Sir Toby’s: the Christmas Special edition
In a dingy, ill-lit basement room at the hostel, the suave young man had been wrapping Christmas presents in selections of seasonally decorated wrapping paper. The presents were identical. They were all copies of his latest book, hot off the press in time for the Christmas rush: presents bought elsewhere in many a dismal shopping mall by desperate relatives of obscure theologians, relatives who annually racked their brains as to what to give the odd black sheep of the family this year. The young man’s Christmas gift list was copious, and this year he would not be found wanting, or joining the last minute frenzy at the three-for-one shelves of Waterstones. ‘Besides,’ he thought, ‘The gift will provide a unique memento of the giver!’ And he smiled to himself as he scribbled out another gift tag.
Seasonally piped music was playing outside in the corridor, and could clearly be heard along with the shuffle of footsteps and banging of doors as theologians made their way off the wet, cold streets, backpacks shouldered, for their annual convocation. Downstairs, the usual paper chains had been extracted from their boxes, and festooned the walls and ceilings of the communal room, which was slowly filling with theologians from all corners of the world – old and new. A rising murmur of conversation from around the tables accompanied the growing miasma of thick blue smoke from clay-pipes, and the reassuring thud of many a solid clay krug, banged to the table after a variety of noxious locally brewed ales had been quaffed to the full.
The Trappist and the Old Man, whose adventures had last been recounted as they made their way in the evening rush-hour from Prague Central station to some undisclosed destination, were even now rattling and swaying their way towards the hostel through reassuringly familiar streets in the equally reassuring enclosed and packed space of the Krymska tram. At the hostel, they had only to be joined by the Antipodean and the Eastern Monk, and the recently self-constituted pentavirate would be complete.
A new generation of eager young novitiates had flown in on packed red-eye flights from the New World, anxious to absorb the wisdom of their elderly confederates amidst the spires and towers of this capital of the old world, with its strangely exhilarating central European mixture of beauty and sinister menace. Anxious also to challenge, to sharpen their wits against the elderly guardians of theological wisdom and authority, and like stags in the rutting season, seeking their opportunity, perhaps, to mount that final charge which would establish their own supremacy amongst the herd. It was such undercurrents of conflict and hidden agendas which lent a frisson of tension to the otherwise comfortable communal glow of the gathering.
As the members of the cabal divested themselves of their pointed hats, theological cloaks, and baggage in rooms around the hostel, and sat down at places left vacant for such an opportunity in the communal room, the hum of conversation gradually subsided, and many a young theological mind wondered whence and in what direction the rapier thrust of theological enquiry would commence on this occasion.
Re: Sir Toby's: the (early) Christmas Special edition
"I can’t help but wonder," the Old Man confided to the Trappist, "what different course might have laid itself before us had we followed a slightly different trajectory. The inn would be here of course, and so would we, but perhaps the table decorations would have been different. Tell me: have you read it?"
"You mean these?" The Trappist, frowning, gestured vaguely toward the unopened parcel he had placed on the table before him. "Yes, of course. After all, I play a significant part in the unfolding drama." He took a short draw from his long pipe and sputtered briefly. "It seems I am the Adversary."
"Ah, it’s a story, is it?"
"A very convoluted story, winding its way from antiquity toward the climactic appearance of a Savior and the subsequent destruction of the holy city and the scattering of its inhabitants, from whence the story winds down a few narrow alleyways until it all but disappears in a miasma of prevarication and sophistry. My character insists that, instead of collapsing onto itself, the alley opens outward and branches repeatedly until it traverses the entire world. I am rebuffed, of course, outdueled and chastened and dismissed by the hero of the piece."
The Old Man didn’t need to ask who the hero might be. He untied the gilt ribbon and white paper and tried to make sense of the title: "In:Comprehensible:Neo:Tribalism:In:a:Post:Neo:Tribe." He opened the front cover, noting the author’s signature on the frontispiece, which had apparently been affixed by an inked stamp, unadorned by any sort of personal message. Suddenly overcome by fatigue, the Old Man glanced across the room toward the suave young Westerner, surrounded by many of the novitiates, silently holding court while animated conversation swirled about him.
