The Woad to Wuin Page 4

  When I started out it was broad daylight, but a full day of travel brought me toward evening with not much in the way of respite in sight. Finding no lodging, I clambered up into a tree to provide me protection from any predators—the animal kind or, even worse, the human kind—and found a secure place in the upper boughs. It was hardly comfortable, but I’d certainly had worse as I drew my cloak tightly around me and slept fitfully. Upon the rise of the sun, and blessedly no advent of snow, I descended and set out once again. With the cold weather rolling in, though, game was becoming scarce, and my belly was protesting its emptiness to me under the assumption that simply registering a complaint would be sufficient for me to attend to it.

  By midday, with hunger pains sharper than ever and the bark of the trees on either side of the road looking better and better, I became aware of activity up ahead. Traffic in the roadway began to pick up with merchants and others discernible ahead of me. In time the blessed smell of cooking meat reached my twitching nostrils, telling me that food and, hopefully, lodging was to be had yonder.

  Sure enough, a structure loomed as I turned the corner of the road. It was not terribly huge, perhaps slightly larger than the average tavern. However the owner of the place clearly had aspirations to something greater than a mere tavern, for the sign which hung outside read, “Bugger Hall.” I couldn’t help but think that “Hall” was a rather pretentious name for someplace as unprepossessing as that which lay ahead of me, but I wasn’t about to let the proprietor’s self-aggrandizement deter me from getting some rest and sustenance.

  I opened the front door and was almost knocked over by the blast of noise and raucous laughter that erupted from within. The Hall was packed. I had to admit, I was impressed. Whoever was running the place was doing a hell of a business.

  It took me a few moments to maneuver my way over to an empty table, my lame leg making its usual contribution to my inelegance. Those who bothered to afford me a glance did so with haughty sneers before hunkering back down over their drinks. Once I was seated, a serving wench approached me and eyed me contemptuously, no doubt considering me a pauper and vagabond. I couldn’t entirely blame her. I must have been a sight, bedraggled as I was. But I also knew that I had the wherewithal to pay for whatever I desired, and as soon as I raised up my purse and jingled it slightly, she knew it as well. From then on I was served in a most expeditious manner, and spoke very generously of the tip I planned to leave her for her attention. In point of fact, the tip I was going to leave her was “Don’t give patrons contemptuous glances,” since I had no intention of sharing my money with her. But she certainly didn’t have to know that.

  The wench refilled my mug with mead, and I would have liked nothing better than to enjoy the burning sensation of the liquid cascading down my gullet. At that moment, however, there was a roar of combined laughter and frustration near me. I glanced over my shoulder and observed that there were four men engaged in a very serious game of cards. The laugher was a wide man with a flattened face, piglike nose, and a beard that looked like a bird’s nest. He pounded loudly on the table as he scooped up assorted glittering coins. The sovs and dukes which comprised the pot winked at me invitingly as the pig-nosed man grinned and gathered them into a sack. “Gentlemen!” he boomed with the air of someone who loved winning more than life itself. “It has been a pleasure, as always!”

  Believe it or not, he rose and began bowing. As he swept his arm down as part of the bow, the breeze created by his sizable arm caused a few cards to scatter off the tabletop. A couple of them sailed into my lap, and I looked down at them with curiosity. A king of swords and a viceroy of cups. How jolly. Well, perhaps such a lucky draw might indicate that my luck would be changing in short order.

  The theatricality of the winner did nothing to cheer the mood of the losers. They were staring forlornly at the tabletop in front of them which had once held their respective riches. The bearded man, still bowing, was a bit too obsessed with his own smugness. I figured that he had probably cheated. Men who are that insufferably pleased with themselves after a card game are generally in that state of mind because they’re not only happy they won, but they’re tickled that they managed to pull something over on someone.

  For no reason that I can readily explain to you—other than that one who has nothing tends to hold zealously on to anything that he acquires, no matter how nominally useless—I tucked the cards under my tunic as I shook my head slightly in disgust at his behavior and turned away. Apparently my disapproval registered upon him. It’s a measure of the pettiness of the man that he gave a damn what some stranger passing through thought of him. “You!” he called.

  I looked around, despairing of the possibility that there was another “You!” that he might be addressing. Or perhaps he had simply shouted out “Hew!” because he wanted an employee to go out and chop some wood. Admittedly the former was wishful thinking, and the latter was just too stupid to be contemplated, but you’ll be amazed at the desperate lengths the thought process will go so as not to have to deal with the inevitable.

  “You!” he said again, this time a step closer to me.

  Tapping myself on the chest, I inquired with as much innocence as I could muster, “Are you addressing me, sir?”

  “I saw you shaking your head at me, young pup! You did so as if you were expressing disgust!” His face was darkening, although he didn’t seem entirely angry. Instead it was as if he was enjoying the art of the bluster. But he was built far too powerfully for me to simply dismiss him as some sort of poseur. If I angered him, there was no question but that he would make things extremely miserable for me.

  “I merely shook my head in incredulity, sir, that the gods so blessed you with such winning prowess,” I said cautiously.

  “And what is that supposed to mean? What are you implying … ?”

