jamieproctor.ca

To: All

From: pgwooster@cgzoo.com

Subject: Hi!!!!

Hello all you happy campers and happier staff members of Clive’s Gussberg Zoo!  My name is Penelope Gertrude Winslet and I’ll be your CEO and marketing director for this summer – sort of like a two-for-one deal, you get it?!  This is the sort of thing that’ll save us money!  But don’t you worry, because I’ve got plenty of ways to MAKE money rattling around in my noggin to!  I know a lot of you are pretty ready to get your paycheques rolling, and rest assured I’m as keen to see that happen as you are! 

Let’s have an incredible summer!!!

Penelope G.  Winslet, CEO & Marketing Director, Clive’s Gussberg Zoo

***

To: pgwooster@cgzoo.com

From: pfitz@cgzoo.com

Subject: re: Security Services       

I want it on record that I thought this was a stupid idea from the start, okay?  Yes, putting a ‘guarded by the inhabitants of Clive’s Gussberg Zoo’ sign on a building’s front door is a tremendous PSYCHOLOGICAL deterrent against simple break-and-enters, but against professionals?  They’re just going to case the joint a bit harder, and what we had wasn’t more than a speed bump for them. 

Vinnie?  I know your first instinct was ‘oh he’s a grey wolf, that’s like a guard dog but better!’ News flash: he doesn’t think of humans as prey items, he doesn’t think of strange new places as his territory, and he’s shy.  I don’t think any of the safecrackers of June 4^th even knew he was there.  Which is good, because he’ll do anything for a belly rub and I think they might’ve walked off with him. 

Clarice did a better job.  Clarice did a lot better of a job.  Clarice did her job entirely too well, because not only did she scare away any potential burglars, she also scared away the neighbours and the client himself, who thought she was a demon from hell.  A barn owl security alarm is a little bit too effective for the human psyche, even if it is impossible to sleep through it. 

Jumbo, of course, is a two-toed sloth.  I don’t think I need to go into further detail as to why renting him out to the airport as a bomb-sniffer was a bad idea.

You can find another bozo to sign onto your projects, because I, for one, won’t play. 

Patricia Fitzgerald, Chief Americas Zookeeper

***

To: pgwooster@cgzoo.com

From: dwrob@cgzoo.com

Subject: re: the call center            

After three glorious days in operation, I must report to you that, alas, our call center has been disbanded.  Our rate of customer interaction was through the roof, but they were uninterested in our sales pitches and more concerned with finding methods to cause us fiscal and /or bodily harm.  It’s a poor craftsman that blames his tools and a foolish leader that passes the buck, but I find myself speculating that the disappointing outcome of our little misadventure owes something to our staff.  The ravens kept to the company script very neatly, but I’ve been told (at length) that their voices were ‘uncanny’ and ‘disturbing’ and ‘sounded like the breath of Satan himself in my ear, may god protect me.’ The macaws, meanwhile, were far more pleasant to the ear, but reacted to being interrupted by throwing screaming fits, so that’s four of our five lawsuits right there – pierced eardrums are a nasty business.  Meanwhile, the bulk of our remaining staff were the budgies, and while I’m aware I was the one who promised you that they would learn on the job, I am saddened to report that this never took place, and their vocabulary remained permanently at ‘pretty bird.’ Few complaints there, but few sales. 

Much of the equipment was still covered by warranty, at least.  Caveat emptor et al. 

Douglas William Roberts, Birdhouse Supervisor

***

To: pgwooster@cgzoo.com

From: dheath@cgzoo.com

Subject: NO MORE UBERS also I’m resigning       

We’ve been BANNED from all thoroughfares, highways, biways, streets, roads, and avenues, commercial and residential (across the country too, which I think is a bit much?).  As bad as that news is, it beat the alternative of facing six dozen individuated lawsuits.  We got off pretty lightly considering the elephants crushed twenty vehicles, the moose engaged in duels with nineteen stop signs, and the zebras bucked off every rider they got before trying to bite and kick them to death. 

I admire your willingness to move fast and break things, but I think you’d better count me out for the next adventure.  The legal consequences are a bit rich for my blood. 

Hope to work with you again in better circumstances,

Delilah Heathers, former Head Large Mammal Coordinator

***

To: pgwooster@cgzoo.com

From: jhay@cgzoo.com

Subject: i told you so goddamnit

I told you, I told you, I goddamned told you.