"So, my ancient friend, where have your wanderings taken you since last we parted ways?" For a time the two of them had considered traveling together to some of those obscure corners of the world that had in times past been sites of veneration and pilgrimage. But the Trappist had found it impossible to disengage from persistent conflicts to which he had committed his energies.
"As you know, my dear contemplative, I am drawn to the arcana of your venerable sect. The three-in-one. The logos. The incarnate divine. The human propensity to transgress. The complicity of law therein. The corruption of the world. And, of course, the beginning. Fascinating."
"Have you drawn any conclusions that might enlighten us? Have you written any more of your legendary scrolls?"
The Old Man nodded toward the passage leading to the scullery. There, affixed to the wall and bespattered with orts and grease, a parchment hung from the wall.
"It had entirely escaped my notice," the Trappist acknowledged. "Tell me: has it been well-received? Have you engaged in stimulating discussion and debate?" The Trappist rubbed his hands together in anticipation of a lively intellectual exchange punctuated by the odd bit of gossip.
"For the most part I’ve heard grumblings from those who, having read the first few paragraphs of my scroll, chastised me for pursuing such an ill-conceived investigation. I must say, the Eastern Monk has proven himself an astute and independent theologian. He positions himself inside the camp as it were, yet his thoughts range freely. He has traveled widely, it seems." The Old Man quaffed deeply from his flagon. "The young Anarchist too has shown insight, as has the Jacobin."
"Anarchist?"
"You know him?" The Old Man jabbed his thumb toward a very young and earnest looking fellow browsing through some of the Apocryphal writings that lined the dusty shelves of the common room.
"Ah yes," the Trappist smiled. "Not Anarchist. Enarchay. Greek for ‘in the beginning.’"
"Really? Was he there, then? I must speak with him further. I had the impression he was more interested in the middle and the end. Another fellow stopped in, an itinerant unitarian witness of some indeterminate affiliation. We had a delightful but brief exchange, the three of us…"
"What about him?" With his finger the Trappist underlined the name stamped onto the book’s first page.
Sinking lower in his chair, the Old Man removed his wire-framed spectacles and rubbed his face in his hands. "At first he engaged in a heated dispute with a group of Inquisitors who regarded my project as heretical — which of course is not really my concern. Having ably defended my right to say what I had to say, he moved on to other concerns. At one point he did point out to me what he regarded as an error in my interpretation of particular Biblical text, citing one of his own prior writings as definitive. When, after reviewing the salient passages cursorily, I endeavored to engage him in conversation, I realized that he was gone."
"Perhaps it’s just as well," the Trappist sighed, reaching across the table for a handful of roasted chestnuts.
"Tell me, friend," the Old Man said, visibly lifting himself from his doleful reverie: "What news do you bring? What adventures have befallen you?"
Re: Sir Toby's: the (early) Christmas Special edition
Please excuse my ignorance and interruption, but who exactly is this Mr. Sir Toby?
Re: Sir Toby's: the (early) Christmas Special edition
Historical note: As far as I know the first mention of Sir Toby’s is to be found in this post.The legend of the place begins fairly early in the thread, then other concerns predominate until near the end, when the inn’s alternate reality as a sort of quasi-medieval monastery reveals itself. The theologians returned to Sir Toby’s last Christmas and again a couple months later. The curious reader will find references to other adventures at Sir Toby’s by using OST search.
Though the inn is a gathering-place for an ever-changing assortment of theologians from the four corners of the earth, five figures have so far established relative permanence: the suave young Westerner, the Trappist, the Antipodean, the Eastern Monk, and the Old Man. Some have suggested that each of these theologians is in fact the alter-ego of a regular contributor to OST. Such speculations are, of course, preposterous. Sir Toby’s occupies a spectral realm between reality and fantasy, consequently it is in constant danger of disappearing altogether. Anyone who can see the inn in his or her mind’s eye is a welcome visitor and contributor to the conversation, which goes on perpetually and can erupt into OST space at any time.
