by John Hunt
Isaac, too, was puffing a bit. Since he started Hashing, he had come to be in reasonably good shape for a man in his late sixties, but it was warm and the breeze was light, so he perspired profusely. Isaac’s brow was moist, and his T-shirt was drenched down the middle.
“DUR, I am ashamed of you. You should be keeping the faith with our good friend Joseph.” Isaac wiped his forehead on a portion of his shirt that was still dry, as he ran on.
Petur, feeling fine and not tired at all, answered, “You know, we have to name him today. He may not be a regular, but he deserves a name. Any ideas?”
“Several. How about Santa Claus? He rather looks like him.”
Brushing that suggestion off, Petur prompted further. “He is an old friend of yours. Do you have any long-forgotten stories or secrets? Any skeletons in his closet?”
“Not a one, at least nothing that I can remember. Well, he once put bullion cubes in a showerhead in one of the girls dormitories at Radcliff. It was quite a feat in those days just to get into the girls dormitories.”
“Baloney, Isaac. Your generation was little different from mine. I am sure you snuck in there all the time.”
“Actually, I still do. You know I am rather fond of women. And I am, of course, quite attractive. The prettiest college girls sneak into my house quite regularly.”
Petur said nothing in response to this last. When Isaac got onto one of his self-inflating sprees, it was best not to encourage it, lest he soon regale you with stories of his sexual prowess with the queen of Bavaria, or some such. Petur hoped to avert this.
But he failed.
“Petur, I have never told you about the time when I was in the hospital, have I?”
“No, Isaac, I don’t believe you have.” Petur knew something outrageous was in the making.
Isaac wiped his forehead again, and then began. “It was perhaps ten years ago. I had been experiencing severe abdominal pain for several hours after a particularly compelling evening in an upstairs room of one of the finer homes on Commonwealth Avenue. I cannot remember the fine woman’s name now, and it was unimportant then, I imagine. The pain in my belly increased. At first, I assumed that I was being haunted by the spirit of the spirits consumed to excess during the night’s revelries. But as a fever took hold, I knew otherwise. I bid adieu to the fair lady, who was most upset to see me depart, and made sail for the nearest hospital.”
“Did you have an appendicitis?”
“Oh yes. I had surgery that night. And over the next five days, I was washed and massaged and in general treated wonderfully by three nurses. Their names were April, May, and June, by some strange quirk of fate. Young, sprightly, in short pink nursing outfits. They worshipped me. And, in my immobility, they managed to keep me, shall I say, occupied. They worked shifts, eight hours each.” Isaac grinned. “Each shift was memorable, Petur. Very memorable. But for some minimal postoperative pain, adequately treated with postoperative scotch, I would have to say my hospital experience was worth repeating. You really should try to get an appendicitis someday.”
Petur patted his friend on the back as they followed the pack ahead. “I think I would probably end up with the typical older, portly nurse named Hilda, wearing a broad white lab coat with pockets full of needles and enema tubes.”
“Petur, you should spend more time with me. You are getting older, you know. One must enjoy life while one can. And, speaking of enjoying life…”
The trail of flour that had been laid skillfully by the hares now veered through white wooden gates into the main swimming-pool areas of the resort. Petur and Isaac ran through the gate and were greeted by the bewildered stares of two dozen or more guests who had been quietly contemplating life’s virtues while soaking in the sun until a herd of wild Hashers destroyed their reveries. They were about the fortieth to run through, and the guests did not know that there were sixty more to follow.
Petur leapt over a lawn chair, which would have been reasonable since it was in the line he was running, but for the fact that somebody was lying in it. That somebody was rather fat too, and Petur’s foot knocked over the drink that was resting on her chest. Fortunately the fracture-resistant glass did not break on impact with the cement. Petur apologized profusely, nodded to the waiter to bring her another beverage, and ran off along the poolside.
“Who was that terrible man? He should be stopped immediately. I am lodging a formal complaint with the Island’s leadership. He should be found and expelled from this place. What nerve!” The fat woman was yelling to no one in particular, and loudly. “How dare you, you pig!” she cried after Petur as he retreated.
