By Peter J. Barbour
“Girls,” Mother said before she and Father departed, “please make sure you gather some firewood today. Father and I are headed to the market. We’ll be gone until well after dark. I expect the house to be in order when I return.”
“Yes, Mother,” Henrietta and Lucinda intoned together as their parents left.
“Well,” Lucinda, the elder of the two, said, “you’d better get started. You have a lot to do. Don’t tarry! You haven’t got all day.”
Henrietta glared at her sister, who had no intention of lifting a finger to help.
“Don’t you make evil eyes at me, you waste-of-a-life,” Lucinda scowled.
Henrietta looked at Lucinda with a downturned mouth as she continued to sweep the floor.
“You missed a spot,” Lucinda snarled, pointing to a corner by the cupboard.
Henrietta finished sweeping the floor, washing the dishes, and scrubbing the table. Lucinda lounged in her bedroom.
“I’m bored,” Lucinda said from her bed. “Are you done with the cleaning yet? I think we should gather kindling for the fireplace as Mother asked. Let’s go.” She took her stick, not for walking but for prodding poor Henrietta. They walked into the nearby woods.
They found sticks and twigs, which they piled on Henrietta’s back. As they worked their way into the forest, they came to the gorge, a deep chasm at the end of the village.
“Henrietta, get more wood for the fire. You’re so lazy, so slow. Henrietta! Henrietta! Henrietta!”
Lucinda’s voice grated on Henrietta. I can’t bear to hear her say my name one more time. She threw down the firewood that they’d piled on her back, and she ran at Lucinda. The uncharacteristic behavior caught Lucinda off guard. She swung her stick at Henrietta and missed. Off-balance, she stepped back into nothingness and careened into the gorge. Henrietta listened to Lucinda’s cries fade into a distant muffled sound as her sister plummeted down the gorge’s steep wall.
“Good riddance,” Henrietta muttered. She retrieved the sticks they’d gathered and returned to their cabin.
Once home, Henrietta sat, initially at ease, but, as evening came, her conscience began to gnaw at her. I’ve procrastinated long enough. The time has come to rescue Lucinda. I’m not an evil person. Granted, it is peaceful without her. What will Mother and Father say if I do nothing?
Henrietta had smiled when Lucinda fell off the cliff into the chasm. Now she wrung her hands as she thought about not making some attempt to rescue her. She imagined Lucinda at the bottom, struggling, in pain, desperate to escape. How could I leave her there? I should have done something.
Henrietta left the cabin and ran to the ravine where she last saw her sister. She carried heavy lengths of rope in one hand and a lantern in the other. She draped a quiver with arrows and her bow over her shoulder. The moon sat low on the horizon and cast a dim reflected light onto the ground.
Henrietta reached the edge of the ravine, approaching it with caution, her hands shaking. She peered into the darkness and held her breath but saw nothing beyond a few feet. She placed the lantern on the ground, leaned over the edge, and shouted, “Luccinndaa? Lucinda, are you down there?”
Henrietta cupped her hand to her ear and listened. Distant voices, shouting, angry argumentative sounds wafted up to her on gentle updrafts from below, but there was no answer to her call. Henrietta began to tie the ends of the ropes together to create one long line.
“Lucinda, I’m going to lower a rope with a knot on the end. Climb onto the knot, and I’ll hoist you up,” she called into the darkness.
Henrietta lowered the entire length of the rope and waited, hoping its length was sufficient to reach the bottom. She felt a tug and started to pull the rope up. At first, she pulled with enthusiasm. Her heart raced, full of expectation and joy that she was not too late. As the rope’s end neared the surface, she began to pull with less vigor, her hands shook, and her palms were wet with sweat. How will Lucinda act once she is beside me? Henrietta stopped retrieving the line.
Memories of Lucinda’s shrewish behavior flooded back to her. She heard Lucinda’s shrill squeaky abrasive voice echoing in her head.
“Good riddance,” Henrietta had said and walked away. Now, she was pulling Lucinda to safety. She recalled her evil-eyed sister’s taunting and poking at her with a stick, making her feel like a lowly cockroach always under her oppressive foot. Henrietta started to question her own good intentions, only to be snapped out of her deliberation by a voice calling from below the canyon’s edge.
