ready to fire. Then I saw the horrible pheasant beast's face. Indeed, half of the creature's face appeared to be disfigured and missing its whiskers on the right side—very much like Professor Grim.
I hearkened back to earlier occasions, when Grim had rooted for truffles like a swine and when he had voraciously engorged himself on goat cheese as the pheasant-beast had done with the vat of goat milk. I considered how strange the actions of Professor Grim had been as of late. And, at last, I found myself facing this horrible abomination of nature at a time when the professor was nowhere to be found—this very beast who possessed such a ravenous appetite for Grim's particular choice of cigars. All of the clues melded into one singular conclusion. The terrible tusked monster stepped into the light, and with a pang of horror I saw something that frightened me to the marrow—the beast was wearing Grim's coat.
Professor Grim was the monster. Somehow, the Fowl-Fortifying Fluid had changed the professor, so that during the day he appeared to be his normal—well, almost normal—self. But at night, his body transformed into the hideous monster that terrorized the citizens of London.
Looking down the barrels of Professor Grim's shotgun, I felt dueling emotions stirring inside my heart: on the one hand, I felt terror and fear at the sight of such a terrible thing as this; on the other, I felt sorrow and sadness, for how could I pull the trigger and destroy my friend?
Still, the beast slowly stepped towards me, and as it got within two meters away, the beast reared back its hideous, ugly head and let out the same atrocious cry I had heard before. This time was far worse, because my proximity to the thing made the cry that much louder and more shrill, but also because I could feel the monster's hot breath steaming towards me.
Looking down the barrels, I realized that I could not do it. I could not pull the trigger and kill my best friend in the world. I would surely be killed by the thing, but it would be better than having to live out the rest of my days knowing that I had destroyed one of the world's most eminent and revered—at least I believed he someday would become so—inventors and scientists of our era.
I lowered the shotgun barrels. “You shall have to kill me,” I said to the beast, or dare I say, to Professor Theophilus Grim. “For I cannot take your life.”
“What are you doing?” a voice spoke beside me. “Shoot it!”
I looked over my left shoulder and saw Professor Grim standing next to me. He had a deep gash on his cheek and was not wearing his coat, and his shirt and waistcoat were shredded to rags.
“Oh,” said I, and I raised the shotgun and fired with both barrels.
Back at Grim's warehouse, Mrs. Fletcher used a long razor-sharp carving knife and a long fork to slice thick slabs of meat off of the terrible beast, which now appeared on Professor Grim's long oaken dining table with a crispy brown skin and an apple in its mouth.
“What do you think?” the professor asked, taking a mouthful of the juicy roasted beast.
“Quite succulent,” I said, swallowing a mouthful. “It possesses the most complexity of any meat I have ever tasted, and I have to say, it has only taken a little bit of the meat to satiate my appetite, and yet, it is so delicious that it is nearly impossible to stop eating.”
“I am glad you enjoy it, my friend,” Professor Grim said, dabbing his mouth with a handkerchief. “It is a most savory end to a most perplexing and adventurous series of events.”
Horatio's mouth was so stuffed full of the cursed beast that he could scarcely join his lips together. It was truly a magnificent meal.
I took a long drink of red wine from my glass. “I am sorry, Professor Grim, that I could have entertained the notion even for a moment, that you could have transformed into the terrible beast which brought terror to the hearts of London’s citizens.”
“Think nothing of it, my friend,” Grim said. “It was indeed a peculiar chronicle of events. I believe it started when the pheasant was transformed inside its cage by the Fowl-Fortifying Fluid, into its horrible condition, which we see on the table before us. I believe it then found its way into my kitchen, thrashed about, burning the right side of its face on my wood-burning stove in the process, giving the beast a similar disfigurement to that which I possess.”
“My greatest question is this,” I said, my gut burning to know the answer. “Why was the beast wearing your coat?”
“As you know by the scar on my cheek,” Professor Grim said, “the beast attacked me. I believe the beast was after the chestnuts I had in my pocket. As I struggled with the beast, I wriggled out of my coat, realizing that he wanted the chestnuts more than he wished to harm me. In the process, the coat wrapped around him as if he were wearing it.”
“If I may be so blunt as to say, my friend,” said I, “you did exercise some unusual traits over these past few days. Your greediness for cheese, your desire to root for truffles.”
“It is true, my friend,” Professor Grim said with a smirk. “But I count myself incredibly fortunate that I was not so horribly transformed as this poor pheasant.”
“I would like to propose a toast,” Grim said, raising his wine glass. I followed suit, as did Horatio and Mrs. Fletcher. “To good friends who are like family, and to a hope that one day soon, we will succeed in creating a better world, if not for all, then at least for most.”
“Hear, hear,” I said, clinking my glass with the others and then draining the rest of my wine. The evening was filled with good food, excellent conversation, and hearty laughter. I counted this evening as a gift, after the trying days I had experienced. And though it had been a singularly strange and amazing time, it would not compare with some of the more amazing and challenging adventures that Professor Theophilus Grim and I would face in the days to come.
THE END
Dannal J. Newman has more fun than should be allowed writing The Trying Tales of Chumbles & Grim series of novelettes. He has been writing fiction and studying the craft of writing for at least twenty years, and he loves reading all kinds of adventuresome and mysterious fiction.
Dannal currently lives in southern Oregon with his wife and two kids, where he runs a TV channel called theDove TV.
Dannal.com
@theDannal
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Look for many other exciting stories in the series:
Theophilus Grim and the Conundrum of Time Part 1
Theophilus Grim and the Stones of Agony
Theophilus Grim and the Veritas Vials
Theophilus Grim Flirts with Udder Madness
Theophilus Grim and the Infernal Chill of August
Theophilus Grim and the Miracle of Christmas
Theophilus Grim and the Conundrum of Time Part 2
Theophilus Grim and L’affaire de Coeur
Theophilus Grim and the Carriage of Justice
many, many more titles to come…
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