Grim Fairy Tales for Adults

By Clinton Smith

They're 0utlandish, extraordinary, bizarre. Stories to amuse and intrigue... Well written, mordant. Juicily entertaining. And most with endings you'll never see coming.

In "Smart Move", a Duke whose neighbours are a famous rock band, discovers the perfect way to silence them.
In "Hannigan", a young man who falls in love with an elderly woman never suspects why they're so compatible.
In "Deep Water", the inhabitants of a residential cruise ship become the only life left on the planet.
In "Elephant", a magician that can make anything instantly disappear requires his new assistant to murder someone to ensure she doesn't give away his methods.
In "Genie", a 10,000 year old sprite, weary of arranging sexual trysts and murders, tries to retire from the world. But is landed with one last assignment.
In "Metal Fatigue", when metal everywhere begins to degrade, a con escapes from prison. Only to find himself stymied when he tries to recover his stash...

And so it goes... Twelve absorbing shock and awe tales.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Buzzword Books
• Release date: Nov 3, 2019
• ISBN: 9780463497142

Clinton Smith

Clinton Smith has extensive experience in radio, film, television (copywriting, producing and directing) and is the author of two previous novels, The Fourth Eye and The Godgame, both of which have been optioned for film. He lives in Cammeray, NSW.

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Copyright © 2019 Clinton Smith

The author asserts his moral rights in the work.

This book is copyright. Except for the purposes of fair reviewing, no part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from both the copyright owner and Buzzword Books and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on any subsequent purchaser or third party. Infringers of copyright are liable to prosecution

Published as an eBook by Buzzword Books, Australia 2019

This edition published by Buzzword Books at Smashwords 2019

Buzzword Books

P.O Box 7, Cammeray 2062

Australia

Buzzwordbooks.com

Grim Fairy Tales for Adults

ABOUT THIS COLLECTION

Some years ago, I collected all my published stories and put them in two anthologies.

VICIOUS TALES FROM MEN'S MAGAZINES and ROMANTIC STORIES FROM WOMEN'S MAGAZINES.

The two collections have sold steadily, though most were written over forty years ago. It's been some time since I wrote stories, and I've had great fun penning these.

Because of my mordant, quirky mindset, most are humorous or grim. A girl tattooed by Picasso becomes an inadvertent commodity. A duke whose neighbours are a famous rock band discovers the perfect way to silence them. When all metal degrades to the consistency of cheese, a jailbird escapes—and gets a nasty shock. A magician who can materialize an elephant requires his new assistant to murder someone to ensure she doesn't give away his methods.

The stories in these collections aren’t the only Smith stories to appear. His more serious or 'literary' stories are in the anthology, SONGS OF A SECOND WORLD. (As most stories in SONGS have won literary awards, perhaps the 'literary' tag can stand.) SONGS and the other anthologies are published by buzzwordbooks.com.

PUBLICATION CREDITS

I have included two older stories in this collection as they seemed to fit:

THE MAN WHO MADE WHISTLES appeared in ARGOSY (UK), December 1970. THE SAND MAN appeared in WOMEN'S WEEKLY, December 1971. (Winner of their inaugural Mary Drake award for fiction.)

Contents:

Tattoo

Smart Move

Deep Water

Luv U 2 Bits

The Hannigan Project

Metal Fatigue

Simplicissimus

The Plates

Jaded Genie

Elephant in the Room

The Man Who Made Whistles

The Sandman

Tattoo

The intercom crackled: 'May we visit Monsieur Picasso's studio?'

From the cottage window near the wall she saw the group of stragglers outside. Her father, the gardener, was replanting a lower terrace and had left her in charge of the electronic gate.

She lifted the handpiece. 'Non. Monsieur Picasso is not in.' It was the reply they had given for years.

The villa at Mougins, a palatial stone pile overlooking the reddish foothills of the Alps, was a mecca for the faithful. Tour busses stopped in the street while their drivers gave commentaries. Art-lovers roamed outside the walls. Tourists picnicked near the gate.

'Lise?'

Pablo's secretary, Miguel, was calling her from the door.

'Oui?'

'He wants to see you.'

She went to the mirror, and examined her seventeen-year old self for flaws. The attractive clear-skinned girl who gazed back was acceptable, even to her.

She went outside, crossed the flagstones, and walked up stone steps flanked by rose gardens toward the buildings that formed the main house.

When she entered the vaulted entrance hall, she heard the strident voice of Jacqueline—fifty-five years younger than Picasso and the maestro's wife. The artist was now ninety-one—hepatic, minus prostate and gall bladder, with failing eyesight, impotent and deaf.

'Non! Non!' the woman shouted. 'You will not do that to me.'

'Merde!' he bawled after her. The word became a gurgling cough. His lungs were filling with fluid and he found it hard to breathe.

