The Revisionaries

by A. R. Moxon

  Once all had passed into in the woodland chute, Frankton Jay followed them, leaving the forge and village populated solely by the rouge-breasted pigeons. An axe dangled from one hand, a hatchet from the other.

  The picnickers at the party’s fore, made anxious by the tightening branches and their own acquiescent silence, made eager by glimpses of sunlight ahead, hastened through the opening and stood blinking in sudden effulgence. Then they saw the skyward-pointing whiteness in the center of the unaccountable sward, felt it conjure ancient fear within them, mortally unbearable and unbearably true, and while they did not yet see squat Love standing beside the fountain, austere and silent and grim, neither did they need to see him, nor the barrel beside him, to feed their panic. They turned, dumb as cattle, to return the way they had come, but they were repelled by the main bulk of those still arriving, newcomers as anxiously zealous to remove themselves from the encroaching forest as those who had so recently extracted themselves were to return to it. In their haste to reach the sun, those behind pushed aside both the bodies and warnings of those ahead; and, as they saw for themselves the alabaster obelisk, and felt the terror, they in turn attacked the debouchment, and were repelled in similar manner. They fell to the edges of the ring and pushed at the dense surrounding thicket in vain, clutching their children tight, their picnic baskets laden with pigeon and boiled autumnal spuds strewn over the green carpet.

  Among the last to arrive were Runyan and Margaret, who, hearing the cries, had to be pushed through by Jay. The boy kept mute sentry at the entrance, impressing them with axe and hatchet, while Love circled the ring, shepherdlike, freeing villagers who had managed to entangle themselves in the impenetrable bramble and throwing them back onto the turf.

  Love had anticipated his flock’s fear, for even he felt new traces of original dread each time he saw the thing. But, following their first shock of panic, he was confirmed in his further expectation: The wailing ceased, cut off with perfect synchrony from all parties, as though a simultaneous agreement had been reached to not acknowledge the thing. The picnickers, clinging still to the fringes, looked up and about them, but not—insofar as this was possible—not directly at the fountain itself. They saw the unbroken forest ringing their clearing, the sole opening guarded by Frankton Jay, who grinned hatred at them, saw the axe in his hand, saw the malevolent pallid fountain, and then, as one mind, they did not see them; they disassociated them as sundries, irrelevant and inapplicable to their situation. They commenced to settling on the grass along the forest fringe, spreading their blankets, forcing themselves back into the ruts of their original expectation. They began to converse, their voices halting at first but gaining volume through the momentum of their own prattle, until they were ensconced, all of them, in a semblance of audible relief, of ease, and they unpacked their meals. They chuckled between themselves at their previous cowardice, at their sudden irrational panic—and at what? They could scarce remember now; it had come on so sudden. Such a fine day, such a blessed day. Yet not one of them met the eye of another as they bit and chewed and talked, their gaze fixed ever on the earth, with such fervency that any chance observer, seeing their stooped postures, might have mistaken them for penitents.

  Then they heard Love’s voice coming from the direction of the thing—

  This is the first of my Assizements. You have been surveyed, and assayed, and have been found flawed and wanting. Yet all of you save one shall be remade in mercy. Drink ye, all of ye.

  —and they turned their reluctant heads fountainward, but still askance, their attention focused not on it nor on Love’s face, but on his boots and knees and chest, and on the pinestave hogshead that stood opened beside him. They saw him slowly take hold the ladle within and lift it up. They returned to their mendicant postures, hoping to unhear as they had unseen, but then they heard his voice ring out again—

  Drink ye, all of ye.

