Igor worked for my grandfather, so we've known each other for my entire life. His "great great great" (as he tells it) grandfather was among the party that came from the Ruhr to this valley with one of my earlier ancestors. I point out to him that since the foundations of our castle's original keep were built by that same group of settlers starting sometime in the 12th century, it had to be someone much earlier than his grandfather's grandfather or whoever.
I do know that this ancestor of his was the character which inspired the naming of the post village as 'Heidlelwiche Constabulary'. The village's leather bound record books, which I moved (right before the first world war) from the back of the post office to a room down the hall from our lab, holds the names of everyone who was part of that group. Among them a notable character was Horstorach Igorenstein, who appointed himself as 'the constable' of the village. Local legend recalls stories of this person's services performed in the capacity of what authority his office entailed, as interpreted by him as exercises in the fullest expression of that authority. Had the villagers of that time not been imbued with a worthy sense of humor from the hardships of their journeys, then not for a lack of hardship's endurance of their self anointed constable's exercise of his office was that sensibility brought to a state of keenly tuned precision. Examples:
- The sheep must be named, individually (by Horstorach).
- All trade or commerce must be 'officiated' in the village square after lunch but before supper or sunset, 'whichever came first' (sic).
- A chart must be ascribed that 'predicted' what days of the year sunset might come before supper so that certificates of trade (valued & sold by Horstorach) might be used to officiate each trade as recorded in the village records.
These rules go on and on. I do have to consider had he not been so obsessive that the villagers might not have had any kind of written record, and so now thanks mostly to Horstorach we have all the books that I rescued from the rear of the post office so they might be safer from destruction in case the war came through here.
What ended up being recorded were Horstorach's initial official decrees, but aside from a few entries attempting to fulfill their edicts, it seems as though some unrecorded compromise mollified any further application of authority to maintain as directed the carrying out of those decrees....in numerous circumstances. There is one page neatly full of single names that seem to comprise the size of the village's herd of sheep, for at the top of the page it merely says 'Sheep'. But there are no later pages with names given to new lambs or further additions acquired through trade.
"That's because they ate the lambs before he could name them." chimes Igor, reading over my shoulder. Annoyed, I point out to him that they obviously did not eat them all, for in the pasture around the village to this day graze the descendants of the herd his ancestor gave the names to. I know for certain that they are descendants because they all in one way or another carry various genetic markers that indicate they were the offspring of some of my earliest test subjects when I was a lad back in the late 18th century. I experimented on sheep before I realized I could get away with using humans. That sheep existed in the pastures around the village from the 12th century to the late 18th century must indicate that the villagers did not eat all the lambs, and from the late 18th century to now we know for certain they are from the same herd because of the six legs, double tails, disturbing parrot-like 'speech' instead of bleats, and (in some cases) three eyes. This must be the thousandth instance where I have attempted to get Igor to understand something using deduction through observation and applied logic.
"They stopped eating any of them once the extra parts started to appear." he remarks, assuring me in some small way that he is at least capable of retaining his own observations. If this is intended by him to be some kind of smart-guy comment at the expense of my early work, well, someone currently employed not as a half-nutty village constable but as a half-wit dimbulb hunchback smartguy oaf lab assistant / slave who might feel the discipline of the lash later. He is still reading over my shoulder, so I know he saw that thing about the lash.
Ah hell, I can hear moaning. Igor hears it too and he shuffles off in the direction of the holding pens. I should go have a look as well.
