I was in my office, and it looked like there I would stay. It didn’t feel right; I'm a mare with responsibilities, and I've never been one to casually just put my hooves up. But this was one of those rare mornings when I’d rather stay in and clear some paperwork than head out on patrol. The radio on my desk offered nothing to change that. Absolutely nothing coming in from dispatch required my attention.
“Altercation outside the Bad Horse Saloon,” crackled the radio. “Cherry Pie has gotten into the hard cider, and she’s dancing on top of Deputy Bench Warrant’s wagon again.”
I laughed. Nopony knows what Cherry Pie finds so irresistible about dancing on Warrant’s cart (probably not even Cherry herself). But old Bench didn’t need my help, he’d handled this a few times before. Truth be told, I think he enjoys the attention.
As sheriff of Eutaw County I policed a sleepy little village that had grown up around a water stop on the rail line to Appleloosa, and the acres and acres of nothing much that surrounded it. This morning, the territory that was my responsibility didn’t seem to need me at all.
Even my “deputy,” Barney, my terrier mix, had settled down under my desk with his chin on his front paws. If Barney saw this as a good morning to conserve energy who was I to argue?
With a nod I flipped my hat off and caught it on a rear hoof. I spun the hat three times then tossed it and scored a perfect ringer over the peg on the wall. Thus, hat off and ritually settled in, I got down to clearing a bit of my paperwork.
I drew the top sheet out of my in basket. It was an expense request from Deputy Warrant, to have hoof prints cleaned off his wagon. I set that aside as I’d soon be attaching an addendum to it.
My radio crackled. “Sheriff, we have a report of a missing foal, last seen at the Counter Residence.”
Now that demanded my attention.
Barney immediately sensed the change of mood, and was up and at attention in front of my desk, waiting for orders.
“Barney, hat!”
My little dog ran to the wall and leapt to retrieve my hat. He brought it to me, without a mark or drop of slobber on it. He’d also ripped the hat peg off the wall. This was the third broken peg this week. We’d have to work on that.
#
A crowd had already gathered in front of the Counter place.
“Unless any of you folks have any evidence to give, I’d appreciate it if you would go about your business,” I said, as I pushed through the ponies milling about to get to the one person I wanted to talk to. This utterly failed to disperse the crowd, of course.
The center of everypony’s attention was a middle-aged donkey, crying over a baseball cap, size small.
“Jenny?” I spoke as gently as I was able. “Tell me what happened.”
“It’s my Timmy, Sheriff Berry.” Her voice barely cracked, but the effort it took to compose herself enough to speak was visible. She clung to the little cap like it was a life preserver and she was drowning. “He was playing in our yard, and I was watching through the front window. I saw his ball roll into the neighbor’s yard, and I went out to tell him not to bother Mr. Counter, as he sleeps all day. By the time I got outside Timmy was gone. I called and called, but he was just gone, Sheriff!”
“Foals don’t just up and disappear, May! It’s that Counter fella! He’s done something!”
“Up to no good, that one is!”
“I knew he was trouble the moment he set hoof in town!”
I did not need this. At the heart of any crowd gathered for any bad reason in Eutaw you would usually find Miss Prickly Pear, Miss Hat Pin, and my own dear old auntie Bee Keeper. I’ve come to think of them as “the Sisterhood of the Sharp Tongue,” though I’d never dare say that out loud.
With these three leading the charge, a crowd could transform into an angry mob, much as a badly tended camp fire might become a brush fire. There were already angry murmurs of agreement from the crowd. I had to head that off.
“Alright, y’all listen up.” I raised my voice to address everypony. “I want a search party, and I’ll take it as a favor if all of you without better things to do would join in. Timmy ain’t answerin’ to his name, so if he’s close, maybe he can’t answer. Look everywhere a little one could crawl to if he was hurt. Now fan out from this spot. Get to it, now. Time’s a wastin’.”
An angry mob with something useful to do becomes just a crowd of your neighbors again. Everypony hurried off to look behind rain barrels and peek under tarpaulins. This left me alone with the three spinsters and poor Jenny Digger.
