Terry Newman - Detective Strongoak and the Case of the Dead Elf

I picked up the bones and walked over to the mirror, re-tied my plait in the family knots and ran a hand over my chin. I could do with my evening shave – us dwarfs have that sort of make-up. I pumped some water into the small basin and splashed my face. I do not keep much in the way of furniture in the office – some might call it sparse, I like to think of it as minimalist. The small hand basin is the only amenity, and for the rest I have to walk along the corridor.

The room is somewhat dominated by my desk, which came with the room and looks as if it was poured out of the same mould as the rest of the building. ‘Monumental’ is an understatement. Its legs are enough to qualify as a tourist attraction in themselves. The desktop is inlaid with a green leather that might have been taken from the butt of the worm that won the Battle of the Forgotten Mountain. Fortunately the desk has two chairs; both similarly worked, as finding a good match would have been impossible on this side of the Big Sea. I had added a chest and a small cupboard. The chest I used for papers and the cupboard contained a change of clothes, my little stove and, most importantly, all I needed for the preparation of coffee. The grinder was a new electric model. I still preferred my old mechanical one and the comforting ritual that went with it. However, far be it from me to spit in the face of progress, as it had actually been a present from a rather special lady. It’s a noisy business though, and with the grinder on full, I almost missed the knock on the reception door and the whole economy-sized parcel of grief that came along with it.

I shouted a simple ‘Come-In!’ I know … I know … over-familiar, but it was out of regular office hours, and I was feeling kind of wild.

The face that peered round my inner door was pretty, but in a world where ‘pretty’ tends to be a rather over-subscribed commodity, you might not think to look at it twice. If you did, however, there was a certain something around the eyes that could come back to haunt you at the most inappropriate times.

With the face there also came a mass of sandy-coloured hair, back-combed in the style that was everywhere that year. Her frame was not large but quite compact, and she radiated an air of both vulnerability and independence: an intriguing combination. She could look me straight in the eye, which, although as I mentioned I am tall for a dwarf, made her quite short for a woman. I recognised her as a receptionist from an office along the corridor.

‘Are you busy, Detective Strongoak?’ she asked.

‘No, come in, take a seat.’ I waved vaguely with the grinder.

This was the first time I had seen her out of work-wear. She had on shorts and an oversized tabard-shirt sporting the legend: ‘Surf Elves – Really Out of Their Trees!’ Surfing, I knew, was the unicorn’s horn as far as the elfin elite were concerned: bronzed, blue-eyed young lords and ladies with enchanted boards that seemed to float forever above the waves. Like most elfin activities, it had now caught on with the Citadel men and women too. It was a trend I did not subscribe to. We dwarfs have an affinity with water a rain-wear manufacturer would hock his treasure trove to patent.

‘The name’s Liza, isn’t it?’ I said, casually, after she had settled.

‘That’s right, Detective Strongoak, Liza Springwater.’

‘Well, would you like some coffee, Liza?’ I paused with the scoop held over the percolator, pleased to have gained an attractive drinking companion.

‘What I really would like is some help.’

‘Sure,’ I said, thinking that there was probably a chest or two that needed the application of some dwarf muscle. The sort of job I’m only too willing to help out with, especially if the grateful party has been blessed with extra helpings of cutes. Liza certainly had plenty to spare. In fact, she could probably have started a market stall and made a good living supplying cutes to women who think that men just go for the physical attributes that are easier to record with paint and brush. Not that I’ve anything against them either; far be it for me to play favourites.

‘Can it wait until after some coffee, Liza?’

‘I don’t know, Detective Strongoak,’ she said, very seriously.

I added an extra scoop to the percolator anyway, and set it on the small stove, which I lit with a flint. I adjusted the flame before we both passed out from heat exhaustion.

‘They can never get the temperature right in this building,’ I added, rather unnecessarily.

‘I know, too hot in the summer and too cold in the winter. Our office is freezing from the moment the first snow starts to fall.’

‘What is it you do there, Liza?’

‘Nothing very exciting: take messages, scrollwork and some dictation. Occasionally I get a trip out if the boss wants a smiling face. Hers only being suited for scaring off ogres.’

‘I’ll remember that. Just might come in handy one day, in my line of business.’

The water was finally warming to my satisfaction, so I sat down on the business side of the desk and put on the understanding face I usually reserve for widows and orphans.

‘Now, perhaps you had better tell me all about it.’

For a moment I thought she was going to cave in on me, but she had come this far and did not intend to back down now. I sort of admired that. ‘It’s about this boy I’ve been seeing, Perry Goodfellow.’

She paused, as if expecting some comment from me. If so, she was disappointed; all she got was that same old noncommittal look and the background music of the bubbling percolator. This must have been good enough, as she continued:

‘He’s disappeared. We were due to meet last week, but he never turned up. When I still hadn’t heard anything from him the next day, I called the inn in Old Town where he worked. They said he had collected his pay and cleared out. They didn’t know where he went, unfortunately. A week’s gone by and I’ve yet to hear a word. I’m concerned, no … actually I’m worried sick.’

She stopped and we sort of stared at each other for a while. I got up deliberately and took my time pouring the coffee. ‘No milk, I’m afraid, but I could probably find some sugar.’

‘No, thank you. Black, without, will be fine.’ I passed her a mug and we both sipped through the, almost, too prolonged silence. Finally I said: ‘You know what I have to ask?’

She shrugged. ‘Sure, I wouldn’t be the first girl to be kicked off the unicorn, and I’m not saying that Perry is any sort of hero. There have been other women in his past and there might well be other women in the future, I can’t say; but I know Perry, Master Strongoak. And I can tell you this, whatever the reason, whatever the cause, there is one thing he would never have done, and that is leave without saying goodbye.’

It was a pretty speech, verbs and everything – the full fellowship. If Perry had run off with some other woman, I, for one, was willing to bet that he had made the mistake of his life. When the wolves come howling round my tree, this is one lady I would not mind being up there with me.

What could I say, though? The heart is a strange sorcerer, which casts its spell in the unlikeliest places and kills them on a whim. Something like that, anyway. The Lizas of this world are being lied to every day and crying their eyes out every night, unlike tough hard-bitten dwarf master detectives. They are far too canny to have trod those dangerous paths – ah, sweet Elester, where are you now with your coal-black hair, ruby-red lips and pilfering fingers in the Old Town Pension Trust? Oh yes, serving five years for fraud after I found the evidence in the false bottom of your bedside bridal hope chest. After all, dwarf, elf, human or gnome, none of us are immune. Shoot, I even saw a goblin once get mushy over a piece of skirt he picked up in a bar – and he wasn’t even trying to eat her.