I sense a great disturbance in the footrest; the digbeards are all astir over something and that can never be a good thing. This den of bearded vipers is a hive of activity above and beyond what we normally see. In recent days, a stone trail was constructed to the very horizon under the careful eye of my "rival" Eydri. The twits have it in their heads that I want the level of attention inflicted on me by the digbeards and seek to usurp my position as their favorite. As such, Eydri spends a great deal of their time outside the footrest, beating walloons to death with their foreheads and eating the odd rockclad, shagtusk, and squeaker that they stumble across. As such, this made it quite easy to build a path to replace the older dirt trail.
The entire place is being scrubbed from roof to ceiling, top to bottom, from nave to narthex, and so on. I've even seen a digbeard wash off the accumulated dirt of a dozen seasons all at once. Even the purple donkey that orders me about as if I were a common lackey has gotten into the act by switching out for an entirely different set of leaves. He's still wearing what seems to be five or six layers of them, but they're clearly a different set. One greenclad even spent the better part of the evening shining my tusks and chattering away all the while. I will admit, he did a rather nice job of it, but it doesn't take much to make me presentable if I do say so myself.
There is a heavy atmosphere of excitement and energy that I have not before experienced in my time here. One purpleclad digbeard whose job seems to be to tell other digbeards what to do has especially been active; from what I understand, she usually spends most of her time in her own den and commands from there, but she had lately been running around and taking a personal hand in things. From what I've seen, this often amounts to her carefully explaining whatever it is she wants in their gobbletygook language, another digbeard listening carefully, Talky Purpleclad leaving, and the latter digbeard doing whatever it was they were doing before the purpleclad came along. The primary difference is that they now do so with angry muttering as musical accompaniment. My impression of the purpleclads seems to be much in line with that of the common digbeard.
...
The air is stifling. Something must happen soon or I think we shall all go insane. Rather, I shall go insane and the digbeards will continue with business as usual.
...
The day has arrived and I am so far unimpressed. The social "event" of the season seems to be the arrival of two purpleclad digbeards. One of them a relatively tallish, scrawny creature carrying a calf while the other is a stout little fellow who is almost square in shape. The latter is obviously in charge; when he laughs, everybody else (barring his mate, apparently, as I've yet to see any change of expression on her face) does as well. When he stops, so does everybody else. The latter is rare; the old boy laughs at everything. He laughs with delight at the statues, he laughs at Eydri's heads pummelling each other (which, I admit, endeared me to him), he even laughs at the fountains, and he even laughs at me (which somewhat nullifies the earlier endearment). Still, while seemingly a nice chap who enjoys everything, I can't see why he is so all-fired important.
...
There was a bit of consternation the other evening when a rockclad leaped at the laughing purpleclad out of nowhere with a sharp stick. The situation quickly resolved itself when the theoretical victim subdued the attacker by pummeling him with his own, newly detached arm until I wandered over and stepped on the rockclad to keep him from further mischief. You have to nip this sort of situation in the bud. That was probably the single longest moment I've seen Laughing Purpleclad refrain from so much as the slightest chuckle. On the other hand, it was only seconds later that the situation struck him as being amusing.
That recent incident seems to have reinvigorated the "images of me" industry, which had been trailing off as late. Eydri had begun closing the gap between us while the newcomer purpleclad had quickly shot up the ranks. That gap has widened again considerably. Eydri is apoplectic about it, but it is beneath my notice. The only reason I am aware of it is because of Eydri's moaning about it.
There has always been a steady trickle of new digbeards showing up, but Laughing Purpleclad seems to really draw them in. I usually try to come and watch them arrive as there is always something of interest in such a caravan. The latest group seems a small one and barring a straggler off in the distance seems of little interest. As I turn to go back to my customary post by the fountain, I hear a voice off in the distance. "Reggie? Is that you old boy?"
"Eustace?"
Next time: Reginald is on the case! or Ho, ho, my lad! Ho, ho, my lad!
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Topic: The Life and Times of Reginald Goblinstomper, Elephant at Large. (Read 51080 times)