Cugel Read online

  “Agreed!” said Bunderwal. “We must play the game like gentlemen. Further, to avoid spurious tactics of delay, let us stipulate that the move must be made before the second boy emerges. For instance, you have lowered the shutter and I have calculated that the tallest boy is next to emerge. I may, or may not, as I choose, wait until one boy has emerged, but then I must slip my chain before the second boy appears.”

  “A wise regulation, to which I agree. Do you care to go first?”

  Bunderwal disclaimed the privilege. “You, in a sense, are our guest here in Saskervoy, and you shall have the honor of the first play.”

  “Thank you.” Cugel lifted the chain from its peg and lowered the shutter by two links. “It is now your turn, Bunderwal. You may wait until one boy has emerged, if you choose, and indeed I will expedite the process by ordering more beer for ourselves.”

  “Good. Now, I must bend my keenest faculties to the game. I see that one must develop an exquisite sense of timing. I hereby lower the chain two links.”

  Cugel waited and the tall boy emerged carrying a tray loaded with four pitchers of beer. By Cugel’s estimate, he avoided the shutter by a gap equivalent to thirteen links of the chain. Cugel at once let slip four links.

  “Aha!” said Bunderwal. “You play with a flair! I will show that I am no less dashing than you! Another four links!”

  Cugel appraised the shutter under narrow lids. A slippage of six more links should strike off the tall boy’s cap with smartness and authority. If the boys served regularly in turn, the tall boy should be emerging third in line. Cugel waited until the next boy, of medium stature, passed through, then lowered the chain five full links.

  Bunderwal sucked in his breath, then gave a chirrup of triumph. “Clever thinking, Cugel! But now quickly, I lower the chain another two links. So I will avoid the short boy, who even now mounts the stairs.”

  The short boy passed below with a link or two to spare, and Cugel must now move or forfeit the game. Glumly he let go another link from the chain, and now up from the still-room came the tallest boy. As luck would have it, while mounting the stairs he bobbed his head in order to wipe his nose on his sleeve and so passed under the shutter with cap still in place, and it was Cugel’s turn to chortle in triumph. “Move, Bunderwal, if you will, unless you wish to concede.”

  Bunderwal disconsolately let slip a link in the chain. “Now I can only pray for a miracle.”

  Up the steps came Krasnark the landlord: a heavy-featured man taller than the tall boy, with massive arms and lowering black eyebrows. He carried a tray loaded with a tureen of soup, a brace of roast fowl and a great hemisphere of sour-wabble pudding. His head struck the bar; he fell over backward and disappeared from view. From the still-room came the crash of broken crockery and almost at once a great outcry.

  Bunderwal and Cugel quickly hauled up the shutter to its original position and moved to new seats. Cugel said, “I feel that I must be declared winner of the game, since yours was the last hand to touch the chain.”

  “By no means!” Bunderwal protested. “The thrust of the game, as stated, was to dislodge a cap from the head of one of three persons. This was not done, since Krasnark chose to interrupt the play.”

  “Here he is now,” said Cugel. “He is examining the shutter with an air of perplexity.”

  “I see no point in carrying the matter any further,” said Bunderwal. “So far as I am concerned, the game is ended.”

  “Except for the adjudication,” said Cugel. “I am clearly the winner, from almost any point of view.”

  Bunderwal could not be swayed. “Krasnark wore no cap, and there the matter must rest. Let me suggest another test, in which chance plays a more decisive role.”

  “Here is the boy with our beer, at last. Boy, you are remarkably slow!”

  “Sorry, sir. Krasnark fell into the still-room and caused no end of tumult.”

  “Very well; no more need be said. Bunderwal, explain your game.”

  “It is so simple as to be embarrassing. The door yonder leads out to the urinal. Look about the room; select a champion. I will do likewise. Whichever champion is last to patronize the urinal wins the game for his sponsor.”

  “The contest seems fair,” said Cugel. “Have you selected a champion?”

  “I have indeed. And you?”

  “I selected my man on the instant. I believe him to be invincible in a contest of this sort. He is the somewhat elderly man with the thin nose and the pursy mouth sitting directly to my left. He is not large but I am made confident by the abstemious manner in which he holds his glass.”

