Answers continued

A while ago - aka 7 or 8 months or more - I posted the beginning of a story about the Four Great Thinkers of Europe. Having been struck by a particularly playful satirical mood quite often in the last few months, I decided to continue the story because, well, it makes me snicker. Since it's been so long since the first installment was posted I'll post the whole thing from the beginning. The new part starts with "Meanwhile, Liv Thatch finished a book." Comments appreciated. =)

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It was a Thursday when the four great thinkers of Europe set out to find the answers to the great existential questions of reality, said reality being kept by each man in a convenient carrying-sack.

For the compulsive-clock eater who desired so earnestly to add more time to his life, reality was a small ice pack at the bottom of his very large lunchbag containing numerous wristwatches and two alarm clocks. The pedagogue carried a certificate of authenticity shoved into each of his very old books, which he always carried awkwardly under his tweed elbow-patched arm. For the scientist, the only reality lay in the extendable pointer which he used to point out various pieces of evidence. (For weeks, the pointer had circled aimlessly around a hypothesis but had not been able to land anywhere - this confused the scientist greatly.) Straggling behind, as always, was a small man who was much younger than he looked, who carried nothing but the clothing upon his back save for one pair of sunglasses that never moved from their place perched atop his head.

The clock-eater, Harry, munched down on the small hand of a once-alarm-clock. Between bites and crunches, he muttered worries about whether or not the group were headed toward the right terminal - what if the right one ended up to be the left one, and then the world were all confused and no truth could ultimately be found? He ground his teeth furiously upon the clock-shards.

"Don't do that," snapped the scientist. "You merely suffer from a delusion, my friend."

"Freud says-" began the pedagogue - but he was cut off by the thud of one of his books upon the ground. "Drat!" he exclaimed as he stooped to pick it up. His legs were sore from all that stooping. The only good that would come of it, surely, would be toned thighs. A pedagogue cannot afford not to be in shape and healthy, for he must be around to pass down knowledge and other such whatnots.

The sunglassed man was named David. "Like the king," he would say. The one to whom he was speaking might enquire if he meant Elvis; in this case, the man would erupt into a tirade about how no one knew anymore the important religious figures and "this clearly showed," would continue the pedagogue, "the decline of spirituality in this the modern age..."

The scientist shuffled his feet. The line was too long. The world was quite overpopulated. Evolution had gone to people's heads. He stared in spite at their baseball caps and - and - things. He wanted to throw a book at the people who stood in his way in line. He glanced at the pedagogue's stack like a hungry man ogling a mushroom pizza.

"Please, will you kindly cease to ogle my collection?" said the pedagogue with characteristic assuredness that his collection was the most important thing in the world and no one should dare ogle it, or do anything to it that sounded so vulgar. "My, my!" he changed tracks. "This line is mightily long!"

"Mighty like the wrath of God is," said the sunglassed man - David - solemnly.

"Wrath?" burst the clock-eater. He was done with his small hand and had no diversion from thoughts about wrath, truth, etc. "Will the torments never cease?"

"Theoretically-" began the scientist and the pedagogue at the same time.

"Shutup!" said David. They had reached the front of the line and were about to be searched. In past it had always taken a very long time for this process to succeed because of the metal bits on Harry's clocks setting off the alarm, the pedagogue's books having to be each opened and examined, the scientist's pointer having to be handed over - he watched it nervously as it passed hand to hand - biting his nails until he got it back. David stepped through relaxedly and came out clean.

The scientist was watching the pedagogue's books as they were being flipped through by security.

"Stop ogling my books!!" yelled the pedagogue.

The security men stopped for a bit and stared at the pedagogue.

"No, not you," said the proper pedagogue. "Him."

They stared at the scientist.

"I am an empiricist!" said man of science asserted.

The books were ruffled through one last time and handed back over to the pedagogue. He snatched them readily and resisted the urge to smash the clock that Harry had just surreptitiously snuck from his bag and started to nibble on.

Harry's eyes widened. "Don't tell," he said.

The pedagogue swore not to.





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Meanwhile, Liv Thatch finished a book. She had liked the language, but she was a bit annoyed because the ugly heroine had turned out to be beautiful. It seemed like no matter how ugly the heroine started out being, it just so happened that she really was beautiful after all by the end of the book. Just once, Liv would like for the ugly heroine to just end up plain - but as Liv looked in the mirror, she realized that if she were the ugly heroine, she would not desire such an end for herself. Maybe characters really did write books, instead of authors.

Liv had red hair that looked pretty on Sundays and skin that was all right for most of the year but which turned bad in June. She considered the most valuable part of her appearance to be her smallish waist that could be smaller (no cake after dinner, no cake after dinner). The best compliment that anyone had ever given Liv was that she vaguely resembled Scarlett O'Hara, but the person who had bestowed this resemblance upon her could not figure out why. Really, Liv looked nothing like Scarlett O'Hara, but she still treasured the supposition.

