Chapter two
By Jim Farrell
Brother Bill dreamed the night we were separated of him walking out to the barn to check on the three-legged cow, unfortunately while dreaming, he had stood up on the barn door we were laying on, and in his sleep had sleep-walked right off that door. When he finally awoke, he was still in that terrible wind and instead of my hand he was holding, his was wrapped around the horn of a unicorn. He thought that it was indeed strange because the last know unicorn had perished the night Noah had set sail in the Ark and the unicorn had missed the boat along with a few other strange creatures. Apparently, the unicorn had good reason to miss Noah’s Ark, for he had been caught up in this terrible furious wind, not because, as it has been taught throughout history, off galloping around and playing somewhere.
Brother Bill kept flying along with the unicorn, along with a wooly mammoth that looked like an elephant, that was flapping his ears to keep upright, until they almost hit a dark black cloud bank. That cloud bank was so thick that a flightless Dodo Bird from the island of Mauritius was walking along with some waddling ducks without falling through. Being that Brother Bill was only 2 feet 12 inches tall, and didn’t weigh all that much, he was able to grab a piece of that fortunately placed cloud as at flew by and finally was able to get off that howling wind.
After the bellowing wind had passed by, the worst of it had roared pass him, he began to walk down through the cloud bank. It was a long walk, for that wind had carried him many miles into the air. As Brother Bill walked along, he would pass many other animals trying to get down through the cloud with him. He often thought to himself during that long walk, how nice it would have been to be able to talk with the animals and find out where they were from and how they happened to be caught up in that horrendous wind. As Brother Bill got lower into the clouds, he noticed that it seemed to be breaking up a little. Finally, he looked down and saw a patch of green and blue-green water through the fog that enveloped him. He got down on his hands and knees and stuck his head through an opening in the bottom of the cloud.
Much to his utter amazement, not so far below him was a village with the largest houses that he had ever seen; in fact, they were the only houses that he had ever seen other than Mother’s and those of Walnut Grove Missouri around the farm. These were long and wide with smoke pouring out of holes in the roof. In front of them were strange looking trees with carvings of different animals stacked on top of each other.
Well, here he was looking over that huge village of houses, when all of a sudden like; a piece of that cloud broke away, and with it went Brother Bill. Bill was certain that even after all that he had been through, he was falling to his death. He kept falling, tumbling, dropping, and generally plummeting even faster toward that village. With an abrupt halt, he stopped his ungainly fall not four feet from the ground.
He couldn’t imagine what in the world had caught the seat of his pants, he tried to squirm around, but whatever had a hold of his breeches was holding him firm. There he was hanging from he knew not what, when all of a sudden like he felt himself being lifted back up into the air and when he was about ten feet up, he was spun around and there he looked straight into the piercing black eyes of the biggest Indian with a funny looking hat, he had ever seen, or for that matter had ever hoped not to see.
As he hung there feeling sillier by the minute the big Indian’s face broke out into a huge grin, showing a couple of missing teeth. The Indian mumbled something in a language
Brother Bill didn’t understand as he put Brother Bill into his arms, like one would a baby.
Try as he might Brother Bill couldn’t understand the Indian and the Indian couldn’t understand him. The Indian lumbered over to the giant village of long houses, that he could see were made of what appeared planks. Many more tall Indians came out to of those houses to look at what the grinning Indian had caught form the sky. Brother Bill couldn’t make up his mind whether to be afraid or try to be brave. He had no way of knowing what the sizable Indians would do to him. In fact, he was feeling hot and hurting so bad anyway from all the cuts and bruises that he had picked up from flying objects in the wind that he was almost to the point that he didn’t even much care.
The tall grinning Indian that held him so lovingly in his arms kept walking over to the strangest long house of all in that bizarre village. The house was painted with every conceivable color, and there was a few that Brother Bill was sure there wasn’t a name for. Once inside, the oldest most wrinkled, pox-marked face and gaudy dressed man with, what looked like an eagle head for a hat, that Brother Bill thought he had ever had the misfortune to lay his eyes upon, came over to him and took him from the grinning Indian. But for some reason Brother Bill didn’t feel afraid anymore. Just the touch of that stern looking man was a comfort to him!
This Indian was not only ten feet tall, but he appeared to be at least three feet around the belly, caused by a blanket covered with something that could have been animal tails or even feathers from birds Brother Bill was sure were extinct. The blanket was black, red, and white interwoven in intricate designs.
The strange looking Indian carried him ever so tenderly and placed him on a bed of cedar boughs that had the scent of the forest still in them. He then spoke some words to the grinning tall man, who turned and left the house. He then twisted his large frame back over Brother Bill and began to grin a toothless grin…
…Brother Bill knew that now was the time that would tell of his most uncertain future. The old weird looking man walked over to an earthen jar and scooped out the slinkiest, goopiest, greasiest, and darkest looking sauce that Brother Bill thought he had the ill luck to have ever seen. Then he turned and walked back to Brother Bill and began to spread this moldy gunk all over Bill’s small body.
Brother Bill’s body began to quake and shake all over. He would first feel hot, and then cold would overcome him, until he shook again. All that time, the old curious looking Indian would run around the house and chant many unintelligible words as his arms waved in many different all directions at once. Finally, after about four hours Brother Bill’s temperature he began to drop, and the cuts and bruises had all but disappeared. In fact, he felt so good that he jumped off the bed of cedar boughs and began to jump and dance right behind the old gentleman who then grinned his toothless grin at Brother Bill, giving out the most ear shattering scream that could only have come from the throat of the biggest cougar in the whole world.
Immediately, the grinning Indian came back into the plank house, grinning even more now, and took Brother Bill by the hand and led him out of the gaudy colored long house. They crossed the compound, through a small clearing and into the biggest long house of them all, where a huge fire was burning in the middle of it. Around the fire was what looked like the entire Indian village, with not many of them any shorter than ten feet tall. There were fat ones, skinny ones, and just plain medium ones, and they all had their eyes turned toward him…
…The tall grinning Indian turned to the assembled crowd, raised his hands toward the heavens and the roof of the house and then said something that sounded like an announcement of some kind. Out of the crowd came a very gentle looking woman with tears in her eyes who joined the tall grinning Indian. Then both of them took one of Brother Bill’s hands in theirs as they walked outside to one of the other long houses. Bill thought to himself as he was being led away, that either he had been adopted by these two tall Indians, or they might be making a dandy dinner out of him.