A young college-aged waiter came by her side and smiled, “Ma’am, that man is the Island’s leadership. That was Petur Bjarnasson himself.”
Hearing the name, which had become familiar to people around the world over the past year, caused the woman to sit down abruptly in her lawn chair. She burbled something incoherently to the waiter, who went off to obtain a fresh glass of whatever she had been drinking. He knew Mr. Bjarnasson would insist it be put on his tab. The head honcho of the Island Project was big into personal accountability.
Meanwhile, Petur caught back up with Isaac. This was not hard, for Isaac had removed his running shoes and jumped into one of the larger segments of the multilayered pool. He was dallying with two young and fit women who, until the moment that he entered, had been swimming laps. Petur sat down beside the pool and laughed at his friend.
“You know, Isaac, we’re going to get way behind!”
“Nonsense, my young and sightless friend. Look there.” He pointed to the far side of the pool complex, where, overflowing from within a darkened grass-roofed bungalow, a crowd of Hashers gathered for the middle-of-the-run beer stop. “We have all the time we need to make some new acquaintances.”
Petur chuckled, and let Isaac perform his magic on the two swimmers who, clearly, had caught his eye. Petur’s eyes wandered out over the sunbathers. There was, as always, a melting pot of nationalities represented at the resort. Almost everyone spoke some English, which seemed to be becoming the international language of choice, perhaps by default, since the Americans never seemed to learn other languages, and people had to communicate with them somehow. Or perhaps it was because one of the most influential American exports was Hollywood movies, and the subtitles helped make English so broadly understood. Among the resort staff were such a variety of nationalities that language barriers were never long a problem for the guests. Translation was always readily available. There was even a speech translation software package developed by one of the groups on the Island. It had a ways to go, but Petur was certain that someday this software would help people communicate worldwide.
A Chinese couple sat close together on the other side of the pool. They were watching, bewildered, as the continuous stream of runners invaded their resort-sanctuary. A British couple, pale-skinned, with the man sporting a large mustache, seemed more amused by the interruption, and waved at the passing Hashers. Hashing was a British phenomenon, after all. Those two might be Hashers themselves.
Next to the British couple was an empty lawn chair. A woman had just climbed out of the pool and picked up a towel and sunglasses from that chair. She walked away from Petur. It was an elegant walk. Her hair was dark brown and wet, just reaching her shoulders. She was of modest height — not tiny. Her legs looked as if Leonardo had carved them: perfectly shaped, and precisely contoured. Petur knew who she had to be.
The wet hair, which was plastered against her head, the short white towel around her waste, and the drips of water that followed the luscious curves of her legs as they rolled down to the ground brought back memories as if they were yesterday. Despite all odds, and, miraculously, defying Jeff’s prediction from earlier that same day, the woman whom he had dreamed about so many times — the woman whom he had seen in the elevator in Amsterdam, and again, soaking wet in the lobby of the hotel in Mannheim — was now here in Paradise. It had to be her.
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sp; She was just about to disappear through a high wooden fence, so Petur moved expeditiously. He left his sneakers by the poolside and trotted along the cement after her. He had to weave a way around the architecturally designed pools. A prodigious amount of water thwarted him, and as the girl disappeared through a gate in the far fence Petur jumped into the pool and swam for the other side.
The cool fresh water of the pool was exhilarating, but not nearly as much as the girl. Petur climbed up the far side as fast as he could and bounded across the cement to the gate. It was spring-loaded, and the latch had become sticky from the salty air. Petur, in his excitement, could not get his fingers to work the latch, so he struck at it with his fist, and then swore loudly. He reached up to the top of the white fence, half-climbed and half-vaulted the structure, and landed with a soft thud on the thick grass on the other side.