Re: Sir Toby's: the (early) Christmas Special edition
“News? Adventures?” replied the Trappist, sighing wearily. “Would that it were so. My supposed peregrinations, including a feigned death, transportation in a coffin to an obscure chapel in an equally obscure society of learning in an English university town, flight to Paris, Balkan lecture tour, return to Prague, defenestration in a coffin into the Vlatava, return to the Inn, migration to a gentleman’s club in St James’s Place in London, philosophical conversations in a chip shop and within the National Gallery of the said metropolis: alas, all these are no more than figments of my imagination transmitted to papyrus by reed pen; a literary invention; a sham.”
“What, all invented?” spluttered the Sage.
“Entirely,” said the Trappist, gazing into his Guinness. “I was here all the time. I never left the portals of this venerable institution. I was in my room, with my books, occasionally changing the message on my callminder, to convey the impression of infrequent visits and departures.”
The Elderly Sage looked down in his flagon, and raised it to his tremulous lips, then banged it down onto the table. “But this is preposterous!” He muttered.
“Yes, indeed,” replied the Contemplative. “But if my adventures have been no more substantial than my dreams, then you also, my bardic friend, have been no more than a fantasy, or maybe a phantasm of a dream. For you also have remained imprisoned in this place of dreams, no more a voyager to Samarkand than to Timbuctoo. We are no more than figments of each other’s highly active imaginations.”
The Bard pondered these remarks whilst allowing the soothing, soporific effects of his brew to swirl around his brain, softening the shocking impact of the Trappist’s revelations. Together they grieved over the web of illusion which they had spun over their lives, now exposed for the first time as a web of deceit and sophistry.
The reverie was interrupted suddenly by the looming presence of one dressed in dark attire, with a long white apron suspended from his neck, and shirtsleeves rolled to the elbows. In his hand was held a piece of paper, which he waved threateningly at the duo. It was the unpaid bill of their libations, not only for that night, but many previous nights; and an estimate of unpaid days’ and nights’ sojourn at the Inn.
“To the scullery?” said the Trappist.
“Inevitably,” said the Sage.
Wearily, the two rose to their feet, as they had done on many previous occasions, and made their way down the well-worn steps to a lower basement room where piles of crockery, flagons and clay krugs awaited their customary ablutions.
Rolling up their sleeves, the Trappist at one stone sink, the Sage at the other, the pair began the long evening’s task of paying their bills by adopting, for the time being, the lowly role of scullions.
From a window, high up in the basement room, floated sounds of a more ethereal nature. The music cohered from disembodied notes into a recognisable tune, a Christmas melody, sung as with the voices of angels: ‘The First Noel, the angels did say - - -,’. For those who had ears to hear, the entire kitchen cellar was flooded with the heavenly sound. The countdown to Christmas was underway.
Re: Sir Toby's: the (early) Christmas Special edition
The Old Man swiped his greasy rag ineffectually across the outside of a krug and set it aside to dry. "Let’s suppose for a moment that your theory is true: I imagine you and you imagine me; when we imagine one another simultaneously we engage in conversation together, undertake adventures together, together fan the embers of fellowship and scholarship — perhaps also of resentment and competitiveness — that glow perpetually in the hearth of Sir Toby’s, ever on the verge of bursting into full blaze or of extinguishing themselves entirely. Are we to regard these imaginings as mere vanities we toss into the formless void, the expression of vain hopes that distract us from the vast emptiness in which we are immersed and that fills us to the brim?" The old Sage swirled another vessel in the grease-befilmed water, emptied it, and inspected it under the dim light emitted by the single 25-watt bulb that provided the scullery’s only illumination.
