Brindle's parents gasped in unison as they clutched each other, and the sacks of pieces between them. Staring at Loden in disbelief, their eyes bulged from their heads. They were sure he was out of his mind, mad with the Dreaded Drought Disease, himself. How could he suggest their only daughter should go into that fearful hole, into the realm of Underearth? How dare him claim it was her idea. How could she have volunteered? She couldn't even talk.
"But, but she can't even talk,” her father said, as if offering the wellkeeper a gentle reminder of a well established fact. No one, other than the mayor, would ever dare to get on the bad side of a wellkeeper, and even the mayor had not fared too well the day before.
"But, she can talk!" Loden burst out gleefully.
"He's mad,” Brindle's mother muttered.
"Quite taken, I'm afraid,” her husband concurred.
Loden could see the expressions on their faces and was pretty sure he understood the assertions underlying them.
"My fellow easterners," he said calmly and reassuringly, "I am not delirious. Your daughter does speak - or rather she can communicate her thoughts. But surely you must already know this?” Loden looked at them suspiciously when they only responded with a flustered look. “Brindle, if you really do want to take Tyter's place going into the well, stomp your right foot, if not, clap your hands."
Brindle stomped her right foot several times. Then, she stomped both of her feet, one of which stomped on Bourg's foot - quite accidentally.
"By veget, female. Be careful!” Bourg roared more out of annoyance than pain.
Brindle’s parents didn't know what to make of it all. They felt embarrassed and in their hearts cursed her for making them look like fools in front of the wellkeepers. Brindle studied their eyes, then let loose of Bourg's arm. Straightening her back to obtain an erect posture (as she had seen the mayor do so often), she slowly walked up to her cowering parents.
"Ah ga ib weh fo Thyda,” she announced with slow deliberation. Her parents dropped their jaws. They didn’t have the slightest idea what she had said, but she said it with such determination it actually frightened them.
Loden stepped beside Brindle on her right. "It’ll take a little time to get used to the way she speaks,” he reassured them.
"Uh huh," Brindle's mother responded with timid pessimism. "And what exactly do you think she said? That is, if you don't mind sharing it with her own dear parents."
Loden was surprised by their cynical attitudes. He had expected them to be overwhelmed with joy. However, he couldn't be too hard on them. For the truth was, he didn't know what Brindle had said either. "Ah, well then, uh let's see. She, uh, er, a, she said....”
"She said she wanted to take Tyter's place in the well.” Bourg’s voice boomed as he stepped to Brindle’s other side.
The combination of shock and fear twisted the faces of both her parents. Brindle's father placed his free hand upon his wife's shoulder and with a forced smile toward the three imposing figures, he asked, "May I have just a private word with my wife? This has all come as quite a shock to us, as you might well imagine!"
"Of course, you may. But please keep in mind the matter of which we speak is becoming more and more urgent with each degree of the sun. You do wish to have your daily ration of water, don't you?” This made Brindle's parents cringe. Was Loden attempting to blackmail them? They weren’t sure; neither was Loden.
"Ah, yes, yes, well only be a moment,” Brindle's father assured Loden as he nudged his shaken wife out of hearing range from the others.
"Oh, what shall we do? What shall we do?” the mother whimpered.
"Shush, female! Keep your voice down. We mustn't make the wellkeepers angry. You heard what Loden said. Threatened us, he did. By veget, the mayor was right about him. He's a troublemaker. Why I've half a mind to....”
"Oh - I, I feel faint.” His wife began to swoon.
"Not now, female!" he ordered. "We don't have time for that."
"But - but they want to put our only child down that horrible hole. Oh, how can a loving mother even consider such a thing? What would the other mothers think of me, if I should give my approval to - to ... oh, I feel faint - again."
"I said not now, female! We have to make a very important decision and we only have a few moments in which to make it. Look they’re already getting restless. A moment. Just, a moment, kind sirs. Hah, hah,” he called with pseudo pleasantry.
"Oh, look at my baby. Look at her smiling. How happy and determined she seems. I never knew she could smile. I never knew she understood a word we ever said.” Brindle's mother clutched her husband's collar and pulled his face to hers. "All this time, I never knew!"