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Downstairs, the doorbell rang. Liv Thatch hurled herself at the door, not bothering to first check who was behind it, because she was expecting a friend. When she yanked open the door, then, she was very surprised to behold a group of four men, all of whom except one were very well-turned-out. The exception was wearing sunglasses and stood at the back of the group.

Liv stared. She thought about closing the door but decided that maybe they were tax collectors. Were there still tax collectors? Oh no, maybe they were Jehovah's witnesses. She would just tell them she had already been converted by the last group that stopped by...

"Hello!" cheerily spoke the man at the head of the group, a thin figure with wafty, nondescript hair and a large but not unbecoming nose. He only looked awkward because he was carrying a number of ungainly textbooks beneath one arm. "What is your name?"

"Who are you looking for?" asked Liv.

"We are," began the man - his expression suddenly turning solemn...

"We are searching for the answers to the existential truths-" interrupted the un-well-turned-out man from the back. His eyes had gone a little crazed, at least in Liv's opinion, so she started to shut the door -

"Stop!" burst one of the other men. He prevented her closing the door by shoving a metal pointer between the door and its closure.

Liv stared up at the men with big eyes. She was starting to get afraid, although she considered herself not easily scared. Surely the men were a bunch of lunatics. What had that sunglassed one been blabbing on about? Liv moved her foot in order to get the pointer out of the way of the door, but by this time the thin man had shoved his elbow and the textbooks under it into the foyer and Liv simply could not close the door.

"Please - stop -" entreated Liv, but there was a regular commotion going on now (not like there is anything regular about commotions - or is there? One may never know exactly). The book-carrying man and the pointer-sticking man were forcing their way into the house with, well, force, and the sunglassed man was coming in not far behind. A quiet man who had not yet spoken hovered on the doorstep, seemingly waiting for things to stop being crazy so that he could -

Liv was frantic. Men were breaking into her house! This was never how she had pictured a break-in. Surely there must be windows shattered and the crime must be done while no one was home, not while she was standing right there. What were they going to do?

Before she knew what she was doing, Liv started to cry. Oh, it was humiliating. She hated crying in public. But what did she care? Men were breaking into her house! She started to yell, a great sobbing yell: "Help! Help!"

A neighbor came dashing across the street. "Liv!" he exclaimed. "What-?"

"They're breaking in!" shrieked Liv, who was not accustomed to shrieking - but then, she did not feel as though she was doing any of the things she was accustomed to doing.

"What!" said the neighbor again. This was very odd. "Go - go call the police, I'll - ?"

"STOP!" a voice came from within. Liv and the neighbor turned and looked.

The man with the pointer was back outside. "We are not breaking in," he said with surety. "We are soliciting the neighborhood to find out the answers to the existential truths of reality."

The neighbor looked at Liv with a helpless expression. There was nothing he could do to ward off lunatics. Liv stood there thinking that everyone was particularly idiotic today.

"Now, we are sorry to have disturbed you," the man said to Liv, waving his pointer about. "But this is a matter of urgency. As our friend Harry can tell you, time is ticking."

The quiet man stuck his head out of the door. Liv tried to make out what he was holding in his hand. A weapon! No... no... A clock. A very small clock.

"Get out of my house!" yelled Liv.

"Get - get out of her house!" screamed the brave neighbor.

His loud yell attracted more neighbors than the rest of the commotion had. All of the block was now standing at the bottom of Liv's steps. The man with the pointer pointed his pointer around at each of them, until he tired of doing that and used the pointer as a cane to lean on on the step.

"Will everyone kindly disperse?" asked the man.

No one dispersed, especially not kindly. A few neighbors had already phoned the police and sirens approached.

"No, not again," said the man vaguely.

And the four were all carted off.


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A prison cell, thought David, could perhaps be an opportune place for considering the existential truths of reality. Had not Joseph been chained as a slave? Had not Sarai been prisoner in the Pharaoh's harem? But David soon realized that, since he was not Joseph, and since he was most assuredly not Sarai, the prison scene was not nearly so encouraging.

"Oh, what a crisis this is," bemoaned he.

The pedagogue was sitting in the far corner, grumbling and generally looking to be in very bad spirits. He was trying to read one of his books for the fortieth time, but not having much success as the scientist kept clanging his pointer against the cell's bars, trying to get the guard's attention. Apparently the scientist was in the mood for a good review of Darwin and the pedagogue would not let him use his books, so the scientist was about to ask the guard if any of these books were in the prison, by any chance?

Harry crunched down on a pocketwatch.