Suddenly the door leading from the common room swung open and another familiar figure came into view…
Re: Sir Toby's: the (early) Christmas Special edition
It was, of course, the Westerner - now garbed in knee-breeches, a sword hanging from his intricately carved belt. His shoes were of expensive Italian leather with large, gleaming buckles. A cape was slung rakishly across his shoulders; on his head was a tricorn hat, from which an ostrich plume extravagantly protruded. The whole presented a dandyish, almost coquettish, and certainly theatrical appearance.
With one foot at the top of the stairs, the other on the first step down, he inclined towards the two below at their sinks, a hand theatrically extended towards them, and uttered:
“Sages! Leave your contemplations; brighter visions beam afar; seek the desire of the nations - ye have seen his natal star.”
The Trappist turned to the Sage, and they exchanged knowing glances. The former wiped his hands on a greasy cloth, which he draped carefully over the edge of the sink, and moved towards the great table in the middle of the scullery. Leaning against it, he found his centre of balance, and ponderously gave utterance.
“I was a traveller once upon the moor; I saw the hare that raced about with joy; I heard the woods and distant waters roar - or heard them not, as happy as a boy. But as it sometimes chances, from the might of joy in minds that can no further go, as high as we have mounted in delight, in our dejection do we sink as low. We poets in our youth begin in gladness, but thereof come in the end despondency and madness.”
The Sage, at this point, moved quickly towards stairs, placing himself between the Westerner and the Contemplative, and extended his arms, as it were, in a gesture protective of the Trappist (now downstage of him), saying:
“My liege!” And with this he made a long, low bow, sweeping the floor with his outreached hand as a sign of obeissance. “To expostulate what theology should be, what exegesis is, why day is day, night night, and time is time were nothing but to waste night, day and time. Therefore, since brevity is the soul of wit, and tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes, I will be brief. The Contemplative is mad. Mad call I it, for to define true madness, what is’t but to be nothing else but mad? But let that go.”
“More matter with less art!” said the Westerner impatiently.
“Mad let us grant him then; and now remains that we find out the cause of this defect, for this effect defective comes by cause. To the purpose: I prescripts gave him, and being thus repelled, a short tale to make, he fell into a sadness, then into a fast, thence to a watch, thence into a weakness, thence to a lightness, and by this declension, into this madness wherein now he raves, and we all mourn for.”
“Vainly we offer each ample oblation,” mused the Trappist. “Vainly with gifts would His favour secure.”
“Precisely!” pronounced the Westerner, and waving his hat with a flourish, pointed it towards the high basement window, through which the celestial harmonies still poured. “So let us even now go and see this thing which is come to pass. If we get our skates on, we should just catch the 10.40 tram to the city centre.”
Instantly and obediently, the duo divested themselves of their aprons, hanging them on a peg behind the door, and speedily mounted the worn brick stairway to the communal room, where, joined by the remaining two of the Cabal, they donned theological hats and cloaks (for it was a cold night), and left the hostel through the thick glass doors of the foyer - recently redesigned in a contemporary art deco style.
In line, five obscure figures shrouded in their cloaks made their way down the dark street to the tram stop, their silhouetted forms punctuated only by their five pointed hats. A brilliant full moon shone through the clear, frosty night sky. From a nearby rooftop an owl hooted - but whether in celebration or derision, it was impossible to say.
Re: Sir Toby's: the (early) Christmas Special edition
The frost performs its secret ministry, unhelped by any wind. The owlet’s cry came loud — and hark, again! loud as before.
"Bald heads forgetful upon their sins," the Antipodean muttered, his icy breath encircling his head like a halo as the five passed beneath a streetlamp. "Old, learned, respectable bald heads edit and annotated the lines that young men, tossing on their beds, rhymed out in love’s despair to flatter beauty’s ignorant ear."
"So you believe our time is past, do you?" The Trappist growled, struggling to keep pace.
"All shuffle there; all cough in ink."
"Whose coffin? What ink?"
"They cough, Old Man — at the inn, I believe he means." The suave young Westerner strode briskly and effortlessly through the familiar old streets.
"All wear the carpet with their shoes; all think what other people think; all know the man their neighbour knows."
