SHORT STORY – RIDDLES
RIDDLES
Automatic traslation from the original story in Spanish. Not checked manually
Pedro was heading to his room to go to bed. Suddenly, he sensed something strange. He felt an odd drowsiness creeping over him.
He woke up with a dry mouth and his heart pounding in his ribs like a caged animal. The room was damp, with a low ceiling and peeling walls. It smelled of old wood, dust, and stale air. It took him a few seconds to realize he wasn’t in his own house.
Looking around, a childhood memory flashed through his mind with unbearable clarity. It was that old house in the village. As a child, it had filled him with irrational terror. From the window, he had seen the farmer slaughtering rabbits in the yard. Then he skinned them with monstrous calm.
Then he heard a voice, dry and close, that seemed to emanate from the walls.
“If you want to get out of here, you’ll have to cross three rooms. But to leave each one, you must solve a riddle. If you make a mistake, or try to cross the threshold without solving it, a huge blade will kill you.” Pedro swallowed hard. Fear clouded his mind. Even so, he stood up. He took a step toward the door, convinced that perhaps it was all a cruel joke. The moment he slid his left foot across the threshold, a metallic click sliced through the air. He jumped back. A blade descended violently and tore off the toe of his shoe. He fell to his knees, trembling. He looked at his foot. A small piece of leather was missing. For a moment, he was sure he had lost his big toe.
“Stop being an idiot and solve the first riddle,” said the voice.
In the room were three large boxes. Each had a hole on the side through which he could only insert his arm. One was labelled “apples,” another “oranges,” and the third “mixture of apples and oranges.” The voice continued:
“All the labels are fake. You can only put your hand in one box, take out one piece, and then, based on that, tell me what’s in each one.” Pedro closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and reached into the box labelled “mixture.” He pulled out an apple.
He smiled, though he was still terrified.
“The ‘mixture’ box contains only apples,” he said. “Since the label is fake, it can’t be a mixture. So, the ‘apples’ box can’t contain apples or a mixture. Therefore, it contains oranges. And the ‘oranges’ box contains the mixture.”
The voice was silent for a few seconds.
“Correct. Go in.”
The second room was narrower. It was lit by a yellowish bulb hanging from the ceiling. In the centre were two identical doors. Above one, an inscription: “Exit.” Above the other: “Death.” In front of them, two motionless guards. One always told the truth. The other always lied. You could only ask one of them a question to find out which door led to the exit.
Pedro felt sweat trickle down his back. He thought about asking directly, but that wouldn’t work. Then he remembered the old trick with logic puzzles. He approached the guard on the left.
“If I asked the other guard which is the correct door, what would he answer?”
The guard pointed to the door on the right.
Pedro understood instantly. If he asked the truthful guard, he would tell the liar’s lie. If he asked the liar, he would lie about the truthful guard’s truth. In both cases, the answer indicated the wrong door.
“Then the exit is the one on the left,” he said, and crossed without hesitation.
The third room was even worse. On the floor were three ropes hanging from the ceiling, but only two reached the exit at the far end. The voice spoke again:
“One of these ropes activates the exit. Another activates the blade. The third does nothing. You can only pull one.”
Pedro examined the ropes. One was rough and old. Another, new and taut. The third rope looked cut and patched. He thought about the pattern of the previous traps. A solution had to be based on eliminating possibilities.
Then he noticed something. The patched rope had a strange knot. It looked like it had been manipulated to deceive. The new rope seemed too obvious. The old one, on the other hand, appeared to him in the darkness of the ceiling to pass through a pulley and connect to some mechanism.
Although he remembered hearing that in the riddle of the ropes and the bell, the answer was the new rope, he thought that this must be the trap. Almost without thinking, he said:
The old one…
The voice boomed.
You’ve been lucky… You can leave…
Pedro approached the exit. Just as he crossed the threshold, a blast of strange gas hit his face. He felt himself losing consciousness. The voice was saying something he didn’t quite understand.
When he regained consciousness, he was unaware of the time that had passed. Terrified, he slowly opened his eyes.
He was pleasantly surprised to find herself in her own bed, at home. Than he smiled and convinced herself it had all been a nightmare.
He went to take a shower. Then he had a coffee and started getting dressed.
As he put on her shoes, her face paled. Her heart raced. Her left shoe was missing its toe.
Then, just then, thoughts began to swirl in her mind the last words of that horrible voice were crystal clear: “You were lucky this time. We’ll see what happens next…”
Riddles – Short stories series – Copyright ©Montserrat Valls and Juan Genovés