While they were debating what to do, they stumbled across a man sleeping outdoors, dusted with snow, and snoring loudly. In his slumber, his hat had fallen from his head and lay half-embedded in a nearby snowdrift. Fearing the stranger would freeze to death before nightfall, the five companions shook him awake.
“Oh, my goodness!” he cried out. “I fell asleep with my hat off. I guess there’sno bedlike asnow bed!” Harry slapped his one attached leg and chuckled with delight at the jest, but the others remained silent, for they did not see the humor in it or, indeed, realize any joke had been attempted.
The odd fellow stuck the hat skew-whiff on his head so that it covered his left ear. The snow ceased falling, and the temperature began to rise.
“Let me guess—he was identical to Jack, Sam, Clem, Kit, and Harry in face, figure, and size?”
“Got it in one. Should I stop now?”
“What? No. Why?”
“You just slid right off the rock.”
I had. When had that happened? And for that matter, how was I comfortable enough to start dozing off on the bare ground? His voice was so soothing, though.
He offered me a hand, and I drew myself up, brushing dirt and leaves off my cloak. “Please continue. I want to hear how it ends.”
Max—for that was his name, or at least we will choose to pretend so—became a member of the group as soon as he heard what was afoot.
The six of them journeyed for weeks together and had many adventures. However, at this point Jack’s plan had run into a snag, for even in Ecossia, it had become difficult to find others who were like enough to them in looks. A month passed, but every single person they came across was too scaly, too feathered, too fetal, too dead, or otherwise unsuitable.
“Too what?”
“We were really scraping the bottom of the barrel by that point.”
But just when Jack had nearly lost hope, in a town at the southern edge of the island, he saw six men passing through a market. They were as indistinguishable from each other as six pips in a pear and likewise similar to Jack and his fellows.
Jack grabbed the arm of a nearby costermonger. “Who are those six men? For it is urgent that they join my cause, and follow me about, and dress in green, and wear masks, all forreasons I have no intention of revealing in the present narrative.”
“You were never planning on telling me? You’re mean.”
Sam gave a remorseful sigh. “I wish I could tell you, really. But I promised Jack I’d keep his secrets.”
“Mean,” I murmured, swaying where I sat. I put down a hand to steady myself so that I wouldn’t fall off the rock again.
“Begone with you, for I have costers to mong,” the costermonger sneered, “and I do not have the time to answer foolish questions.” But once Jack had purchased a few costers, the peddler became more amenable. “Those are the six siblings of our duchess,” our hero was informed. “As odd a family as ever you’ll find. When the eldest brother speaks, frogs and toads leap out of his mouth. And where the next eldest walks—”
“Yes, yes,” Jack cut him off. “I’m sure they’re all extraordinary. But where do they live?”
“Why, up in the castle that sits upon yonder hill.”
And he pointed to a great, dark edifice that squatted on the hillside. In shape, it resembled a malevolent toad, its gate a gaping maw that made our heroes feel uncomfortably like flies.
Undaunted, Jack and his friends soon presented themselves at the castle, where they were greeted by none other than the duchess herself.
“My brothers shall not go with you,” she advised them, “for they are dear to me, and I wish to keep them by my side. But I will make you this offer instead—if one of you can beat me in a footrace, you shall leave with as great a reward as the strongest among you can carry. If you fail, however, then you shall all be beheaded instead.”
Jack was puzzled. “Do you make this same offer to every group of strangers that drops by?”
“Yes, actually.”
“Why?”
The duchess shrugged. “Everybody needs a hobby.”
“We agree to your terms!” Jack declared, for during that short conversation, he had already conceived of yet another ridiculous plan.
And there shall the tale be paused, for the sun has long since set, and we must travel when morning arrives.
