While it is possible to create bricks from many kinds of natural mud and clay the brickmaking industry currently relies on carefully measured cocktails of specific chemicals in fiercely guarded recipes. On several occasions whistleblowers who had attempted to share the brickmaking secrets have disappeared under strange circumstances.
Caption: While being a merchant of merit, and a tradester of verve, "Mr. Kolin Kelly" is not the wan eyed money maniac so often found among the empire of finance. He closes shop and goes forth to play.
[ID: Ignatz stands in front of the closed door of Kolin Kelly's Brick Yard. A sign nailed to the door reads, "Closed Indefinitely, Gone on Vacation." /end]
Ignatz: It's a nice time to go on a vacation, dah-gunnit!!! And I had promised myself that I'd use unusual gusto in tossing a "brick" at that "Krazy Kat" today. Dag-nabbit.
Caption: As for "Ignatz," we can only see things bleak, black & blank for him.
[ID: Ignatz leans grumpily on a tree trunk by the side of the road. /end]
Ignatz: My whole day is ruined. Just because "Kelly" takes a notion to go on a vacation.
Caption: Until - his acute ear catches certain sounds, full of that elusive intangibility from which "hope" is born.
[ID: Ignatz cups a hand to his ear to hear a conversation occurring below the cliff whose edge he stands near. /end]
Ignatz: ?
Pelican: And so, Dr. Zowl. You really think that the making of "bricks" is no art?
Dr. Zowl: I do indeed, sir. I consider it but a common craft.
Caption: "Dr. Y. Zowl" lets fall a word of cohesive cheer.
[ID: Ignatz stands beside Dr. Zowl, an owl, and the pelican he was talking to. /end]
Ignatz: And is it as easy as all that to make a "brick," Dr. Zowl?
Dr. Zowl: 4000 years ago, the lowest Egyptian could knead a hand full of clay, and bake it into a "brick." And I feel sure that today, with your intelligence, you could do as well.
Pelican: Golly, I bet even me, I could make a "brick." Who knows.
Caption: "Good intentions" travel slowly. Evil ones never lag in their purpose. If you'll notice, "Ignatz" works fast.
[ID: Ignatz pours a pitcher of water onto a small mound of clay he's dug out of the ground with a shovel. A rectangular loaf pan sits on the ground beside him. /end]
Ignatz: Just think. A bit of clay, and water.
[ID: Ignatz stares impatiently at the clay set inside the rectangular mold. /end]
Ignatz: Now to find some place to bake it.
[ID: Ignatz walks over to a dog with a chef's hat who gestures toward a brick oven behind him. /end]
Ignatz: And now, Mr. Piki. Could I bake it in your oven?
Mr. Piki: Sure, and it's all hot, and ready too.
Caption: "Krazy" enters, for a moment - bearing a cake of yeast.
["If you see the hand of fate in this, we'll say that you & we see the same things.]
[ID: Krazy bends over and drops the cake of yeast into Ignatz's brick. /end]
Krazy: Ain't it lucka I had this yeast cake just when somebody needed it?
[ID: Ignatz takes the loaf pan and places it into Mr. Piki's oven. /end]
Ignatz: That's awful nice of you, Mr. Piki.
Mr. Piki: You came to the right place. This is the best dawgun bake oven in "Coconino." And just you lay to that, now.
[ID: Ignatz and Mr. Piki wait around - Ignatz lying on the ground, Mr. Piki sitting on a log and looking at his pocket watch. /end]
Ignatz: Well, I guess it's about baked now, heh?
Mr. Piki: Yep, I guess it is. Let's go give a look.
[ID: They return to the oven and are shocked by what they see - Krazy's yeast caused the clay to grow uncontrollably and crack the oven in half. It looks sort of like a ceramic hamburger now. Clay even spurts out of the chimney on top. /end]
[ID: Mr. Piki furiously chases Ignatz down the road. Krazy, lying down on a rock by the side of the road, looks on. /end]
Ignatz: But Mr. Piki, it's all a mystery to me.
Mr. Piki: What I'm gonna do to you ain't gonna be no mystery to nobody.
Ignatz: L'il speedsta, how fleet he is among his foots, in a game of tag nobody can catch up at him.
[ID: Ignatz Mouse sculpts a pile of clay into the shape of a brick, patting it down with his hands. To his side rests a watering can, still dripping from the spout. /end]
Ignatz: With a dash of water, and a few hands full of clay, I will shape a "brick."
[ID: The sun beams down on Ignatz's homemade brick as he turns and admires it. /end]
Ignatz: Now, the dear old sun will dry it for me in an hour, or so.
[ID: Ignatz walks off. /end]
Ignatz: While it's drying, I'll toddle over to Mr. "Kelly's" brick yard, and tell him that I've decided to mould my own after this.
[ID: It begins raining. Ignatz stops, shocked, in his tracks. /end]
Ignatz: ?
[ID: He returns to the clay that would have been a brick. The rain has dissolved it, all that remains is a puddle. An arrow labels it "What was to have been a 'brick.'" /end]
[ID: Ignatz stands by the front door of Kolin Kelly's Brick Yard, ringing his doorbell. /end]
