“Yes, my friend,” Tesserax said. He fluffed his orange robes. “We maseni are incapable of becoming intoxicated, as you may know. Indeed, your own race is somewhat unique in that respect, compared to all the races we have thus far encountered. Certainly, we have drugs that make us—as you might say ‘high’. But we are always in command of our senses, perfectly rational and able to exercise as good judgment as before taking drugs. It fascinates our people that your race can become so mindlessly drunk. The fact that tens of thousands are killed every year on your highways by drunken drivers has sparked the imagination of the maseni people. A Drunken Driver is a rather mysterious, inexplicable creature to us. And, in the past few years, a new myth has arisen to explain accidents on our own highways.”
“The myth of the Drunken Driver?” Jessie asked, not quite able to get that one down.
“Yes,” Tesserax said. “Enough superstitious people have taken up belief in the marauding Drunken Driver who haunts our home world highways that, in fact, he has come to exist. Fortunately, though he’s a recent supernatural, laws have been passed to keep him from killing anyone. He may only careen around, frightening people—as you just saw.”
For a while, everyone was silent, digesting this. Then the detective said, “I didn’t realize that diplomatic and social relations between our two races could give rise to new superstitions.”
“Oh, yes, my friend. It’s surprising there are no new Earth-born myths based on things your people have picked up from our culture.”
Jessie said, “Is it possible that this marauding behemoth in the mountains is such a new myth?”
Tesserax shook his large head. “It’s unlikely. We’ve run computer depth studies of new trends in maseni society, and we found nothing that could account for this murderous mountain giant.”
“Still…”
“I don’t want to cloud your fresh perspective,” the maseni said. “But I truly believe you’d be wasting time in following up that possibility.”
The black-boled, white-leafed trees grew thicker at the sides of the road, and the hills grew steeper and the clouds gradually came down like heavy blankets onto a bed. They drove on toward Gilorelamans Inn, an ancient hotel on the slopes of the high peaks, which would serve as their base of operations until the case was closed.
Chapter Eighteen
Gilorelamans Inn lay on the lush green lower slopes of the largest peak in the whole range, Piotimkin. It was as far down the rocky mountain as it could get without moving into the foothills, but the view from its grounds was staggering, no matter which direction one looked. Behind were the snow forests and then the bare granite cliffs and finally, high above, the snowfields themselves. On the other three sides one could view vast panoramas of lower lands: hills, hillocks, sparse woods, plains and robot-tended fields.
The inn was pleasing to the eye. It was made from the wood of the conifers which had replaced the black-boled trees as the land rose and the temperature dropped. Its roof had three peaks and two steep valleys between and was shingled with slabs of wood stained black by sap and tar. The windows were deepset and flanked by wooden shutters, reflecting the late afternoon sun and the moving clouds that raced across the sky. Not a single daub of paint marred the inn’s natural beauty.
The two-lane road fed directly into the inn’s drive, and their robot chauffeur brought them right around the spouting fountain to the front door, which was fully ten feet high and six wide, graced by a shining coppery knob and knocker, each so large it seemed a man would need two hands to grasp them.
“It’s lovely,” Helena said. “It must be very old.”
“The whole place is a mythical establishment,” Tes-serax said. “It dates back centuries. And because it is mythical, it remains constant, unweathered, untouched by decay.”
As they got out of their limousine, the big front door of the rustic inn swung outward with a great deal of groaning and creaking, successfully attracting everyone’s attention. A maseni in black robes came out to greet them. He glided forth, his tentacle hands folded against his chest in such a manner that he suggested a mandarin emperor of another Earth age. He bowed to them, twice to Helena, and said, “Welcome to Gilorelamans Inn.”