  “He is a good choice,” Bunderwal admitted. “By coincidence I have selected his companion, the gentleman in the gray robe who sips his beer as if with distaste.”

  Cugel summoned the serving boy and spoke behind his hand, out of Bunderwal’s hearing. “The two gentlemen to my left — why do they drink so slowly?”

  The boy shrugged. “If you want the truth, they hate to part with their coin, although both command ample funds. Still, they sit by the hour nursing a gill of our most acrid brew.”

  “In that case,” said Cugel, “bring the gentleman in the gray cloak a double-quart of your best ale, at my expense, but do not identify me.”

  “Very good, sir.”

  The boy turned at a signal from Bunderwal who also initiated a short muttered conversation. The boy bowed and ran down to the still-room. Presently he returned to serve the two champions large double-quart mugs of ale, which, after explanation from the boy, they accepted with gloomy good grace, though clearly they were mystified by the bounty.

  Cugel became dissatisfied at the fervent manner in which his champion now drank beer. “I fear that I made a poor selection,” he fretted. “He drinks as if he had just come in after a day in the desert.”

  Bunderwal was equally critical of his own champion. “He is already nose-deep in the double-quart. That trick of yours, Cugel, if I must say so, was definitely underhanded. I was forced to protect my own interests, at considerable expense.”

  Cugel thought, by conversation, to distract his champion from the beer. He leaned over and said: “Sir, you are a resident of Saskervoy, I take it?”

  “I am that,” said the gentleman. “We are noted for our reluctance to talk with strangers in outlandish costumes.”

  “You are also noted for your sobriety,” suggested Cugel.

  “That is nonsense!” declared the champion. “Observe the folk around this room, all gulping beer by the gallon. Excuse me, I wish to follow their example.”

  “I must warn you that this local beer is congestive,” said Cugel. “With every mouthful you risk a spasmodic disorder.”

  “Balderdash! Beer purifies the blood! Put aside your own drink, if you are alarmed, but leave me in peace with mine.” Raising his mug, the champion drank an impressive draught.

  Displeased with Cugel’s maneuver, Bunderwal sought to distract his own champion by treading on his toe and causing an altercation, which might have persisted for a goodly period, had not Cugel interceded and pulled Bunderwal back to his chair. “Play the game by sporting standards or I withdraw from the contest!”

  “Your own tactics are somewhat sharp,” muttered Bunderwal.

  “Very well!” said Cugel. “Let us have no more interference, of any sort!”

  “I agree, but the point becomes moot as your champion is showing signs of uneasiness. He is about to rise to his feet, in which case I win.”

  “Not so! The first to use the trough loses the game. Notice! Your own champion is rising to his feet; they are going together.”

  “Then the first to leave the common room must be deemed loser, since almost certainly he will be first at the trough!”

  “With my champion in the lead? Not so! The first actually to use the trough is the loser.”

  “Come then; there can be no exact judgment from this distance.”

  Cugel and Bunderwal hastened to follow the two champions: through the yar
d and out to an illuminated shed where a trough fixed to a masonry wall served the needs of the inn’s patrons.

  The two champions seemed in no hurry; they paused to comment upon the mildness of the night, then, almost in synchrony, went to the trough. Cugel and Bunderwal followed, one to each side, and made ready to render judgment.

  The two champions prepared to relieve themselves. Cugel’s champion, glancing to the side, noticed the quality of Cugel’s attention, and instantly became indignant. “What are you looking at? Landlord! Out here at once! Call the night-guards!”

  Cugel tried to explain. “Sir, the situation is not as you think! Bunderwal will verify the case! Bunderwal?”

  Bunderwal, however, had returned to the common room. Krasnark, the landlord appeared, a bandage across his forehead. “Please, sirs, a moment of quiet! Master Chernitz, be good enough to compose yourself! What is the difficulty?”

  “No difficulty!” sputtered Chernitz. “An outrage, rather! I came out here to relieve myself, whereupon this person ranged himself beside me and acted most offensively. I raised the alarm at once!”

  His friend, Bunderwal’s erstwhile champion, spoke through clenched lips: “I stand behind the accusation! This man should be ejected from the premises and warned out of town!”