I fished Barney’s tracking harness out of my saddle bag and began to get him dressed. Of course, the ‘Sisterhood’ weren’t going to just let me ignore them. They circled me, cutting off any hope of escape.
“You know that Head Counter is behind all this, May, and don’t you deny it!”
“I know no such thing, Miss Hat.” Barney always gets excited about his harness, but that means he won’t sit still and it takes forever to get it on him. While I worked I was a captive audience.
I could understand their feelings about Mr. Counter. I didn’t like it, I certainly didn’t appreciate it, and I didn’t necessarily agree; but I understood. Here in Eutaw we get more than our fair share of odd characters, for a variety of reasons. We’ve grown used to that, and over time most folks have learned to deal with our more eccentric visitors. We may have an instinctive distrust of anything different, but we have an even stronger instinct for neighborliness.
Head Counter, however, was in a class by himself. He was so far from normal that if you stood next to him you couldn’t see normal anymore.
“Counter stalks around all night, and stays shut up all day,” declared Hat Pin. “And if he does come out in the daylight, he wears that cloak with that big ol’ hood. There ain’t a soul who’s actually seen his face!”
“Now, Miss Pin, he did explain that…”
“He said he was an okapi, and his folk come from deep jungles, so he’s sensitive to the light. What the Hay is an okapi, anyhow?”
“I think it’s a tall goat, Hat,” said Prickly Pear.
“Actually, I’m pretty sure they’re more like short giraffes…” Barney poked his head through one of the harness leg holes and barked happily.
“I seen him out with a shovel diggin’ up cactus. Tell me that ain’t suspicious!”
“I would have thought, Miss Pear, that you would think better of a fella who shares your appreciation for cactus…”
“By moonlight?!”
“If you ask him where he’s from he says ‘I am from Prance.’ Well, my Granny went to Prance. She said those fancy ponies was just ponies. There ain’t no okapis in Prance!”
“Well, now, Auntie Keeper, that could just mean his Ma moved to Prance before he moved here. There must be a few okapis all over…” Barney rediscovered his tail and began to circle in place to catch it.
“Then there’s his voice,” exclaimed Prickly Pear. “Don’t you try to tell me you don’t find it haunting, May. It’s just creepy!”
“Oh, I don’t know, I think Mr. Counter has a lovely voice…”
“Princess Celestia has a lovely voice! It ain’t right for a stallion. He could go to Canterlot and sing for the Royal Opera. Course, they would make him hide behind a curtain and put a pretty mare out front to lip-sync for him.”
That much was true. With just his voice, Counter could convince most stallions to follow him home, if he were so inclined. Said stallions would be in for a big surprise, no doubt. I pushed the thought out of my head.
“Tell me this, May,” demanded Hat Pin. “What do you make of that leg he’s draggin’ behind himself? Counter says he’s a retired accountant from a pony resources firm. How’s an accountant hurt himself so bad?”
“I think that’s an impertinent question to ask a fella with a disability, and I have better manners than to ask.”
“That’s enough sass out of you, Little May!”
Once Aunt Keeper started in calling me ‘Little May’ it was all downhill for me. I could feel my authority and my dignity slipping away, and no amount of insisting that she call me ‘Sheriff Berry’ when I’m on duty would ever have any effect. If this went on, she would soon remind me how she knew me when I was still in diapers. I wished Barney would sit still, darn it!
“What about the green lights in the middle of the night, May? You gotta agree that’s weird!”
I didn’t have a rebuttal ready for that one. I had seen it with my own eyes. Half the town had. Green light filled every window in the Counter home, bright enough to illuminate the lawn. This was doubly impressive, as Mr. Counter kept all his windows blacked out. There was no pattern I could see. It seemed to happen on random nights.
Yes, I had been watching Mr. Counter. I ain’t no foal, at least not completely, and I had my territory to protect. Counter was a suspicious character and bore watching. But I wasn’t about to admit that to the Sisterhood or anypony else. Being suspicious is a long way from being a candidate for a lynching.
“Count did explain that,” whispered Jenny. “He said it was a fancy flash cooker for candying cactus slices.”