Her husband pulled her hands from his collar and pushed her back. "What does that matter now? Listen, maybe this is her fate - to be lowered into the well."
"But what if something should happen to her?" his wife groaned.
"Would it be worse than the life ahead of her now?"
"But, but that's all changed. She can talk!"
"Talk? Talk? You call that talk? You didn't understand a single word she said, did you?”
"Well, no I ... but the western wellkeeper said she said....”
"Oh, and you believed him? Are you going to fall for that? Can't you see it's just a trick. 'Stomp your foot' the eastern wellkeeper says. They've trained her to do a trick. The child's out of her wits. She doesn't know what's going on. She just knows to stomp her foot on command. They've had time enough to teach her this morning while you dragged me off to that heartless, unforgiving brother of yours."
"Oh, do you really think that’s all there is to it? I mean if I thought we had raised our daughter for sixteen years and never knew....”
"Just put that thought out of your head, female. I told you how it is and that's all it is. The wellkeepers need someone to go into that well because the young male’s ill unto death. But who would be stupid enough to go down into that hole? Only a half wit like our Brindle."
"But what will the other parents think of us? I mean, if we allow our only child to be lowered into that thing? At least that young male was an orphan."
"Blast what the other parents say. For sixteen years they’ve pretended our daughter doesn't even exist. If she was lost in the well, they’d just say it was for the best, anyway, and put any thought of her out of their memories for good.”
Brindle's mother cringed at the cruel truth of such harsh words. "Then, I guess, if someone must go into the well it might as well be our Brindle.”
"Just remember that going into that well to check the water level will be considered a pretty honorable task in this time of drought. This is a time of making sacrifices and we will be making the supreme sacrifice by offering up our only dear, sweet child. Who in all of Nuttinnewian history has given so much for the sake of their beloved little town? We will be honored as heroes.”
“Yes,” his wife nodded in agreement. He made it sound so right - even noble.
"Good, then we agree,” he sighed with tentative relief, and nudged his wife toward the wellkeepers.
"I - er, her mother and I agree. If Brindle has told you she desires to take the wellwalker’s place, then let it be so."
Brindle gave out a shriek, "Ayah!" and began to dance around Bourg, jumping up and down with glee. Until, at last, she recaptured his arm and clung to it as she panted to catch her breath.
Her father gave her mother a knowing glance. If there had been any doubt in either of their minds concerning the half-wittedness of their daughter, it had just been screeched out of existence.
"Good!" Loden reaffirmed with his own deep sigh of relief. “Then let’s get on with it. Bourg, bring along our new wellwalker. There’s no time to lose.”
Chapter 8
All over Nuttinnew sleeping eyes were blinking as its inhabitants oscillated between the world of dreams and the world of schemes. Loden looked towards Center House and wondered how difficult the mayor was going to make his day. He didn’t underes
timate Pentalope’s determination, at least he tried not to. But whatever was to come, it would surely come soon enough, and for that very reason, he didn't have time to dwell on it. He had a much bigger, more immediate problem at hand.
The eastern wellkeeper couldn’t see through the upstairs Center House windows. They were far too high and, besides, their curtains were closed. If he could have seen inside, he would certainly have burst into laughter at the sight of Pentalope and her husband lying together, naked, in the stone bathing basin. He would also have seen Pentalope’s large brown eyes pop opened as if she had been suddenly startled out of a deep, sound slumber by what might have been an unsolicited emergence of some unsettling, all but forgotten memory; or by the overwhelming apprehension one experiences with the cognitive realization that in sleep one is most vulnerable to the wiles of existence.
Whatever the cause, her eyes struggled to pierce through the shadows of the darkened room to put some context to the sensations stimulating her flesh. The first thing her senses comprehended was that she was lying in an enclosure of polished stone. Second, that the air about her was thick and humid. Third, that a shroud of sorts lay casually draped across her nude body.