  Krasnark turned to Cugel. “These are serious charges! How do you answer them?”

  “Master Chernitz is mistaken! I also came out here to relieve myself. Glancing along the wall I noticed my friend Bunderwal and signaled to him, whereupon Master Chernitz set up an embarrassing outcry, and made infamous hints! Better that you eject these two old tree-weasels!”

  “What?” cried Chernitz in a passion. “I am a man of substance!”

  Krasnark threw up his arms. “Gentlemen, be reasonable! The matter is essentially trivial. Agreed: Cugel should not make signals and greet his friends at the urinal. Master Chernitz might be more generous in his assumptions. I suggest that Master Chernitz retract the term ‘moral leper’ and Cugel his ‘tree-weasel’, and there let the matter rest.”

  “I am not accustomed to such degradations,” said Cugel. “Until Master Chernitz apologizes, the term remains in force.”

  Cugel returned to the common room and resumed his place beside Bunderwal. “You left the urinal quite abruptly,” said Cugel. “I waited to verify the results of the contest. Your champion was defeated by several seconds.”

  “Only after you distracted your own champion. The contest is void.”

  Master Chernitz and his friend returned to their seats. After a single cold glance toward Cugel, they turned away and spoke in low voices.

  At Cugel’s signal the serving boy brought full mugs of Tatterblass beer and both he and Bunderwal refreshed themselves. After a few moments Bunderwal said: “Despite our best efforts, we still have not settled our little problem.”

  “And why? Because contests of this sort abandon all to chance! As such, they are incompatible with my personal temperament. I am not one to crouch passively with my hind-quarters raised, awaiting either the kick or the caress of Destiny! I am Cugel! Fearless and indomitable, I confront every adversity! Through the force of sheer will I —”

  Bunderwal made an impatient gesture. “Silence, Cugel! I have heard enough of your braggadocio. You have taken too much beer, and I believe you to be drunk.”

  Cugel stared at Bunderwal in disbelief. “Drunk? On three draughts of this pallid Tatterblass? I have swallowed rain-water of greater force. Boy! Bring more beer! Bunderwal, what of you?”

  “I will join you, with pleasure. Now then, since you reject a further test, are you willing, then, to concede defeat?”

  “Never! Let us drink beer, quart for quart, while we dance the double coppola! The first to fall flat is the loser.”

  Bunderwal shook his head. “Our capacities are both noble and the stuff of which myths are made. We might dance all night, to a state of mutual exhaustion and enrich only Krasnark.”

  “Well then: do you have a better idea?”

  “I do indeed! If you will glance to your left, you will see that both Chernitz and his friend are dozing. Notice how their beards jut out! Here is a swange for cutting kelp. Cut off one beard or the other, and I concede you victory.”

  Cugel looked askance toward the dozing men. “They are not soundly asleep. I challenge Destiny, yes, but I do not leap off cliffs.”

  “Very well,” said Bunderwal. “Give me the swange. If I cut a beard, then you must allow me the victory.”

  The serving-boy brought fresh beer. Cugel drank a deep and thoughtful draught. He said in a subdued voice: “The feat is not as easy as it might appear. Suppose I decided upon Chernitz. He need only open his eyes and say: ‘Cugel, why are you cutting my beard?’ Whereupon, I would suffer whatever penalty the law of Saskervoy prescribes for this offense.”

  “The same applies to me,” said Bunderwal. “But I have carried my thinking a step farther. Consider this: could either Chernitz or the other see your face, or my face, if the lights were out?”

  “If the lights were out, the project becomes feasible,” said Cugel. “Three steps across the floor, seizure of the beard, a strike of the swange, three steps back and the deed is done, and yonder I see the valve which controls the lucifer.”

  “This is my own thinking,” said Bunderwal. “Well then: who will make the trial, you or I? The choice is yours.”

  The better to order his faculties, Cugel took a long draught of beer. “Let me feel the swange … It is adequately sharp. Well then, a job of this sort must be done while the mood is on one.”

  “I will control the lucifer valve,” said Bunderwal. “As soon as the lights go out, leap to the business at hand.”

