.
“Pride comes before a fall.”
“Do you think it’s dangerous, then?”
“Of course, it’s dangerous. Put one wrong foot wrong when doing something like that turns doing it at all into the wrong foot itself and then you’ll have fallen into that huge black pit some call death.”
“You were always so damn poetic! It’s just that if I don’t try I shall never succeed. I know I’m good at it. I think I’m in fact the best in the world at it.”
“How many people have tried it before you? You can only be the best at something if others have also done it and done it badly. Being the only one to have done it does not mean you are the best, because someone else may be better at it than you, but has not been bothered or foolhardy enough to do it. And I’m not trying to be ‘damn poetic’ there, as you put it. Just realistic.”
“You always had a flowery turn of phrase. ‘Poetic’ was the wrong word. Poetry is cleverer than mere floweriness. I don’t want you to think I’ve ever thought you clever at anything! Ha Ha.”
“Point taken, Sandy! Oh, hello, John, I didn’t hear you come in. Sandy and I are talking about her doing it at last. What do you think. Pride comes before a fall? Or only fools can get near enough to joke with death? Ha ha. I like proverbs, even if they don’t mean anything!”
“Yes, I heard what Sandy said to you. No wonder she’s now blushing. Errr. A blush in the cheek is to brush the cheek of death. That’s another new motto for you!”
“John, you know full well that Peter hates the thought of me doing it. You could at least give me some encouragement.”
“Give you some encouragement to die, Sandy? Is that what you’re asking me to do?”
“Well, if you know that I’m bound to try doing it, whatever you two say, your encouragement is better than your discouragement. You’re only wanting to feel less guilty if it all goes wrong by discouraging me when you simply know I am definitely destined to do it. Encouragement may help me do it successfully. Discouragement may increase the risk of me failing. Think of it logically. .... Peter! What are you doing? Let go of my wrists! John, what are you going to do with that rope?”
“It’s for your own good, Sandy.”
“Yes, Sandy. Sorry. We’re being cruel to be kind.”
“But what’s that! MMMMMMMMMMMMMMM...”
“Well, that’s that then, John.”
“Did we really need the gag as well? She can hardly breathe. She could only have done what she intended to do with her hands. Well one of her hands, really.”
“The writing or typing hand?”
“Yes, or the hand that draws a thin blue line in the sand against false criticisms. Ha ha.”
“But the gag is for her own good, too. She might have been able to shout loud enough for her critics to hear! They might be lurking next door with their evil tangles of unspooling threads!”
“Yes, but they might be able to read her mind, though, even at a distance. Things can pass over vast areas these days with all that damn webbery in the air!"
“Yes, you’re right. We’d better finish the job. We don’t want them knowing that she intended to publicly complain about the nature of their reviews of her novella, do we? That would have been dreadful. Something worse than death, in fact. Critics hate being criticised. They’d chase authors into Hell itself, rather than put up with being criticised themselves.”
“So, if death can’t put a halt to it, then, there is no point in following a gagging with a deadly daggering, as they say. It’s best just to let her experience near-death as long as possible till her mind goes awol and she forgets or wipes clean that she was utterly determined to complain in public about their devastating reviews. They can’t possibly read an empty mind. Lingering longer abashed is better than precarious pride."
“Yes, give Sandy till Autumn, I say. A mind in endless fall is worth a million fell swoops.”
“MMMMMMMMMMMM...”