To her left, a large clammy mass pressed heavily against her arm. Her own flesh felt numb, as though life itself had drained from it. Her mind quickly reached but one inevitable conclusion: she could only be dead!
“Yeeaack!” Pentalope screamed, while flailing ferociously about the smooth stone tub, her arms and legs numb and uncontrollable. Wiggling, squirming, writhing, turning, she began to feel the fire beneath her flesh as her heart engorged each appendage with its life-sustaining fluid. Every nerve ending burned as they begrudgingly awakened from their slumber.
“Yeeaack!” Wudrick screamed, startled out of an exceptionally deep sleep. Not pausing to assess his situation, as his wife did, he immediately began to kick and thrash about as panic of the unknown sent every fiber of his being into total chaos.
Together they screamed at the touch of each other, of the smooth stone, of the shroud and of anything else that stimulated their flesh. Kicking and clawing, each eventually managed to exit the tub on opposite sides. Several moments and many screams passed before either realized the source of their fear. As wide-eyed as beasts of the wild when startled by the sudden flash of light from an on-rushing vehicle, each stared at the other through the darkness of the room.
"Wuderbutz! Wuderbutz!” Pentalope screamed for help.
"Pentalope! Pentalope!” Wudrick shouted for help.
"Wuderbutz? Is that you?” Pentalope asked cautiously of the darkened figure poking its head above the rim on the opposite side of the bath.
"Pentalope? Is that you?" the figure responded in such a wimpish voice Pentalope lost nearly all sense of fear.
“It is you!" she panted. "Bless, Veget! I - I feel so cold - so lifeless. Oh, Wudrick, I'm not dead am I? Tell me I'm not dead!" she pleaded, earnestly. After a few moments she choked back the dreaded thought, then began to dramatically lament her untimely demise as only she could do. "Oh, Wudrick, I had so much to live for. I was so young, so alive - so ... so virginal! How can I be dead when there is so much yet for me to do. My destiny! Oh, Wuderbutz!" she groaned then fell into a most nauseating, mournful fit of moaning.
Wudrick’s verbal arguments rebuffing her demise were to no avail. Fumbling around on a nearby vanity table, he eventually found a candle and a firestick. Lighting the one with the other, the resulting candle flame eagerly illuminated the small room.
"See, Pentalope, I am not dead, therefore, you’re not dead,” Wudrick calmly announced as he stepped around the bathing basin. The light from the candle flickered off his veget-puff white body.
"Yeeaack!" Pentalope screeched and clapped both hands over her eyes. "Wudrick - Pulpit - you - are - na - ked!"
Startled, Wudrick quickly grabbed up a drying cloth, set the candle down on the table and wrapped the towel about his waist. She made him feel so embarrassed - so angry - when she behaved that way toward him.
On their wedding night, Wudrick had been subjected to such mental and emotional trauma when he first approached his new bride for the consummating insertion, he never dared to make any future attempt, nor did Pentalope encourage such behavior. Throughout their years of marriage, she refused to even look upon his nakedness. However, she had absolutely no qualms about parading her own naked, long, scrawny body in front of him.
At first, seeing his wife’s nudity excited him, but in time abject rejection had taken its toll on his sexual responsiveness toward her. Now, the sight of her bare flesh only made him feel ill.
Pentalope's predilection toward her own nudity was widely known by all the folk of Nuttinnew. In a small town where windows and shades were customarily left open on unbearably hot summer nights, it took little more than a casual glance to peer into the otherwise private moments in the lives of one’s neighbors. Pentalope's obvious "openness" made it appear that Wudrick was the more sexually timid of the two. Therefore everyone assumed he was the cause for the continued childlessness of their long marriage.
To fuel this flame of assumption, Pentalope not only emasculated Wudrick in private, but before the whole town as well. She knew he was too gentle a soul to let the truth be known - except, perhaps, to that horrid female, the widow Forbal.
"Are you decent, yet?” Pentalope demanded in a perturbed tone which sounded more like an order than a question, and always made Wudrick feel slightly less than human.
"Yes dear, I’ve covered myself,” he answered impotently. "I'm so very, very sorry. I know how upset you get when....”
