The Little Shoppe of Evil
Thursday night, ten p.m. Seymour Skinner, Anthony DeGeorge, Freddy Quimby, and Joseph Quimby stood on the corner across from the Shop of Evil ('Your One-Stop for Evil!'). They shielded their faces with scarves, hats, and the collars of their long coats. They felt naked and exposed, their thin veneer of uprightness one encounter away from destruction. They waited, feeling like total fools, for Hareton Courtley.
Five minutes after the hour, Lord Courtley arrived, in his usual formal attire.
"You're late, Courtley."
"Sorry, sorry, ever so sorry." he breathed, surveying them with gleaming eyes. "You needn't have waited out here in the cold all this time…or did you think I wasn't coming."
"We were beginning to doubt…" Skinner growled.
"Well, come on then!" he said in seductive tones, and he lead them across the street.
The Shop of Evil was, as its name clearly indicated, a place of evil. Shelves of shrunken heads stood beneath the flickering lamplight, their faces bearing grimaces of pain for all eternity. Dusty cases held talismans, amulets, and charms, emblazoned with various dark symbols, alongside badgers' teeth, snakes' eyes, and the shriveled feet of vultures. In the cabinets and cases, strange potions and elixirs sat congealing in glass jars and miniature cauldrons.
A small, simpering man came shuffling out of the back of the store. He looked at Lord Courtley.
"Oh, its you. Get out, Mr. Chen says he doesn't want you in his store!"
"I'm here to buy this time, Gilligan, and I have money."
Beat.
"Cash money?"
"Coin of the realm, greenbacks, moolah…money. Gentlemen, each of you have your share?"
They nodded, and produced their payment from inside their coats. DeGeorge pulled out his billfold, and removed several crisp hundred-dollar bills. He flicked them, and handed them to Courtley. Skinner opened his coat, pulled up his shirt, and opened the traveller's wallet he had strapped to his abdomen. He took out a mixture of hundreds, fifties, and twenties, and stuffed them into his hand. Freddy Quimby, grinning proudly, dispensed several neat rolls of hundreds and fifties. Joseph Quimby looked about morosely. He emptied his wallet, then proceeded to hand over the assorted loose bills in his pants pockets. Finally, he opened his coat, and handed over several bags filled with rolls of quarters and loose Sacagawea dollar coins.
Courtley collected all the money in a large burlap sack marked with a large dollar sign, then handed it over to Gil.
"Bring it!" he hissed. Gil looked at the bag, at Courtley, then at the four, and at the bag once more, then left nodded and retreated into the back room. He returned with a large oak box, which he set on a nearby display case. He took a bronze key from his pocket, and, inserting it into the lock on the box, turned it. The latch clicked, and he opened the box.
Inside the box was what appeared to be a mass of blood red fabric.
"Er, uh, what's all this?" Joe Quimby asked.
"These were the belongings of the most evil man who ever lived-C. Montgomery Burns!" Gil said in a frightened whisper. Courtley pulled the cape out of the box and set it aside.
"His cape…his cape clasp…the signet ring of the house Dracula, the Black Ring, worn by Dracula, and Burns, said to be a gift from the Devil himself…and…" he stopped, holding up a bottle filled with red powder.
"What is it?"
"The blood of Mr. Burns!" Gil hissed.
"It's…its just red powder…" Anthony DeGeorge said.
Gil seemed to have just snapped out of a daze.
"Y-yes, yes of course…powder…"
"We'll take it!" Courtley said, throwing the items back in the case and snapping it shut.
"May the Devil take good care of you," Gil whispered, his upper lip curling. He shuddered and retreated once more into the depths of the store.