  “Wait,” said Cugel. “I must select a beard. That of Chernitz is tempting, but the other projects at a better angle. Ah … Very well; I am ready.”

  Bunderwal rose to his feet and sauntered to the valve. He looked toward Cugel and nodded.

  Cugel prepared himself.

  The lights went out. The room was dark but for the glimmer of firelight. Cugel strode on long legs across the floor, seized his chosen beard and skillfully wielded the swange … For an instant the valve slipped in Bunderwal’s grip, or perhaps a bubble of lucifer remained in the tubes. In any event, for a fraction of a second the lights flashed bright and the now beardless gentleman, staring up in startlement, looked for a frozen instant eye to eye with Cugel. Then the lights once more went out, and the gentleman was left with the image of a dark long-nosed visage with lank black hair hanging from under a stylish hat.

  The gentleman cried out in confusion: “Ho! Krasnark! Rascals and knaves are on us! Where is my beard?”

  One of the serving boys, groping through the dark, turned the valve and light once more emanated from the lamps.

  Krasnark, bandage askew, rushed forth to investigate the confusion. The beardless gentleman pointed to Cugel, now leaning back in his chair with mug in hand, as if somnolent. “There sits the rogue! I saw him as he cut my beard, grinning like a wolf!”

  Cugel called out: “He is raving; pay no heed! I sat here steadfast as a rock while the beard was being cut. This man is the worse for drink.”

  “Not so! With both my eyes I saw you!”

  Cugel spoke in long-suffering tones. “Why should I take your beard? Does it have value? Search me if you choose! You will find not a hair!”

  Krasnark said in a puzzled voice: “Cugel’s remarks are logical! Why, after all, should he cut your beard?”

  The gentleman, now purple with rage, cried out: “Why should anyone cut my beard? Someone did so; look for yourself!”

  Krasnark shook his head and turned away. “It is beyond my imagination! Boy, bring Master Mercantides a mug of good Tatterblass at no charge, to soothe his nerves.”

  Cugel turned to Bunderwal. “The deed is done.”

  “The deed has been done, and well,” said Bunderwal generously. “The victory is yours! Tomorrow at noon we shall go together to the offices o
f Soldinck and Mercantides, where I will recommend you for the post of supercargo.”

  “‘Mercantides’,” mused Cugel. “Was not that the name by which Krasnark addressed the gentleman whose beard I just cut?”

  “Now that you mention it, I believe that he did so indeed,” said Bunderwal.

  Across the room Wagmund gave a great yawn. “I have had enough excitement for one evening! I am both tired and torpid. My feet are warm and my boots are dry; it is time I departed. First, my boots.”

  At noon Cugel met Bunderwal in the plaza. They proceeded to the offices of Soldinck and Mercantides, and entered the outer office.

  Diffin the clerk ushered them into the presence of Soldinck, who indicated a couch of maroon plush. “Please be seated. Mercantides will be with us shortly and then we will take up our business.”

  Five minutes later Mercantides entered the room. Looking neither right nor left he joined Soldinck at the octagonal table. Then, looking up, he noticed Cugel and Bunderwal. He spoke sharply: “What are you two doing here?”

  Cugel spoke in a careful voice: “Yesterday Bunderwal and I applied for the post of supercargo aboard the Galante. Bunderwal has withdrawn his application; therefore —”

  Mercantides thrust his head forward. “Cugel, your application is rejected, on several grounds. Bunderwal, can you reconsider your decision?”

  “Certainly, if Cugel is no longer under consideration.”

  “He is not. You are hereby appointed to the position. Soldinck, do you endorse my decision?”

  “I am well-pleased with Bunderwal’s credentials.”

  “Then that is all there is to it,” said Mercantides. “Soldinck, I have a head-ache. If you need me, I will be at home.”

  Mercantides departed the room, almost as Wagmund entered, supporting the weight of his right foot on a crutch.

  Soldinck looked him up and down. “Well then, Wagmund? What has happened to you?”

  “Sir, I suffered an accident last night. I regret that I cannot make this next voyage aboard the Galante.”

  Soldinck sat back in his chair. “That is bad news for all of us! Wormingers are hard to come by, especially wormingers of quality!”