The Father of Teeth

Text for today: II Pulp ccxliii-cclxi

When the Father of Teeth awoke from his intoxication, however, he felt forty-eight fingers and a dozen thumbs all groping at various parts of him. By cunning rotation of his bloodshot eyeballs within their black leather bags, he discovered that six blind persons were gathered close about him and feeling him with their hands.

Finally one of them, whose hands were on the Father of Teeth's inexcusable feet, said: "The elephant is much calloused and greatly knobbled, and exudes a most poisonous miasma."
"True," said the second, whose fingers were feeling the Father of Teeth's horrible hand; "I detect little miasma, but the epidermal endowments are indubitable."
"Indeed," said the third, who was exploring the Father of Teeth's disreputable breeches. "The creature has a most unrefined hide, with wrinkles which attain a near-cosmic depth of hideousness."
"I can only agree, fellow scholars," said the fourth, whose palms were flat against the Father of Teeth's impossible back, or as flat as the circumstances allowed. "I also find a rough and disreputable texture, besides knobbles in plenty, arrayed in a teetering tower of vague and wavering verticality."
"Quite right, esteemed colleagues," said the fifth, a little indistinctly as he was sucking his fingertips, which were somewhat abraded thanks to an encounter with the Father of Teeth's unintelligent designer stubble. "I can confirm that the elephant is a creature with formidable natural defences, including a thick skin and some sharp protrusions in the facial area."
"It is a fact," said the last, whose fingers had found their way to the formidably elongated precautionary dentition which the Father of Teeth customarily utilised during his more deliberate periods of unconsciousness. "There are formidable tusks on this creature, that is for certain."

Finally wearied from their pontificatory pokings, the Father of Teeth protruded his tongue. This expelled the intrusive fingers of the sixth scholar, who was greatly astonished but nevertheless continued her observations. "How interesting," she said. "Though uncouth in form, the elephant is clearly a mild-tempered creature. Rather than deterring me with its terrible tusks, it used a sort of flexible muscular appendage, very dry and furry, which came between the tusks to push me gently away."
"Enough of this," said the Father of Teeth. "Noble and perceptive scholars: though your minds be acute and your observations accurate, your conclusions are nevertheless in error, for you have been exploring a fake elephant."
"A fake elephant!" they said. "But how can this be? We heard that an elephant was present in the district, and made inquiries as to where we might find it; and we were guided to these parts of yours by a most reputable person, esteemed by all as a servant of the Creator and the truth."
"You have been deceived," said the Father of Teeth, "but rest assured that I shall deal with this pachydermic prankster. Now go in peace, and if you will take my advice, concern yourselves less with admiring the gaudy circus of Creation. Rather contemplate the One who made you blind and prone to error, and how you may best offend Him."

The scholars bowed solemnly and went their way, while the Father of Teeth went in search of the reputable person who had lied to them. He was not hard to find, as he had set himself up in the largest house in the village, from which he gave orders to all and sundry on account of his great humility. Having gained an audience and thoroughly inserted three blunt brown fingernails beneath the reputable person's ribs, the Father of Teeth inquired as to the justification for his elephantine falsehoods.
"I did no harm," said the reputable person, and the Father of Teeth wagged his forefinger in reproach. "Ouch," said the reputable person. "I meant no harm, I tell you. I intended only to provide an object-lesson in the imperfections of worldly perception. Ouch," he said again, for the Father of Teeth had pushed his fingers deeper. "Would you kindly moderate the thoroughness of your thoracic intrusions," said the reputable person. "I could hardly help noticing the disposition of your digits before you stuck them in, and as a vocal servant of the Creator my pleural cavity is nothing less than a spiritual asset."
"A rather imperfect and partial judgement," said the Father of Teeth, pushing his fingers a little further and groping about inside. "You see how inconvenient it can be," he said, "when all one has to go on is the touch of a hand?"
"He who has eyes to see, let him see," coughed the reputable person; so the Father of Teeth closed his fist tight and yanked it out, extracting several rather messy biological facts.