"Yes, I grasp your meaning, Antipodean," said the Eastern Monk in muffled tones, his face encowled against the cold. "These are the desolate, dark weeks when nature in its barrenness equals the stupidity of man. The year plunges into night and the heart plunges lower than night to an empty, windswept place without sun, stars or moon but a peculiar light as of thought that spins a dark fire — whirling upon itself until, in the cold, it kindles to make a man aware of nothing that he knows…"
"But it’s Christmas, man," the Trappist shouted into the darkness. "The wind is chill; but let it whistle as it will, we’ll keep our Christmas merry still."
The tram arrived just as the theologians arrived at the stop. Had they been more attentive they might have noticed the two other hooded figures who had followed them from Sir Toby’s and who with sprightly step had bounded aboard the tram just as the doors closed.
Re: Sir Toby's: the (early) Christmas Special edition
The tram hurtled its way along the crowded Christmas streets towards Stare Mesto. At a particularly acute bend, something caught the eye of the Westerner, and he seized the emergency brake handle. The tram lurched to a standstill, and he leapt off into the crowds, followed by the four (or was it now six?) remaining members of the Cabal. An astonished crowd melted fearfully before them, as the Westerner pointed towards a distant vagrant on a street corner. Turning to the Eastern Monk, who had shed his cloak and hat, and was now revealed arrayed in doublet and hose, with shoes which tapered to a point and curled back over on themselves, he boomed:
“Hither, page, and stand by me! If thou knowst its telling - yonder peasant, who is he? Where, and what his dwelling?”
“Sire!” replied the Eastern Monk/page, “He lives a good league hence, underneath the mountain; right beside the village fence, by St Agnes’ fountain.”
“Bring me flesh and bring me wine!” commanded the Westerner to his courtly retinue, “Bring me pine logs hither! Thou and I shall see him dine, when we bear them thither.”
Thus imperiously speaking, the Westerner set off towards his object at a ferocious pace, followed by the four (six?) members of the Cabal, cloaks flapping and medieval costumes a decorative source of interest to tourists and local shoppers alike in the Christmas markets.
Page and monarch, forth they went, forth they went together, through the cold wind’s wild lament and the bitter weather. The Eastern Monk could scarcely keep up with the astonishing pace the Westerner had set. “Sire, the night is darker now,” he complained, “and the wind blows stronger. Fails my heart, I know not how; I can go no longer.”
“Mark my footsteps, my good page, tread now in them boldly,” said the Westerner; “You shall find the winter’s rage freeze your blood less coldly.”
In his master’s steps he trod, where the snow lay dinted. Heat was in the very sod which the saint had printed.
“O.K. cut, cut!” yelled the film director, panting after the pair who were rapidly disappearing into the distance, hotly pursued by TV studio video camera operatives and sound technicians, trailing audio leads and lugging metal cases and flight-boxes. A pair of traffic policemen were also making their way purposefully towards them, having rounded up the remaining members of the Cabal.
“I think that will do,” he continued. “Someone cut along after them and tell them that’s the final retake. It’s too late to do any more. We’ll complete the remixing tomorrow morning. Tell everyone they can take a break and get back to the hotel. The rest of the evening is free.”
He turned to a couple of assistants who stood by his side with clip-boards. The technicians started rolling up lengths of cable and packing them into the cases.
From a lamp-post at the intersection, a tannoy blared out into the throng a crackling rendition of ‘Silent night’. All was as it should be.
Re: Sir Toby's: the (early) Christmas Special edition
The few passers-by who had been watching the shoot lingered, as though they believed the performance would continue if they continued to watch.
"So we’re to join the society of the spectacle, are we? Well I for one will have none of it." The Antipodean, red-faced, glared at the director. "Who hired you? Who gave you preeminence in our cloistered world?" But the director stared into a monitor jotting notes on a clipboard, totally ignoring the subjects upon whom he and the camera had so recently concentrated their unblinking gaze.
Removing his hat and cape and handing them to a set assistant, the Westerner opened the passenger door of a Mercedes and, without word or gesture, slipped into the seat and closed the door behind him, leaving the others to watch the sedan’s receding taillights.