I told you that baboons take staring deeply into each other’s eyes as an insult. 

I told you that manatees look less like mermaids than advertised, no matter how near-sighted, hopeful, and scurvy-ridden the viewer may very well fucking be.

I told you that hyenas would get possessive and needy and bite anyone intruding on their partners.

And I told you to your goddamned face that Ginger would be more interested in the food than her date.  I’m not sure that panda would understand romance with a chart and a six-person romance team.  As a matter of fact, I AM sure she wouldn’t, because we tried to put her through that reproduction crash course last year and she flunked, as you would know if you bothered to read any of the files I sent you.  Ever.

Most-importantly, I told you that hiring out nonhumans for escort services would attract the worst creeps ever to crawl the earth.  I haven’t gotten this much of a workout from my cattle prod, taser, and tranq gun since I worked the nuisance bear program.  If it weren’t for that job satisfaction I’d quit this second. 

Jude Hayes, Lead Wrangler

***

To: pgwooster@cgzoo.com

From: krqueen@cgzoo.com

Subject: Abject Failure

I don’t know a way to put a better spin on it.  Complete disaster from top to bottom, start to finish.  Execution chamber?  The coastal taipan was the only animal angry enough for the snake pit, and after being exposed to three days of strangers it got used to them and didn’t bother anyone that kept their hands to themselves.  Death arena?  The lions won’t eat until it’s dark out.  Shark tank?  They’re lemon sharks, they prefer fish and only bite if you start biting them first.  Torture services?  Tarantulas are so mildly venomous they’d have been better off rubbing their hairy abdomens on the victims.  Rent-a-legion?  Doesn’t matter if you give them laser carbines and cyber-suits, a gorilla is still a gorilla and would rather eat shoots and leaves than shoot. 

If the former client hadn’t tried to whip the chimpanzee mining-squad into obedience I’m sure he’d have filed a complaint with you already.  As it is, I salvaged what I could of this rental opportunity by rifling through his safe and taking everything marked ‘top secret.’ If nothing else, the FBI might be interested. 

Kelly R.  Queen, Sales Associate

***

To: All

From: pgwooster@cgzoo.com

Subject: A Wonderful Summer!!!!!

Hello all you happy campers and happier staff members of Clive’s Gussberg Zoo!  We’ve sure had a busy, bustling, activity-bursting heap of a summer, and I’m happy to report that profits have never been higher!  I would like to personally thank every member of staff that agreed to wear a tiny little camera hidden in their nametag (it would’ve been so easy to opt out, too – page 167q had very clear font!), because we’re the number 1 most popular streaming channel for the fourth month running, and the advertising dollars are pouring in (except for that little suspension we got when Kelly walked in on her client after he’d had a tiny argument with the chimps – oops!  Turns out it’s illegal to show dismemberment, even if it’s hard to tell any of the bits belonged to a human!).  You wouldn’t believe the number of shirts we’ve sold!   

Let’s have a magical winter!!!

Penelope G.  Winslet, CEO & Marketing Director, Clive’s Gussberg Zoo

There was a wanderer.   There are and were and will be wanderers, wherever, whenever.   But this one was.   

In particular, this one was Somewhat-Clever Cirlew, who was walking down the long dirt roads of the long spring valleys when she found an unexpected thing: the road became cobbled.   

“Well, that’s nice,” she said.   

“Not as much as you think,” said a nearby peasant, bent-triple under a load of stones for roadwork.   “It’s not for the benefit of you and me, but for the land-lord.”
“And who might that be, and who might you be?” asked Somewhat-Clever Cirlew.
“I am Bow-Legged Nleet, and these are the lands of Wide-Armed Wallis,” said Bow-Legged Nleet.   “He’s the strongest within these lands and so they are his and he may do what he pleases with them, and what pleases him is to extract ruinous tolls from all passers-by on pain of death, which he gathers up in his grand keep.   We toil at his will to keep the roads busy with traffic to extort, and it will never end.”

“I think I can fix that for you,” said Somewhat-Clever Cirlew.   

“Well, good luck with that,” said Bow-Legged Nleet, “because here he comes now.” And indeed the cobbled road hummed with the furious force of thunderous footfalls, and up the road stomped Wide-Armed Wallis, thirty stone if he was an ounce and all of it burly and hairy and most of it knuckles.   

