Although you really wouldn’t expect it, judging by his sort
of sideways gait and lackadaisical manner, Tremolo the Tale-Teller could make
tracks pretty quick when he had a mind to run. Over the hills and flowerbeds,
among the trees and streams, past the sign reading “Barnum Memorial Botanical
Gardens,” and sort of parallel to the expressway that could be heard in the
distance, Tremolo ran, his waterlogged pursuer never far behind.
“Scalawag!”
shouted the musician (who by now had exhausted the more obvious forms of
invective and was in a way you’d say distracting himself from the effort of
running by shuffling through the more uncommon pejoratives), “Cutpurse!
Coxcomb!”
Tremolo,
his tongue hanging out of his mouth and reaching roughly to the level of his waist,
turned over his shoulder to shout back at the dripping guitarist, “Run, run, as
fast as you can, you can’t catch me… well, because no one catches Tremolo!”
“Rapscallion!
I’ll tie your tongue to a tree and play La
Marseillaise with your innards!” retorted the other.
“Tremolo
will drop a water balloon on you at every turn! He’ll slip water balloons into
your pillow to burst in your sleep!” Tremolo cackled, his eyes aflame.
“I just
wish I knew why you hate me so much!” complained the musician, whose shoes were
soaked through and becoming increasingly unpleasant for running.
Although
it’s rather unlikely that either party noticed, so absorbed were they with
running and shouting and the manifold difficulties of prolonged locomotion of
any sort, an exceptionally odd man seated on a park bench some distance away
was observing them quite closely. He appeared to have some desire to conceal
his presence, for he held a newspaper (yes, by God, a newspaper! Who would
believe it, these days?) up to his face and looked over it sort of Kilroy-style
at the receding pair. Two sizeable bulges just above the man’s ears were covered
by a black toboggan that, considering the heat of the day, must have caused him
no small discomfort.
“Tremolo
hates no man!” Tremolo objected.
“Then
why did you humiliate me like that? Do you know how many hours I practiced this
song, just to have you ruin everything? Now she’ll never look at me without
seeing that red balloon dripping all over my head!”
“Tremolo
did it for your own good, foolish young musician man!”
“What
possible good were you trying to do?”
Tremolo
the Tale-Teller shrugged dismissively, said, “The highest good, maybe?” He
frowned and shook his head at this, ran on for a little while lost in thought,
“Tremolo’s got it! The needs of the many… no, that’s no good. How about ‘A
penny saved…’ no. Sorry, kid, Tremolo’s just not so good at telling tales when
he’s running.”
“Damn
you, Tremolo the Tale-Teller!”
“And
don’t swear, it’s not polite.”
It was
by now quite late in the evening, and the sun began to dip into the horizon as
they ran along in silence. The shadows of trees grew long and weary, the light
soft and stretching into delicate reds and purples across streaks of cloud.
The
runners passed a pair of gardeners tending a flowerbed off to their left, and
the musician shouted to them, “Catch that man! He’s trying to cause a general
disturbance in the Botanical Gardens!”
The
gardeners set down their tools, exchanged a brief glance, and then took to
their feet, breaking into a run some distance behind the musician.
“You’ll
never catch Tremolo!” Tremolo taunted, a wild grin dancing behind his beard,
“It’s logically impossible, you see.”
“We’ll
catch up with you in just a minute, you’ll see,” answered the man with the soaked
shoes. In the distance, he thought he could hear the gardeners murmuring
agreement. Still, overcome by some slight doubt, he couldn’t help but ask, “But
why do you say it’s impossible?”
“Well,
you see,” said Tremolo, turning around to ensure that he could be heard
clearly, “If you’re ever going to catch Tremolo, surely you’ll grant that you’d
have to reach the place where Tremolo is—“ The completion of the paradox was
unfortunately cut short by the fact that Tremolo the Tale-Teller here ran into
a rather solid tree with a resounding smack!
He fell to the ground, crying out and moaning histrionically.
The
musician, moving to stand beneath the tree with his hands on his knees and
panting considerably all the while, waited for the gardeners to arrive before
beginning to speak: “Well, Tremolo, it looks like we’ve gotten to where you are
now.”
“What
seems to be the problem?” asked the first gardener, a thin, wiry little man
with a thick moustache.