If the spinster mares heard her, they ignored it, and I withheld comment. I thought it was to Jenny’s credit that she was so reluctant to think ill of her neighbor that she bought that ridiculous story.
“Green lights, May. Green.” Prickly Pear was insistent. “Only one kind of magic is green. Changelings!”
“Now, Miss Pear, you know Mrs. Silver, who makes that fine turquoise jewelry, has a green magic aura.”
“It’s more of an aqua, May.”
“And there was that artsy bunch of unicorns, who were experimenting with mixing auras. As I recall, they came up with lots of pretty shades of green.”
“Those hippies?” Hat Pin gave me a disgusted look. “They went back to Manehattan to do light shows for rock bands!”
“Really, ladies, I’d have thought you would have learned your lesson long ago. Don’t you remember how you treated those egghead unicorns down from Canterlot? Sure, they used words like ‘quantum’ and ‘trans-temporal’ and such. That wasn’t an excuse to be all unfriendly and distrustful. And you all felt bad about that after the accident, didn’t you?”
That got them. They hung their heads, and there was a moment of silence.
“We was all real generous when you passed the hat for their widows, May,” said Prickly Pear.
“Ponies still come to see that glass crater they made,” said Auntie Keeper. “It’s right pretty, especially at sunset.”
“And it led to a growth industry for us, too,” I pointed out. “Ponies from all over Equestria come here to conduct their dangerous experiments.”
“And the town’s gone downhill ever since,” declared Hat Pin. “Having acres of land you don’t care about ain’t something a town should be proud of. Next thing you know, we’ll have a new motto, and a sign at the railroad station. ‘Come to Eutaw. We don’t mind if you blow it up!’ Anyhow, I just know Counter’s a Changeling spy!”
“Spy? Spyin’ on what?”
“The secret military base up on Big Butte.”
“’Secret base’? The one with the visitor’s center?”
“Counter goes out to watch every time they set something on fire and push it off the butte hoping it’ll fly. And he takes lots of notes.”
“The launches off Big Butte are announced in the local paper, Miss Pin. Miss Shiny Apple takes her students on school outings to watch them. Counter wouldn’t have to do much to spy on them. Just subscribe to their newsletter.”
“That’s just the public base. The real secrets are inside the Butte!” Hat Pin gave me a conspiratorial wink.
“Oh, that is complete nonsense, Hat!" snarled Prickly Pear. Predictably, they were turning on each other and had begun to bicker. I have preferred they not do this with me trapped between them. "Counter ain’t a spy and he ain’t a Changeling."
“I’m please you see reason, Miss Pear…”
“Counter’s a space alien,” declared Prickly Pear.
“What?!”
“Or maybe he’s a dimensional traveler. It’s hard to tell the difference most times.”
“I imagine it would be,” I muttered. I discovered that I had Barney's harness on back-to-front, and I'd have to start all over. “Please, stand still, Barney, please!”
“You’re both wrong,” stated Auntie Keeper. “Counter’s a… whatayoucallit? Help me out, Girls. You know. Stalks the night, preying on the innocent?”
“A demon?”
“No, that ain’t it. Dead thing walking?”
“A zombie?”
“No, that ain’t it, neither. Bat thing with fangs?”
“Oh, I know, Bee. You mean a mummy.”
“Tarnation! What about anything I’ve said made you think of mummys?”
“Okay, I have to insist we put an end to the scary talk in front of the worried mother!”
Just then fate was merciful, and I got the harness snapped on before Barney got his head free again. Harness on, my dog immediately transformed from frisky pup to all-business tracker. He sat at attention, waiting for a scent sample.
“Sheriff Berry, whatever they say Count’s been a good neighbor,” said Jenny. “And Timmy liked… likes him. Oh, May, since Well passed on, Timmy is all I got in the world. Please find my boy!”
“That’s what I aim to do, Jenny. Hold out Timmy’s cap so Barney can get a good whiff of it.”
Once I was satisfied that Barney had the scent, I gave the command. “Barney, seek!”
The dog briefly sniffed around the yard, then he made a beeline for Counter’s front door. Barney pushed it with his nose and the door swung wide open. It wasn’t latched.
Barney bounded inside and promptly disappeared.