"I seemed to know my lines without ever having learned them. And these" — the Eastern Monk grasped the sleeve of the Elizabethan costume he had worn beneath his monastic cloak — "I don’t recall putting them on."
The Old Man turned toward the Trappist, who still seemed to be watching the Mercedes even though it had long since disappeared into the anonymous city traffic. "You?"
"And you."
The Old Man wagged his finger in dissent. "But I know nothing of this strange and impersonal sort of entertainment. I have glimpsed such wonders in my occasional forays into the future, but I could never have reproduced them in my imagination."
"Enough, my dear Sage. You know full well that you are no more a medieval monk than I, that you are an American of the twenty-first century, immersed since earliest childhood in Hollywood illusion. Your unconscious has taken shape inside the electromagnetic hall of mirrors generated by the interplay between the videocamera and the television screen. Tell me: haven’t you wondered why we all smoke pipes in the inn even though tobacco didn’t arrive in Europe until the Middle Ages had already come to an end?"
"Who said it was tobacco?"
"More to the point: haven’t you wondered why this medieval city is crisscrossed by trams and automobiles?"
"I no longer find these temporal juxtapositions disconcerting," the Old Man asserted, though to the lingering cinematic audience he appeared confused and distracted — "inasmuch as time itself is but an artifact of human consciousness, a psychic buffer between our fragile mortality and the terrible truth of eternity. Isn’t that so, my Eastern friend?"
But the Eastern Monk, seemingly lost in thought, kept his own counsel.
"Although I must acknowledge that I often find myself disappearing from this place," the Old Man continued. "Quite perturbing. But when I make the conscious effort to leave, I find that I’ve been transported back here, as though I had never left… And now that I think about it, I realize that you, Trappist, seem intent on proving to me that this place is an illusion. You suddenly board airplanes to England and act as if the monastic milieu of Sir Toby’s were unreal; repeatedly you stage your own death and produce doubles of yourself; you invent intrigues that seem to have nothing whatever to do with theological inquiry. And now this pointless costumed charade, explicitly intended to expose the illusion. Tell me, Trappist, or whatever sort of Englishman you claim really to be: are you saying that the entire collective theological endeavor is likewise an illusion, created and sustained over the millennia by the collective imaginings of earnest yet ultimately self-deluded extras in a Hollywood historical farce?"
Re: Sir Toby's: the (early) Christmas Special edition
“Neither, really,” replied the now somewhat dishevelled, and diminished Trappist, “Or ‘none of the above’. It was actually just an excuse to weave together some Christmas carols into the subplot - though even that kept getting hi-jacked by additional comments into something else.
“I had intended to have the five of us end up sitting on a bench in a jail cell in Prague Central Police Station - awaiting trial on charges of causing a public affray and misuse of the emergency brake on a municipal tram. But yet again, the story ran way with itself. Though in fact, I believe the Westerner sold his Mercedes some time ago, so I don’t know whose it was that bore him away.
“So here we are, those who remain, destined to spend Christmas in theological cyber-limbo; no direction home, a complete unknown, like a rolling stone - and there it is again; the songs keep trying to take over the story. So I shall revert to my Trappist silence, but not before taking the time to wish everyone a Joyful Christmas and Happy New Year, and, as Tiny Tim Cratchit said: ‘God bless us one and all!’.”
Thus spake the Trappist, and forthwith appeared a shining throng of angels praising God, and thus addressed their joyful song: ‘All glory be to God on high and on the earth be peace; good will henceforth from heaven to men begin and never cease!’
Re: Sir Toby's: the (early) Christmas Special edition
Despite the statement of his best intentions, the Trappist and his four companions were taken to Prague Central Headquarters of Police, where they spent an uncomfortable night in separate cells. The following day they were bundled into a van with darkened windows and thereby delivered to the Central Court, for a speedy trial and verdict (to clear the backlog of cases before Christmas Day and the judicial holiday season).
