Mark Dunn - Under the Harrow

“Would you care to form such a party with yourself as its leader, Skettles?” queried Pupker dryly of his carping brother-in-law.

“I would if I could, Pupker, but I can barely walk after what was done to me by that attacking Scadger mob. The deputy sheriff was blest to receive only one shock from that electric gun. For my part I was shocked five times.”

Skettles rubbed his leg a little to burnish his point as his brother-inlaw murmured skeptically, “Five times. That’s one more than in your last embellished recounting of this encounter.”

Addressing William Boldwig, Pupker asked if his son, the sheriff, intended to arrest “those animals for their attacks” (Skettles having failed to mention the provocation responsible for employment of the Taser: the shooting death of Solomon Scadger).

“There just happen to be matters of even more pressing urgency in contention, Pupker,” replied Mr. Boldwig on behalf of his son. “Besides, the Scadgers are armed now with a deputy’s pistol and the electrical device, and it would not be wise for Billy — with so few men — to concentrate himself on the Scadgers purely as a matter of revenge. Once things settle down, he can simply set the building on fire and shoot everyone who stumbles out.”

Dr. Towlinson groaned. “This talk of shooting people I simply will not tolerate. Have we not always said — and I thought that we were in perfect agreement on this point — that as savage and bestial as our Overlords become, we will not stoop to be like them, that we will endeavour always to keep our own hands clean, to never seek to depreciate our intrinsic humanity?”

“You refer, of course, to the over-lording barbarians whose plan it is to kill everyone in the Dell who is not sitting in this room?” asked Fitz-Marshall with sardonic scorn. “Don’t be a hypocrite, Towlinson. Your hands may be as clean as polished brookstones when we leave this valley, but every day thereafter your heart will remain immutably imbrued with the blood of all of those thousands of your countrymen who were not so lucky as to escape along with us. If you believe in Hell, doctor, then I should think that there will be a special place reserved for all of us — yourself included— quite near the devil’s own furnace, for that is where the most inveterate hypocrites must lodge.”

“And what is the alternative, Fitz-Marshall?” rejoined Towlinson in a faultering voice. “That we should now at this late hour renounce the Project only to suffer the same fate as everyone else out there? How will that save a single soul amongst us? What will happen will happen, and we can choose to commit suicide or we can escape with our lives. For fiftynine years I have looked forward to the opportunity to study all of the advances in medicine that have passed me by in this time-frozen vale, and I do not intend to give up that chance, no matter how much of a hypocrite it makes me.”

Dr. Towlinson had scarcely completed his defence when Pupker signalled “quiet” with his hand. “I see him. He’s coming down the lane.”

“Are they detaining him? Do they accost him?” asked the Lord Mayor’s frantic wife, pushing her way to the window.

“No,” said Pupker, stepping aside to share space at the window with Mrs. Feenix. “He is speaking to them calmly, as you see, and they are responding in kind. Now a few are retreating. I don’t know what he is saying to them, but he does seem to be doing some good.”

It took several minutes for the Bulldog to finally conclude his conference with those assembled in the lane and to make his way to the door. Once inside, he sat himself down and fanned his face with a book that lay within reach. “It is a warm night. Is there lemonade? I should like a glass of cold lemonade.”

“What news have you?” asked Pupker, who stood nearest the overheated Lord Mayor.

“I believe, gentlemen, that the crisis is past. I have told those who held me outside — and do you not see that they’re now returning to their homes? — I have told them that the Parliament has convened a special session this evening to address this terrible civil unrest. I have told them that our families accompany us only for reason of protection, as threats have been made against our lives and our persons, and it was thought best that we should have our loved ones close to us on this aberrant night. And I put it that way because it is an aberration, and things will calm down once people come to understand that it isn’t the end of the world, that rumours can make for nasty anomalous situations, but those situations need not endure once sanity and reason are restored.” To the bearer of his glass of lemonade: “Thank you, my dear. You are a gem.” After a long slurping drink: “So this is what I told them. I believe that the crisis is passing — that it will pass, that peace will return.”

“And the Project — what did they say?” prodded Pupker.

“Oh, yes. Well. Not at all what I’d expected. They disagreed with my assessment of the situation. They fear that things will only continue to deteriorate. For this reason they have moved up the date of our departure.”

“What is to be the new day?”

“To-day. Later to-day. This afternoon, in fact. Two o’clock.”

There were scattered gasps made about the room, followed by whispers and low chatter.

“But do you think it wise, Feenix?” asked Dr. Towlinson. “So soon and with so much left for us to do?”

“We will do what we have to do to be done with this place,” said Pyegrave, now stepping forward and finally making his opinion known. “I for one will be quite happy to leave here in nine hours. I’d be happier still if it were nine minutes. The sheriff will do his duty, I trust, and assign every deputy to guaranteeing our safe passage to the Summit?”

Boldwig nodded.

Pyegrave continued, “I do not care what happens to this valley otherwise. I do not care about the peripheral fires that are burning people out of their homes, nor do I care about those who sit in our gaol or those sardines of Towlinson’s in the Bedlam tin. The only thing that matters to me now, and which should matter to all the rest of you, is getting your arses out of this Goddamned place and getting out as soon as possible. So I take this as good news and I am now going to my lodgings to pack my bags and be ready to make my climb to the Summit. When and where do we assemble, Feenix? I assume that we will make our march together in some sort of assembly for safety’s sake.”

“Let us meet here at 12:15, post meridiem,” replied the Lord Mayor.

The widower Pyegrave (widowed by his own offices) nodded, solicited the accompaniment of his two brothers with a second nod, and was well nigh ready to step out of the palace and commence his peregrination home, when he was halted by a beckoning Montague Pupker.

“Mr. Pyegrave, is there not something you’re forgetting?”

The redoubtable Pyegrave coloured, returned to where he had been seated, and retrieved his leathern satchel.

“All that Dinglian jewellry you stole this afternoon from the Fagins’ shop will do you no good at all with the Outlanders if you accidentally leave it behind,” said Pupker archly.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” retorted Pyegrave with a snort as he snatched up the satchel, a jet necklace jangling untidily from beneath the open clasp.

Once outside the Parliamentary Palace, Pyegrave was approached by a worrisome, still-aproned Mr. Chuffey, the baker. “Has something been decided?”

“What do you mean?” asked Pyegrave in an impatient tone.

“By the Petit-Parliament. Is order and calm to be restored?”

“Yes, most certainly,” replied the murderous and larcenous upholsterer, sweeping past. Then over his shoulder: “There is a plan to return things to normalcy. It will be announced by Lord Mayor Feenix upon the Milltown commons to-morrow evening.” Pyegrave stopped and paused, for it became necessary for him to compose himself to prevent the escape of a cruel smile. Then he added, “I trust that you know how to swim.”