Fairy Tales From Hell Presents:

Rumpelstiltskin

By

Max Booth III

He wished he could stop gambling, but he was addicted. It was something he had to do, and as the years went by the addiction got worse. If only he would have stopped, then maybe the old man would still have his goddess daughter.

One day, the man was sitting at the horse track, puffing away on his tobacco pipe, when he overheard two people talking. He heard that the game was fixed. That horse number thirteen was hyped up on all kinds of speed and it would surely win.

So, without a moment to waste, the old man ran to the ticket booth and bet every single nickel to his name on number thirteen. That included the rent money for the apartment.

As the old man sat in his stadium seat, fingers crossed, he hoped and prayed that he would win. If he did he vowed to never gamble ever again. This was it. This was the Big One.

The gunshot went off and the horses took off. Number thirteen won the race with time still to spare. The horse was so fast that it was clearly obvious the game was fixed. Somebody had cheated.

Screams of liars and people wanting their money back filled the racing stadium. The old man was getting tensed and nervous. Should he go collect his winnings? Would it be okay? Well, he had to. There was no money left for him if not.

The old man snuck to the winnings booth and showed the lady his ticket. She looked at him and said that Mr. King would like to see him. Sweat dripping off his face, the old man unenthusiastically went in the back room and through a door.

Every body in Chicago knew who Vincent King was. He owned Chicago. He was the King. He was English. Before he came to America he lived in London. Vincent also ruled London, but he soon got tired of that and moved to Chicago. His main ambition was to be Lord of the World.

Vincent King sat being his desk. He was about four hundred pounds, almost all of that muscle. Bald head and a white suit. There was a burning cigar in his big mouth. He was the King.

King told him to have a seat and the old man did as he was told.

“Now, you seemed to have bet a huge wager on one horse. A horse that just so happened to be fixed. Did you do it to the horse?”

“No, absolutely not,” the old man said.

“Well, how didja know then?”

“I-uh-I heard some people talking about it,” he explained.

“So what? You just thought you would just help yourself to information not informed to you? You just thought, ‘hey, what do I have to lose?’ Huh?”

“Um…yeah, basically.”

“Well, we have a problem here,” King said, and pulled a machete out of behind his desk.

The old man’s eyes shot wide open and he was shaking even more uncontrollably. Was this the way the old man would go?

But before King could say anything else the door swung open and a black man wearing a biohazard suit came barging in.

“King, sorry, but I quit. This is bullshit work, man. I don’t know anything about goddamn meth,” the black man said.

“Well, that’s more bad news,” King said.

Then, as foolish as it was, the old man interrupted and said, “My daughter knows how to make meth!”

King looked at him weirdly. “Really?”

“Yeah! The best in all of Chicago! She gets straight As in science at school. She’s a genius when it comes to chemicals!”

“Now, you’re not just shooting off your gun are ya?”

“No, no way. I’m no liar,” the old man lied.

“Well, there’s some relief,” King said, and drove the machete through the top of the black man’s skull.

“Jesus Christ!” the old man yelped.

King pointed the machete at him and said to have his daughter come over tonight. Make sure she brings her own equipment, too.

Before the old man left he turned around and asked, “Say, just for the sake of saying, that what if my daughter if having an off night tonight?”

“Then you and her both gets a taste of my machete,” said thy great King of London and Chicago.

The daughter was infuriated at the topic of discussion when her father came home. She, of course, had no idea how to make any kind of methamphetamines. She was a straight A student, not a drug dealer. The old man got on his knees, crying, and begged his daughter. If not they would both surely die. The daughter said she hated the old man to death.

“How do I make it?” she asked.

“I don’t know. Aren’t you good in science?”

“Yeah, but not with drugs, Dad.”

“What’s the difference.”

“I’ll just Google it. Maybe there will be something there.”

The daughter went to their computer and typed into the Google Tool Box: HOW TO MAKE METH.

And what do you know? There were links and links of how to make methamphetamines. It was incredible.

She found things about Iodine Crystals and 20 oz. Coke bottles. It was a lot of complicated stuff to process, but she thought she got the just of it. She found some of the objects she needed in her own house, but the rest was a little more difficult. She had to break into her high school and into the science room. She filled her book bag with all sorts of chemicals cylinders and tubes. Plus some different kinds of chemicals. By the time she got back to the house, the old man said it was time to go.

So, here she was. Inside a basement wearing a yellow biohazard suit, trying to make methamphetamine. But she could not for the life of her figure it out.

She knew she would die, there was no way around it. Why couldn’t she just be able to make meth?

Then, like a dream, the basement door opened and a small man walked down the steps. He was a dwarf. At the tallest three foot eight. He had orange hair and a long orange beard. He was dressed all in green. Like some sort of leprechaun.

“Hello, missy!” the dwarf said.

“Umm…hello,” the daughter cried.

“Oh, why all the tears, pretty lady?”

“If I don’t make a bunch of meth that big guy is going to kill me and my dad. And I don’t know how to do it.”

“You have to make meth?” the dwarf asked.

“Yeah.”