So the pentavirate were taken up to Court 5, the gloomiest of the courtroom buildings, at the centre of the courts, in a complex designed when the Art Nouveau style of the 19th century was at its most ornate, and some would say, grotesque. They were seated in a row on a hard wooden bench, facing the austerely carved judicial box and judicial chair which arose from a platform at one end of the room. Behind the five were seats (now empty), arranged in steep tiers in a gallery for members of the public. Benches, chairs and tables for court officials were set out in front of the judicial platform. Two secretary stenogaphers prepared to record the proceedings with long goose quill pens. Two stern officers of the law stood beside the five. The judge entered, the court rose, and sat - as instructed by the clerk of the session, in deference to the berobed luminary who was to form the centrepiece of the proceedings.
Legal practice and court proceedings in Prague, as in the rest of Bohemia, had been strangely preserved unchanged since the 19th century, unnoticed by the more enlightened intentions of the European Union. They reflected the practices of the long deceased Austro-Hungarian Empire, and were the product of the ‘reforming’ zeal of Klemens Wenzel Lothar Metternich, Prince von Metternich, whose intentions had been to create a police state in which the purpose of the judicial system was not to dispense justice, but to identify and dispatch as speedily as possible any person deemed to pose a threat to the stability and continuity of the Empire under its dual monarchy. The judge was also the public prosecutor and inquisitor. There was no party for the defence, and no right of appeal. Verdicts were instantaneous, and tending to be reached more speedily as lunchtime approached. Justice, and its executions, were summary.
The five sat gloomily on the bench - the Trappist in more than usually contemplative mode; the Antipodean muttering biblical curses to himself under his breath; the Eastern Monk regretting his elevation to pentaviracy; the Sage pondering his fate; the Westerner having lost his air of confidence and flamboyance, the ostrich feather in his hat drooping forlornly.
The people’s prosecutor glared angrily over the top of his box at the five. The wall clock behind him ticked sternly as the minute hand moved inexorably and dangerously towards the noontide hour.
“Aufstehen!” he shouted at the Young Man, whom he took to be the ringleader of the group. The Westerner rose, somewhat nervously, to his feet. The judge glared at him, his face reddening as the apoplectic rage within him built up its head of steam; his lips quivering. He shuffled through the papers which the clerk of the court had handed to him.
“Sir! he declared. “You will hang! First, because you have a hanging look about you. Secondly, because it is nearly lunchtime. Your colleagues will also hang with you. Or be burned, if sufficient green wood can be gathered for a public burning in the town square. Thus perish all heretics! Take them down!” He banged his gavel on the desk.
The judge rose, and the clerk jumped to his feet and commanded the court also to rise. The judge shook his voluminous cloaks, as if to shake the contamination of proximate criminality out of them, turned, and stalked out of the courtroom. The five were speechless. The guardians of the law bustled them to their feet, and conducted them through the door opening onto the staircase which led down to the deepest and darkest dungeons of the Holy Roman Empire - the condemned cells. Things were not looking good for our heroes, the famous five, and Timmy the dog.
Re: Sir Toby's: the (early) Christmas Special edition
“Hang on a minute!” said the outlandishly attired Young Man, ripping off his facial mask to reveal the modest features of the theological enquirer and deus ex machina, A.P. “Can we talk about this for a moment? This storyline is becoming ridiculous. It was OK up to a point while we were at the hostel engaging in an albeit crude form of theological discussion. But now - ‘the famous five’? ‘Timmy the dog’? It’s descending into an Enid Blyton children’s potboiler!”
The Director strode out of the wings towards the group - now huddled in the dark, dank confines of the condemned heretics cell.
“Well I never asked to get roped into this thing in the first place,” said the Antipodean, likewise removing his mask and false beard to reveal the slightly more aged features of Paul Hartigan. “In fact, I’m so disgusted by this whole story thing, I have stopped contributing to the site altogether.”
“I’m only in it for the theological discussion,” said Sam L. Carr, likewise unmasking. “But I’m considering withdrawing my subscription.”