“Yo, what’s the problem up there?”
That’s not Lucinda. Henrietta secured the line to a tree. She picked up her bow, notched an arrow, and moved the lantern to the edge. As she approached the rim, she drew back the bow string. Five feet from the top, sitting on the knot, was a little man, clutching the rope with wrinkled, veined hands, and knobby fingers.
“Pray, don’t shoot!” he shouted, eyes wide, and a hand extended in a defensive posture. “I am Master Pripet. What are you waiting for? Pull me the rest of the way up. If I must spend one more moment with that ungrateful termagant I assume you delivered upon us, I don’t know what I’ll do.” His eyes glowed as the lantern’s light reflected from them. His face was animated as his thousand-year-old wrinkles rippled with each word. He wore a pointed hat, broken at the tip, cocked to the side, and a short woolen coat, woolen pants, and leather boots laced to mid-shin.
Cut the line, send this strange little creature back from where he came, and call for the people of my community to fill the chasm with rocks. Henrietta put down the bow and arrow and lowered the rope.
As the little man began to descend, he spoke again with urgency. “No. No, please don’t do that. I cannot go back, not so long as that young woman is there. She is insufferable, unbearable, just horrible. She even poked me with a stick. She did! She poked meee, the Master, with a stick. Can you believe that?”
Henrietta held the rope fast with one hand, and the lantern high with the other, and looked down at the little man.
“She poked you with a stick?” Henrietta asked.
“Yes, she poked me with a stick.”
“She used to poke me with a stick, too. I know what you mean.” Henrietta took the opportunity to unburden herself to the little man. “Who does Lucinda think she is anyway? It was enough as I watched our parents dote on her. It was enough to know that, in their eyes, Lucinda did no wrong. Lucinda was pretty, graceful, bright, the good daughter. If only one cookie was left, they gave it to her.” Henrietta looked into Pripet’s eyes. “There seemed to be only enough love for one child, and it wasn’t me.” She paused and choked back a tear. “Once our parents went to work each day, a long day that stretched to well after dusk, Lucinda would begin to badger and demean me. She always had to be in charge.”
“My poor dear. Maybe we can make a deal.” The little man spoke, words rushed, desperate to get away from Lucinda and willing to bargain. “You rescue me from the hell my home has become, and I will make you rich.”
“Me, rich?” Henrietta finished raising the little man to the edge of the ravine. “But, what about Lucinda?” She still wrestled with her dilemma.
“Lucinda?” The little man grabbed the edge of the cliff overlooking the gorge and pulled himself up. “That young woman, if that, indeed, is what she is, can take care of herself anywhere.”
Henrietta nodded her head in agreement. Her ambivalence, supplanted by curiosity, and a sense of kinship had developed with this stranger. The prospect of riches warmed her heart as she savored the possibilities.
They sat in the moonlight by the gorge and talked into the night. The little man said that he could be the source of considerable wealth for Henrietta. He proposed that they find a rich person to torment and harass. He would meddle in their life and make them miserable. After a week or two, for he didn’t think it would take longer, Henrietta would present herself and offer—for a fee, of course—to exorcise the demon that had afflicted the wealthy individual.
“I have one stipulation, however. We do this trick just three times.”
“Can I trust you?” Henrietta asked.
The little man took off his hat and handed it to Henrietta. “With this, we seal the deal. When you have received the money from the third rich person, you will return my chapeau, and I shall be on my way. I am Pripet, the Master, that is what my friends call me.” He extended his hand to Henrietta, and they shook.
Henrietta, unwilling to face her parents, decided to spend the night in the forest with Pripet. The next morning, the two arose early to begin their journey to find a rich person. A simple task for the most part, since this was a wealthy land. Before setting out, Henrietta returned to the ravine one last time. Although the bottom was not visible through the foliage, she heard the muffled faraway voices still arguing. She smiled at her good fortune, turned, and left to join Pripet.
By noon of the second day, they were passing a huge farm with acres of wheat, cattle, and horses. Pripet looked at Henrietta and bit his lower lip. Not much farther down the road was a massive home, finely appointed, and freshly painted. Next to the house stood a fine barn, coops for chickens, and storage bins brimming with grain.
“I think we have discovered a very rich person,” Pripet said. “I’ll leave you now. You go. Return here in one week, as we discussed.”