  “Nothing, sir.” I tried to sound as humble as possible. I simply did not need to get drawn into trouble with this idiot.

  But he was not going to let it go. Perhaps he thought I needed a lesson, or maybe he just wanted to show off to his friends. And then there was the outside chance that he was simply an asshole. Whatever the reason, he pulled back a chair opposite me, the legs dragging loudly across the floor, and he dropped into it so that he was not quite on eye level with me. “Do you know who I am?” he demanded. I shook my head. “I am Bugger! Owner and operator of Bugger Hall!”

  “A pleasure to meet you.”

  “You,” and he stabbed a meaty finger at me, “do not sound pleased.”

  “I am sorry that you haven’t found my pleasure sufficiently pleasing,” I told him, almost tripping over the bizarre wording that the sentence had required.

  “I believe I know why you do not sound pleased! It is because,” and his face darkened. It seemed he was going to be able to work himself into a lather without my contributing a damned thing to the process other than just sitting there and staring at him with incredulity. “It is because … you think I have cheated!”

  The smell of mead was wafting off his breath fairly thickly at that point. For a moment I entertained the notion of trying to hold a small flame within range of his mouth. The alcohol content on his breath would likely ignite it, his head would be burned to a crisp, and I wouldn’t have to deal with this fool anymore. But I had no flame handy, not even a candle. “I have no reason to think that, sir,” I assured him. That wasn’t quite true. Not only did I have my suspicions, but the simple truth is that I suspect everyone of cheating. It’s the advisable way to live your life. There are two types of people in this world: People who have betrayed you, and people who have not betrayed you … yet. The former require close scrutiny, the latter even more so. So really, you can’t go wrong expecting the worst of people. If nothing else, it will greatly lessen the chances of you being smashed in the head with an urn filled with your mother’s ashes and having your life savings stolen. And I speak from personal experience in the matter.

  His gaze was fastened upon my hip.
At first I thought he was trying to appraise my endowments through my breeches, and I wasn’t certain whether to be flattered or nervous or both. But then I realized that the true object of his desire was the large purse I had hanging from my belt. Sure enough, he said, “How about a quick hand of Naipes, then? You have a fairly decent amount of money there, I would say.”

  “Yes,” I allowed, “a healthy sum. But I’m not interested in wagering it.”

  “Oh, come on!” growled Bugger, wavering slightly in his seat. If he’d had two sober bones in his body to rub together, he would have desisted in this foolishness, but such was not the case. “Play me, if you be a man.”

  I smiled wanly. “And don’t think I’m not ever-so-pleased that you’re concerned about my manhood, but I don’t care to …”

  “I’ll give you two-to-one odds.” And before I could speak, he amended it, “Make it four to one … no, five to one! Five-to-one odds!” That was actually a rather interesting offer, and for a moment the aspect of my character that called for caution and staying out of potential fiascoes was fully at war with my greed and avarice. But before I could say yea or nay … and I have to admit, I was leaning toward yea … he promptly said, “All right, ten-to-one odds, damn you, on one go-around of Naipes! You drive a hard bargain! But, har har, no man alive can be saying no to odds such as these, harrrr!”

  I wondered precisely at what point he had started talking like a pirate, but it didn’t matter. What mattered was that my mental mathematics—dubious in quality as they so often were—were still sufficient to assure me that even the winnings he had amassed were not equal to ten times what I had in my purse. I pointed this deficit out to him, thinking that it would draw an end to the matter.

  I saw from the momentary surprise in his drunken eyes that he had indeed been caught off guard. What I did not count on, however, was the snickering and jostling from those sitting nearby, clearly rather pleased that old Bugger had gotten himself into something of a fix. But this gave him only a few moment’s pause, and then with a grin that bordered on the demented, he sneered at me and said, “All right, then. One hand … and I’ll put up this entire place against the contents of your purse!”

  “But … I don’t want the place,” I said. The entire conversation had tripped over into the unreal.

  But even my lack of interest didn’t daunt him. “What?” he fairly roared. “No interest in Bugger Hall! Do you have any idea of the proud history of this place?” He stood then, his chair toppling back, and I thought for a moment that he was going to produce a sword out of somewhere and attack me with it. But apparently he just wanted some declaiming room. “This place,” he informed me, “has been in my family for four generations! Every generation it would be handed down, from a father Bugger to a little Bugger, being passed along …”

  “Not unlike the clap,” I muttered.

  Fortunately he didn’t hear me. Instead he thumped the table loudly and shouted, “That is just how confident I am that I will defeat you, you little toad! You … you worm! You gutless wonder! You—”

  “All right, all right!” I said in exasperation. “As you will, then. Deal the cards. One hand, winner take all!”

  There was a ragged cheer from the onlookers, who were probably thrilled just to see an end to this pointless confrontation. But my mind was unclouded, and I was looking around the place and seeing the potential. It was packed. It looked to be an extremely profitable enterprise, and I wouldn’t mind in the least coming into possession of it.

  Removing my purse, I thumped the small sack into the middle of the table with a most satisfying jingle of coins. The sound of its weight drew appreciative “ooohs” from the crowd. They knew I was not some mere charlatan. But they also knew, or at least suspected, that whatever money I had upon me, I wasn’t going to remain in possession of it for long.