“Well, that’s easy. I can do that.”

“You can?”

“Yeah.”

“Will you do it for me?” the daughter asked, hope rising forth.

“Depends. What will you give me if I do it?”

“Umm…” the daughter could not think of anything. Then she felt the cold steel of her necklace rubbing against her chest. It was the necklace her mother had given her before she died, but the daughter was sure that her mother would have wanted to give it to this midget man to stay alive.

“I will give you my silver necklace,” the daughter announced.

“Lets see, shall we?”

The daughter handed the dwarf the necklace and the dwarf smiled. “I’ll do it!” he exclaimed.

The dwarf had the meth made in no time.

In the morning when Vincent King walked into the basement he was astonished and delighted to what he found. But his black heart became only more greedy. So that night he threatened the daughter with her and her father’s life unless there was more methamphetamine for him to make his riches off of.

The daughter sat there, crying again. She had not bothered to watch the dwarf making the meth so once again she was clueless. But then the door opened and the dwarf pranced down the steps.

“Hello again, my love,” he smiled. “I see you are once again in a little predicament, eh? Well, what will you give me if I make the meth again?”

The daughter looked at the shiny ring on her finger. It was also her mother’s. But it would have to go. “The ring on my finger,” said the daughter.

“Good enough, I say. Move out of the way, will ya?”

He began conjuring up the drug and it was soon done.

King rejoiced at good measure at the sight, but still he had not enough methamphetamine, and he had the old man’s daughter taken into the basement once again. This time she would have to make an even larger amount of meth. King also said that if she were able to make it all, she would become his wife.

“Hello once again, pretty lady,” said he. “I heard you need something done again?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, what shall you give me if I do it for you this time?” he asked.

“I don’t have anything else!” the daughter cried.

“Relax, its okay. If you have nothing left then promise me something.”

“What? Anything.”

“Good,” the dwarf smiled. “Promise me, if you should become the don’s wife, that you will give me your first child.”

Who knows whether that will ever happen, thought the daughter. And, not knowing how else to help herself in this strait, she promised the dwarf what he wanted, and for that he once more created meth.

When Vincent King walked into the basement the next morning, and found all the meth, he took the old man’s daughter into marriage, and the daughter became the don’s wife.

One year later she brought a beautiful child into the world, and she never once gave a thought to the dwarf.

But one day, as she was tucking her child away in her crib, the door opened and in came the dwarf.

“Hello, baby!” the dwarf exclaimed. “May I have what I was promised?”

She was horrorstruck. She fell to her knees and cried, begging for him not to take her child. She would give him anything. “Money? You can have all the money you want! Anything, I mean it! Please, just don’t take my baby boy!”

“No way, miss. Something alive is much dearer to me then any treasure you can offer me.”

The wife began to cry even more and lament, and the dwarf started to pity her.

“Alright. Shut up!” the dwarf said. “I will give you three days. If by that time you find out my name, then you shall keep your child.”

And with that the dwarf left.

The wife sat up awake all night, trying to think of any possible names that she might have heard in the past that seemed familiar. But nothing came to her. So she sent a boy who ran numbers for her husband out in the streets to inquire the name. He came back with a whole list of names.

And when the dwarf came back the next day he asked if she knew his name.

Caspar? Melchior? Balthazar? She said all the names she knew but to every one the dwarf said ‘that is not my name’.

The wife repeated the most uncommon and curious, “Perhaps your name is short-ribs? Sheepshanks? Laceleg?”

“That is not my name,” replied the dwarf.

On the third day the boy came again and said he had found the name. He said that there is a midget man that feeds the horses at the horse tracks. He wears green and has orange hair.

“I heard him singing a weird song as he was laying down the hay. It was like; ‘today I bake, tomorrow I brew, the next I’ll have the *****’s child, ha, glad that no one knew, that Rumpelstiltskin I am styled’. So I’m guessing Rumpelstiltskin is his name. Pretty strange if ya ask me,” the boy said.

“Are you sure it was Rumpelstiltskin?”

“As sure as I’ll be.”

“Good, now leave me be,” the wife said.

“Oh, wait just a minute. I thought we had a deal,” the boy pouted.

The wife sighed and lifted up her shirt and gave the boy a flash. The boy’s face filled with a smile. “Now get out of here you little pig.” The boy went on his way.

The rest of that day the wife said that name under her breath over and over. She could not get this wrong. There was no way. She had it down pat.

Later that night the dwarf came back and said, “Well, mistress, this is your last chance to get my name. If you don’t than I will take your child.”

“Umm…Conrad?”

“No.”

“Is your name Harry?”

“Are you even trying anymore? No, my name is not Harry.”

“Well, perhaps your name is Rumpelstiltskin?”

The dwarf’s smiled turned to a frown and his nostrils flared. “How? How did you know? Huh? You little cheater! You little cheating *****!”

In anger the dwarf plunged his right foot into the ground and the sound of a bone breaking filled the room.

The wife picked up her husband’s machete and screamed off the top of her lungs, “Your name is Rumpelstiltskin!!!” And sliced him in half.