Time elapsed (so the remaining clocks in Harry's bag indicated). Finally the scientist stopped rapping and yelling about, and he retreated into the corner opposite the pedagogue, staring longingly at the pedagogue's books once more, and consistently moaning about how uneducated modern prison guards must be, to refuse to listen to the earnest entreaties of a man of science. The pedagogue soon tired of the pathetic sound of the scientist's speech, and hurled a book at him. The scientist grabbed it hopefully but became much dejected when he realized that the book was neither The Origin of Species nor The Descent of Man, but was instead The Pilgrim's Progress, which was certainly no use to the scientist.

Suddenly the pedagogue looked up from his book. He had remembered something that the four great thinkers should certainly have discussed, and was sure that it was his duty to bring it up.

"That girl was awfully rude."

The others nodded their agreement.

But the discussion got nowhere.

"I mean," said the pedagogue, adopting airs of the loftiest degree, "The youth today have no interest in educating themselves. She was probably eager to return to - to - something disreputable. She excluded us in an effort to exclude knowledge from entering her ignorant world." And, feeling like he had said something very good, even prophetic, he leaned back and rested against the wall.

"Surely," took up the scientist in airs, if less prophetic, certainly equally lofty, "It is a psychological construct. How old was she, do you think? Fourteen, fifteen?" (Liv was nineteen.) "She must have been acting out as an outward representation of the internal struggle to cling to childhood, and by barring us from entering her peaceful world, she was showing classic adolescent rebellion against adult knowledge. She must have a firm attachment to her parents, still, showing a lack of development. Such attachment at such a late age can only be a sign of psychological trauma-"

"Oh, for if you love anyone too much these days, you must be disturbed." All of the men looked up upon hearing this decidedly female interruption - they were shocked to see none other than the red-haired girl who had barred them from her home standing right there on the other side of the bars.

David sprang to his feet. "This is a sign!" he exalted.

Harry swallowed the last bit of his pocketwatch-chain with a great gulp.

"What are you doing here?" asked the scientist - who was rather miffed at having been interrupted.

"I figured that, since you're all safely behind bars and guarded, and pose no threat to me, I might as well come down as see what you were on about," said the girl.

"What is your name?" asked the pedagogue.

"Liv Thatch." But someone went by wheeling a cart and it was difficult to hear what she had said.

"Olive patch?" said the pedagogue.

"There is no such thing as an olive patch," said the scientist disdainfully.

"No. Liv Thatch. That's my name. Olivia Thatch," said she.

"Oh," the men all said together.

"So what were you doing at my house?" said Liv, who was, when not in almost-hysterical fear, greatly entertained by the prospect of these four British lunatics.

"We were trying to find the answers to the-"

"Truths of existential reality," finished Liv. "I heard you. But what on earth were you doing trying to find the answers to the truths of existential reality at my doorstep?"

"We reasoned," took up the scientist in grave tones, "that by going door-to-door throughout the continent, we could serve to educate the masses on their current state of being, and enlighten them to seek the path of reason and knowledge. We also expected that, perhaps, by searching their homes and their minds both, we would be granted the ability to discern what it is that modern society is wanting, and replenish the stores of illustrious knowledge with our own earnest research."

Liv went into a fit of laughter.

"Oh, so this is what an existential crisis looks like!" she exclaimed. "It's terribly funny."

This daring expression caused an immediate outcry amongst the company - with each member ejaculating such violent exclamations as, "Heresy!", "How insipid!", "Why - !", and added to these was the resonant sound of the violent crunching of an antique mahogany timepiece. Then the general sentiment was finally summarized in the words of the pedagogue as he cried, "How can you so eagerly disclaim the work of great minds?!"

Liv, however, was resistant to such attacks - for the only thing she found as amusing as existential crises was extreme arrogance. And so there was rather a lull in the conversation, Liv letting an occasional smile flit across her face, and the four Great Thinkers of Europe each stewing in his own particular way inside the prison cell. Finally, seeing that no more ejaculations or lamentations were to come from the jailed housebreakers, Liv took herself away, quietly snickering as she left.

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There was yet to be salvation for the low-spirited thinkers, though. At half past one that very day, an anonymous doner paid the small fee of their bail, and so the caged company was finally released.

As they stepped out into the sunlight, I am sure that a number of praises were expressed, reproofs of jail life uttered, and that the entire group eventually agreed to return to their solemn mission with renewed and even increased devotion - but, having lately seen the four so animated and expressive of their most firm opinions, the reader can be spared a more lenghthy description of their exact words.

After their confinement, the four were understandably very hungry. After a brief period of deliberation, they decided to go to a café. They found one with a fair prospect looking over the bay, and there sat down comfortably to sip coffee and eat pastry (what else for such prodigious thinkers?)