My confidence had suffered a great loss of esteem that day due most in part to the poor review I had recieved from Prof. Lonney.

Lonney, being a thin and suirrelly man -- a vegetarian I am told -- is of the sort who undeniably had suffered from inadiquacy and great torment throughout his childhood. The top of his head seemed to me swollen and malformed. Assuredly his inadiquacy resulted in great pride and fefence ofver his positioned power as instructor and he would undoubtably berate any who feel their mind of the matter superior to his own.

It is for this reason that Lonney felt it necessary to defame my masterpiece as being unsatisfactory.

Had I been a new student, unaccustomed to composition or logic, I would have taken to heart his dissatisfaction with my writing. But, because I have confidence in my ability, I ascertained that such an insult was certainly a jibe at my own character. It is the weakest of men who assail the art of the man they loathe, yet whilst retaining an unmoving countenance.

Lonny, I know, had wronged by being, putting me in a mood of despondence, lost, questioning my own personage. What had he found so overbearing or threatening about me? I admit I put myself over other students with some leverage, but had I been too unjustly pomp?

In times such at this, I miss my home town, Gring's Mill. I wanted the embrace of my mother -- dead-- a pat on the back from my father -- insane-- or even something from my sister -- who has left with that man.

Gring's Mill owns a cool breeze even in the oppressive heat of summer. The soil of the place has always a dampness which smells of the aura of a newly sprouted basil leaf or the saltless smell of a river after most of its fish had dug themselves in. Trees are everywhere -- oak, maple, pine -- and make seeing the sun a task in the greener months. There is a river there -- now dwindled to that of a creek, but still known as a river-- called the Tulpehocken, an ancient native name, no doubt, which ran so plump with fishes and elderly men who wished to catch them in the summertime.

I made my way to the University's library, hoping to find some trace, some vision of home within its books. I asked the woman at the wooden desk, an old airy woman, whether any books existed with my desired information.

She had but one book concerning the history of the Gring's Mill region, which he admitted shamefully, but I was entirely satisfied of the existence of any book on the topic at all. In sixteen years, I had never known of any history of Gring's Mill. It seemed to me that what was, had been and ever will be.

I took the directed book in my private nook to read the work, and what I had found astonished me. For what a delight a man has when he grasps the knowledge he seeks and more!

Most of the book had been overrun by drab history, founders and businesses, rivers and fish. But its history of a local -- now forgotten -- legend is what quenched the void Lonny had dug me earlier.

It was the history of Ms. Polly Kiss, the daughter of Gring Kiss, the founder of the original Mill. I will recount... Nay, ENHANCE!... the story of Ms. Kiss, the legendary woman of Gring's Mill.

Polly was astirred from her brief and shallow slumber on the living room sofa by a loud knocking. Her bright green eyes opened to the tooth-white ceiling. There has not been but one day those men have stopped building, not even through the thunder storm last week. She rolled on her side, sighing.

"Must they, must they, must they keep up that racket? Could they not make a smaller footpath, like the one they have in Bern?" said Polly, dusting strands of her thick dark hair from her face.

"Polly, the men must do their work, do you not get enough sleep at night? And we need a large bridge because commercial vans hope to pass this way, and the commercial vans hope to pass this way, and the anthracite boats must be able to make their way down the Tulpehocken without scraping a bridge set in the way. It is a very big project, try to cope my dear, it will not be long til it is soon over." said Gring kiss, her father and owner of the mill by the river.

Polly swept to her back again, closing her eyes and squeezing her palms to her ears. The local boy children looked at her like a goddess. Her face as pale as pearls and long dark hair which swooped over her forehead. She curled her back making a small bridge of her own over the sofa cushion, letting out a loud yawn and collapsing bac into her beautiful half sleep.

She was well educated and, in fact, was the most intelligent person in the small town. She had attended two years of university in the city of Philadelphia, studying psychology. She had written a pamphlet there which was included in the University's curriculum and she was well paid for her insights. With her profits she purchased a camera, one of the first of its kind, and she hobbied herself by taking pictures of the Tulpehocken river and interviewing/photographing revolutionary war veterans in the nearby city of Reading, which was booming with commerce. Although she was disallowed to graduate from her university with a degree, she was still very highly regarded by the men of study and often received letters from them regarding, usually, her influential work in psychology.

However, it was one man, Dr. Peter Lonney -- coincidence, I am sure -- who sent her an occasional love letter:

"Polly, my love;

It has been now a year since you have replied to me. My dear, do you not see that I yearn? It is cruel that you leave me here, in Philadelphia, alone, to cry each night I cannot see your green budding eyes. To forget the love of a kind man is more than a venial offense, in my eye! Dear, it is for you that I weep, to hear you speak, even of your nonsense drivel of the brain, is all I ask! Please please, love, allow me to visit you, or come visit me, so that I can just be happy in seeing you again. Oh, I am reminded of your warm breath and it tries me so! Please, do not leave this letter, like the rest, without Reply.