She should have been right there, just a stone’s throw away. But she wasn’t. Petur turned to the right, toward the beach, but the path was empty. Then he looked left toward the main hotel building. An elderly couple, holding hands, was walking unhurriedly toward him. Two newlyweds were playing Frisbee on the grass. In the distance, a golf cart was disappearing around the back of the hotel. The brunette, the girl of his dreams, was nowhere to be seen.
Dejected, Petur stood and gazed around, though he knew she would not reappear. The old couple said hello as they walked past, and the woman showed her white dentures in a pleasant smile. Petur acknowledged them only in an offhanded manner. The dentures stopped smiling, and the couple moved down toward the beach.
The Beer Stop had filled with Hashers now, and as Petur reentered the pool area, the havoc was only beginning. Dozens of sweaty bodies flopped in the pool, water flying everywhere. The stodgy British couple was thoroughly soaked by the floodwaters, but took it in stride. Some other guests quickly moved out of the splash zone, although nobody but the obese woman, whose breast Petur had tripped upon, had actually risen to leave. Several cases of beer were imbibed in very short order.
Most of the Hashers weren’t drinking yet. There was more running to do first. He worked his way through the rambunctious crowd to one of the people who was drinking: Isaac.
“You remember that woman I saw in Mannheim? The one who I thought was traveling with Standall?” Petur spoke loudly into Isaac’s ear, for the partying around them was loud.
“No. Have you been to Mannheim recently?” Isaac appeared to have no clue what Petur was talking about.
“The time when I first met Otto Wagner. It was that great week when we finally got financiers. I can remember every detail of that week. Well, almost every detail. Can’t you?”
“Not at all. I remember little of anything. My brain is becoming like mush.”
“Well, I guess the impression was mine, as were the hormones. There was a girl who I bumped into, just for a moment in Amsterdam, at the hotel. Then she was at my hotel in Mannheim, the very next day. I fell instantly in lust with her.”
Isaac swallowed repeatedly as he downed another half of a beer. “Yes, now I remember.” But he said it in an unconvincing, perhaps bored, tone.
“Anyhow, she was not with Standall. In fact, he thought she was with me. I puzzled over that for a time, then attributed the whole thing to strange coincidence.”
“Or perhaps fate,” Isaac interrupted.
“Perhaps. But now I have seen her here, on Paradise.”
“So, did you find out what she is up to?” asked Isaac, who still seemed not to care.
Petur shook his head and rubbed the back of his neck. “No. I only saw her as she walked away. Didn’t even see her face. I couldn’t catch up to her before she disappeared.”
“Didn’t see her face? How do you know it was the same girl?”
“Isaac, you of all people should know that a man can tell quite a bit by the wrapping. This girl is wrapped in a most distinctive manner.”
“I withdraw my question. So, now that she’s here, you should certainly be able to find her. I don’t think there are any more planes leaving today, are there?”
“No. You’re right. I should have no problem!”
The pack of runners seemed to be congregating spontaneously near a large opening in the pool area’s fence, rather like fish gathering in a school. One person stayed behind to clean up the beer stop, but the rest began to run once again, and cries of “On! On!” trailed behind them as they went.
Petur and Isaac ran together in the middle of the pack. But because Petur was motivated to begin the hunt for his mysterious woman and Isaac had beer in his belly, the two gradually separated: Petur pulled farther ahead and Isaac fell farther behind. Soon, Petur was at the front of the pack, picking out the Hash markings and leading all the others. He was nearly sprinting. Several false trails had been laid, but Petur stuck on the true path and was the first to reach the end of the journey — the On In, where the waiting hares congratulated him on a most brisk run. The On In was on the beach east of the resort complex. They would all have a long walk back to Science Hall and their surrounding homes.
He still had much time before he could start his little private investigation to hunt for the woman. There were post-Hash festivities, and having been the fastest bum on the run, he would no doubt be encouraged to imbibe large quantities of beer. Oh, well. Someone had to.
The rest of the hundred-or-so runners gradually arrived, and as they caught their breath they headed over to the two golf carts that were loaded with coolers. Most people, after wiping the sweat off their foreheads, reached in to grab one of several varieties of beer.
