The Wondermark Gazette

Our story thus far: Having landed on the Isle of Yam-Runners, I have been mistaken by the inhabitants for their sacred ancestor, the healer Grenadon — whose signature jade necklace I have stolen.

Mayor C___ announced that the town would hold a lavish banquet to welcome me officially back to the Isle, and the entire populace was quickly swept up with banquet fever. Mr. C___ originally set the date of the affair for the very night of my arrival, inviting the whole town to come over to his house and that his wife would “whip something up” — but the towns-folk raised objections at once, on the grounds that such an impromptu event would deprive others of their chance to contribute to the revelry. Thus, the town Council met in a standing-room-only special session in the middle of a pasture, and appointed all interested parties — that is, every man and woman in the town over the age of 12 — to seats on the newly-formed Banquet Planning Committee. Then they convened a special Auxiliary Committee for the children.

By the time the moon rolled into the sky, as I was later informed at excruciating length, the town’s carpenters had drawn up plans for a brand-new Banquet Hall, to be furnished by the craftsmen and the drapery-women, with the town’s landscapers planning to cross-breed a special breed of flower in honour of the event. Nobody was left out — the town’s chefs would prepare the meal; the shepherds would bring in sheep to corral; and the Auxiliary Committee began at once making nylon lanyards for the official souvenir key-chains. Everyone had a part to play; for once their lives were driven through with purpose, and for the first time in many of their lives, they could while away their hours towards a productive pursuit, instead of huddling in stinking hovels waiting for death, as they were wont.

I had been instructed to keep away from the meeting (as it was to be in my honour, after all), so I spent my time ambling idly through the empty town, strolling through unlocked houses, rifling through bureau-drawers and trying on any robes and shawls that caught my fancy. I picked through waste-bins and took bites from ham-hocks; I kicked slippers through windows and piled laundry in larders. In short, I made myself at home.

As I wandered across roof-tops and relieved myself down rain-gutters, I began to note the appearance of the occasional ship-mast on the far, watery horizon. I was too engaged in my exploration of the town’s domiciles to pay the thought much mind, but later, as evidence was mounting towards the revelation that people’s houses were boring, I chanced to glance through a high-mounted window in the Mayor’s dusty prison-tower and found that the sky-line was littered with sails, flags, and stalwarts.

It wasn’t long before I began to hear voices and foot-falls on the packed dust of the town’s main boulevard. Thinking that the town was returning from its convention, I hastened to remove the stockings and house-dress that I’d been scientifically experimenting with, and rushed out the back door of the Archbishop’s home so as to not make a spectacle of myself. But when I made my roundabout way back to the centre of town, I found not the towns-folk back from their meeting, but rather sailors, adventure-men, and passengers debarked from ferries and steamers — all of them, seemingly, infirm.

They lurched about like the walking death, gaping glassily into shut-up store-fronts and empty fruit-stalls where flies picked over mouldering tangeloupes. Word had spread of my return. These pitiable fools had come to the Isle in pilgrimage. They had come for healing.

So of course, sensing an opportunity to take advantage of the sudden rush in tourist traffic, I broke into the swap-mall and set up shop at some sap’s basket-booth. All the town’s establishments were shuttered tight, from inns to taverns to the baby exchange — so I did a thriving business, selling wicker baskets by the bushel. The visitors paid me in the random and various currencies of their native lands; I wasn’t picky. I accepted them all; it was pure profit for me; I hadn’t paid for the baskets, after all. After an hour my pockets were full to bursting with shillings, lira, piastres and at least one goat.

As the sunlight faded, I began to parlay my success into franchises, collecting fees from patrons who’d expressed an interest in relocating permanently to the Isle of Yam-Runners, and installing them at nearby stalls selling whatever inventory the stall’s old owner happened to have sitting around. In just the first hour, I must have broken dozens of latches and locks with a spade-head — demand for commerce was climbing with each new wave of spend-happy tourists. The sky was just turning from orange to black as I handed over control of my very own basket-stall (for a tidy profit, considering that I had invested exactly zero capital) to an enthusiastic entrepreneur from Lapland, and with that, I rested, satisfied; I had filled the entire swap-mall with thriving independent businesses. Of course, as there were no lights in the swap-mall, I doubted that they would do very well from here on out. I’d gotten out of the market just in time. It was my savvy way.

Just as a newly-installed kerosene-seller approached my young Lappish basket-merchant and began to outline a co-operative plan for selling torches, I felt a weak but insistent pressure on my hip. Thinking it was some insect, or perhaps the goat trying to be inappropriately assertive, I swatted it away — but it returned, stronger and more petulant, and I saw that it was a very ill-mannered young boy of about ten. “There you are, Grandfather!” he shouted, panting. “Who are all these people? Why is there a Gypsy woman at Papa’s cell-phone cart?”

“You’ll understand when you’re older,” I told him.

“Oh, you must come quickly,” he said. “The Council’s secretary has collapsed from exhaustion! Your healing is needed immediately! They dispatched me around mid-afternoon, but I couldn’t find you until I decided to follow a long, winding trail of opened closets and discarded night-gowns. I fear it may already be too late!”

“Sounds like it probably is,” I said, as sagely as possible. “No use rushing all the way out there.”

“Oh, but you have to come, Grandfather Grenadon!” the boy wailed, and at that, the entire swap-mall fell silent.

Every head turned towards me. The word Grenadon echoed forever in the dark, enclosed swap-mall.

And then, with a terrible, ailing cry from a thousand sickly throats, I was mobbed by cripples.

NEXT: An Unlikely Saviour

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