Henrietta left the little man and occupied herself by a nearby stream away from Pripet and his mischief. After seven days, she walked back to the farm, past the fields of wheat, cattle, and horses, to where she had last seen Pripet. When she came to the house, she found the owner seated on the front lawn. He looked up at the sky, his hands balled into fists, shaking his head.
“Hello there,” Henrietta called. “Hello.”
The man looked up. He grumbled to himself, his eyes darting back and forth, preparing for an assault from any direction. He swatted the air. A harsh cackle came from behind him, and he whipped around to face it, but nothing was there.
“Are you all right?” Henrietta asked, amazed at the spectacle Pripet had created.
“I was a sane man a week ago,” the man said. He stood and walked backward toward Henrietta, keeping his face pointed in the direction from which Pripet’s cackling had come. “This peaceful land, my land, is possessed. The chickens have laid no eggs. They peck at each other and won’t sit on their nests. The cows have given no milk, remain in the fields standing on rocks, and my workers have fled with fear in their eyes. My family is held prisoner in the house, afraid to come out. I am concerned that all I have will be lost.”
“What if I can help you?” Henrietta asked. This is too easy to be true.
“Name your price,” the rich landowner answered, and Henrietta named a price.
“I will come back tomorrow,” Henrietta said, “and, once I receive the agreed-upon fee,” for she insisted on being paid for her services in advance, “I promise to bring peace to the farm and rid it of the demon that has invaded it.”
The next morning the farmer gave Henrietta the money. In return, she danced a very silly dance, shouted nonsense, and threw rocks at the house, the barn, and the coops. She tapped the ground with a stick. After several hours of this behavior, she grew tired. Without anything further to say or do, Henrietta took a seat by the man.
“Well, that should do it,” she said.
“I hope so,” said the man, already greatly relieved and extremely impressed with Henrietta’s thoroughness. Of course, Pripet was long gone, having slipped away the night before. Henrietta bid the man and his family farewell and departed that much richer.
By dusk, she caught up to Pripet at a previously selected meeting place. Pripet prepared a meal from the food that he had gathered at the farm. Henrietta hugged Pripet. After they ate, the two scoundrels sat by the fire and counted the gold Henrietta had collected from the man. Henrietta smiled and stood tall. I wish Lucinda could see me now.
The next weeks brought Henrietta and Pripet great fortune as they found the second and third rich persons, possessed them, and exorcised them, for a fee, of course. Henrietta’s incantations and gesticulations became more elaborate, and her love for power and riches grew. But, according to their agreement, they would only perpetrate their scam three times. Pripet was ready to depart. Wealth bred greed, and Henrietta, who now had plenty of money, wanted more.
“I’m leaving,” Pripet advised Henrietta. “I’ll be taking my chapeau.” The little man was not himself without his hat.
“Let’s do it one more time,” Henrietta demanded with a snide smile and narrowed eyes. “One more time, and then I’ll give you back your hat.”
Pripet knitted his brow and his lips turned down. “I have kept my part of the bargain. Now, it is time for you to honor yours.” He opted not to beg or argue further—after all, a deal was a deal—but she continued to refuse.
“All right, keep my hat! But, beware, you’ve scorned this little man,” Pripet snarled and stomped off.
“Be off then,” Henrietta shouted after him. “I’m a woman of means now.”
Henrietta began her journey home at the next daylight. She avoided the areas through which she’d passed previously, not wanting to bump into any of the people she had deceitfully “helped.” She decided, as she walked, that she would build a mansion on the site of her family’s cabin. She could begin to live the way she had always intended.
How proud she anticipated her mother and father would be when she returned with a plan and the ability to make it come true. It would more than make up for the loss of Lucinda. They would have to excuse her prolonged absence. She passed by the ravine where her adventure had begun, but she neither looked down nor listened for Lucinda’s voice.
She arrived home after nightfall and stood at the door listening. Voices emanated from within. They are home. A broad smile spread across her face anticipating a joyous reunion. She drew a breath and opened the door only to stagger backward, horrified by the sight.