Joseph came in near the end of the pack, after he had walked much of the second half. He moved over to Petur.
“Young man, you are too fast for me. I get older every day.”
“Well, Joseph, you get younger today.”
“How’s that?
“Today is your second run, right?”
“Yes, I suppose it is — although far from being consecutive.”
“Doesn’t matter. Tradition in this Hash is that you get named on your second run.”
“Oh my. I am not sure I like that idea.”
Petur reassured Joseph that since he was a much more respectable character than Isaac, he doubted that he would be given a name like Lewd and Lascivious.
“That’s encouraging, DUR. I have a reputation, you know. I have no great interest in being kicked out of my society circles because of a crude nickname, no matter how fitting it might be.”
“We’ll be good to you, I’m sure.”
Irish Spring had called together a large gathering of people. This group — the naming committee — then began bantering over the future Hash names of the various people who deserved the honor. From time to time, they would call over experienced Hashers who could advise them regarding their friends and acquaintances. After a time, Petur was called over. “DUR, get your hiney over here!” Even though he founded the Island Project, and was gaining worldwide influence, Petur was given no more respect than anybody else at this gathering. He expected this.
“So, DUR, what kind of improper and impious name can we stick old Joseph with?” Evan Harrigan, a.k.a. Irish Spring, asked.
Petur looked around at the eclectic group. Most of them had been Hashing since early on. Many had Hashed in their previous careers at other locations around the world. All of them were dedicated to Hashing weekly, and several, Petur knew, had traveled around the world to Hash. Harrigan, for one, had gone to Kuala Lumpur for an InterHashional, in which Hashers from around the world converge in order to run and wreak havoc.
“I was thinking that Sphere would be a good name.”
“Why?” asked one of the committee members.”
“Well, it’s most fitting, for reasons that I am not at liberty to divulge. But publicly, we can claim it is because of his rather impressively round midriff.”
“Any other ideas?” asked Irish Spring, a name that he had been given, years ago, because he had failed to use deodorant befor
e a particularly sweaty Hash.
Petur said, “Another name might be Bounty Hunter. He has a price on the heads of the people who bombed the OTEC.”
“Well,” Irish Spring added in support, “it has no sexual connotation, and therefore it has one weakness, but other than that failing, I think it is a mighty fine name. Bounty Hunter, he is.” The committee all drank from their beers and ushered Petur away so they could work on the next person on their list, as they hoped they would be more successful in their attempt to malign that Hasher.
Petur walked back over to Joseph. Joseph eyed him suspiciously.
“Don’t worry, Joseph. Your Hash name is manly and respectable. It will tickle you, actually, and no one will know why it fits so perfectly.”
“Well, what is it?” Joseph asked impatiently.
“I am not supposed to say.” But when he saw Joseph’s distressed expression, he relented. “Bounty Hunter. You will be rechristened Bounty Hunter.”
“Ha!” Joseph laughed. “That will be just fine. Most apropos!”
The committee meeting went on for some time, as the committee had to honor about a dozen people with names today. The Hashers reveled and socialized as they waited.
“Petur… I mean, DUR, how do you think we should go about our search for the Bounty? Assuming you buy in, of course.”
“I don’t really know. If it is here at all, it could be anywhere within a ten-kilometer radius of the island — maybe more. It’ll be like finding a needle in a haystack.”
Joseph thought that the analogy was apt. “But it is very helpful, when searching for a needle in a haystack, to equip oneself with a giant magnet. We have all sorts of technology at our disposal.”
Petur concurred. “I suppose we’ll have to obtain a vessel with which to sono the floor of the ocean all around here; then send down ROVs to check out the most likely candidates based on the sonographic findings. Despite using that kind of equipment, it will be nearly impossible to find. And if it is at the bottom of a crevasse — or worse, on one of the slopes — the chances are even more remote. Heck, Joseph, it could be down two thousand meters, on the other side of Paradise 3!”