“Five!”
“Six!”
The indignity was bad enough. Worse yet was that our escape ploy stood in imminent danger of being ruined. I did not require Wolfgang’s sotto voce hissing in my ear to realize that Gwendolyn would not tolerate the situation much longer. The ensuing mayhem would, of course, be gratifying—fierce joy filled my heart at the image of draymasters hacked and chopped into pieces. But it would, as the saying goes, “blow our cover.”
The situation came to a crisis when one of the swine actually made so bold as to advance upon Gwendolyn, open her mouth with his hands, and begin inspecting her teeth, while a second began poking her thighs and buttocks with his thumb.
Wolfgang’s coaching now came into its own.
“Get your filthy paws off my property!” I roared, cracking the bullwhip. The tooth inspector backed up a step, but the buttock prodder merely sneered and continued his examination.
A moment later he was rolling on the ground, howling in pain. And well he should! I dare say I removed a good piece of his own buttock with the whip, whose tip was reinforced with steel wire. Two pieces, actually, one from each haunch—for the sight of his great ass in the air as he flopped on his belly was irresistible.
Perhaps I should have resisted, for the second lash seemed to arouse the mob of draymasters as the first had not. No doubt I had transgressed some quaint local custom.
A moment later they had surrounded the cart, bellowing their fury, shaking their fists, and cursing my person.
“Ozarine whelp!” cried one. (I fear my accent was pronounced.)
“We’ll teach you better!”
“Proper Groutch manners you’re about to learn!”
Wolfgang was whispering some advice into my ear, but I was not paying the slightest attention. I should listen to a lunatic, when I had been trained by my uncle Larue?
“It’s a fearsome arm, the bullwhip,” he’d said to me, “but remember—of all weapons, it’s the one that relies the most on panache and the psychologic flair. The perfect weapon for you, you sassy, disrespectful little wretch.”
“Would you, base curs?” I roared. The first I had lashed from my seat, but now I arose and began laying about with a fine touch—fine, not only in the hand, but in the jocularity of the remarks which I sent along with the strokes. The key, however, was the scalps.
Pain will dissuade a mob, of course, as humor will depress their spirits. But there’s nothing like the sight of a few scalps lifted from bully heads by smart cracks of the lash to drain their passions. The more so when the cunning of the stroke causes the scalps to fly directly into the whipmaster’s free hand. After I had collected four scalps, stuffing the bloody things into my belt, the draymasters fled in all directions, howling with terror. All but two, who made the mistake of trying to hide behind (I should say, in front of) Gwendolyn. Without breaking stride, she shouldered them down, trampled them under, and hauled the iron-rimmed wheels of the cart directly over their bodies. A cart, mind you, bearing not only my weight but that of the giant Wolfgang as well!
I was adapting to Grotum, I could tell. The sound of crunching bones was a pure musical delight.
“Oh, well done! Well done!” hissed Wolfgang.
“Thank you,” muttered Gwendolyn.
“I wasn’t talking to you, dear,” chuckled Wolfgang. “I was referring to the masterful whipwork. Are you by any chance related to Larue Sfrondrati-Piccolomini?”
“My uncle,” I whispered. “And will you please shut up? You’ll give it away, people see your lips moving—you’re supposed to be a damned statue!”
“Not to fear, my boy. I’m a ventriloquist, you know.”
Casually I turned my head, looking into the back of the cart. There was Wolfgang, posed cross-legged like a saint—a statue of a saint, more properly. Quite a good likeness, if I say so myself. I had discovered that painting a man up to look like a huge wooden icon was not all that difficult—not, at least, for an artist like myself who had carved and painted more wooden icons by the time I was nine than I could remember.