Under that mask of mud, Toby was managing to remain calm. First, he reflected that being cruel sometimes makes you rich and powerful, but it always makes you ugly. Then he wondered what truly horrific and monstrous idea his tormentor would come up with next. Would he abandon him to the insects? Did he want to exterminate Toby right here in the mud?
But Pinhead’s idea was even nastier. It was as disgusting as he was.
He took two small, white capsules out of his pocket, prompting all the weevils to turn their heads his way.
“Hey, brat-face, don’t they just love ’em! We give these balls of sap concentrate as a reward to the best workers. They can smell them from miles away. Sometimes, we put them inside knots of hardened wood. The weevils smash through the wood to get to the capsule.”
He threw a capsule to the bottom of the crater. Twenty animals rushed off after it. A young weevil and two females were almost crushed in the fight. Toby kept his eyes on Pinhead, who was twirling his whip. “I’ve got one left. What shall I do with it?”
Toby could have imagined just about anything except what happened next.
Pinhead carried on, “It’s dead simple. Nothing new. I’ll just copy what your dad did with that message. I’ll make you swallow the capsule, and then I’ll stand well back. If these creepy-crawlies can make for a capsule that’s ten centimetres below the bark, they won’t have any problem finding it in your innards – even if it does mean clearing a bit of raw flesh to get in there. I’ll count to a hundred – that should give the weevils time to do their work. And then I’ll scrape you up. You’ll be in a right old mess, but there’ll still be a flicker of life in you. Just another brat who won’t curl up and die. I’ll take you to Joe Mitch and pocket the million. That’s the plan!”
He was laughing very loudly. And Toby was watching him. At a certain level of horror, fear cuts out. This had already happened to Toby. More than anything, he felt sorry for Pinhead. Your problem is being cruel, he thought, mine is how to survive. So Toby just concentrated on breathing steadily. He was even starting to think more clearly again. He had found out there was a price on his head. He was worth a million. Not bad. He decided a million was a sum worth defending.
But right now that million was trussed up like a parcel on a piece of jutting bark that was sawing his back in half.
Why did these words make Toby stop and think?
Sawing his back in half.
His mother had taught him how to read when he was three, teaching him that words are the enemy of darkness. If you choose to be their friend, they will help you out all your life. But if you don’t, they’ll block your path. Maya had explained that was why people talked about being “familiar” with a word or a language. They were like family to you.
It was a bumpy ride to start with, but Toby had made friends with words in the end. Every day, he saw them working miracles. They had rescued him from loneliness and boredom. They had been by his side to help him study with his father. Most of all, they hadn’t deserted him during his conversations with Elisha.
Elisha was only familiar with a few words, but she dressed them up so that Toby risked tripping at every sentence. By listening to her, he had learned to make words come to life through silence and the power of the human voice.
Words often whisper advice we don’t hear. But this time, Toby caught their message: “A piece of bark that’s sawing my back in half…”
A mask of mud hid Toby’s smile. If bark can saw through your back, it can saw through other things too…
Gently rubbing against that bark ridge, a moment or two was all it took for the rope that had paralysed Toby’s hands to be sawn in two.
Pinhead hadn’t seen a thing. Toby wasn’t much better off, but at least it was progress of sorts. He was careful to keep his hands behind his back. A few cracks of the whip had forced the weevils to retreat. Pinhead was walking over to Toby now, his face split by a smile that displayed the occasional tooth. He leaned over his victim, holding the capsule in his hand. Toby knew that if he swallowed the capsule, five hundred weevils would open up his belly to retrieve it.
This prospect made Pinhead throw his head back and roar with laughter. Close up, his aggressor’s mouth was even more revolting than Toby had imagined. The stench of rotten eggs accompanied a vision of hell. Pinhead grabbed Toby’s jaw and forced his mouth open. He slid the capsule between Toby’s teeth.
Not missing a trick, the weevils were already starting to close in. Their feet and pincers glistened in the afternoon light.