"Just what were you doing lying (ugh) naked in my bathing basin?” A disgusted look contorted Pentalope’s facial expression. "I awoke thinking I was in my grave."
Wudrick tried to explain. "I found you in it when I returned from the well and....”
"The well? Yes, now I remember. So, it wasn’t just a horrible dream.” She became thoughtful and walked to the window. Peering through the curtains, she saw the two wellkeepers and a young female at the well. "By veget!” she swore. "Oh, that Loden! How dare him defy me in front of the whole of Nuttinnew.” She spun around from the window and glared at her husband. "Am I not, Pentalope Pulpitt, Mayor of all Nuttinnew?” The question was rhetorical. "Hurry, Wudrick, fix me a fresh bath! I have much to do today. Soon people will be gathering at the well for the day's rations."
Slowly, turning back toward the window, a low growl escaped her lips, followed by words Wudrick could barely hear, "I must be ready this time. No wellkeeper is going to make me look like a fool and live another day of his life in my town.”
With those words she stomped out of the room in an aura of vengeance. Meanwhile, Wudrick began pouring the remainder of the water - that for which he had stood so long in line - into the bathing basin for his wife's bath.
***** ***** *****
At the well, Bourg carefully lifted Brindle into the well swing seat. Then Loden gave her a verbal volley of last minute instructions. Several times he stressed the importance of keeping hold of the emergency signal rope. More than once he demonstrated exactly how to use it in case of an emergency. Eventually, there was little more to say which hadn’t already been said over and over again. The time had come to be lowered into the well. Brindle could feel herself tremble with excitement.
"So, do you think she understood all those instructions?” Bourg asked rather doubtfully. Upon hearing this, Brindle lunged toward Bourg, throwing her arms around his thick neck, squeezing it as tightly as she could.
"Careful! You'll fall out of the seat,” Loden shouted as he grabbed her waist from the other side of the well. Brindle gave Bourg a hard kiss on the only hairless spot on his face - his nose. The wellkeeper was too surprised to give any form of response.
Brindle accepted Loden’s admonition as she allowed him to guide her hips back onto the well seat. "You really must be more careful! This isn’t a children's game, child. There won’t be
anyone to catch you once you’re below the rim of the well. If you fall - well....”
Meanwhile, Bourg bumbled awkwardly to tie another rope under her armpits. However, his earlier discovery of her surprisingly well developed totes made him too self-conscious to do the job properly. Brindle didn’t know what his problem was, but she had no thought not to come back out of the well. Gently, she took the rope from his hands and laced it under her arms, and handed it back to him. He hesitated at first, then took the rope from her, looped it once, then twice and drew it into a secure knot with more agility anyone would have expected from such short, stubby fingers. Brindle was impressed. It gave her a deep sense of confidence knowing she was in such adept hands.
"It’s getting late,” Loden reminded them. "We don't want to be here all day and all night like we were yesterday. His eyes met with Bourg's. Each wondered about the other’s thoughts, but neither spoke his own. So it was in the shadowy distance of silence, the suddenly estranged wellkeepers lowered their novice wellwalker into the dark, dank, potential dungeon of doom below.
Brindle felt a sinking sensation in the pit of her stomach as the well seat dropped slightly beneath her. Her whole being shuddered as her body fell after the seat, joined to it, and then sank with it. Remembering Loden’s instructions, she took a deep breath, then clamped her jaws about the emergency rope, clenching it tightly between her teeth.
Gradually, the cylindrical wall rose above her head. Looking up, she could see a circle of blue sky, broken only by the silhouettes of her two new friends. It was a forlorn sight, accompanied by the eerie, creaking sound of the crank shaft as it slowly turned, giving up the dual cords providing her only means of ever returning to upper earth.
"Eighteen, nineteen....” she counted each stone level of the well as its cryptic ambience slowly began to heighten her senses. Never before had she felt so near to death - yet so alive. For the first time in her young life she was excited with fear. She wondered if Tyter felt the same way each time he entered the well.
Pieces: Book One, The Rending Page 19