“HEY YOU,” he introduced himself.   “YOU OWE THE TOLL FOR USE OF THIS ROAD, WHICH IS EVERYTHING YOU’VE GOT ON YOU.”
“Oh dear,” said Somewhat-Clever Cirlew.   “To whom is this toll owed?”
“ME,” explained Wide-Armed Wallis.   “I AM THE LAND-LORD OF THESE LANDS, FOR I AM THE STRONGEST OF ANY WITHIN THEM.   THAT’S HOW IT WORKS.”
“Oh, you are?” said Somewhat-Clever Cirlew.   

“YES, I AM,” said Wide-Armed Wallis.

“Oh.   Alright.   I thought – nevermind.   Well, what’s the toll?”
“YOU THOUGHT WHAT?’ demanded Wide-armed Wallis.   

“I thought I heard you were the strongest within these lands,” said Somewhat-Clever Cirlew.   “And well, I suppose that’s sort of true.   Strongest man, yes, certainly.”
Wide-Armed Wallis’s shoulders flexed in outrage, destroying his shirt.   Hot steam spurted from every opening of his body in rage.   “I ATE A BEAR ONCE,” he proclaimed.   “I CAN LIFT AND THROW COWS.   I AM THE STRONGEST OF ALL IN THESE LANDS, NO EXCEPTIONS.   WHAT LIES HAVE YOU HEARD?”
“I heard the winter weather here is pretty fierce up on yonder mountainside,” said Somewhat-Clever Cirlew, with a meek and submissive gesture of her pointiest finger.   “Quite tough.   Real nasty.”
“I FEAR IT NOT,” said Wide-Armed Wallis.

“Of course, of course.”
“I AM STRONGER THAN IT.”
“No doubt, no doubt.”
“I WILL GO SHOW YOU RIGHT NOW.”
“Oh?” said Somewhat-Clever Cirlew innocently.   “Oh, well, I mean, if you insist-”

Wide-Armed Wallis picked up Somewhat-Clever Cirlew in one hand and his snarl in the other and clambered uphill and through dale and nigh to the very summit of the nearest peak, where you couldn’t see your hand in front of your face for the wails of the winter in the wind and the rush of snow through your eyesockets.   
“NOW I WILL FIGHT THIS BLIZZARD AND SHOW IT WHO IS STRONGEST,” said Wide-Armed Wallis.   

“Oh, how brave!” admired Somewhat-Clever Cirlew.   “Only it’s not this spot that’s the nastiest.   It’s a bit over there.”
Wide-Armed Wallis went a bit over there.   “HERE?”
“No, there.”
Wide-Armed Wallis went a bit over there again.   “HERE?”
“No, there.”
Wide-Armed Wallis went a bit over there again, again.   “HERE?” he began to ask as he fell into a crevasse, plummeted two hundred feet, and lost a very rapid arm wrestling match against the mountain.   

***

Bow-Legged Nleet was taking a breather with a cup of tea and some gossip with Natter-Mouth Moilra when Pretty-Cunning Cirlew came back down from the mountainside, covered in snow and a bit smug grin.   

“I believe your land-lord problems are now over,” she proclaimed with satisfaction.   

“Oh, not quite, not quite, not nearly so,” said Bow-Legged Nleet.   “You see, Wide-Armed Wallis had a son: Quick-Grasp Grimley.   He’s not as burly as his dad was, but he’s lightning-fast and even more avaricious.   As a matter of fact, since his father’s dead, he should be coming up the way to raise the tolls right now.”
“When?” asked Pretty-Cunning Cirlew.

“Now,” said Quick-Grasp Grimley, his boots still-dusty as he tidied them off by kicking Bow-Legged Nleet’s shin.   He was as tall as his father, but six times narrower and three times nastier.   “And now, I will take the toll for the use of this road.   Everything you’ve got on you twice over, please.”
“That’s quite a lot,” marvelled Pretty-Cunning Cirlew.

“I deserve it for my diligence,” said Quick-Grasp Grimley.   “Every day of my father’s reign I woke up bright and early to squeeze our rightful gains from insolent and greedy trespassers.   I billed the roads; I priced the bridges; I took three birds from every flock and three fish from every stream.   Nothing moves through these lands without paying a price, for I am their land-lord.”
“Oh of course, of course, of course,” soothed Pretty-Cunning Cirlew.   “Except the clouds, naturally.”
“Naturally what,” said Quick-Grasp Grimley, his eyes narrowing.   