  —and Runyan and the rest muttered and stamped and looked no higher than the top of the cask. But Margaret looked; she pierced the collected fear and denial, and saw all: fountain, barrel, ladle, and Love’s countenance, which contended between fervor of triumph and some other thing unrecognizable to her. She looked into the barrels of his eyes, and he looked back at her and smiled. She reflected contempt back to him and nothing more—not even defiance, but only scorn—knowing the struggle had finished. She saw clearly their fate, which the others would or could not see. Though the means of his attainment, which he held pendulous in the ladle, were not clear to her, she knew he had won, and that she, who had all through the long winter tried to cajole her own Isaac out of his comfortable ignorance, and had kept this other Isaac at bay, had failed. She had tried to warn her husband of Love’s steady advance, first fearing to kindle his will into the desire for revenge common to all men, and then, finding that tinder damp, remonstrating more directly, sinking slowly into despair as he refused to hear, keeping herself hidden from Love in their newlywed cabin while winter permitted the excuse of sequestration. And here it is spring, she thought—sprung upon us. Yet even still, there remained within her a great resolve. Even now, in this place, she braced her will against his own—no matter the devil he had bargained with, no matter what poison this madman would force upon them, she would not give him the victory he sought. His defeat would reside in her eyes. She would wear her scorn as if it were her eternal raiment, into his mind she would sear it, and may he someday die thinking on it.

  A third time Love spoke—

  Drink ye.

  —imperative now, inexorable in timbre, some quality that both invited and commanded, cajoled and threatened, offering no escape from a stark choice: only one thing or else another, either admission or excommunication, either selection or apostasy, and, as the first obedient few of them broke free from the edges and made their way across the grass to where he stood, Frankton Jay swung the axe in a long arc, allowing the heavy-soft thunt of the head burying itself into the turf to serve as that command’s punctuation.

  Runyan began to screw his courage to the point of some as-yet undefined future action, thinking: Not I, no and not Margaret either, and neither should any of us be made to take that drink; Runyan seeing (as though for the first time) the hatred Frankie Jay had for them, seeing Jay’s axe at the ready, but also, in his mind, seeing himself walking boldly to Jay, with Margaret trailing behind, and then, when challenged by the boy—for boy he was despite his size—demanding his weapon of him, and, when the boy refused, wresting the axe from him and knocking him easily aground and the boy rising up off of the turf and leaping at him in a dark rage and Runyan already swinging the axe in fast deadly ellipse into Frankton Jay’s head down to the neck and then announcing to amazed Isaac Love that he was taking his leave along with all others who wished to go…

  But even in his imagination Runyan did not attack Love; even in his own hidden folds of self-regard, the capacity for that act could not be discovered. No, he would attack Frankie, and he would do it..soon. Not now, but at some fast-approaching future moment. The picnickers had formed a queue now before Love’s ladle. Hand in hand with Margaret, he took a place with the rest at the rear of the line, and Frankton Jay’s axe and baleful eye kept their place by the pathway leading out. The inescapable fountain leaned up in defiance of the sky. Love’s people waited their turn to take their ladleful. Frightened but mute, they took it into themselves reverently, as if thankful, and then sank down together in glassy forgetful communion. As they accumulated, Jay came and pulled them away to make room for others, leaving the path out unguarded—unconcerned now that those yet to partake might dare anymore to attempt flight. But Barefoot Runyan had been a mountain man for a time, in years past. He knew wilderness living. He would escape soon. In a matter of seconds, he would tug at Margaret’s hand, they would make a dash for it, and if Frankton Jay pursued them, so much the worse for him…

  Those first to drink had begun waking and calling out like travelers lost i
n a fog when Runyan reached the barrel, and now the moment to act was near, very near…he saw Jay distracted, corralling a panicked few, the moment was nearly upon him, and then he and Margaret stood before Love, who proffered the ladle to him, with the moment of rebellion so close now, almost upon him. He could see blue sky and the dense complexity of old forest all about, and he could see the face of his adored Margaret, the miracle who had delivered herself to him, whose love had tied him to this place when otherwise he might have moved on, Margaret who was in turn staring, bilious, at Love, and he could see Love’s implacable face staring at him over the barrel. He could see the cold beads sweating from the tin of the ladle. He could hear the distant keking of a million pigeons. The stone white eye of the cherub nearest to him had a chip in it. A light breeze stirred the trees. He could see each leaf. Each leaf, if only he had time to look at each of them in turn. The barrel’s water seemed black. Runyan wondered with what malignant tincture it had been treated, even as the hopeful front of his mind told him it was naught but water, and safe to drink.