“This
man,” said the musician, indicating Tremolo rather breathlessly, “Dropped a
large and very heavy water balloon on my head, causing probably irreparable
damage to my guitar and in the process really quite seriously running the risk
of breaking my neck. Can’t you see he’s a menace to society?”
“Is
this true, Tremolo the Tale-Teller?” queried the second gardener, a tall,
muscular woman with an even thicker moustache.
Tremolo
the Tale-Teller, lying on the ground in a heap, sighed, raised a finger into
the air, and croaked, “I deny everything.”
“He
denies it,” explained one of the gardeners.
“Well,
of course he denies it,” said the musician.
“Would
you be able to produce any witnesses in support of your claims?”
The
musician flushed, made a face, shuffled nervously from one foot to the other,
“Well, maybe.”
“I deny
the sun, the moon, the stars, the earth, the grass—“
“You do
realize that this is a serious business, sir?” said the shorter gardener,
twirling his moustache menacingly, “Now kindly answer the question: will you be
able to produce witnesses or not?”
“—the dirt,
the sand, the trees—“
“Well,
in all honesty, I’m not sure if I can produce witnesses or not.”
“—civic
virtue, electricity, the scientific method—“
“And
why aren’t you sure?”
“You
should really be sure. Shouldn’t he be sure?”
“He
should be sure.”
“We’re
in agreement, then? That he should be sure?”
“Sure.”
“You
should be sure, sir.”
“—climate
change, conspiracy theories, cats—“
“Well,
I’m not sure, because… because I’m not sure what her name is.”
The
gardeners exchanged another look, perhaps what you’d call a meaningful look, before the short man
turned to the musician and asked, “And just what would be your name, sir?”
“—materialism,
Boolean logic, personal identity—“
“My
name?” sighed the musician, taking a deep breath, “My name is Roger Nobody.”
“Mr.
Nobody, is it?”
“Roger
that.”
“—frame
narratives, intertextuality, cellular respiration—“
“Could
you kindly let us know what happened, Mr. Nobody? From the beginning, please.”
“Well,
first there was the Big Bang, or maybe God created the Universe out of nothing,
but I guess the really important and relevant beginning came with the Knowledge
of Good and Evil and the subsequent Fall—“
“You
could skip to this evening, if you would.”
“—the
Law of the Excluded Middle, transcendental idealism, probability—“
“Tremolo
the Tale-Teller dropped a water balloon on my head while I was playing the
guitar under a tree, and I’ve been chasing him down ever since.”
“After you threw away the water balloon
in the proper trash receptacle, naturally.”
Roger
Nobody made a face, “I didn’t have time for that, I had to chase him down. Now
look, let’s just get all this over with so we can—“
“Sir,
you do realize that caring for the environment is part of the civic duty of
every American citizen?”
“You do
want to leave a sustainable environment for future generations, don’t you,
sir?”
“The
earth is the only home we have, sir.”
“Yes,
yes, I know,” nodded Nobody, “But don’t you see that—“
“Not to
mention the five hundred dollar fine for littering on the Botanical Gardens’
property.”
Roger
Nobody’s eyes widened, “Isn’t that a bit excessive? I mean, surely these are
extenuating—“
“Sir,”
said the woman, “If you’d kindly accompany I can escort you from the property.
You should be hearing from our legal department in five to seven business
days.”
“Well,
can’t I just go find the balloon and throw it away? This all seems terribly—“
“Sir,
please don’t try to talk your way out of this. You’ll only make this situation
more painful for all involved.”
“Some
people just have no respect for the planet, do they?” mused the short man.
Roger
Nobody gave a defeated sigh, followed the mustachioed gardener off in the
direction of the park exit. As he disappeared off into the distance, he shouted
back, “I’ll get you, Tremolo the Tale-Teller, if it’s the last thing I do!”
“I deny
that most of all,” Tremolo muttered to the wiry gardener who remained beside
him.
“Are
you all right, Tremolo the Tale-Teller?” the man asked.
“Quite
all right, thank you,” Tremolo answered, springing to his feet and revealing in
the process that he was marked with nothing so much as a minor scratch or
contusion from his encounter with the tree.
“So
what happened back there? Why’s that poor sap got it out for you so bad?”
“Tremolo
will explain,” Tremolo explained, “By way of parable.”
And
with that Tremolo the Tale-Teller opened his mouth and began to tell…
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