“Well, that’s an interesting development,” I said, straightening my hat and stepping up to the door.
“Little May, what are you gonna do if you run into Counter?”
“I expect I’ll apologize for trespassing and hope he understands, Auntie Keeper.”
“What if there’s trouble, Little May?”
“Then I’ll do what any self-respecting lawpony would do.” I drew my torch, flicked it on, and held it in my mouth as I entered the house. If I ran into trouble, I planned to beat it into submission with my flashlight.
Mind you, I did not plan on falling through the floor.
#
I must have been stunned when I landed. The next thing I knew a beautiful mare was speaking to me. It took me a moment to realize that mare was Mr. Counter.
“Sheriff Berry? Are you alright? Can you hear me?”
My eyes were slow to adjust to the light, which Counter kept uncomfortably low. In the dark the hood that covered his whole head and face appeared even spookier than usual. “I figure I’ll be just fine, thank you. Am I in your basement, Mr. Counter?”
The hood moved, indicating that Counter was nodding. “You are. I fear I’ve been trying to fix a broken floor hatch, and the hinges continue to be faulty. It isn’t supposed to act like a trap. Perhaps I should block off my front door until I’ve fixed the problem, but I rarely have visitors. Speaking of that, to what do I owe this visit, Sheriff?”
“I’m looking for a lost foal, Mr. Counter. You know Timmy Digger? Mule, about so tall?” I indicated Timmy’s height with a hoof.
“I wish I could tell you Timmy is here in my basement, Sheriff, but he is not. You will have to continue your search elsewhere. And please call me ‘Count.’ All my friends do.”
“As you wish, Count.” Since I was on duty I didn’t invite him to call me ‘May.’
“I can have you on your way as soon as I right my ladder. But you are unsettled from your fall. Can I offer you some refreshment? I have water and cider.”
“No thanks, though feel free to indulge yourself, Count.”
“Oh, no, I never drink…” He paused as he noticed something. “Cider. Is that your dog, Sheriff Berry?”
My vision had finally adjusted enough that I could make out Barney in a corner on the far wall. Count had overlooked him because he was quiet and still. Count wouldn’t have known it, but Barney was alerting on something.
“Yep that’s him,” I said, walking over to see what Barney found so captivating. It was a funny-looking steel box, just the right size for hiding a foal. “Would you open this for me, Count?”
“Absolutely not! I must insist you leave my personal property alone.”
“Never mind, I’ll get it myself,” I said, though I wasn’t sure I could work the box’s strange latches.
“You leave that alone! You have no right!”
“Well, that’s a grey area, Count. I claim the dog signaling me gives me probable cause. You or your lawyer may file a claim against me with Town Hall. As the welfare of a child is involved, I’m willing to risk a lawsuit.” I finally got the box unlatched. The lid eased up with a hiss and a gout of chilly vapor. Timmy Digger was inside, curled around his ball. I was pleased to find him breathing.
“I’d take it as a favor if you would come quietly, Count.”
“I’m afraid I can’t do that, Sheriff.”
I still don’t know what hit me.
#
I woke up with my forelegs manacled. I was hanging from the ceiling by chains, and my rear hooves just rested on the floor. At least I still had my hat.
“Mr. Counter, I’m afraid I’m going to have to detain you while we make a few inquiries,” I said. “And I’m going to have to see some valid ID.”
“How delightfully droll, Sheriff. What I have enjoyed the most about my time among you ponies has been your sense of humor.” I would have to take his word for it that he was amused. I couldn’t read any of Counter’s body language. “Since there is no further point to pretending, I believe I’ll make myself more comfortable.”
Counter threw off his hood. There was a movement under his cloak, then a second head snaked out of his collar. Well, Counter did have two eyes. Each face had one.
One long head and neck leaned back and unhooked a harness attached to his paralyzed leg. He unbuckled it, then tossed both harness and leg into a corner.
“Ah, that’s better.”
“So, you aren’t actually an okapi?”
“Again, very funny, Sheriff Berry. And no, I am not an okapi.”
“Then what are you? A space alien?”
“Not exactly.”
“An inter-dimensional traveler?”
