They came on the last day of fall, right before the snow came. My dad ran into them when he was patrolling the roads outside our village, and told me I better spruce up the damn place, so I got to tidying and I was only just done when they got inside our little inn.
“Don’t be difficult,” he said. He was wearing nice sharp clothes and shoes that shone. Bad for winter.
“It’s pokey. There’s a smell,” she said, stroking her fur coat nervously. It looked soft, and dead.
“Well, if you want to sleep in the car–” he said. He gave me a look. “Room for two, my good man?” He was holding the babe, and he shushed it every time it squalled.
“That I’ve got,” I said, fiddling around for the keys. “Twenty pound for two. We can take the babe for nothing.”
“More than the place deserves,” she muttered, under her breath. I heard it. I don’t have much but I got good ears from my dad.
He sloughed off a couple of notes from his fat wallet and added a few coins to the mix.
“No need for that,” I said, and pushed the extras back. “Breakfast eight till nine. I hope you have a right good stay.”
The woman put her little nose up in the air and pulled at his arm, and together they went up the stairs.
.
Next morning they came down to the dining room. It was just them. I noticed that the woman had gone all quiet. She held the baby in her arms and stared off into space. Her man tried to engage her in talk, but she just nodded and shook her head.
“Something the matter with the lady?” I asked all chatty-like as I brought him his coffee. She took water and a collection of unbuttered crackers, but she didn’t touch them. Wasting food’s no good, you know.
“She’s fine,” he said. “It’s the weather. Must be the weather. It was a damn cold night you had here.”
I nodded and withdrew. Always stuff to do.
They went out, and I heard the man exclaiming about how the car was stuck. After he came back and paid for another night, I busied myself and put the vases in the right spots on the mantelpiece above the fire. Cleaned their room too, though it hardly needed cleaning.
After dinner they came back and the man took the woman and the babe up to the room.
I didn’t hear anything from them till half past nine, when the man came down the stairs, his clothes all mussed-up.
“Hullo,” I said, helpfully.
“My good man, is there a different room available?”
“Nope,” I said.
“It’s just …My wife is of a rather delicate disposition.”
I cocked my head at him, quizzical.
“Isn’t this inn empty?” he asked, exasperated. “I haven’t seen or heard anyone else but you in this place. If the other rooms are pricier, I can pay.”
“They’re taken,” I said. “You got the best room.”
“The best room!” he exclaimed, and went back upstairs.
I watched the clock. Put everything back in place for the day, so I just watched the hands chase each other round and round.
Thirteen past thirteen, a magical kind of hour. He came down the stairs again.
“Listen, man,” he began. Upstairs there was a really nasty kind of scream, the kind of scream a man makes when caught in a trap. I heard that noise before. Don’t like it so much.
He ran up the stairs.
At fifteen past thirteen he came back down clutching the babe, his wife clinging to him as best she could.
“There a problem?”
“There was something at the window!” she said, her eyes wide and staring. She squeezed her husband’s arm tighter, until he told her to get off, and she stamped her feet and shook as though she were trying to shake something off.
“No idea, miss,” I said. “You’re on the second storey.”
“There was something!” she said. “Hubert! I want to go.”
“The AA won’t be here ’till tomorrow,” he said.
“I’d rather sleep in the car!” she cried.
He gave her a look. “Fine,” he said, closing his eyes, exhaling.
“Can’t give you a refund,” I said. as he stormed out. He didn’t need to drag her. She was pulling him along.
.
In the morning there was a commotion. I went outside to see if anyone needed me for anything.
“That’s him!” the woman cried, pointing a red-tipped finger at me. Just her and her man. No babe.
The mayor was there, and our good old constable was there, and the neighbours were there.
“Horrible little man, you say,” the constable said, mulling the words over. “That’s no good.”
“Yes!” she cried. “Do something about it, for the love of…”
“Shouldn’t blaspheme, miss,” the constable said. My dad was always a right proper man.
“It was him! My baby…”
“Our baby,” said the man.
“Baby,” the mayor said, looking into the car.
“You were in a locked car.” Dad tapped his pen against his block of paper, fumbling a little through his gloves.
“I told you,” she said shrewishly. “We fell asleep and the baby was gone and we got out to look for him. And then Hubert and I saw this creature,” she stabbed a finger at me, “running into the inn with my child!”
“That’s not very nice,” the mayor remarked. “Let’s check the inn, then.”
We all went upstairs and the man held the woman’s hand tight, and she looked at him.
“Not a thing,” the mayor said, dubiously, surveying the spartan room. “Didn’t see any sign of a baby in your car either.”
“Funny, that,” my dad said. “Maybe the other rooms.” He took us along. All the other rooms were empty, of course. He even opened the closets to show them.
“My baby,” the woman said, again and again, but her voice was growing more and more uncertain, even as her grip on her husband tightened.
“I don’t know that you brought a baby with you,” the mayor said, shaking his head. “The things you young people do these days. The things you think you see.”
She wrung her hands and said, “Hubert!”
But his face was all glazed-over and he said, “Looks like the snow is melting.” He saw her shivering and put his arm over her shoulders.
And it was. It was melting down into the road, slowly, melting away from their tyres.
I watched them get back in their car, holding each other like maybe they lost something and found something they never realised they had lost, or something. Beats me, sir. Not like I’ll ever see them again.
“Now then!” my dad said. “See you at dinner.” He patted my head and grinned with his sharp, sharp teeth.
