end justifies the means? Never mind, although you have no idea of what my goals are.”
“Taking over the world is obvious enough.”
“What I intend to do for it is not, Sir Mumphrey. Don’t underestimate me, or how much good I can do. But I think we’ve both said enough. I’ll go up now and pack, and say my good-byes.”
“Chives has already had your things packed and put in your car. It should be out front right now. Good-bye’s would not be . . . expedient. You may leave now, Baroness.”
“My, the bum’s rush, English-style. Well, I look forward to having you and the Lair Legion over sometime, Sir Mumphrey, as soon as I find a more permanent home.”
“I don’t think we’ll be that familiar, Baroness. Chives, kindly show the Baroness out.”
Back in London, Elizabeth Zemo collapsed on the ornate bed in her hotel suite and closed her eyes in hopes of a delicious nap. Thirty seconds later, though, a harsh growl ended her reverie.
“Your stay at the Englishman’s was that tiring?” Baron Ottokar Zemo was displeased as usual.
Eyes still closed, Elizabeth responded acidly. “Most of the guests were merely annoying. But there were a few special moments.”
“Yes, the Ausgardian whelp must have been special. But he was Aryan, after all.”
“You’re a snoop *and* a racist, Grandfather Baron Otto. But you’re not going to spoil that for me. Now go away and I’ll see you tomorrow at breakfast.”
“Tomorrow at breakfast you will be where you belong, in our schloss. I’ve had Sally pack you up and the jet is waiting. Come.”
“I’m not going anywhere. I’m staying in, having some of that fantastic food sent up, and maybe spending a couple of hours in the tub. Your little trip can wait until tomorrow, and you can’t make me do anything.”
“Were you wondering what Flapjack was doing late at night?”
“Probably sneaking around, looking though keyholes. So?”
“He had a Bautista 4775 infrared camcorder with zoom lenses. And now he has about 15 minutes of footage of you and young Harlagaz – or rather, I have it now.”
“Flapjack gave up his secret nooky-cam tapes? What did you do, torture him?”
“Yes. He insisted on a half-hour more than I intended, that’s why I was late. And, if you do not come with me immediately, they will be all over the Internet.”
Elizabeth paused for a moment, and then chuckled. “As if you’d do it, Otto. You’d discredit the family name, spoil my plans for Harley and give a Flapjack the pleasure? All just so you can get me to some crumbling castle a half day earlier?”
“You must come. The stars are aligned properly tonight; they will not be in a similar configuration for some time.”
“Find some other mystical guinea pig, Grandfather Baron Otto. You expect me to walk into one of your little get-togethers and get turned into a zombie or a frog or something? Just take the jet and go there yourself; I’ll catch up in a day or two.”
“That will be sufficient, granddaughter. If you do not value the power I can grant you, I will not force it on you.”
“Then why did you bother with that silly attempt at blackmailing me?”
“I was bored. And felt like testing you a bit. I probably should have just asked Flapjack to stay longer and try out the new rack at Lord Finsterleigh’s.”
Two days later, Elizabeth’s limousine was again pulling up in front of a country estate. This one, though, had none of the serenity or beauty of Wilton Manor. Coal-black stone loomed over the entrance, with a surfeit of gargoyles, mounted knights trampling peasants and impaled heretics carved over the granite arches. Dormers and gables, adorned with moldy shutters and leaking roofs, emerged every which way. Cracked glass casement windows were almost opaqued by dust and dirt. The wall around the courtyard sported holes and breaches from artillery shells and A rusted sign by the archway to the gardens warned, Achtung! Minen! while another one with peeling black letters by the front entrance asserted Schloss Schreckhausen —Eigentum des Deutsche Demokratische Republiks.
“I thought East Germany went away fifteen years ago,” she said to the waiting Baron Otto.
“I let them leave the sign up. They were too afraid to come inside – for 45 years. Just a small example of what our ‘little mystical get-togethers’ can do,” he said proudly. “
“That means nothing. The name of this place is ‘palace haunted house,’ after all.”