  Naturally they didn’t know me very well.

  For one of the few times in my life, I actually played the hand that I was dealt. Mine was good. His was better. He slapped down his combination of tens and kings, two in cups and two in wands, which surpassed what I was holding. Not even bothering to display the faces, I slapped down the cards in disgust.

  The thing was, I had kept my money close to me. I suspected—and turned out to be correct—that he would reach over to scoop up his winnings. This he most obligingly did, just as I slipped my hand into my tunic and pulled out what I’d secreted in there. “Hold it!” I snapped at him, catching him completely off guard, his look of triumph giving way to confusion as I snagged his left wrist with my hand. Since I was reaching diagonally across him, it immobilized him for a moment, trapping his arm crosswise across his chest. “What the hell is this up your arm!” I demanded, maintaining my grasp on his left wrist with my left and, and reaching over with my right hand toward his loose sleeve. I moved so quickly, so deftly, that no one saw the cards already tucked into my fingers. Even if they’d been in a position to, their gazes would have instead been upon the exact place that I’d just told them to be, namely on Bugger’s arm.

  With an ever-so-slight flip of my fingers, it suddenly appeared as if I was extracting two cards from Bugger’s sleeve. The king of swords and viceroy of cups were right there in my hand, and I had made the maneuver so quickly that it occurred to no one that the cards were already in my possession.

  Well, I amend that. It certainly occurred to Bugger, who let out a yelp of anger and alarm … the anger because he realized that he was being had, and the alarm because he intuited just as quickly that he was going to have a hard time making anyone believe it. This was particularly the case when someone has just made a killing at cards, and those he was playing are especially open to hearing accusations of cheating. That would naturally invalidate the game, and restore some measure of pride to those who had taken the beating.

  “It’s a trick!” Bugger shouted.

  “Bloody well right it’s a trick!” snapped back one of the men whose money had been cleaned out in the game. “And we know who’s been pulling it, and the gods only know for how long you’ve been perpetrating such shenanigans!”

  Now they were converging upon him. “For years now we’ve put up with your winning all the time!” one of them snapped at him.

  “All the time? What ‘all the time’? I was the main loser last week!”

  “Aha! Proof! You did that deliberately just to throw us off the scent!”

  Bugger was unable to come up with any sort of reasonable response to such a preposterous train of logic. I simply sat back and smiled, secure in my knowledge of human nature and human idiocy. Finally he found his voice to point at me with quavering finger and say, “But he … he … you’re not going to listen to him … ?!”

  “He’s not saying anything!” was the response. “He’s simply the one who caught you red-handed! You’re damning yourself with your own protests!” They were converging upon Bugger from all sides. He backed up, trying to get some distance from them, and instead bumped into one of the larger specimens standing directly behind him. The shortest of the group approached him, looking up at Bugger, his face twisted in fury. “For ages now, we’ve listened to your bragging and your self-aggrandizing, and the way in which you boast about your achievements! It’s always ‘Bugger this’ and ‘Bugger that’ and ‘Bugger some other damned thing!’ And now you’re revealed for the cheater and thief that you’ve always been!”

  “No! No, I—!”

  They didn’t want to hear another word of it. Instead they came at him, grabbing him by the arms and legs, pinning him. Bugger struggled mightily, for he was larger than any one of them. But even he couldn’t overcome the lot of them, no matter how much he pulled and pushed and shoved.

  “Kill him!” they shouted. “Kill the cheater!” “Kill the thief!” It was, I must say, a pleasant diversion to hear such things being shouted and not be the subject of them. But then another of them cried out, “Burn his damned hall down!” and that did not sit particularly well with me.

/>   Immediately gripping my staff to propel me, I was on my feet. There was now such a din, such a commotion what with one man yelling over another about what to do with the “cheater,” that I knew I was going to have problems making myself heard. Nevertheless, I endeavored to do so, pounding the table in front of me with the base of my staff while bellowing, “Gentlemen! Gentlemen!” over and over again. Short of dousing them with water, that’s the most effective way to gain the attention of a mob. If nothing else, certainly being called “Gentlemen” was such a novel experience for the crowd of reprobates and loafers that it couldn’t help but capture their interest. My mind was racing in the customary way it had when I was confronted with a situation and had not the slightest clue what was going to pop out of my mouth in an attempt to deal with it. It’s a quite stimulating way to live, really, provided it doesn’t kill you along the way.

  “Gentlemen,” I said once more, this time in the quieter but still commanding voice which I could effect when the situation called for it. “Gentlemen … there have got to be more generous and humane ways to deal with this predicament than simply killing him. After all, how will you possibly get your money back if you take him outside and beat him to death … as pleasurable an experience as that might be?”

  Considering they were an angry mob, they were rather attentive. The only one who seemed ready to tear me apart was Bugger, and I suppose I couldn’t blame him, since he and I knew that I had set him up. Understand: I was certain that he had, in fact, been cheating, and so this was simply some belated justice catching up with him. And in the off chance that he’d never cheated at cards, well … I’m sure he did something wrong in his life at some point, so on that basis this was deserved.