“It would seem that our Trappist friend is pushing the boundaries of acceptable interactive website protocol to the limits,” said John Doyle, now revealed as the eminence behind the persona of the Elderly Man, Sage and Bard. “I wonder how he will extricate himself from this untimely farrago?”
“Patience, my friends!” said the Trappist emolliently. “We’ll dispense with Timmy the dog and the famous five references. But allow the narrative to take its course, and the deconstructive discourse to develop towards its potential conclusion. We are decentring the accepted power structures, subverting the norms and assumptions which underpin the monolithic edifice of modernism. We are in the vanguard, if I may say so, of the postmodern project!”
“Well, if you are sure,” said the Young Man suspiciously.
“Quite sure!” said the Trappist.
“Can we get the cameras rolling again, then?” said the Director. “We’ve only got limited time-use of the crypt, and special effects are waiting for the usual untimely denouement.”
Grumbling assent was given from the other three.
“OK - Take 2. Lights! Cameras! Action! Roll!” said the Director, and the narrative sequence was renewed - having come so perilously close to being expunged from the site altogether for contravening all the principles and practices to which contributors are enjoined in ‘rules of engagement’.
Re: Sir Toby's: the (early) Christmas Special edition
Starbursts of sunlight glanced across the surface of the water as it gently lapped against the harbour wall of Cyprus’s Limassol. Five beach chairs were arranged around one of the cafe front tables, the parasol protecting their occupants from the strengthening rays of the sun. Even in January, the early morning warmth promised a balmy day to come.
“And what happened to you after we had escaped the bonfires?” questioned the Elderly Man of the Contemplative, contentedly sipping his pina colada.
“It was quite easy really,” said the recluse. “The crowds always like a recantation speech at a good burning. Or better still, heroic defiance in the face of adversity.
“So while you were fleeing for your lives, having soft-talked your way to freedom with the stock sympathetic Swiss guard,” here he turned to the Westerner, who acknowledged his glance with a slight tilt of the head and a hand reaching out to his cafe frappe, “I launched into the peroration from the platform in the town square. Very kind of them to provide one for me. Right next to the Huss memorial, appropriately enough.”
“And what about my helpful diversion?” said the Eastern Monk, stirring his twiggle-stick in an interesting cocktail of obscure liquid ingredients enlivened by ice and ground herbs.
“Ah yes,” said the Trappist. “The firework display. Very helpful. I never would have evaded the burning had it not been for that distraction to the crowds. Still, I was slightly disappointed that I was unable to complete my third point - the grand tradition of the martyrs - step-changes in theological progress brought about by the contributions of the persecuted outsider, all that kind of stuff.”
“Jeez,” said the fiery Antipodean contemplatively, raising his Fosters as the only appropriate response, and downing a significant proportion of the contents.
“And where now?” said the Sage, turning to the Westerner.
“Pressing engagements for me,” he replied. “I have a book review to attend to. I’ve already completed the first part. You can read it on that website. Then my next book beckons, aided in no small measure by our recent experiences and escapades.”
“The Far East,” said the Eastern Monk. “On engagements of a compassionate nature - enlightened by projects of ecological sensitivity amongst remote tribal peoples of Indonesia.”
“Earls Court for me,” said the Antipodean.
“Some business to attend to of a personal nature,” said the Trappist, “aided in no small measure by remunerations from the cinematic reproduction of our exertions and exigencies. And you?” turning to the Sage.
“My travels are not yet over,” he sighed. “The road beckons; I am destined to wander the dusty wastelands of this world. To travel hopefully is better than to arrive. It is the journey, rather than the destination, which is the measure of the true traveller.”
But for now, our companions in adventure and adversity were able to enjoy a pleasant hour or two together, allowing the the various brews they sipped to work their medicinal effects. The gentle background hum of Greek-Cypriot sounds lulled their senses, and the engagingly enlivening music wafting from the nearby bouzouki ensemble wrought a picture of harmony more effectively than any postcard.