  The moment to rebel was only seconds away now. In a moment he would turn and run.

  Drink, said Love.

  You can’t make me, Runyan said, but his lips did not move.

  Drink, Love said once more, and the moment to run was near.

  No no I won’t I never will not ever this is wrong I won’t, thought Runyan as he drank what tasted like no more than water and then he felt himself sinking numb into a cavern in which there was no joy, no pain, no hope, no worry, nothing, nothing, none, no

  Margaret watched her husband sink down out of himself onto the grass.

  Drink, Love said to her.

  The last of them, the only one to meet his eyes, she stared at him with contempt void of anger or hatred or even fear, and he told himself it was of no consequence to him, for soon her demeanor would be void even of contempt. He held the ladle to her, and to his surprise she took it at once, without hesitation, as if she had merely been awaiting the offer. She took the ladle in both hands like a child and tipped it back eagerly, and when she lowered it again he saw still that purified disdain in her eyes and then she spit the mouthful back into his shocked face. He tightened his eyelids, frightened to open them lest he give the liquid admittance into his humours. Enraged beyond all thought, he roared, blind hands darting out and finding her collar and her head. His fingers entwined her hair close to the roots and then he pulled her, struggling, to him. He dried his eyes on his shirt shoulder, and, opening them again, saw her defiance still unquenched. He pulled her head slowly into the barrel and held it there until he saw the bubbles rise. When he was sure she had drunk, he pulled her out and laid her gently on the grass, her eyes wiped clean of any traceable human thought. She gazed up at him, entirely lost from herself, but not yet confused, not yet frightened.

  To one side, he could see Frankton Jay struggle to contain the pandemonium of those who had learned confusion and fear once more. They howled for their lost selves and ran distracted from the mass, from those who had not yet come into the realization they had a self to miss. They stumbled madly until they ran against the inevitable encircling forest wall, caught there until Jay came to extract them and drag them back to the center, all the while muttering in their ears to be silent, to sit and be silent and wait, for all would be made clear. As ever, Frankton worked with celerity, but he was one and they were many, and as he toiled he began to slow. In the mind of Frankton Jay—Love could see it writ on the boy’s face—there was some troubling and recognizable quality to this situation, something connective; Love saw distraction working in Frankton’s countenance, and guessed its cause.

  Love lifted Margaret and slung her over his back. With his free arm he filled the dipper once again. He carried her over to the general congregation and lay her down among the rest. Jay led two weeping villagers back to the assembly, and then came up to Love. His breath was ragged, and he intimated his misgivings that, matched against the accumulated need of those now gathered, even their best efforts would be insufficient.

  I will manage it alone, Love told him.

  Alone?

  Love indicated the full ladle with his eyes.

  You too must drink, he said.

  Jay looked at Love, disbelieving.

  No. Oh, no, Isaac, no, not I. Not I.

  Aye, Frankton Jay. You. You of all men must drink. I have in my need fashioned you into something unfitting. But I am still a smith at heart. I will melt you down in mercy and reshape you.

  Jay looked around, as if hoping to conjure allies from the ground to his aid. Love regarded him unblinking, his eye fixing with cold appraisal the trapped boy who stammered and shook his head mulishly and finally began in silence to weep.

  It will not harm you, boy.

  I don’t want to. I ain’t going to.

  You shall.

  Love’s voice conveyed nothing of impatience, nothing of anger; only the dry conviction of a scholar lecturing on a well-documented event long complete. You shall, he said again, in the way another man would say, “you have.”

  The boy glared. I shan’t, I said. He seemed for the first time to remember the axe. He had set it down to manage the fugitives, and it lay some yards behind him. His eyes made furtive dashes toward it.

