Who Killed the Elf?

By Jeff Baker

The Widow was sitting across from my desk in my cramped office that smelled of cigarettes and busted hopes. With the Widow Elf there, it now smelled a little of peppermint.

She dabbed at her eyes with a green lace handkerchief and I busied myself with the handle of one of the desk drawers. She was tall, thin and wore the red pantsuit with the Santa motif of white ruffs and fur collar that most of the Elves wore.

She had breezed into my office like a sleigh trimmed with mourning crepe and a story about her husband being found dead in the house he had been assigned to.

I hadn’t been surprised. Shelf elves are essentially snitches and snitches are dead meat in this world.

I looked around the dingy little Christmas tree rising a full five inches by my blotter and ashtray and began asking the questions.

“When did you find out your husband was dead?” I asked.

“Two days ago,” she said. “I was making fudge and the radio was playing Percy Faith’s Christmas album when there was a knock at the door. It was a Messenger Elf.”

She stopped to dab her eyes again. Messenger Elves generally picked up kids letters, but this one was delivering bad news.

The Widow Elf went on.

“The Messenger told me…told me they’d found him draped over a lampshade where he’d probably been sitting all day and night. Whoever did it probably caught him before he moved to his next position.” She shuddered and not from the cold. “Up until then all had been merry and bright.”

Sitting unmoving on a lampshade all day left his back unprotected. The ideal position was on a shelf with your Elf-back to the wall. Never forget you are in a strange house.

“Was there an investigation?” I asked.

“As much as there can be in a house with a family of four near Christmastime,” said the Widow Elf. “They sent the usual pixies and sprites to view the scene of the…crime.” She shook her head. “I’ve never trusted sprites.”

I listened, staying outwardly calm but with my mind busy analyzing everything. Pixies and sprites had the advantage of moving fast and usually going unnoticed by people. Especially during daylight.

The Widow Elf cleared her throat. “The report said that my husband was probably done in with a sharpened peppermint stick. Brutes.” She blew her nose which looked red. But then Elves noses always look red.

“They claimed the body…discreetly.” Widow Elf said. “He wanted to be laid to rest on the grounds of the Toyshop here at the North Pole.”

“The Toyshop?” I asked, raising an eyebrow. “Nobody can bury anything in the ground around the Toyshop.”

I’d found that out three years ago when the Jolly Old Guy had hired me to find a missing ornament. Solid gold. It wasn’t buried, that was for sure.

“Ma’am, your husband would know that nothing can be buried around the Toyshop. The ground just won’t, uh, dig.”

I had a thought.

“Ma’am…this is a little indelicate to ask, but I ask indelicate questions and charge for it. It’s how I make my living.” I said. “Did you actually see your husband’s body?”

“Well, no,” she said. “I barely saw him anyway. He was off on assignments during the Holidays and then he would…” Her voice trailed off.

At that moment, the Christmas music playing on the desk radio I had turned down low started spouting the breathless voice of a newscaster. I turned up the volume and we listened like a puppy who just heard the can opener.

“We repeat…Santa’s sleigh has been stolen. The sleigh and a reindeer. Seen taking off from the Toyshop Area with a Shelf-Elf at the reigns and a sprite in the passenger seat along with what has been described as a bag of enough goodies to feed someone for a month…Authorities believe the reindeer pulling the sleigh may be an accomplice…We return you now to Percy Faith and…”

I turned down the radio. The Widow Elf, who was no more a widow than she was the Golden Gate Bridge, and I stared at each other.

“Sprites.” She said coldly. “I never trusted them.”

I was going to mention that the sprites were probably in on it with her husband but I didn’t. The onetime Widow got up, thanked me and said the check would be in the mail.

Then she left the office, like the Old Year on December Thirty-First.

I sighed. With the sprites removing him from that house, he would be able to get to the sleigh and then he could go anywhere.

I thought about it, and then I shut the office and went over to Sugarplumb’s for some ‘nog and a sandwich.

I don’t know what happened to the wayward shelf-Elf and his new sprite. Nobody asked me to take that case.

As for the erstwhile widow she didn’t stay draped in black for long. Around Washington’s Birthday I got an e-mail from a Tropical island with a picture of Mrs. Elf smiling on the beach sipping a Margarita next to a chubby pink guy with wings, a quiver of pink arrows, a big smile and a Margarita.

Figured he’d be playing the field after Valentine’s Day.

The message read: “Having a ball! Burned the black crepe.”

I’ve found that while there are eight-million stories in this town, not all of them go down in history.

—end—