My Fault?

Regular customer-mistress Ms Mukta Madam thinks it’s funny – initially at any rate – that my wooden footblock has disappeared beneath a layer of dirty snow. She asks me what I have done with it? And how do I expect her to present her boot to me for lickshining?

I apologise profusely to the customer-mistress, explaining most politely what she already surely knows – to wit that the footblock has become buried in the snow – and inviting her to kindly extend her foot beneath my face on top of the layer of snow, if she wouldn’t mind and if she would be so kind and understanding? I apologise again for the inconvenience.

She tuts and says that I am lucky the snow is deep enough for her not to have to hold her foot up in the freezing cold air in front of my face, as she is ‘unaccustomed to helping lazy slaves do their work’! She opines that I should be whipped for ‘allowing’ my footblock to become covered in snow, and why hadn’t I eaten the snow? Or melted it away with my dirty, stinking slave-breath? She then, thankfully, laughs, and says that on reflection she thinks having me taken out of my wall and publicly whipped in the town square would be too good for me in such freezing cold weather, as the whip would only help to warm up my back!

I thank customer-mistress Ms Mukta madam for her mercy and compassion towards me, and assure her that, footblock or not, my tongue shall endeavour to do a good job of lickshining her dirty boots. She then tells me to shut up and get on with it, using her gloved hand to point down towards certain dirty-snow stains on her boots that she wants licked off.

Afterwards, as she heads off towards the warm lights of the big city leaving me behind to freeze in my exposed, public-footlick pitch, I bow my head in shame, as she is clearly nota satisfied customer-mistress. She’s right – I should have done more to keep my wooden footblock clear of snow. I can only hope and pray that she won’t report me to the authorities for both my argumentative insolence and incompetence.

You can observe her pretty face as she walks away from me, her boots crunching through the snow. What do you think? Is she minded to report me and have me whipped? Am I at fault?