“Naturally you can’t extract payment from the clouds.   But I mean, who would? The clouds are beyond anyone’s grasp.”
“Not mine,” said Quick-Grasp Grimley.   “Of course they’re not beyond me! They just have nothing of value to give up.”
“There’s a rain-cloud!” pointed Pretty-Cunning Cirlew with a precise and accurate gesture of her pointiest finger.  .  “It’s not stopping, either!”
“OH, NO IT WON’T!” shouted Quick-Grasp Grimley, and he was gone, and gone, and gone, matching pace with the cloud as it soared down and away through the valleys and over the hills and down the riverways and over the sea and over the sea and over the sea and into the middle of the sea, where it evaporated.   

“Tax-dodger!” snarled Quick-Grasp Grimley.   

Then he remembered he couldn’t swim.   

***

It took Very-Crafty Cirlew four days to walk to the coast and back, and by the time she made the trip, word had got around.   The village was in an uproar of riotous festivity, and not a single back was bent under a load of stone and brick.   

“I’m back!” proclaimed Very-Crafty Cirlew, holding aloft her noxious prize.   “With proof of your land-lord’s passing: the discarded boots and clothing of Quick-Grasp Grimley!”
“Hooray!” shouted Bow-Legged Nleet.

“Hooray!” called Natter-Mouth Moilra.

“HOORAY!” hollered Damned-Short Sillas.
“HOORAY!” yelled everyone else.   

“I also got his keys!” said Very-Crafty Cirlew.   

“Hooray!” shouted Bow-Legged Nleet.

“Hooray!” called Natter-Mouth Moilra.

“HOORAY!” hollered Damned-Short Sillas.
“HOORAY!” yelled everyone else.   

“Now I’m going to live in the land-lord’s keep as the land-lord, since I am the cleverest in all the land,” said Very-Crafty Cirlew.   “I suggest you pay up on time, since I’m incredibly devious and will get you no matter what in the end.   Now get back to work on the roads.”

“Hooray!” shouted Bow-Legged Nleet.   “Wait.”

“Fuck,” said Natter-Mouth Moilra.

“Shit,” said Damned-Short Sillas.   

“Piss,” agreed everyone else.   “NOW what?”
Bow-Legged Nleet thought about it, then smiled.   “I think I know who can save us.”

***

The land-lord’s keep’s great and terrible door laid open a crack, permitting the faintest egress of light into its depths.   A hand was placed upon it, gnarled and wrinkled, and with a slow and ominous creak the crack opened wide.   

“Pay your dues and begone,” said Very-Crafty Cirlew’s voice from far within.   “But don’t come inside, or the many terrible curses I’ve laid upon the door will fell you.”
“Feh,” said the intruder, and stumped inside, slamming the door for good measure.   

The land-lord’s keep’s towering, ominous hall soared and swooped from gloomy rafters to flat dead-grey flagstones, wide and rough.   Old leathery boots tramped on them, and mud spattered across them.   

“Ah, you are too brave to be thwarted with curses,” said Very-Crafty Cirlew’s voice from the end of the hall.   “But your fellow villagers fear you for your boldness! They plan to turn upon you when you return to them after dealing with me, serving you poisoned beer with false smiles.   I can save you from this fate if you’ll stop and listen and promise to leave.”

“Meh,” grunted the intruder, her hobnailed waddle unceasing.   

The land-lord’s keep’s throne was a great and towering thing carved from raw oak, and in its enormous seat was sat Very-Crafty Cirlew and a very comfortable pillow.   

“Okay, you’re too smart to be tricked,” she admitted.   “How about this: you can have all the gold in this place if you go home and say you killed me.”

“Hngh,” said the intruder, as she patted at her pockets.   Then she pulled out a large, sharp kitchen knife and planted it in Very-Crafty Cirlew’s chest.   

“But….I’m the cleverest…” she bubbled.   
Face pinched in annoyance, one-good-eye squinting, her killer leaned in closer.   
“EH?” shouted Stone-Deaf Dreen.   

***

They still kept the road in decent shape, when all was said and done.   Toll or no toll, they all had to walk on it.   

It was a beautiful October, a fine October.  The pumpkins had flourished, the corn had crowned, the squash were fine and full-fleshed.  The apples and nuts fell from the trees and the hogs grew fat upon them until they looked ripe themselves.  The whole world was round and flushed with life and ready to pluck before winter slipped in the window and shushed everything to sleep. 

