Уильям Голдман - The Princess Bride

The Thieves Quarter where Fezzik reunited with Inigo, I saw that, and the room where Inigo finally finally killed Count Rugen—it's on the castle tour. Buttercup's farm has been kept pretty much intact, but what can I tell you, it's a farm. And of course the Fire Swamp is still as deadly as ever, no one's allowed in, but I did see the spot not that far away where local scholars believe that Buttercup and Westley held each other after she pushed him off the cliff. (It's where the reunion scene took place, and let me tell you, it was strange, me standing there, looking at that patch of ground.)

You still can't get to One Tree Island by boat because of the surrounding whirlpool, so I rented a helicopter, wandered. (One Tree is where they went to get their strength back.) It's where Buttercup and Westley first made love, where poor Waverly was born. Probably I shouldn't call her "poor" Waverly, she had a great time for a while, parents who loved her, the world's greatest fencer as her guard, the world's strongest man as her baby-sitter. Can't ask for a whole lot more.

Of course, everything changed with the kidnapping, but I better shut up now, before I get ahead of the story....

Fezzik Dies

FEZZIK CHASED the madman up the mountain, the madman who carried the most precious thing, for Fezzik, ever to be on earth, the kid herself, Buttercup's Baby.

"Chased" was perhaps the wrong word. "Lumbered after" might have been more accurate. However you wanted to put it, the news was not good, because Fezzik, try as he might, was falling farther and farther behind. There were two reasons. The first: size. They were fifteen thousand feet in the air, the rise was sheer, and Fezzik had terrible trouble finding footholds that might make him secure. His huge clumpy feet would touch here or there, seeking sanctuary, but it took too much time.

And the madman used that time to his advantage, increasing his lead, occasionally glancing down with his skinless face, to see how much farther Fezzik had fallen behind. Even to Fezzik, his plan was clear: get to the crest, run across the plateau, start down the far side, leave Fezzik helpless, still trying for the ascent.

The second reason for Fezzik's lack of success was this: fear. Or, to be more specific, fears. Being the biggest and strongest, no one realized he also had feelings. Just because he could uproot trees, people didn't want to know that the little squirmy bugs that lived in the roots spooked him. Just because he had defeated the wrestling champions of seventy-three countries, people didn't believe that his mother had to keep candles burning all night long when he was (comparatively speaking) little. Of course, the idea of public speaking was beyond thought. But Fezzik would rather have spent the rest of his years in constant speechmaking than face what was staring at him now. The possibility of

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With nothing but rocks to crush his body at the end.

True, he had climbed the Cliffs of Insanity, but that was different. He'd had a rope to hold on to so he knew which way to go, and he'd had Vizzini insulting him, which always made the time pass more pleasantly.

If only the madman possessed some other baggage, Fezzik would have stopped and crept back down to safety. If only it was all the silver in Persia or a pill that you only took once and you weren't a giant anymore.

Easy to stop the chase then.

But this was Waverly, his blessing, and though he knew in his great heart he would lose this pursuit, knew he would somehow slip, Fezzik lumbered on.

He glanced up. She was rolled in the blanket she had been kidnapped in—and how long ago was that now? Fezzik chose not to remember because the kidnapping had been his fault. He had allowed it somehow—it had happened on his watch. Fezzik blinked back quick tears of remorse. Her body was still. The madman probably gave her some potion. To make her easier to carry.

Above him, the madman stopped, pushed, kicked out—

—and giant rocks were coming down toward him.

Fezzik did his best to get out of their way, but he was too slow. The rocks grazed his feet, knocking them loose from their holds, and now he, Fezzik the Turk, was swinging high in space, holding on by just the strength of a few fingers.

The madman cried out with delight, then climbed on, rounded a mountain corner, was gone.

Fezzik hung in space. So very afraid.

The winds picked at his body.

His left hand began to cramp so Fezzik took it out of the hold, reached a yard up to a better one.

He hung there, thinking, and what he thought was not how very afraid he was but that he had just gone up three entire feet, using only his hands. Could he do that again? He reached up another yard, found another hold. This is all very interesting, he told himself. I actually went up without using my feet. I went up faster than before, without using my feet.

Hmmm.

And then suddenly he was moving. Just using his hands to reach, grab, then the next, reach, grab, and never mind using all fours, just use the upper twos—

—and then he was moving fast.

Fezzik flew up the mountain now. Somewhere on the other side was the madman, probably taking his time, feeling sure that Fezzik was gone. Fezzik increased his speed, up to the crest, then to the plateau, racing across it with enormous strides, and when the madman got there with the babe, Fezzik was waiting.

"I would like the child," Fezzik said softly.

"Of course you would." The madman had no mouth. The sound came from somewhere inside his skinless face. He still held Waverly's body.

Fezzik took a step nearer.

"I can breathe fire," the madman said.

Fezzik knew that it was true. But he was unafraid.

Another step closer.

"I can change shape," the madman said, louder now, and Fezzik knew that it was true. But he also knew this: fear had entered the heart of his enemy.

"These are my final words," Fezzik said. "When I tell you to give me the child, you will give me the child."

"I will use all my magic on you!"

"You can try," Fezzik said softly. "But even though you have no face, I can see how frightened you are. You are frightened that I will hurt you." He paused. "And I will." He paused again. "Badly."

The fear inside the madman was pulsing now.

Fezzik's great hands reached toward the blanket. "Give me the child," he said, and the madman started to do that very thing, but then, instead, he flipped his hands so that Waverly rolled out of her blanket, spun high into the mountain air—

—the momentum carried her over the edge where the two men were standing, and as she spun, her eyes fluttered open, and she looked around wildly, saw Fezzik, reached out toward him as she fell from sight, said the word she alone called him: "Shade."

Fezzik had no choice. He dove into space after her, gave up his life for the child....

Well, what do you think?

It's exciting, I'll give Morgenstern that. A 'grabber,' as TV guys say. But this is a novel, you have time to develop plot and character, no one's changing the channel here. So I'm not nuts about it. I also don't like calling Chapter 1 'Fezzik Dies.'

Do you believe that Morgenstern's really going to kill Fezzik? I sure don't, not for a New York minute. Forget that he's my favorite. But think what he did for Buttercup and Westley: he let himself get set on fire, just before the castle storming; he found the four white horses they all rode to freedom on; and don't think for a minute Inigo would have made it down through the Zoo of Death without Fezzik right there with him, so in a way, he saved Westley.