Jonathan Howard - Johannes Cabal the Detective

“People of Mirkarvia …” He spoke in a pleasing baritone that carried easily across the square. “Friends …” He said it with such sincerity that commoners who had long referred to him as “lard arse,” “flobber features,” “cancer borne on the backs of the proletariat,” and other things less kind, suddenly felt unfamiliar but not unpleasant pricklings of admiration for their emperor. They hung on his every word. This was going to be important. “I come before you today to share a vision I have of the future. Not just the future of our own great and noble country but also that of our neighbours …”

It was powerful stuff, and those of a romantic, nationalistic nature in particular were borne along by it. Karstetz was all that and stupid to boot. He rose from the table and walked slowly towards the fluttering curtains as if drawn by siren song. He stopped and listened, transfixed. Cabal watched him as a scientist watches a beetle on a tombstone. After a few seconds, it was plain that Karstetz had forgotten all about him. Quietly, Cabal climbed to his feet, picked up his bag and cane, and walked softly, staying on the thick carpet, in the direction of the door.

On the balcony, Marechal glowed inwardly. This was exquisite, far better than even his fondest hopes. The crowd were eating this with an even more avaricious appetite than the one they’d used to demolish several tons of state-owned sausage. The rumours of the emperor’s death could now be skilfully twisted into the people “knowing” about the emperor’s fragile health. Yet he’d heroically torn himself from his deathbed to deliver this, his last and greatest gift to his people, his wish for the future. This wasn’t going to be some grubby little land-grabbing campaign. It was going to be a crusade .

“The disputed lands are ours ,” roared the emperor. “Historically ours. Rightfully ours. They shall be ours again!” In the crowd’s collective consciousness, their neighbours turned from trading partners and allies into a bunch of thieving Gypsies, ripe for extermination.

Marechal smiled and looked at the others in the line — the generals, the marshals, the admirals of the Aerofleet, and the commodore of the tiny Gallaco Sea Fleet. They were entranced, enraptured. War was in the air, and it smelled good.

Then he noticed Karstetz standing behind the curtains, his attention entirely given over to the wrong subject. Cabal was nowhere to be seen. Marechal felt suddenly cold. So Cabal had escaped, so what? Marechal remembered a sack of cat hair and Cabal’s strange sense of humour, his loathing of war in general, and Marechal’s ambitions in particular. His suspicions deepened.

Karstetz didn’t respond to Marechal’s attempts to attract his attention while not distracting the crowd. He didn’t feel the intense gaze, see the sharp flicks of the head, hear the snapped fingers. He had ears only for the emperor’s speech. “Make no mistake,” Antrobus was saying, “these fair-weather friends, with their deceitful ways and their foul plans, are our enemies!” The crowd roared. “Our mortal foe!” They screamed for blood. “Our prey!” They gave voice to a full-throated howl of fury. It went half-throated when, belatedly, they realised what he’d said.

Marechal flicked his attention from Karstetz to Antrobus. Prey? He’d never written that. “We shall hunt them! Kill them! Eat them!” cried Antrobus in a passion. “They are our meat! We shall tear the flesh from their bones with our bare teeth and devour them!” Marechal realised with horror that the emperor was drooling, dark saliva bubbling from his lips. Down in the square, the people were looking suspiciously at their sausages.

“ Ach, du lieber Gott ,” he whispered. Then to Karstetz he barked, “Lieutenant! Get him!”

“Wha’?” Karstetz looked around as if waking. “What? Who?”

“The emperor, you dolt! Get him inside before it’s too late!”

“Brains!” The emperor was shrieking now. “If we eat their brains, we have their strength, their very souls. Brains!” The strength of his voice was going, quickly turning to a shambling imbecilic tone. “Human brains … must eat … brains …”

“There, there, old fella,” said Karstetz, appearing beside him. “Let’s get you indoors and into your coffin, shall we? Have a lovely state funeral. That’ll be nice, won’t it?”

“Brains,” said Antrobus unheeding, the drool dripping into a dark stain on his robes. “Must eat … brains …” He finally noticed Karstetz and decided to start with a light snack.

The crowd gasped and gagged, and some of them fainted as their Imperial Majesty fell upon a surprised cavalry officer. Karstetz may have started to scream before Antrobus smashed his head open on the marble balcony rail, threw him to the floor, and began to feed. It was so hard to tell amidst all the other screams.

Marechal’s mind worked quickly. He needed a ploy, and he needed it now. The French gambit, it had to be. “We are betrayed!” he shouted, and signalled to the captain of the guards. Sporadically at first and then with increasing discipline, rifle fire started to pour into the crowd. Marechal signalled three volleys and ran into the room. The door at the far end burst open and guardsmen rushed in. “Get that thing in here,” he bellowed at them.

“The emperor?” asked the sergeant at their head.

“Emperor? That’s not our emperor! We are betrayed! Drag it in here and kill it!”

He left them grappling with the foul thing that screeched and whooped at them. The situation was still controllable. The massacre in the square could easily be put at the door of enemy agents. The sudden panic he had caused would drive those last few moments into a strange world of uncertain memory. Had the emperor really turned into a monstrous cannibal before their eyes? Of course not. He’d been attacked by … by … a traitor! Karstetz had attacked the emperor. A life-and-death struggle — the heroic efforts of the emperor killing his own assassin even as he breathed his last. Yes, yes! It could work!

It was a shame about Karstetz, though. He’d owed Marechal money.

He ran through the palace unheeding of the precise course he was taking, uncertain even what he was looking for. He swung two doors open and found himself in the great banquet hall of the palace. It was one of the more medieval parts of the place, a long table running down its centre, a balcony running around from the end of the great staircase on the northern wall, a minstrels’ gallery. At the far end, unsuccessfully trying the doors there, it also had Johannes Cabal.

Marechal smiled bitterly, closed the doors behind him, and loosened his revolver in its holster. This was what his subconscious mind had been up to, hunting this man, this hated man. Sometimes he got a great sense of job satisfaction.

Cabal had heard the sound and already turned to face him. He drew his pocket watch and studied the face. “Have the emperor’s dietary mores changed already?” he asked in a tone of polite enquiry. “Test batch 295 always was unreliable.”

“You knew this would happen?” Now the Count Marechal could relax a little. What was occurring outside could wait for a few minutes. He had time to pause a moment, take stock, kill Cabal.

“Two ninety-five yields remarkable results. Right up to the moment the subject becomes a maniacal cannibal. I had hoped for a few more minutes’ grace, though. Any casualties?”

“Lieutenant Karstetz.”

“No loss there, then.”

“None at all.” Marechal drew his gun. “What am I to do with you, Herr Cabal?”

“It would seem that you’ve already made up your mind on that point.” Johannes Cabal placed his bag and cane on the end of the long banquet table, took off his jacket, folded it, and put it down, too. Then he unbuttoned his cuffs and rolled up his sleeves.