A Christmas Story

With Apologizes to Grendel Briarton

Fresh from his stint as a Guest of Honor at this year's World Science Fiction convention, the one and only Ferdinand Feghoot has journeyed through time and space to return to our pages (compliments of Mr. John Varley, who says he made the mistake of letting this caper loose on the Internet a few holidays ago and has subsequently seen it return to him several times, never in the same form twice). Mr. Feghoot has not graced our pages in thirty-nine years--our time--but the chrononaut appears unchanged save for an odd bunch of pals he has brought with him.

ON A DECEMBER TRIP to Frostbite Falls, Minnesota, Ferdinand Feghoot was summoned to the local college, Wossamotta U. by Inspector Fenwick, the Chief of Police. There he was confronted with an appalling scene. Bullwinkle, the town's leading citizen, had been smashed flatter than a kippered herring by a falling safe.

"It's a common enough means of death for cartoon characters," Fenwick opined. "Every year we lose five or six citizens to falling safes. But this time it was no accident. This time, it's murder!"

He showed Feghoot the ingenious deadfall trap rigged to rain financial ruin on an unsuspecting victim. Bullwinkle's antlers were still entangled in the tripwire. Grasped tightly in one hand was a small statue of a Hindu god.

The dead quadruped's best friend, Rocky the flying squirrel, had been with Bullwinkle at the time of his death, but when questioned by Feghoot the distraught rodent said all he could remember was seeing a rabbi fleeing the scene upon, of all things, a pogo stick. Fenwick immediately issued an APB for the rabbi.

"You're wasting your time, Fenwick," said Feghoot grimly, as he stood from his examination of the body. "The rabbi has been framed. When you find him, he will tell you of some elaborate ruse that induced him to be on a pogo stick at this time and this place."

"How do you know that, Feghoot?" asked the Inspector.

"This is the work of the Christmas Killer," Feghoot declared. " I have been on the trail of this fiend for years, and I fear we might never catch him. Every December he arranges one of these grisly messages. Look! Didn't you notice the smile on the victim's face? The corners of his mouth have been propped up... by these!" He displayed two toothpicks he had taken from Bullwinkle's mouth.

"I still don't see how you know the murderer is the Christmas Killer," said Fenwick.

"Isn't it obvious?" Feghoot asked. "Wee Vishnu, a merry crushed moose, and a hoppy Jew near."