  Go on then, Love said. Lift it. Strike.

  The boy backed up to it and stooped for it. Now he hesitated, one fist closed over the handle. Love smiled at him and held up the ladle. Jay stood and brandished the axe.

  I tell you I won’t drink that mess.

  You shall. Have you not realized you have no other possible course than to obey?

  I could bust your head wide open with this here axe.

  Love laughed. You could not. It can make no dint in me. Don’t you know me, Frankie, even after I have been with you such a long time?

  I know you.

  Who then.

  You’re Isaac Love. You tended me in this place where you found me, out here in the woods, when I was cured.

  Yes, when you were cured. Cured of what?

  Deaf and dumb both.

  And how was your cure affected? In what manner brought about?

  Through a miracle of God.

  Love stepped forward, ladle held upward. Through a miracle of God, say you? And still you have not known me? And even now you have failed to realize me?

  The boy cowered, his unholy fear quaking him to his knees as Love rose ineluctably up before him like a stone god of old, and behind him the alabaster monster grasped heavenward.

  I am the worker of all your miracles. I am the one who took from you and restored to you speech and hearing both, and when you are thankful for that cure, I am that God to whom you offer thanks, for it is through my power you came into knowledge of your cure and all other knowledge besides. I am the source of all your breath and all your thought, the sole architect of your soul. And now I say to you that you shall drink.

  Afterward, when he had with axe and spade dealt with the one who deserved no remolding, Love gathered them all together, raised his hands to the sky and spoke to them in a loud voice. Once he had instructed them, he retrieved the hatchet and descended the cold granite steps.

  But Love did not raise his hatchet against the door. For long minutes he regarded it. A door, unremarkable to look upon—this was the verdict of a first glance. Only upon closer examination did certain curiosities present themselves. An unnatural regularity to the grain, for example—a detectable pattern repeated, as though a printing press could be devised to counterfeit nature itself. Upon the door a handle with design most unique; a smooth short cylinder, of a size amenable to a hand, into whose center a slot—which might be a keyhole, but so narrow one could not see through it—had been most ingeniously carved. Both handle and escutcheon revealed an amber glow in torchlight, suggesting gold or brass, but without the natural tarnish to be expected
upon those metals found in such damp climes. Strange indeed, to see such opulence set within a door so flat and plain, and yet, when one attempted to turn the knob, though the lock held, knob and escutcheon both rattled between each other and the door in minute asymmetry, a concertina of imprecision. Love reached out again and grasped it. Yes, still it felt flimsy, as if the handle only mimicked gold, and the wood only mimicked ash.

  Yet for that it still would not open—the eternally damnable thing.

  How many axe handles had he broken? How many edges had he dulled? It was unchanged, without mark or blemish or warp. It resisted even fire, even digging. Surrounding this frame was the excavation; his toil of months, wide caverns dug to the right and left and above the sealed port, reaching back into darkness, leading nowhere.

  This matter required solutions clever and oblique; he saw this now. This was a conflict not of brawn but of will. By employing force against it, he had revealed insufficient faith in his own worthiness. But he had that faith now. As he strode forward to meet his adversary, he could see all time converge to a point, could hear heaven and hell gasp. Love knew if he were unable to alter this facet of his world, it would not be attributable to the strength of the door, but to some weakness in his own spirit. But he would not fail, for he had perfected himself, and his people, and now he had perfected his suffering. He would not fail. Behind the door lay all that for which he yearned. Worse than not possessing it was not even knowing what it was. He could not fail. He knew he would not.

  He failed. The door’s merciless handle would not turn in his hand.

  After the hatchet broke, his mind left him and he cried out in a language of his own device as he smote the unmarred surface with his body. When he could no longer continue, he attacked it with ragged maledictions and hoarse sobs. The curses penetrated the mute wood no more than the hatchet, and no less, either. As he sank to the ground, the truth of the matter came over him like waves.