Pinhead held Toby’s mouth closed for as long as it took to swallow the capsule. It was time to abandon the boy to his fate, but he couldn’t resist adding, “Enjoy your meal!”
Despite his exhaustion, Toby managed to say, “Thanks, but your capsule is disgusting…”
“No, no … I was talking to the animals,” Pinhead replied, indicating six or seven weevils just behind him.
He clearly thought his joke was hilarious and gave a hideous guffaw, providing Toby with a clear view of the back of his throat. Compared to the repulsive state of his palate and tonsils, Pinhead’s teeth now looked positively respectable.
It was at precisely this moment that Toby drew on all his strength to spit out the capsule he had managed to keep in his cheek. It entered his torturer’s giggling mouth at top speed. Pinhead’s eyes registered astonishment and stupefaction followed by terror, as he realised he had swallowed it.
His reaction made a pathetic sight. It was the second time one of the Lolnesses had pulled a trick on him. He fell to the ground. He was trying to spit out the capsule as he writhed about, pummelling the ground with his fists, whining in the mud like a child throwing a tantrum.
Toby turned the crisis to his advantage, untying the remaining ropes with his freed hands. He even managed to strip his enemy of all his clothes without Pinhead realising what was going on. A few paces away, the weevils were becoming a real threat. Toby cracked the whip once, and the animals backed off briefly. Then he tied up his torturer with the lash.
The first thing Pinhead noticed when he lifted his head – as he slowly came round from his panic attack – was that he was pinned to the ground. Then he saw the weevils jostling for position and moving in on him. It was a sight which made his jaw wobble, seriously risking knocking out the last of his teeth.
Finally, Pinhead spotted a pair of boots right next to him. Rising up out of them was a shadow that reminded him of something. The shadow of a short man in a coat, with a hat that kept falling over his eyes so that it hid half his face. He let out a shriek, and the weevils pawed the ground.
The short man was him. Pinhead. It had to be a nightmare: the sap capsule taking effect. A hallucination. There were two Pinheads on the edge of the Crater.
But when Pinhead-in-a-coat nudged his hat, Pinhead-in-his-birthday-suit recognised two sparkly eyes he detested. Dressed like that, Toby was the spitting image of Joe Mitch’s man. It made Toby’s flesh creep. But he had just turned his toughest challenge so far into a chance to escape, which was a huge boost to his confidence.
“I’m leaving you the whip,” said Toby. “The knot isn’t very tight. You’ll be able to get away. But I don’t know which is worse – the weevil’s pincers or your men’s sniggers when you have to explain to them, stark naked, what an idiot you are.”
Toby left Pinhead to his nightmare. A label in the coat’s lining revealed he was called W. C. Rolok. To get out of the enclosure, this was the name Toby would need to go by.
He had no second thoughts as he put the weevils’ Crater behind him and climbed towards the top-side of the branch. Toby had rammed his hat on good and proper as he forced himself to slow down, imitating those stiff little steps taken by Rolok Pinhead, as well as copying the way he hunched his shoulders.
Toby knew how to imitate people’s posture and gestures. One day, his parents had discovered Grandmother Alnorell playing funnyball behind their house in the Low Branches. Funnyball was a children’s game – silly,
but tricky – that involved playing ball with your hands on your feet.
Toby’s parents, who were already shocked to find Mrs Alnorell at their Onessa home (when they hadn’t heard a squeak from her in four and a half years of exile) were even more surprised to see her galloping along with her hands on her feet pushing a hollow wooden ball. It was unimaginable. Grandmother had no idea what the word “playing” meant.
In fact, it was such a fantastic sight, they couldn’t help giggling, then hooting, and finally choking they were laughing so hard. When Mrs Alnorell spotted them, they tried to pull a straight face. But Maya’s dimples kept twitching, and her eyes were streaming from trying not to chuckle.
When they were just a few millimetres away from Toby’s grandmother, they got the surprise of their lives. Standing before them was their son, Toby Lolness, delighted with his joke.
