The Mystery Megapack

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    “I don’t like mean people, Mister Coachman. You should be nice to me. My fingers do bad things to people who speak harshly. To me.”
    “So I hear,” I whispered, hoping she hadn’t heard me.
    “I heard you,” she said.
    * * * *
    Inexplicably, we escaped the glen without further incident. We were moving along at a fair clip when, to the curdling of my blood, I registered a piercing scream which nearly unseated me. It was followed by a “Stop!”
    Did I stop? Of course I stopped. My father went to his grave providing me with an education, which included knowing when I was out of my depth with terrible enfants.
    “ There once was a man from Kilkennyyy ,” Charlotte sang as she relieved herself behind a spiny blackthorn, “ who thought he would never get anyyy …”
    I plugged my ears with my forefingers and closed my eyes. This was not happening to me. This was not happening to me .
    “Listen to my rhyme, Mister Coachman.”
    “Must I, Pinprick?” I heard myself ask.
    “If you choose not,” the wee murderess replied as she brushed my sleeve with fingers still bloodstained from the morning before. Why hadn’t someone washed her hands? God in Heaven! I begged my guardian angels to guide me safely to her awaiting Uncle Pilchard. (An outrider had gone ahead with the revolting news.) I suddenly felt an indomitable angelic presence, which indeed was comforting, and my belief remained constant that God will not put upon His children any more than we can bear. But why had I been chosen, of those with far better credentials (fellow murderers, for example), to escort a diminutive Elizabeth Bathory! Surely this was another instance, as with Job, where the Devil had wagered with God concerning my ability to endure the unthinkable—and God had accepted the challenge!
    “Mister Coachman?”
    “Yes, Miss Pilchard?”
    “Please call me ‘Pinprick.’”
    “Yes, Miss Pinprick.”
    “‘Pinprick’ by itself will do.”
    “Right. Pinprick . What can I do for you?” I asked as I opened the coach door and released the stairs for her.
    “Well …” she replied as she rolled her eyes, “I’m hungry, and the basket of food prepared for me is not to my liking. I don’t care for soda bread and apples much.”
    My blood went icy. This meant that we had to stop again at Kilmacullough, which was only down the way, and purchase whatever would be to her heart’s delight.
    “I wish to use my crossbow and kill something to eat. Like Robin Hood,” she said.
    I went light-headed and fell against the lacquered coach, the sweat on my ungloved hand causing me to slip quickly along the surface so that my next contact was an eyebrow on the brass lamp.
    “Mister Coachman? Did you see something that frightened you?” she asked me as she snapped her head to gaze into a nearby stand of gorse. “ Ooooo! You’re bleeding!”
    “Yes, as a matter of fact I did see something frightening,” I replied, trying to staunch the seepage of blood with my kerchief.
    “What was it? What did you see that terrified you?” she asked as she bounced on her toes, an unsettling glee in her voice.
    Not answering her, which made her pinch her lips together and glare at me, I found strength enough to help her back to her seat, and to find mine. It would have only been a few more leagues and we would have arrived, safe if not sound. But now we needed to stop again so that she could kill something. What would she kill? And how would we cook it? We would be all night reaching our destination at this rate, and my post would most likely be lost. I may even be put into custody for kidnapping.
    We drove on.
    “Stop at the wee wood near Kilmacull, Mister Coachman,” cried Charlotte as she thrust her head out of the window. “We’re near there now. I can tell by the sweeter air. And, we just passed Bloodland.”
    I couldn’t help myself. “Bloodland?” I cried, trying to direct my voice backward at full gallop.
    “It’s nothing, Mister Coachman,” she cried back, and we rode on in silence as I reflected upon driving straight past ‘the wee wood near Kilmacull,’ but then considered that a crossbow arrow could easily pierce the roof of the coach.
    “Good thinking,” she said.
    I froze where I sat.
    * * * *
    “Here, Mister Coachman. Pull over here. See the wee wood?”
    Seeing a copse of oak growing in front of farmland, I said not a word as I slowed the team, dismounted and prepared to water them. I was glad ’twas near