Today Bigtoes couldn’t care less about Carlotta. But he still had that old score to settle with the Director General.
Leaving the fashionable section behind, Bigtoes turned down Apple Alley, a residential corridor of modest, old-fashioned houses with thatched roofs and carved beams. Here the mushrooms were in full bloom — the stropharia, inocybe, and chanterelle — dotting the corridor with indigo, vermilion, and many yellows. Elf householders were out troweling in their gardens. Elf wives gossiped over hedges of gypsy pholiota. Somewhere an old elf was singing one of the ancient work songs, accompanying himself on a concertina. Until Director General Hardnoggin discovered that it slowed down production, the elves had always sung while they worked, beating out the time with their hammers; now the foremen passed out song sheets and led them in song twice a day. But it wasn’t the same thing.
Elf gardeners looked up, took their pipes from their mouths, and watched Bigtoes pass. They regarded all front-office people with suspicion — even this big elf with the candy-strip rosette of the Order of Santa, First Class, in his buttonhole.
Bigtoes had won the decoration many years ago when he was a young Security elf, still wet behind his pointed ears. Somehow on that fateful day, Billy Roy Scoggins, President of Acme Toy, had found the secret entrance to the North Pole and appeared suddenly in parka and snowshoes, demanding to see Santa Claus, Santa arrived, jolly and smiling, surrounded by Bigtoes and the other Security elves. Scoggins announced he had a proposition “from one hard-headed businessman to another.”
Pointing out the foolishness of competition, the intruder had offered Santa a king’s ransom to come in with Acme Toy. “Ho, ho, ho,” boomed Santa with jovial firmness, “that isn’t Santa’s way.” Scoggins — perhaps it was the “ho, ho, ho” that did it — turned purple and threw a punch that floored the jolly old man. Security sprang into action.
Four elves had died as Scoggins flayed at them, a snow shoe in one hand and a rolled up copy of The Wall Street Journal in the other. But Bigtoes had crawled up the outside of Scoggins’ pantleg. It had taken him twelve karate chops to break the intruder’s kneecap and send him crashing to the ground like a stricken tree. To this day the President of Acme Toy walks with a cane and curses Rory Bigtoes whenever it rains.
As Bigtoes passed a tavern — The Bowling Green, with a huge horse mushroom shading the door — someone inside banged down a thimble-mug and shouted the famous elf toast: “My Santa, right or wrong! May he always be right, but right or wrong, my Santa!” Bigtoes sighed. Life should be so simple for elves. They all loved Santa — what did it matter that he used blueing when he washed his beard, or liked to sleep late, or hit the martinis a bit too hard — and they all wanted to do what was best for good little girls and boys. But here the agreement ended. Here the split between Hardnoggin and Crouchback — between the Establishment and the revolutionary — took over.
Beyond the tavern was a crossroads, the left corridor leading to the immense storage areas for completed toys, the right corridor to The Underwood. Bigtoes continued straight and was soon entering that intersection of corridors called Pumpkin Corners, the North Pole’s bohemian quarter. Here, until his disappearance, the SHAFT leader Crouchback had lived with relative impunity, protected by the inhabitants. For this was SHAFT country. A special edition of The Midnight Elf was already on the streets denying that SHAFT was involved in the assassination attempt on Santa. A love-bead vendor, his beard tied in a sheepshank, had Hardnoggin Is a Dwarf written across the side of his pushcart. Make love, not plastic declared the wall of The Electric Carrot, a popular discotheque and hippie hangout.
The Electric Carrot was crowded with elves dancing the latest craze, the Scalywag. Until recently, dancing hadn’t been popular with elves. They kept stepping on their beards. The hippie knots effectively eliminated that stumbling block.
Buck Withers, leader of the Hippie Elves for Peace, was sitting in a corner wearing a Santa Is Love button. Bigtoes had once dropped a first-offense drug charge against Withers and three other elves caught nibbling on morning-glory seeds. “Where’s Crouchback, Buck?” said Bigtoes.
“Like who’s asking?” said Withers. “The head of Hardnoggin’s Gestapo?”
“A friend,” said Bigtoes.
“Friend, like when the news broke about Shortribs, he says ‘I’m next, Buck.’ Better fled than dead, and he split for parts unknown.”
“It looks bad, Buck.”
“Listen, friend,” said Withers, “SHAFT’s the wave of the future. Like Santa’s already come over to our side on the disarmament thing. What do we need with bombs? That’s a bad scene, friend. Violence isn’t SHAFT’s bag.”
As Bigtoes left The Electric Carrot a voice said, “I wonder, my dear sir, if you could help an unfortunate elf.” Bigtoes turned to find a tattered derelict in a filthy button-down shirt and greasy gray-flannel suit. His beard was matted with twigs and straw.
“Hello, Baldwin,” said Bigtoes. Baldwin Redpate had once been the head of Santa’s Shipping Department. Then came the Slugger Nolan Official Baseball Mitt Scandal. The mitt had been a big item one year, much requested in letters to Santa. Through some gigantic snafu in Shipping, thousands of inflatable rubber ducks had been sent out instead. For months afterward, Santa received letters from indignant little boys, and though each one cut him like a knife he never reproached Redpate. But Redpate knew he had failed Santa. He brooded, had attacks of silent crying, and finally took to drink, falling so much under the spell of bee wine that Hardnoggin had to insist he resign.
“Rory, you’re just the elf I’m looking for,” said Redpate. “Have you ever seen an elf skulking? Well, I have.”
Bigtoes was interested. Elves were straightforward creatures. They didn’t skulk.
“Last night I woke up in a cold sweat and saw strange things, Rory,” said Redpate. “Comings and goings, lights, skulking.” Large tears rolled down Redpate’s cheeks. “You see, I get these nightmares, Rory. Thousands of inflatable rubber ducks come marching across my body and their eyes are Santa’s eyes when someone’s let him down.” He leaned toward Bigtoes confidentially. “I may be a washout. Occasionally I may even drink too much. But I don’t skulk!” Redpate began to cry again.
His tears looked endless. Bigtoes was due at the Sticks-and-Stones session. He slipped Redpate ten sugar plums. “Got to go, Baldwin.”
Redpate dabbed at the tears with the dusty end of his beard. “When you see Santa, ask him to think kindly of old Baldy Redpate,” he sniffed and headed straight for The Good Gray Goose, the tavern across the street — making a beeline for the bee wine, as the elves would say. But then he turned. “Strange goings-on,” he called. “Storeroom Number 14, Unit 24, Row 58. Skulking.”
“Hardnoggin’s phone call was from Carlotta Peachfuzz,” said Charity, looking lovelier than ever. “The switchboard operator is a big Carlotta fan. She fainted when she recognized her voice. The thrill was just too much.”
Interesting. In spite of Santa’s orders, were Carlotta and Hardnoggin back together on the sly? If so, had they conspired on the bomb attempt? Or had it really been Carlotta’s voice? Carlotta Peachfuzz impersonations were a dime a dozen.
“Get me the switchboard operator,” said Bigtoes and returned to stuffing Sticks-and-Stones reports into his briefcase.