After that episode, Toby would spend whole evenings making his parents laugh. He could imitate anybody, just by stooping, or hunching his shoulders. His best number was called “Joe Mitch in his bath.” His parents were astonished by Toby’s memory, because he hadn’t seen any of these people since he was seven.
He could also do “Mr Perlush and the pocket money.” His grandmother’s accountant was responsible for giving Toby his pocket money during his holidays up in the Summit. Sim had given the accountant a few coins that he was supposed to hand over to the boy each week. This prompted some very funny scenes in which Mr Perlush would present Toby with a small gold coin, before hurriedly taking it back, then offering him a grain of gold that he recouped no less quickly, as if he’d made a mistake. He would hold out half a grain, but he just couldn’t bear to let it go, so he put it back in his pocket instead. Mr Perlush would end up claiming he didn’t have any spare change on him and that he would have to give Toby his pocket money the following day.
This mimicry made Sim and Maya laugh a lot, but it also meant that Toby’s father found out the little gold coins he had handed over every summer for his son’s spending money had ended up lining the pockets of Radegonde Alnorell and her accountant.
A while later, when Toby-Rolok appeared in the midst of four men lying peacefully on the damp ground it was too late to turn back. So he just buried his hands in his pockets and tucked his chin inside his collar.
The four men had spread out their coats and were just finishing a nap. The moment they saw Rolok’s shadow they jumped to their feet, highly embarrassed.
“Boss, sorry, we were just having a quick break…”
“A five-minute break… Sorry, Boss…”
“Boss… Sorry…” a third man repeated.
Toby knew he mustn’t say anything. His voice would give him away. But his silence made each second more worrying for the others. In the bottom of his pocket, Toby could feel a notebook and pencil.
To ratchet up the tension he took out the notebook, wrote down a couple of words as he looked at each man, and then turned on his heels.
He was breathing hard. As he walked, he glanced down at the notebook. He’d written, Be brave, Toby four times. He leafed through the other pages. They were covered in the diligent handwriting of a five-year-old. It had to be Rolok’s writing. On the first page, Rolok had written, Denunseyashun Noteboock beelongin to W. C. Rolok.
Further on, there were sentences such as Petur Salag has eated two sandwitchez insted of wun, he will be hangd 4 too hourz by the left fut.
And, Geralt Binoo didunt hit the weeval propa, he will be hitted himsilf.
Toby understood that Joe Mitch’s men were driven by one thing: fear. Fear of being denounced, fear of being punished. Denounce the other before he denounces you. Hit so hard they won’t hit back.
After a few minutes, Toby had a nasty feeling he was being followed. He glanced over his shoulder. The four men had stolen up on him. Toby tried to walk more quickly, but the men accelerated. He made several detours, but they kept following him. In the end, he stopped dead, standing tall in his boots, and watched them coming towards him. With their hats under their arms, they looked like school children caught out getting up to mischief.
“Boss, we were just having our break. We want to apologise,” said one of them.
“We didn’t mean to,” joined in the second one.
“We really want to denounce the others, if that helps…”
“Pouzzi keeps playing darts on Thing’s bum.”
“And Thing is too scared to say anything, because he lost his whip in the Crater.”
“He’s meant to be guarding big Rosebond, who knocked out one of the weevil’s eyes…”
Toby had started walking again. He was disgusted by these denunciations. All four of them trotted along behind him, never letting up with their pathetic bootlicking.
“We can tell you more serious stuff, Boss.”
“Flannel and Magnus play football with Thing.”
“They say things like, ‘Curl yourself into a ball, then you’ll roll better.’”
“Thing has to give all his supper to the Blett cousins.”
“He does night duty for them, even though he’s scared of weevils…”
Not only was Toby suffering from having to listen to these mindless cruelties, but he was also starting to feel rather uncomfortable. A character was slowly being sketched through what they were saying: Thing. Thing, who was victimised by his colleagues, who was scared of the insects he was meant to oversee all day. Poor, unlucky Thing. All of a sudden, Thing’s lot seemed even worse than his own.