Til then, I am, as ever, yours.

Peter"

Dr. Lonney's letters were kept neatly underneath Polly's bead. SHe read them when she felt alone, which was more often than not. Fear, however, thralled from inside her when she considered her father's reaction to her finding love, leaving him alone with the mill. She couldn't do this to the old loving man, but she also yearned for Dr. Lonney.

The two, as youths at the university, had shared their first kisses in the bell tower in old City Hall, where Peter had worked in order to afford the measly apartment above his uncles tavern. She had been afflicted to him ever since.

For months the thumping of the men's hammers had ceased when Polly had decided that she could no longer restrain her passion:

"Dearest Peter,

Forgive Me! For I fear that I have been far too restrained. Peter, I love you, I must see you again! Forgive me!"

Within the week, Dr. Lonney had arrived.

There was a knocking at the door.

"Father, I will get it. It is for me... a student... here to interview me." she opened the door and immediately pursed her finger over Peter's lips and pushed him slowly out the door, shushing him.

She closed the door and there he stood, tall and slender, with a bulging forehead with defined temples, draped with his thick, almost wet hair. He begun to speak, but she shushed him again and directed him to the bridge.

She returned that night paler and alone. Her father insisted she explain her absence, but she said nothing. Her head simply swayed side to side as her feet heavily clapped the floor.

Mr. Kiss could hear his daughter clop up the stairs into her bedroom. She sat on her bed weeping. The high pitched shrieks she made when inhaling another breath strained into her maning whelps of agony. My poor dear, what types of interviews do tese universities hold? He rubbed his baled spotted head.

The next morning she had not emerged from her bedroom, nor did she for the rest of the day. She asked her father politely to leave her food by her doorstep and to not ask questions. He agreed and followed her instructions.

The next morning there was a letter outside of her door which she asked her father to mail. He agreed and followed her instructions.

He returned from the post office to find that his daughter remained in her bedroom. He asked why she remained inside, had she not felt well? But she was harshly apprehensive and scolded her father for asking questions.

Their days remained this way for many days, weeks. Some days she had letters, other days she had none. The university had stopped mailing her, perhaps she had bumbled up that interview.

However, after months of this ongoing lassitude from Polly, Mr. Kiss became irate. He called doctors and psychologists which she deftly refused to see. When a letter came for her, he quickly intercepted it. It read:

"Ms. Kiss,

Your theories lack merit and I will not forgive you for your brash actions. I wish to never see you again and I defy the day in which we have met. My love will not be taken for granted and I will not stand for a loony psychologist woman berating my studies with her photography! Art has no place in the studies, dear, and I wish you happiness.

Thank you for all,

Dr. Peter Lonney"

My daughter is heartbroken, I see! Thought Mr. Kiss. He accepted that there is little he could do to ameliorate his daughter's affliction. He became disconcerted with Polly's strife.

Polly stepped from her room for the first tim ein the winter. Holding in her arm a large basket and had a large scarf wrapping her head. It was past midnight so she stepped softly down the stairs and through the front door. She cautiously walked down the rocky street towards the red wooden planked bridge, shuttering at the sight of it.

Her eyes seemed to glow an unnatural redness and as she sucked her breaths in the spit beside her tongue gargled. She stepped with conviction, towards the red-wooden planked bridge, which was now well-travelled by vans carrying goods and passed by the anthracite boats in the river below. Altogether it was about thirty feet from the frigid waters.

The bridge was covered and there were bats making their horrid nests within. As she stepped the squeaking of these malformed creatures grew. The boards of wood moaned beneath her obviously larger frame.

She came to a white wood lined window and set her large basket on the wide sill overlooking the river.

From the basket, she pulled from the ankle one cooing baby -- newborn and small -- and immediately tears stemmed from the side of her still glowing eyes.

After carefully examining the child through the darkness, she began to man and moan, until she began to laugh. Then holding the baby by the ankle she dropped the small thing into the cold water below.

It let out a gasp just before its naked body hit the water. Just then hysteric crying was heard, not from the river, or Polly, but from the large basket she was carrying.

A second baby flown into wild hysteria. Somehow it knew its doom.

Polly shuttered as she saw a man with a lantern on the bridge.

"P... Poll... Polly! What in God's name are you doing?!" screamed Mr. Kiss.

But Polly wrapped the crying baby in her thick nightdress and lept into the frozen water below. Her laughter deafened the ears of her bewildered father.

It is said that when investigated, Polly's room was covered with photographs of her nude body, her breasts and stomach swelling as her pregnancy commenced. As well, there was a torn envelope with photographs of the foreheads of several local men with Dr. Lonny's name written upon it. There was also a journal with a tale benefitting the extent of her torture. Finally, after a sound was heard, the investigators found an emaciated and dehydrated baby with the greenest eyes and the largest, swollen forehead.

END