“You could say that, but it wouldn’t be true.”
“Both?”
“In a way. But not really.”
“I’m running out of possibilities here. Oh, I know. Are you from a secret subterranean civilization hidden deep underneath Equestria?”
“I can safely say no to that. Oh, wait, now that I think of it, there is a grain of truth there, though it’s not what you would expect.”
“I’m not going to get a straight answer, am I?”
“I don’t mean to be evasive, Sheriff, but it isn’t easy to explain simply. How’s your eleventh-dimensional physics?”
“Sadly, that wasn’t part of the standard curriculum when I was in school.”
“Don’t look at me; I was trained as a botanist.”
“Never mind. I have a better question. What are you going to do with little Timmy? Vivisect him?”
“Oh, no, that would be a waste. My employers would never miss the chance to observe such a young specimen’s growth. You, on the other hoof, are a mature sample and an excellent candidate for vivisection.”
I hoped he didn’t see me cringe. “You said your friends call you ‘Count.’ You know that’s what Jenny Digger called you.”
He fell silent. Finally, Counter answered. “I’m aware that I am a traitor to her trust. Jenny has been a good neighbor, and a friend. She brought me baked goods. She… it does not matter. I shall be very well paid, and that will do wonders for my conscience.”
He pushed a big blue button, and a platform descended from the ceiling. It was round and glowed green. I figured it was big enough to hold me, Timmy, Count, and all the crates scattered around the room. “Is that how we’re going to travel?”
“Yes. Please don’t ask how it works. All I do is pull the lever.”
The lever he indicated was a big, red affair, just like in all the thriller novels.
That he’d only bound my front legs indicated that Counter had a fundamental misunderstanding of what makes ponies dangerous. Sloppy thinking. I wondered if I could make him a little sloppier.
“You would have preferred to catch Mrs. Digger instead of me, wouldn’t you, Count?”
“It would have been nice to keep mother and son together. But you and your dog snooping about have made that impossible.” He began loading boxes onto the platform. I could have warned him against doing such work when angry, he could have an accident. But I didn’t feel I owed him the favor. “I have standing orders to abort and evacuate if discovered by the authorities. Everything would have been just fine if you hadn’t meddled… you… you meddling…”
“Yep, that’s us, meddling meddlers.”
“What is it, anyway?” It took me a moment to realize he was indicating my dog.
“It? He is part cairn, part fox, and all terrier. Just the dog you need for finding evidence hidden in stupid places, or catching somepony hiding behind a curtain. A meddler’s perfect meddling sidekick.”
“He will make a fine sample, along with the other varmints I have already sent home.”
It was a bit disconcerting to watch Counter working with one mouth while he spoke to me with the other. Distracted by his loading, Counter didn’t notice Barney begin to stir. He likely expected whatever it was he used on us to last longer on the little dog. Counter wouldn’t know about a terrier’s excitable metabolism. Barney would soon be up and raising a fuss, and I didn’t want that. Not yet.
“Sit. Stay.”
“What was that, Sheriff?”
“I said I want to stay.”
“And I would just as soon leave you, if I could. But that is just another regret I have, due to the hasty departure you have forced on me.”
“You have regrets?”
“I regret not having a better recording device. We enjoy your little pony songs very much. Actually, we enjoy you little ponies in general.”
I don’t think it’s what he meant, but that sounded a little like Counter’s folk enjoyed eating us. I held my tongue and let him natter on as he worked.
“You are a very amusing species, and we find you very funny. You are also educational. I have learned a lot from your philosophy of life.”
Unfortunately, ‘do not kidnap ponies’ was not one of the lessons Counter had learned.
“Oh, and I regret not gathering more cactus. I think it’s wonderful. I have plenty of samples for my employers, but I wanted to gather more for my own garden.”
“And you regret not capturing Jenny Digger.”
Counter bristled. “Do not say it like that, Sheriff. I would be doing her a favor. Without her husband her business has been failing. Jenny is an outstanding surveyor and can find water better than perhaps anyone else in Eutaw. But many distrust a female working alone, and Jenny is too shy to promote herself. With me, Jenny and Timmy would no longer need to worry about where their next bit is coming from. I hope I can convince my employers to allow me to come back for her.”
