Three: Off To a Bumpy Start

Pipton steered our dingy to a corner of the island where the banks receded into a narrow inlet beneath its tree-fringe. The narrow inlet became a small river that wound its lithe serpantine self towards the center of the small island, the banks becoming nearer and nearer on either side until it seemed we would be able to go no further. But before my squinting eyes had any more time to wonder at the increasing impossibility of our passage, the river opened into a small bay, with thirty or so dinghies tied to several docks.

Bringing our own dinghy around to the last available spot, Pipton helped Willoughby and I out onto the landing platform before tying up the boat and ascending himself. By lantern-light, Pipton lead us down a small trail, at the end of which a faint glow could be detected, as though a congregation of fireflies had settled amognst the islands’ many interior trees.

As the light grew closer, so did the din of the cheeriest party you have never heard: even I did not know that hermits could be so very chatty! Finally arriving at the clearing, the scene was nothing if not jovial: Five long banquet tables, heaped with the most appetizing array of fruits, vegetables, nuts, loafs of bread, cakes, cheeses and pitchers of wine, encompassed a grassy dance-floor of sorts, where hermits danced, laughed, joked, frolicked and cart-wheeled.

Animals ran in circles, animals of all kinds: cats, dogs, rabbits, deer...a monkey or two. At the head of one of the tables, a koala bear looked on, amusedly chewing at a bit of Eucalyptus, and several different kinds of birds looked demurely on from nearby tree-branches, in mid-air conversation with each other.

I looked down at Willoughby and then at Pipton: we were all smiling as broadly as our faces would allow. Willoughby’s face allowed for the broadest grin of us three, and he set off without further ado to join in the romp himself.

Pipton and I began to make our way towards the tables. A large-eyed lady with ankle-length blonde braids and a beret conversed with a jolly-looking bearded man (I later found out that this man is, in fact, Santa Claus); three cloaked men (who otherwise might have been confused with Druids) were laughing so heartily over their wine and cheese that their faces were turned bright crimson; women in patch-work skirts gigged to flute music and men in top-hats disco-ed, children (or elfish, ageless-looking people) hoola-hooped, and from the trees on all sides, as I had naively observed, but hadn’t hoped to believe, millions and millions of fire-flies did, indeed, set the scene a-glow.

We were just coming to the second table when we heard someone call to Pipton. It was a short and gnarled man with twinkling eyes, who grinned a toothy grin and introduced himself as Jack.

“I am the host of this convention” he said “and just wanted to extend a hearty welcome to you. Pipton tells me that you are quite a brilliant writer, and, from the pieces of yours that I’ve had the luck to come across, I feel that there is a good chance that is true.”

I looked at Pipton in surprise, and then back at Jack to thank him....And then back to Pipton. How and when had he ever read my writing, I wondered. He just smiled his benevelont smile and twinkled his blue eyes at me.

Jack brought us over to his table and introduced us around. Afterwards, over wine and cheese, with sporadic intervals of dancing and frolicking, I was treated to the long story of their acquaintance, which had begun seventy-some years before in California, when California still had land to farm, small towns, and non-toxic beach sand with which it was still safe for little boys to build sand-castles.

The night was magical, that is until Pipton snuck off for something or other and, as the din of the party raged on unwitting, clutched his heart and fell silently to his death.

It didn’t take long for people to notice, and soon all the world’s hermits, and all of their animal friends were gathered in silent awe around his still body. I alone was weeping.

The reason for this is simple: hermits have long since done away with death as a natural part of their life progression (Camellia Buttersfirth, hermit and scientist extraordinaire, figured out how to get around THAT nasty human glich in the early 20th century) so, not as yet a hermit myself, I was the only one who felt the full impact of that antiquated equalizer.

When the ordeal was resolved and I was helped back to my hermitage, I reflected on the intensity of my feelings: it did seem strange that I was so affected, having only known Pipton for a single day. But I suspected there was more to the story. In a single day, I felt as though I had known him a lifetime, but perhaps I had known him an entire lifetime and it only felt like a single day.

By the time I fell asleep, traumatized though I was, I felt some kind of resolution. Afterall, Dante had had his Virgil and, I, Lima Bean (or whatever my name is), felt honored to have a Pipton Lear.

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