The beautiful woman flounced past her, yelling back insults to him in French.

She entered the studio uncertainly. The huge room was littered with paintings, drawings, sculptures and ceramics. In an alcove was a figurine he had made of her—both beautiful and ugly in intent. It showed her about to be devoured by a minotaur, her head already in the mouth of the beast.

The little monster stood by a self-portrait crudely rendered in charcoal, a gargoyle image except for the great dark eyes.

'Lise! Come here.'

'Oui, Monsieur.'

She warily approached him. His eyes, as dark as the painting's, were framed by mundane spectacles. The man with the thousand-rayed sun in his belly now had his life collapsing around him. Despite his monumental ego, he now feared his furious art had been mere posturing—that he'd become a factory for facile statements. Perhaps why most of the latest works in the room were unsigned.

'Step over here and take off your clothes.'

She did it as she had before, knowing she had little to fear. He would grope her arse, groin, breasts but nothing more.

She stepped out of her dress and underthings.

'Lie on the couch, face down.'

She did it reluctantly, wondering what would come next.

He had a strange object in his hand attached by a cable to a motor of some sort. She heard a whirring sound.

'What is that, Monsieur?'

'A tattoo machine. I will create a masterpiece on your back.'

'Non, Monsieur.'

'Yes, little trollop, yes! It will be an expression of living art and I will sign it. You will be a priceless artefact and the rest of your life will be miraculous.'

'I do not wish it, Monsieur.'

'A simple design. Like so.' He held up a sheet of art paper with no more than five black curving strokes that formed an elegant odalisque. Even she could appreciate his gift for the bounding line.

'It will be beautiful.'

'My father will not approve.'

'Your father will revere you even more.' He shuffled to a bureau and pulled out an untidy wad of notes. 'Thirty thousand franks. Here. Yours.' He tossed the bundle on her discarded clothes. 'Lie still.'

After he died, the place went into lockdown and legal haggles started. There were death duties on 50,000 works including 1885 paintings. Jacqueline closed the shutters, burned candles, hung black drapes and set a place for him each night at the table. Her father was paid off. Eventually, two of his women made grand gestures. Marie Thérèse hanged herself. Jacqueline shot herself in bed.

By then, they were long gone. Her father took her money, gambled it away then—destitute and desperate—hired her to a travelling carnival.

Roll up and see the beautiful girl with the genuine Picasso on her back.

She endured the sideshow for six weeks then escaped to Paris where she fell in with an engaging reprobate who pimped call girls to high-end customers.

Soon, she had her own clientele and stopped paying the pimp his cut. When he threatened to ruin her face, she put a contract on him. It cost all she had but the hit-man did an excellent job. He'd sandbagged the man so that forensics couldn't be sure he'd been concussed then gave him an overdose, leaving the rubber tube and syringe. The inquest ruled it was suicide. She decided the law was a useful ass.

By the time she was thirty eight, she had climbed to the peak of her profession—owned an apartment on the Left Bank, a villa on the slopes above Cannes, a numbered account in Geneva and was ready to retire.

Then she received a registered letter:

Mademoiselle,

It has come to our attention that you are the custodian of a genuine signed Picasso artwork completed shortly before the Maestro's death. It is reputedly executed on your person—namely on your back.

If this description is accurate, we have a client with considerable means who wishes to make your acquaintance.

This client is prepared to fly you to New York, to pay for your accommodation and expenses while there, and to make you an offer that will be overwhelmingly to your advantage both financially and personally.

Kindly advise a flight date that fits your schedule and a return ticket will be forwarded with all details.

Yours faithfully,

Keenan, Sopmorth, Fleegle.

Solicitors and Attorneys at Law.

She pulled a face when she read it but at the same time was intrigued. She was bored with herself and welcomed an all-expenses-paid diversion. So she replied that the facts were as stated and that she was willing to travel to New York.

She was met at JFK by a courier who ushered her to a limousine and drove her to a mansion on Long Island obscured by high walls and trees. The main building resembled a stucco version of the Villa in Mougins but without terraces and roses. Instead there were hedgerows and ornamental ponds designed as set pieces for sculptures. And, behind the main residence, a long gallery with high reinforced windows guarded by CCTV.

She was greeted by one Martin Thwale, a fit, affable man about seventy with close cropped white hair and a trim beard. He conducted her into a lavish sitting room where they were served coffee and cakes by a black maid while an Asian footman took her bags to a bedroom on the second floor.

'Now, my dear,' Thwale said, 'I need to give you the short history of myself. I made my fortune in junk bonds, luckily got out in time, and thirty years ago, started to collect modern art. Of course, it makes business sense as well. Nothing appreciates like art. I've acquired quite a collection. Occasionally, I