“For what? To vivisect her?”
“No! I wouldn’t allow that! She would be cared for!”
I chortled. “Why, Mr. Counter! I do believe you are sweet on the Widow Digger!”
“Shut up, and stay out of my head, Sheriff!”
He shoved a dolly under a potted saguaro that was four times his height. He was having trouble muscling it onto the platform.
“Here, let me help you with that.” I pulled up and bucked as hard as I could with my hind legs. Counter went crashing onto the platform, with the huge cactus literally pinning him down. Counter and cactus crashed so hard the crates stacked on the platform bounced.
“That was just mean, Sheriff,” gasped Counter. “This really hurts, and it has gained you nothing. I will wriggle free long before anypony comes to rescue you. Oww! I am swiftly losing my appreciation for cactus.”
He didn’t notice, and I didn’t mention, the scent of burning wiring.
“If you don’t like that, you are going to hate this.” With a nod, I flipped my hat off and caught it on a rear hoof. I spun it three times, then tossed it and scored a perfect ringer on the big, red lever.
Nothing happened.
Counter laughed, then immediately regretted it. Apparently, it hurt worse when he laughed.
“Sheriff Berry, it appears your hat isn’t heavy enough to pull the lever.”
I gave him a big grin that should have scared him.
“Barney, hat!”
“What? No, stop that! Nooooooooo!”
I shut my eyes as tightly as I could, just before the platform activated. Even so, it was so bright that through my eyelids I could tell that it wasn’t the green light we had been seeing for weeks. It was bright red. I think maybe Counter’s machine was damaged even worse than I thought.
When I opened my eyes, and the spots cleared away, I found myself in an empty basement. Counter, cactus, boxes, and the platform had all disappeared. All that was left was me, the box that held little Timmy, Barney, and my hat.
Curiously, there was the scent of fudge.
It didn’t take long for Aunt Keeper to gather a posse, and for her to bully them into coming in to rescue me. It took a little longer for them to find a blacksmith to come get me down. Counter had apparently taken the key to my manacles with him.
#
A week later I was in my office, hat off, with nothing to do but my paperwork.
I could hear Barney snoring away under my desk. If he thought this was a good day to conserve energy who was I to argue?
Timmy Digger remembered nothing of what had happened. He had woken up immediately and none the worse for wear the moment he was released from the box. I hear he’s sad that Mr. Counter went away without saying goodbye.
Jenny Digger closed up shop and took a job with a competing well-digging firm. After less than a week she’s already in line for a promotion to head surveyor.
Officially, Head Counter ran away and remains a fugitive at large. His plans for little Timmy continue to be a mystery, and a source of mean-spirited speculation.
I filed another report, a more detailed and accurate one, which I sealed in a black-bordered envelope and sent off to a post office box in Canterlot. I also packed up and shipped them Timmy’s box. It was the only piece of equipment Counter left behind.
This wasn’t the first report I’d sent, but it’s probably the strangest. Probably.
I don’t know who reads these reports, or what department they work for. I understand that I’m not supposed to know. I certainly don’t need to know, and most days I don’t really want to know.
I do think about Counter quite a bit. I know I sent him away. But, damaged as that platform of his was, I don’t know where he went, or even if he went anywhere at all.
I hope he went home. I truly do. I’d like him to deliver a message to his employers. Don’t mess with little ponies.
It does make you wonder. They (whoever ‘they’ are) find us entertaining and educational, and they like our songs. How many other ‘okapis’ are scattered all across Equestria?
I drew the top item from my In box. It was a letter, postmarked ‘Canterlot’ but without a return address. Inside was a printed card, with no signature. All it said was “Thank you for your vigilance.”
“You’re welcome,” I said to my empty office.
Here in Eutaw we get more than our fair share of odd characters, for a variety of reasons. We’ve grown used to that, and over time most folks have learned to deal with our more eccentric visitors. We may have an instinctive distrust of anything different, but we have an even stronger instinct for neighborliness. But there’s no reason you can’t be a good neighbor and still keep your eyes open.
I’ll be watching.