So they had plenty of warning, same as always, but it still made folks’ backs prickle and feet hurry on their way home; made them check the storm doors on the basement and give the children sleeping pills; made them stare out the windows and look away quickly to pretend they hadn’t been looking, hadn’t been thinking, hadn’t let it cross their mind at all. 

That harvest moon. 

***

It had sat on the edge of the afternoon all day, smiling down at them from its pale little perch in the sky.  Every now and then a white cloud slid over it and hushed it away, but it was always waiting, always watching, always there again when it passed by.  Near-invisible in the deep blue sky. 

Now that deep blue had purpled up, turned itself into something thicker and darker that brought it out of its shell and into its glory, gave it light, gave it legs, gave it strength.  Gave it a path to walk down from the stars and come closer to the darkened earth and moistened soil, to probe among the fields with ruddy orange light.  To come, to see, to touch. 

That harvest moon. 

***

It came to ground outside of the township, on the bald hilltop by the old gravel pits, where even the wild grasses didn’t want to grow.  All around it shone soft orange sodium-light, and all the night turned from dark to shadows.  Every hole, cranny, and crevice in rock and wood and brush tripled in depth; every small thing snuggled deeper in its nest and watched and waited for its passing. 

Unlike the trees and the brush, the neat and tidy fields billowed and blossomed under its light, and it walked towards them.  It had no legs but it walked towards them, and among them.  Its face had no eyes and from its gaze poured a more full light, one that went from white to yellow to orange to something that was indiscernible but tangible. 

The soil groaned and breathed under the weight of its attention.  The shoots rustled and stiffened.  Fruit gurgled and rounded.  Grain grew.  Roots swelled.  Piglets trembled in their pens, too frightened to squeal.  An owl screamed. 

That harvest moon. 

***

That was midnight.  That was normal. That was safe. 

Then it was the morning, and it was time.  A morning that was still dark and orange and shadowed, and it walked the new-ripened rows and rows and rows and rows and pens and barns and it had no hands but it reached out and touched, and touched. 

And it touched and it took its harvest.  One-tenth of every leaf, every stem, every root, every fruit, every grain, every stalk.  It did not dig, it did not pluck, it did not uproot or tear or grasp or grab.  It just touched, and its touch took.  The sheep’s-wool, the piglets, the milk and the calves, even the newborn rats and mice hidden at the bases of the silos and deep in the barn-rafters, even the kittens that hunted them. 

That harvest moon. 

***

When the dreadful moment came, it came quickly.  The light was in the window, then it was inside, then it was inside you, and then it was gone. 

And in one in every ten farmhouses, so was a child. 

No trace, no mess, no fuss, no tears, no trouble.

That harvest moon. 

***

Afterwards, it walked to the top of the bald hilltop, laden with its bounty. 

Nobody ever saw it, nobody ever saw them.  That helped.  That helped.  Nobody could be sure what it did with what it took, nobody could be sure what it was for, nobody could be sure how they needed to feel about it. 

So nobody did.  And then it was gone. 

That harvest moon.

***

In daylight it was still gone, and there was plenty of work to be done.  Plenty of distraction to be had.  Plenty of crops and thoughts and emotions to harvest and heap and crush down into storage, not to be looked at or dwelt on. 

It was a fair deal.  It was a fair trade.  It was completely fine. 

And how could you ever hope for a better bargain to be made when you’d never needed to agree to this one in the first place?

The inner working of the Woodytrudy Society have long been off-limits to the common folk by the strictest social barriers of decorum and profound legal violence, left only to faint rumour and wildest hearsay.  But now, on the thirtieth anniversary of the society’s disbandment, its histories have finally been decoded for the edification of the masses.  No longer are the doings of our betters hidden from us, much as we may feel otherwise. 

Origination

The Woodytrudy Society began as a simple wartime bet between two young men of humble goals and ample means: one bright evening in August 1917, John Barton-Clarke declared to Duncan Smith that if they both survived the morrow’s assault through c that they should purchase a little plot of land somewhere with some nice water and plenty of sun and a big blue sky.  Alas, both would perish before noon come morning, but among the effects transported home to their families was the idly scribbled-and-signed affidavit they had hashed out before their departure from this mortal coil, and Montgomery Barton-Clarke (John’s elder brother, who was exempt from service due to a complex and debilitating case of dicky knee) thought it was ‘simply smashing.’ The next week he bought land around the isolated, pristine uplands of Homely Bay, deep in the Canadian Shield, which he frequently boasted was chosen by throwing darts at a map and pulling them out again until he found somewhere that ‘tickled his fancy.’