A few confessions had established a link between Toby and somebody he had never met.
“But Big Marlon’s the worst. Tonight, he’s going to give the local farmers a fright. He’s made a hole in the fence, behind the oil barrels.”
Toby froze. Slowly, he turned round. The three words “hole”, “fence” and “barrels” were more interesting to him than anything else.
One of the men asked exactly the question he wanted an answer to, “Oil barrels? What barrels?”
“The barrels, just over there… I can show you as long as you don’t tell Big Marlon I told you not to say it was me who told you not to say it was me…”
Toby interrupted by thumping him on the back, and pushing him forwards. They started walking over towards the cans. The three others kept babbling as they followed behind.
“We’d have helped you too, you know? Us too.”
These morons had just shed an extra two or three more years from their mental ages. They were regressing before Toby’s eyes. One more try, and they’d be back in their mothers’ wombs, no doubt the least harmful phase of their wretched lives.
They reached the fence. Sure enough, dozens of full barrels were piled up there. Toby wasn’t surprised to see CRUDE SAP written on each one. Just as he feared, Joe Mitch was already stockpiling the stuff.
All he needed now was the famous Balina black box to convert this fuel into destructive energy.
Toby clapped once. The four men stood to attention. He passed in front of each one, affectionately tweaking their ears to congratulate them. Actually, with his face covered by his hat, he couldn’t see what he was doing, so he never knew if he had tweaked their ear, their nostril, or anything else for that matter.
He made a sweeping gesture in front of him, to indicate they should disperse. Luckily, they understood and melted away, relieved to have been let off the hook. By pushing a few barrels, Toby found the hole in the fence and passed through to the other side.
Toby would have given anything to step out of his Rolok disguise and escape that shameful world. He would have given anything to skip far away and save his skin.
But as he passed the wire fencing, Toby thought of Thing. The whipping boy for Joe Mitch’s band of men.
The thought entered him like a poisoned arrow.
And he turned back.
12
And Another Thing…
Thing was sitting on a box. Big Marlon had told him to keep watch over it, and that he would have the life sq
ueezed out of him if someone took it.
He had been guarding the box for an hour and a half. But he was starting to worry because he would have to check on the weevils shortly. What was he supposed to do with the box, given that it was impossible to carry?
Thing was writing on a leaf of paper balanced on his lap. He was writing to his mother. Writing great long letters was all that kept him going, provided that no one tore them up, or worse still, read them.
Being on box duty gave him a reason to stay there.
That’s what he’d told his colleagues who had come running past him. They were all shouting out ridiculous stories. Insisting that everyone go to the Crater because unbelievable things were happening there.
Thing was convinced it was a trap to lure him away, so he didn’t budge from his box. He was sure they wanted to play a nasty trick on him. One man had even shouted, “It’s Boss Rolok! They say he’s in his birthday suit in the Crater, playing ‘Whips and Weevils’. Hey, Thing, are you coming? Everyone’s going over…”
Really! Did they take him for a complete idiot?
So he stayed by himself in front of the main gallery, which doubled as a dormitory. It was a mild day, like a sunny interval in his terrible life.
Thing had been singled out by Joe Mitch’s men from the start. He was a sensitive, polite and sad boy – the ideal maggot to throw to an army of ants. And the ants in question were the Blett cousins – Big Marlon, Rosebond and Flannel – the kind of unscrupulous savages Mitch had recruited on the spot.
Mitch always made sure he hired a punch bag or whipping boy to be known as Thing. You could vent whatever you liked on this person, giving orders such as, “Thing, clean my boots,” or “Thing, hand over your bread…”
The chosen person had to forget their real name. Everybody would call him Thing from then on.
And so Thing had been chosen to play this tragic role, which nobody had ever managed to escape from. The story of the other Things proved a long litany of misery.