“Benelux must not be here, if I read these signs aright,” said Moxie.
“I think it’s a bluff,” said Goodgubf as he rang the bell insistently, “for the Stewards of Minas Troney have always been private in their ways. Benelux the Booby, son of Electrobux the Piker, comes from a bong line of Stewards dating back many arid generations. Long have they ruled Twodor. The first Great Steward, Parrafin the Climber, was employed in King Chloroplast’s kitchen as second scublery boy when the old King met a tragic death. He apparently fell backward by accident on a dozen salad forks. Simultaneously the true heir, his son Carotene, mysteriously fled the city, complaining of some sort of plot and a lot of threatening notes left on his breakfast tray. At the time, this booked suspicious what with his father’s death, and Carotene was suspected of foul play. Then the rest of the King’s relatives began to drop dead one after the other in an odd fashion. Some were found strangled with dishrags and some succumbed to food poisoning. A few were found drowned in the soup vats, and one was attacked by assailants unknown and beaten to death with a pot roast. At least three appear to have thrown themselves backward on salad forks, perhaps in a noble gesture of grief over the King’s untimely end. Finally there was no one left in Minas Troney who was either eligible or willing to wear the accursed crown, and the rule of Twodor was up for grabs. The scullery slave Parrafin bravely accepted the Stewardship of Twodor until that day when a lineal descendant of Carotene’s returns to reclaim his rightful throne, conquer Twodor’s enemies, and revamp the postal system.”
Just then a peephole in the door opened and a beady eye inspected them.
“W-w-what you want?” the voice demanded.
“We are wayfarers here to aid the fortunes of Minas Troney. I am Goodgulf Grayteeth.” The Wizard took a crumpled slip of paper from his wallet and handed it through the hole.
“W-what this?”
“My card,” replied Goodgubf. It returned immediately in a dozen pieces.
“Steward not home. On vacation. N-n-no p-peddlers!” The peephole closed with a small slam.
But Goodgulf was not easily duped and the boggies could tell from his eyes that he was angered by this impudence. His pupils were crossing and uncrossing like a juggler’s oranges. He rang again, long and loud. The eye blinked at them and a smell of garlic floated from the hole.
“Y-you again? Told you, he’s t-t-taking a shower.” Again the hole shut.
Goodgulf said nothing. He reached into his Mao jacket and extracted a black ball that Pepsi at first thought was the mallomar with a string attached. Goodgulf lit it with the end of his cigar and tossed the ball unto the mail slot. He then ran around the corner with the boggies in tow. There was a barge boom and, when the boggies peeked around to look, the door had magically disappeared.
Pridefully the three walked through the smoking portals. They were confronted by a seedy old palace guard who was wiping the soot from his smarting eyes.
“You may tell Benelux that Goodgulf the Wizard awaits an audience.”
The doddering warrior bowed resentfully and led them through the airless passageways.
“T-t-the S-steward isn’t going t-to like t-this,” croaked the guard. “H-hasn-t been out of p-p-palace for years.”
“Do not the people grow restive?” asked Pepsi.
“T-their idea,” drooled the old guide.
He led them through an armorial hall whose cardboard arches and plaster-of-paris vaultings towered fully a foot over their heads. Richly mimeographed tapestries depicted past Kings’ legendary deeds. Pepsi particularly liked one about a long-dead king and a she-goat and said so. Goodgulf smacked him one. The very walls glittered with inset ginger-ale bottles and costume jewelry, and the polished aluminum armor cast brilliant reflections on the hand-laid linoleum at their feet.
At last they came to the throne room with its fabled thumbtack mosaics. By the looks of the place the Royal Throne Room gave double service as the Royal Shower Room. The guard disappeared and was replaced by an equally aged page in olivedrab livery. He struck a brass dinner gong and rasped:
“Cringe and scrape thee before Benelux, Great Steward of Twodor, true regent of the Lost King who will one day return or so they say.”
The hoary page ducked around a screen and a curtain fluttered nearby. Out rolled the wizened Benelux in a battered wheelchair drawn by a brace of puffing raccoons. He wore tuxedo trousers, a short red jacket, and a clip-on bow tie. On his balding head rested a chauffeur’s cap emblazoned with the Crest of the Stewards, a rather showy affair featuring a winged unicorn carrying a tea tray. Moxie caught a distinct whiff of garlic.
Goodgubf cleared his throat, for the Steward was obviously sound asleep.
“Greetings and Happy Holidays,” he began. “I am Goodgulf, Court Wizard to the Crowned Heads of Lower Middle Earth, Worker of Wonders and Certified Chiropractor.”
The old Steward opened one coated eye and looked at Moxie and Pepsi with disgust.
“W-w-what are those? Sign at door says ‘no pets.’
“They are boggies, my liege, small yet trusty allies of ours to the north.”
“I’ll have g-g-guard spread some papers,” the Steward mumbled as his wrinkled head fell heavily to his chest.
Goodgulf ahemed and continued.
“I fear that I am the bearer of dark tidings and sad. Sorhed’s foul narcs have slain thy own beloved son Bromosel and now the Dark Lord wishes thy own life and thy realm for his own unspeakable designs.”
“Bromosel?” said the Steward, rousing himself on one elbow.
“Thy own beloved son,” prompted Goodgulf.
A flicker of recognition passed through tired old eyes.
“Oh, him. Never w-w-writes except for rn-money. Just 1-like the other one. T-too bad about t-t-that.”
“Thus we have come with an army a few days’ ride behind to revenge your grief upon Fordor,” Goodgulf explained.
The Steward waved his feeble hands with annoyance.
“Fordor? N-n-never heard of it. No two-bit w-w-wizard nneither. Audience over,” said the Steward.
“Insult not the White Wizard,” warned Goodgulf as he drew something from his pocket, “for I have many powers. Here, pick a card. Any card.”
Benelux selected one of the fifty-two sevens of hearts and tore it into confetti. “Audience over,” he repeated with finality.
“Foolish dotard,” growled Goodgulf later in their room at an inn. He had been fussing and fuming for over an hour.
“But what can we do if he will not help us?” asked Moxie. “The bird is nutty as an elf-cake.”
Goodgulf snapped his fingers as if an idea had dawned in his sly head.
“That’s it!” he chuckled. “The old prune is known to be mental.”
“So are his pals,” observed Pepsi sagely.
“Psychotic too,” mused the Wizard. “I bet he’s got a lot of suicidal psychoses. Self-destructive. Textbook case.”
“Suicidal?” said Pepsi with surprise. “How do you say that?”
“It’s just a hunch,” Goodgulf replied distantly, “just a hunch.”
The news of the Old Steward’s suicide that evening stirred the city. The tabloids ran a large photograph of the burning pyre into which he leapt after first ingeniously tying himself up and writing a final farewell to his subjects. Headlines that day screamed BATTY BENELUX BURNS and later editions reported WIZARD LAST TO SEE STEWARD: CITES SORHED AS CAUSE OF B.’S TORMENT. Since Benelux’s entire staff had mysteriously disappeared, Goodgubf generously took it upon himself to arrange a State Funeral and proclaim a Lunch Hour of National Mourning for the fallen ruler. During the next few days of confusion and political turmoil the persuasive Wizard serenely held numerous press conferences. By the hour he conferred with high officials to explain that it was his old friend’s last wish that he, Goodgulf, hold the reins of government until his surviving son, Farahslax, returned. In unguarded moments he could be found in the palace’s executive washroom trying to scour out a faint smell of garlic and kerosene.