Of course, a Society cannot be founded with a membership of one, but Montgomery was an easily-bored human being and possessed good acquaintance with many of his fellows that suffered from a similar condition.  In the name of his dead brother and his equally dead comrade some thirty thousand acres were purchased before the coming of September, and construction plans for the first ‘estates’ (latter to be called ‘cottages’) were scrawled on napkins at a cocktail party at Montgomery’s birthday, September 16^th. 

It was called the Woodytrudy Society after Montgomery Burton-Clarke’s favourite teddy bear. 

Foundation

Early plans for the Woodytrudy Society envisioned it as a little slice of Britain-away-from-Britain, a place of palatial estates and impeccable gardens groomed by a full staff of year-round servants.  Unfortunately, the reality of there being no ground soil other than pine needles and moss atop miles-thick Shield granite dashed those initial dreams, but Montgomery was an easily-buoyed-up soul and soon espoused a new vision: a secluded hunting lodge of the finest caliber; charmingly rustic, expensively furnished, and outfitted with as much alcohol as any ten distilleries the planet could boast.  These became the three guiding pillars of the Society’s elaborate and byzantine set of building codes, and the first six cottages were completed before the summer of 1918.  The isolated islands and bays soon fairly rang with as much gunfire as No-Man’s-Land itself, and the local populations of beaver, deer, moose, and bear took a somewhat precipitous plunge.  The Society’s documents never included any talk of game conservation, as Montgomery aptly observed that the less time spent shooting while on hunt, the more time spent tippling, and therefore so much the better if there was as little to shoot at as possible. 

Codification

By the time of death of Montgomery Barton-Clarke at the age of seventy-six from a severely untreated case of Bungy Bottom, the Society was in grievous danger of becoming dull.  Its initial membership – and their livers – had become old and faulty, and their offspring sneered at their idle and antiquated notions of amusement (blowing apart wild animals while inebriated).  The next step in the society’s history came entirely by chance: young Terence Twatherly–Fordring (the Twatherlys and the Fordrings being distinguished owners two of the original six founding cottages) had a fine bull moose in his sights when an errant cough from his batman spoiled his shot.  Enraged, Terence beat his poor servant about the head with a juniper branch until the man fled in terror and became entangled in the bog, where he sank over a heartrending twenty-six minutes and forty-nine second.  Terence declared it the best sport of his life and eagerly told all his peers and chums about this fabulous plot of backwoods where you could flog your servants even better than the good old days, for there was nowhere for them to run but empty bush, forest, and lake – an unappealing and mosquito-cursed sanctuary, to be sure.  Soon the average age of the Society’s membership had risen from a sunken and cadaverous seventy-three to a spry and vigorous thirty-six, and once again the hills and isles of Homely Lake rang with laughter, gunshots, and screams of agony.  The modern entertainment of the Society had arrived. 

Domestication

Of course, servants will talk, and soon it became somewhat difficult to find good help to accompany Society members on their summers.  This was alleviated by a cunning practice pioneered by Joshua Barton-Clarke-Foxworth II, which was secretively paying for free rounds in the village pub and pressganging anyone who became insensate.  The quality of manservants thus procured was very low, but this was seen as all the better, seeing as this produced an ample sum of reasons to punish them as extensively and creatively as anyone could wish.  Nonetheless, it had its downsides, as was exhaustively proven by the tragic demise of Joshua in his sleep at the age of twenty-three from one-hundred-and-forty-nine separate stab wounds.  Investigation of the murderer by pleading and threat seemed fruitless until Joshua’s best mate, Graham Axway-Sneedlebury, hit upon the notion of letting his prize hound Worble IV Chesterton smell Joshua’s body and then the servants.  The trusty hound barked at every single one of them, and a s reward for his service in the name of justice, was given free reign upon them along with every single one of his kin – a sizable pack, given the popularity of kennel breeding among the Society’s members.  It took no great mind at all to see the potential in the loyalty of animals as warden against the duplicity of man, and thus was the second of the two essential components of the modern entertainments of the Woodytrudy Society realized: the guard animal. 