“It is time for you to enter your ancestral home, granddaughter,” he chided, opening the stained oak doors wide to reveal a pitch-dark cavern.
“I suppose,” she griped. “Sally, give me that flashlight.”
Stepping into the anteroom, Elizabeth aimed the flashlight around. It illuminated a 15th century suit of armor, a number of portraits of Zemo ancestors with hideously deformed faces, cracked black and white floor tiles adorned with dust bunnies and mud, a chandelier almost blackened with dust and covered in cobwebs, and peeling green and brown paint.
“My real estate agent would love this place,” she told Otto. “Brandi would be saying, ‘It just needs a little fixing up and it will be charming.’ I’d use napalm, myself. Or invite Kerry Shephardson for tea.”
“This is how I kept it for the neighbors,” chuckled the Baron. “Watch.” After a few muttered phrases and vague hand motions, a warm glow blossomed, rapidly increasing until Elizabeth had to cover her eyes and avert her head. When it dissipated, the chandelier was blazing, the walls sported 18th century wallpaper, and the rooms were spotless. She stepped forward into the salon, filled with comfortable chairs and sofas, German antiques, and an amazing array of hunting trophies ranging from bear skin rugs to mounted elk heads to tigers. The side tables contained ashtrays made from animal paws. A set of window hangings was made from leopard skin. Two porcelain stoves in the shapes of an elephant and a bear warmed the room.
“Good grief, what a slaughter! Did you do all of this?” she asked her grandfather.
“Only about half. I preferred the rare species, like that Gondorff’s eagle over there. I bagged the last one. The earlier Zemoes did the rest,” he preened.
“You can keep this room,” Elizabeth replied. “Shall we look at the rest of the castle?”
“Wait one moment. There is a gentleman to see you. Would you bring him in, Sally?”
A few moments later the Huntmaster entered the room. He stopped short to take in the spectacle. “Most impressive,” he breathed, and looked eagerly at Baron Otto. “A Wilkins’ antelope? You found one?”
“We can talk of this later. I believe you know my granddaughter?”
“Yes. Your Excellency, I am so sorry I have not been able to begin my hunt, but you are aware of the delays.”
“I didn’t expect you to fight the Hellraisers to get to Shazana Pel, and I know she fled to the Moon Public Library. But it’s your job to get her back here. I’ve arranged with ITC for transportation; find some bait that will bring our pigeon back. We’ll restart the clock now.”
“That will be fine. Thank you.”
“Go ahead and talk shop with Baron Otto, if you’d like, while I take care of a few things. I’ll be in Parodiopolis in a day or so; I expect to see you there soon. Sally, come with me.”
They spent the rest of the morning exploring the old castle’s innards, including its dungeon, prison tower and what appeared to be an indoor swimming pool until Sally found out it was filled with acid. They paused for lunch in the kitchen, but found nothing.
“I’ll get a couple of sandwiches from that shop next door,” Sally suggested.
“I suppose so. I mean, we’re right in the middle of a suburb; a shopping center on one side and a gym on the other. I can practically see through the windows the Hausfraus trying to take off a couple of pounds. And Otto kept telling me that he’d preserved the whole estate.”
“I did preserve the whole estate. But when we split the barony up so that both Heinrich and I would have manors, this was all that was left. A castle and about 50 meters of land around it,” Baron Otto admitted sheepishly.
“So that’s what Sir Mumphrey was talking about when he was ranting about ‘postage stamp barons,’” murmured Sally. Otto flushed but said nothing.
“Sally, do you remember that creepy old estate in Pierce Heights? The one with all the acreage? Call Brandi and tell her I’m buying it. Cash if they vacate within a week. And also tell her to get a wrecking crew in there as soon as they leave. I have an idea for this place.”
Playing the part of Baroness Elizabeth Zemo von Saxe-Lurkburg-Schreckhausen:
J. Jonah Jerkson
VOICE OF THE PEOPLE
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