Sitting at her table, using her utensils, and eating from her plates, were a host of slovenly little creatures covered with dirt and grease. They reeked of the putrefaction they consumed as they sat in the slimy mess. As the hot air in the room rushed through the open door, Henrietta became nauseated by the disgusting odors that engulfed and smothered her. She turned and began to retch. Between heaves, she heard the familiar cackle that had tormented those she and Pripet had bilked.
“Seen Pripet, Henrietta?” One of the beasts at the table asked and then cackled. Henrietta covered her mouth and her nose as the smell of rotting flesh emitted with those spoken words blew over her. Her eyes burned; her stomach cramped. She wanted to lie down but not in the slime that coated the floor. Her head spun as she started to lose consciousness, only to be alerted by a searing sting across her back.
She turned in the direction of the presumed attack, but no one was there. She dropped her bag of money, and, when she tried to reach for it. A blistering pain crossed her arm. She pulled her hand back and ran out the door. She sat in the yard, facing the door, as cackling laughter filled the air, mixed with the sound of breaking glass and splintering wood.
“Well, Henrietta, how does it feel to be rich?” Master Pripet whispered with a sharp edge into her ear.
“Where are my parents?” Henrietta shouted. “What have you done with them?”
“Oh, they’re safe in a closet,” Pripet mocked.
“Make your horrible friends go, you little . . . ” Henrietta snarled and swung her arm viciously in the direction of Pripet’s voice. She struck nothing. Henrietta jumped up, flailing the air with her fists, kicking, spitting, and cursing Pripet. Henrietta was frantic now, desperate to rid herself of these devils. Then she stopped, smiled, and ran to the ravine. The bow, quiver of arrows, and spliced ropes were where she had left them. She seized the rope and lowered it over the edge.
“Lucinda! Lucinda! Hop onto the rope; I’ve come to rescue you.”
From the depths of the gorge, Lucinda called, “Henrietta? Is that you? Where have you been, you lazy, good-for-nothing? I can’t believe I call you sister or that we come from the same parents. Why, you’re just—”
“Lucinda, hurry!” Henrietta pleaded, ignoring the epithets being heaped upon her.
“I don’t hurry, Henrietta, especially not for you. Only low-rent, good-for-nothings like you hurry. Hurry, she says; you are worse-than-worthless. Wait until I tell Mother and Father how you’ve behaved.”
The rope stiffened as Lucinda climbed onto the knot. With fierce determination and speed, Henrietta raised the rope until Lucinda appeared. She had her hickory switch in her hand, poised above her head in anticipation of striking Henrietta at her first opportunity.
“Don’t hit me or I’ll lower you back down to the bottom of the gorge,” Henrietta threatened.
“You haven’t got the—” She caught her breath as Henrietta let the rope slip backward in her hands. “Okay, I won’t hit you. Get me out of here,” Lucinda said.
Henrietta secured the line and took her sister in her arms, but not to hug her. She secured an arm, turned, and ran in the direction of home. Upon reaching the house, without hesitation or explanation, she rammed open the door and dumped Lucinda onto the slimy floor.
“What has happened to my house?” Lucinda screamed, shrill and as irritating as ever. “What are you ugly diminutive creatures doing here?” Her hickory switch flew this way and that, more often finding its mark than not.
“Oh, no! It’s her!” the little monsters cried and began to scramble toward the windows and doors, shouting in pain as Lucinda whipped them left and right. Pripet and his band yelped all the way to the ravine.
Once they were gone, Henrietta looked at Lucinda and sheepishly braced herself for a reprimand or another prod from Lucinda’s stick. Henrietta pointed to the bag on the table.
“I got that for us,” she said, biting her lip.
“For us?” Lucinda said, as she poured the contents of the bag onto the table and smiled.
“For all of us,” Henrietta answered. She placed Pripet’s hat on Lucinda’s head and turned to look for their parents, stowed away in the closet.
Dr. Peter J Barbour retired his reflex hammer to become a fulltime writer and illustrator. His works include Loose Ends, a memoir, three illustrated children’s books: Gus at Work, Oscar and Gus, Tanya and the Baby Elephant, and over forty stories in e-journals and magazines. “The Fate of Dicky Paponovitch” earned him Raconteur of the Month from Susan Carol Publishing Company.
He lives in Oregon with his photographer wife of over fifty years. They enjoy traveling and the outdoors. Visit his website, Pete Barbour Stories and Illustrations.