Elaboration

Of course, even the most amusing pastime must contain innovation, lest it become tedium.  Fashion at first lent itself to the largest, most threatening and aggressive dogs being brought to Homely Lake, but such creatures proved at least as dangerous to their masters as their servants, and soon the painstaking care inherent in producing a beast that would react with utter love to its owner and rabid death to any member of the lower classes was applauded.  When that balancing act was mastered to the point of boredom, exoticisms became the point of the day – keeping exclusively water-dogs that would drown their prey, or game dogs that would fetch the mortally wounded but never mutilate them, or a herd of feral lapdogs that would swarm the fallen all had their day as amusements, each mastered, then discarded.  But even novelty must pall, and so it was that on May 14^th, 1978, Charles Jalopy-Cordwith announced in the Woodytrudy Society’s quarterly newsletter that he would be bringing no dogs with him at all that summer.  Astonishment bloomed – surely if Charles had become so bored of the Society’s sport, why come at all? – then in its wake a subtle and omnipresent anticipation, and when Charles stepped off the docks to his family cottage fashionably late there was a veritable horde of his peers watching, and therefore ample witnesses to his accompaniment by a chimpanzee named Piers. 

Piers, it became rapidly-apparent, was a revelation.  He understood more of what was said to him than even the best-trained dogs, could wear a tie and smoke a cigarette with aplomb, and in addition to still possessing a relatively fearsome bite could – with his bare hands – tear a recalcitrant butler limb-from-limb and face-from-skull.  Furthermore, upon his initial demonstration of such a feat (at the wedding anniversary of Mary-Anne and Thomas York-Feedle), he could then pick up the tray of drinks said butler had carelessly dropped, refill the glasses, and act as a perfect gentleman’s gentleman for the remainder of the evening.  Such feats could not go unnoticed, and in fact, did not. 

Imitation

By the mid-eighties, it was difficult to find a single human member of staff on the properties of the Woodytrudy Society.  With the growing difficulty of acquiring sufficiently discreet servants in sufficiently discreet manner for sufficiently proper wages (and making proper compensation to an increasingly INDISCREET constabulary), a switch to employing a handful of animal trainers and handlers was a relief for both the mind and the pocketbook.  Besides, a capuchin or colobus carrying a drinks tray or lighting a cigar was at least twice as charming as a human, at least twice as liable to fail, and therefore at least twice as likely to be entertainingly punished afterwards.  Apes and monkeys of every size and species populated the grounds for the summer, trimming back the encroaching foliage, operating the oar, sails, and engine-workings of boats, carrying putters at miniature-golf-courses, waiting on hand and foot, and ruthlessly dispatching their fellows who failed in their duties.  In this they were boundlessly creative in the manner of children, and while watching a fellow anthropoid be eaten alive by dogs was a sight that could grow stale, witnessing the multitude of ways a chimpanzee or baboon could find to execute their simian comrades never grew tiresome.  Never had so much tedious time been so excitingly passed. 

Culmination

The exact circumstances that led to the closure of the Woodytrudy Society are unknown, although their date can be pinpointed with absolute precision: on June 4^th, 1993 – the seventy-fifth anniversary of the Society – a grand soiree was to be held at the original Barton-Clarke cottage, with all members attending in full pomp and gaiety.  Letters were being posted at the nearest postal office until the very evening of that event, and afterwards? Nothing.  Several phone calls were made using exceedingly expensive satellite calls, but alas, poor reception was available due to the vagaries of the local weather (an overcast evening quite spoilt the view of the full moon in neighbouring counties), and few messages were passed on.  What garbled audio remained was often deleted by appalled family members, and what wasn’t erased was most certainly hidden.  The few samples preserved that have fallen into public hands are scarcely educational – screaming, indistinct begging, and howling of ambiguous origin. 

Since every standing member of the Society was present at the celebration, none returned from it, and personal investigations were both belated and unfruitful, the events remain a source of speculation, but the available evidence – the disturbing phone calls, the abandoned cottages, the ransacked grounds, and the paltry few remains retrieved (principally those that had been cast into the lake, which had suffered some decay and aquatic scavenging but were otherwise intact) suggests a peculiar sort of servant’s revolt against those who possessed no servants.

As to the staff themselves, no trace has been located – or at least, located and reported.  Several search parties have vanished after venturing too deep into the woods, the most recent in 2014.  The winters of Homely Lake are cold and brutal, but there are rustic and sturdy lodgings available, of course – well-furnished for a winter’s comfort, and with ample alcohol to keep out the chill from the most tropical of bones.

And in the summer, there’s plenty of sun in a big blue sky.