EPT"Isn't what magical?"
"Haven't you ever noticed the iceberg in the room?"
"If it is anything, it is the crooked way Plemdone holds the feathered quill with his third finger. It is perverse and untenable."
"I wager there is a connection between those golden locks, how curly they are, and the apparent good fortune that he enjoys in every pursuit."
"But isn't the way he holds his pen queer?"
"I partially understand him."
"My heart beats briskly when I behold his work, but I am sorely at odds with the cruel caricature with which he paints certain isolated figures."
"Plemdone is not a man of the people."
"But he is a man!"
"So little does he comprehend the human condition that I should speak vainly of his experience in attaining the ends for which he strives."
"And yet what wonders he produces."
"I do not marvel to see him creature some fanciful imaginary, but I behold with certain trepidation the method which I can only call a last resort."
"But like so many others in search of a holy grail or elixir of life, the fountainhead of his effort is the effort itself."
"Really there is a certain majesty in the method of employment."
"With Plemdone many things are ill-concealed."
"Many things worth seeings are ill-concealed!"
"Yes, that is the great mystery of Plemdone. He reveals to us the hidden side of life."
"It is the real side of life that he reveals. Never more has a side of beef been removed from the broil than the entire flank should immediately reveal itself as sorely under-cooked."
"You mean that you cannot withstand the revelations of Plemdone?"
"What do you mean! What revelations are those?"
"Why the obvious... I should think..."
"Plemdone is a demon of sorts. As with all true things it does not improve an iota for the blessings we bestow upon it. No amount of labor and toil will create a finer product than the innate talent already manifests."
"I do not think that is true. Great effort creatures great progress."
"Indeed."
"But don't you see Plemdone as having generated just that sort of effort?"
"Plemdone has involved himself in something maniacal. It was outside my reach to stop him but he has truly visited upon us all the occult mystery--the torrid abyss."
"But you were saying something about the hidden side of life?"
"Yes, it is only with certain satisfaction that we can manifest our absolutely superior nature to the chagrin of nearly no one at all."
"What do you mean by that?"
"I mean that the greater the mystery, the fewer people to whom any obvious revelation is available."
"And Plemdone is this sort of person?"
"He is the sort of person who has toiled long with the pleasant furnace of our damnation and has received the curse reserved for those who out of selfishness involve themselves enthusiastically in the devil's work."
"And he reveals nothing?"
"He reveals--as they say--a pearl before swine."
"Oh really?"
"What is beautiful to Plemdone is not so obviously beautiful to us."
"I hardly understand it myself."
"Do you grudge him his hatred?"
"I do at that. It is unhealthy and it is unnatural."
"But that is not how he sees it!"
"No?"
"The source of our suffering as shortly as it is named will disappear forthwith!"
"I do not believe it."
"Why not?"
"Because there is malice in his heart."
"Malice is just an absence of skill."
"Now you are talking like Plemdone! He seeks to reduce everything to some illimitable form."
"Plemdone is wise in that--I think."
"But don't you believe--as we surely all believe--that the true nature of our instinct is the sentiment of importance. What is significant beyond all doubt is the intention."
"Yes may our intentions never change."
"I do not like the way you reply to that. You speak with the uncharacteristic artifice of someone who has stared too long into the aching soul."
"You would make an enemy of me!"
"I would not. You can can seldom keep around even the help at such wages as those of our employ."
"Perhaps."
"But does it make you vindictive in some earnest way?"
"No."
"But surely it does! Look at the way your eyes flash and how you scorn the common rabble."
"What do you mean?"
"I resist the conclusion to which we ultimately are guided."
"I daresay I am uncertain of what conclusion you mean."
"An unsettled case, I suppose. Why don't you express more deliberately the question of Plemdone. Do you see him as a nuisance?"
"Plemdone is a precocious youth as so many are--and so many are not."
"But what does it mean?"
"It is not something I would take lightly at any rate."
"It is an unsettled stone in a river. It means nothing."
"On the contrary, and I beg to differ with your result--I think it may mean everything. As far as Plemdone is concerned he seems most occupied by such strange and fictitious events as really confer almost nothing."
"To the ordinary manner of thinking, I believe Plemdone is mad."
"He is not mad."
"Do you understand the difference? The subtle difference in the interpretation of such a person and the mannerisms which co-opt them?"
"I do not claim to understand it nor do I think much of it."
"You are in fear!"
"Possibly. It is not manful of me. And yet I dread the circumstances around Plemdone's recent disappearance. He has absconded to some unknown vista without any ascertained purpose. There is no telling what will become of him."
"You laugh at this!"
"I do not."
"'It is progress!' That is what Plemdone would say. But at the same time you underestimate him."
"I do not."
"You will realize it before long."
"I will not."
"I see you have separated the snake from his fangs."
"I believe it is more aptly said that we have separated the wolf from his supper."
"But is there anything that you more truly mistake?"
"Like what?"
"The somewhat listless satisfaction of which you have completely lost sight."
"I feel you are having a laugh at my expense."
"Is that really true?"
"Yes, I feel that you are taking Plemdone's part even as if he were here."
"But he is not here."
"Then I suppose it is wrong to laugh at him."
"It is not wrong to laugh at him! It is wrong to laugh at me."
"But I have already conceded that I am not laughing at you."
"Are you most certain of that?"
"Of course."
"You begin to sound more and more like Plemdone."
"Do I?"
"Everything will soon be rhetorical."
"I think you are being superstitious."
"A certain amount of mystery is attached to everything which is not known to oneself."
"What?"
"I mean that it does matter the things we are ignorant of."
"I can hardly imagination the price of ignorance being visited upon us in such a rude and misunderstood way."
"It seldom is. Our ignorance, I mean. It is seldom manifest before us in any direct way. There is esoteric wards that keep us at a distance from those things that are inaccessible to us."
"Maybe that is why they are inaccessible."
"I don't know."
"Plemdone would have something to say about this."
"His absence is welcome."
"And yet I think you know well what he would say."
"And what is that?"
"That the world is absorbed in many occult and hidden windings. Many tortuous paths separate us from the hidden reality."
"The human is constructed to absolve itself of its significance."
"Yes what a strange twist of obsolescence. Man is both divine and indentured. Let us go in search of Plemdone. It is not good for him to be away for so long."
"Is man really a divine instrument?"
"An instrument? What do you mean?"
"It has always been asserted that man is a manifestation of free will."
"I suppose that is something you would have to ask Plemdone."
"Yes, if we find him I will ask him."
"What exactly will you say?"
"I will ask him the meaning of his absence and request a full explanation of its consequences."
"And do you think Plemdone will acquiesce?"
"I think he will be most reticent but in the end he will come around."
"Then let us adjourn."
