Richie's Picks: THE BLACK BOOK OF SECRETS by F.E. Higgins, Feiwel and
Friends, October 2007, ISBN: 0-312-36844-5
"When I opened my eyes I knew that nothing in my miserable life prior to
that moment could possibly be as bad as what was about to happen. I was lying
on the cold earthen floor of a basement room lit by a single candle, no more
than an hour's burning left. Instruments of a medical nature hung from hooks
in the beams. Dark stains on the floor suggested blood. But it was the
chair against the opposite wall that fully confirmed my suspicions. Thick
leather straps attached to the arms and the legs were there for one purpose only:
to hold down an unwilling patient. Ma and Pa were standing over me.
" 'E's awake,' crowed Ma excitedly.
"Pa dragged me to my feet. He had me in an iron grip, my arm wrenched up
behind my back. Ma held me by the hair. I looked from one to the other.
Their grinning faces were only inches away from mine. I knew I should not look
to them to save me.
"Another man, concealed until now in the shadows, stepped forward and took
me by the chin. He forced open my mouth and ran a blackened, foul-tasting
finger around my gums.
" 'How much?' asked Pa, drooling with anticipation.
" 'Not bad,' said the man. 'Thrupence apiece. Maybe twelve in all.'
" 'It's a deal,' said Pa. 'Who needs teeth anyway?'
" 'Someone, I hope,' replied the man dryly. 'I sell 'em for a living.'
"And they laughed, all three, Ma and Pa and Barton Gumbroot, the notorious
tooth surgeon of Old Goat's Alley.
"Once the money for my teeth was agreed with Barton, they moved quickly.
Together they dragged me over to the surgeon's chair. I kicked and shouted and
spat and bit; I wasn't going to make it easy for them. I knew how Barton
Gumbroot made his living, preying on the poor, pulling their teeth, paying them
pennies and selling them for ten times as much. I was racked with fear. I
had no protection. I was going to feel it all. Every nerve-stabbing twinge."
Oh man! I shiver as I read that opening scene and realize how, four decades
later, I am still so traumatized by my own childhood experiences in the
world of dentistry.
In contrast to the struggling Ludlow Fitch -- who is about to escape that
basement room with most (but not all) of his teeth still intact -- I was more
like the lamb being led to slaughter. Every six months I would obediently
enter the little shop of horrors that constituted the office of my childhood
dentist, Dr. Arthur Roberts, where he would constantly discover new places to
drill into my teeth. I would sit there and quietly endure the agony of every
nerve-stabbing twinge.
It was not until I was in middle school, when my mother found a new dentist
closer to where we then lived, that I learned that other dentists first
administered Novocain to eliminate the pain of the drilling. I am still unclear
whether Dr. Robert's lack of pain management was a strategy to get me to do a
better job of brushing my teeth, was a byproduct of my parent's dental plan,
or whether Dr. Roberts really was a nineteenth century kind of dentist and I
was just too young to be administered the proverbial shot of whiskey -- like
in a cowboy movie -- before his getting down to business.
In any case, young Ludlow Fitch escapes his parents, the despicable tooth
surgeon, and the City by clinging precariously to the back of a departing
carriage "like an organ-grinder's monkey," and ends up in the mountain village of
Pagus Parvus, where he is taken in by Joe Zabbidou, a mysterious character
who has arrived in the village at the very same moment. During the day, Joe
runs a pawnshop he's established where he pays handsomely for worthless junk.
And, after midnight, Joe is a pawnbroker of secrets, paying handsomely for
those secrets that the villagers want to get off their chests in order to
attain some peace of mind. Ludlow becomes his scribe, carefully getting every
word written into the Black Book of Secrets.
Ludlow, who over the course of his entire childhood in the City was forced
by his parents to be a thief, cannot fathom what Joe's angle is:
" 'What exactly are you doing, Joe? Who are you? Why did you come here?'
"He leaned back on the counter and stretched his long legs out in front of
him. 'I am just an old man, Ludlow, trying to help those in need.'
" 'But the book, the money. You give all the time. What do you get back?'
" 'It doesn't have to be about taking. Don't you think it's enough to give?
Why should I expect anything in return?'
"I was beginning to understand, but it was not easy. I suppose I was still
a thief at heart. My whole life in the City had been about taking for myself
and taking care of myself."
THE BLACK BOOK OF SECRETS offers readers an intriguing view of the human
psyche as the equilibrium of this isolated village, located in the distant
past, is set off-kilter by the arrival of Joe and Ludlow:
" 'Why must it be human nature to hear one thing but believe it is another?'
" 'Because we want things to get better,' I said. 'Otherwise we would all
give up.'
"Joe closed his eyes. 'Dum spiro, spiro,' he said. 'While I breath, I
hope.' "
It is an exceptionally well-crafted and mysterious tale.
Now, the question is: what is YOUR darkest secret?
Richie Partington, MLIS
Richie's Picks http://richiespicks.com
Moderator, http://groups.yahoo.com/group/middle_school_lit/
BudNotBuddy@aol.com
http://www.myspace.com/richiespicks
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