CHAPTER 13

THROUGH THE COOKING GAS

   From one end of the Arch to the other was a three foot high wall. This might have stopped a smaller creature, but this didn't present a problem for Boris, so he stepped over it and passed under the arch; just as he did this, Boris thought he heard the scurrying of many little feet, but these sounds were soon gone and Boris surmised that this must have been just some small cave rodent.

   He now found himself in a long, dark tunnel and he had to walk slowly, for he couldn't see far in front of him.  However, to his left and right, he could see row upon row of shelves, but for some time he couldn't make out what was placed on them, though he could see that there were a lot of them and all of the same sort. After a while he could make them out as small jars--at least small from the perspective of Boris. All of them were filled to the brim with pickled eggs of some sort.

   "Perhaps," thought Boris, "these Chess Players are Survivalists of sorts, though they seem to have stashed away much of the same thing with no variety in sight. Perhaps they have other provisions stored elsewhere."

   Soon he could see another archway ahead of him leading to a lighted area--at least lighted as compared to the rather dark and dank tunnel he was now in. 

   "Ah," thought Boris," this must be where the Chess Club congregates. I better slow down and check things out, for I haven't been invited in, though, on the other hand, nobody has stopped me either."

   So to that effect, Boris stopped at the archway so he could espy his new surroundings.  He peered in and it took a while for his eyes to focus on things, for even though it was partly lighted--with many candles--all the shapes therein shifted and swayed with a strange peculiarity. He could smell some strange odor and supposed that some sort of gas inundated this place.  Since Boris could see this gas coming from a side door wherein also emanated the noise of clanking dishware, he guessed the gas was coming from the club's kitchen, where, no doubt, some fowl, or something foul, was being cooked up.

   "Ah," thought Boris as he quoted Shakespeare in a most jocular manner, "this is a most fowl congregation of pest-ilent vapours, ha. However, it doesn't seem that foul, well not yet, at least; but it does seem to have some effect over me. Now, why am I yawning so?"

   As Boris rubbed his tired eyes, he had a good look at the place, and to his eye it rather looked like a British Gentlemen's Club; however, there were three main differences: one, all its occupants were about a third the size of a normal person--if you took Boris as a normal; two, there were both males and females here; and three, all occupants seemed to be dressed as chess pieces.

   Another curious feature of these figures were the bottom ends of their costumes: these seemed to transform into scaly appendages which snaked around the legs and feet of its wearers--at least where Boris figured their feet and legs ought to have been.

   So Boris tentatively entered the room so as not to unnecessarily upset its occupants, but because of either the low light or the wavering gas or both they seemed not to notice him at all; perhaps, paradoxically, he may have been too big for them to  notice him.

   In addition, Boris believed that the occupant's stiff dress prevented them from turning their heads fully around to see behind them, a position Boris, whether by design or by accident, always seemed to find himself in.

   Anyway he entered and the top of his head just brushed the ceiling of the room which must have been a high ceiling for its occupants, which was so designed, no doubt, for good air ventilation, although Boris thought the air circulation rather poor in this room, indeed it seemed quite stifling.

   Then something began squeaking next to a table in near Boris, and made him turn his head just in time to see a little girl, dressed as a White Pawn, fall over unto the floor and begin kicking its lower extremities in an attempt to get up, but its cumbersome costume prevented any agile movement that would have facilitated this goal of hers.  Boris thought that this little girl looked familiar, but the costume and make-up made it hard for him to exactly place her.

   "It is the voice of my fresh and pure child!" a member dressed as the White Queen cried out, as she rushed past a member dressed as the White King, so violently she knocked him over among the fireplace's cinders, and with his costume just as cumbersone, he too couldn't get up. "My precious Lily! My imperial kitten!" and she rushed so that she too fell on the floor, adding another cumbersomely dressed person to the distressed duo already there.

   Boris laughed for a bit seeing these three kicking about, but his inherently good nature caused him to try and give aid to these poor creatures. So he hastily picked up the Queen and set her beside the table by the side of her little daughter, as Boris thought the girl was to the Queen.

   The Queen gasped and sat down; the rapid journey through the air had quite taken away her breath, and for a minute or two she could do nothing but hug the little Lily in silence. As soon as she had recovered her breath a little, she called out to the White King, who was sitting sulkily among the ashes, and said, "Mind the Volcano!"

   "The Queen," thought Boris, "doth protest too much. Ha ha. But seriously now, I hope that I haven't frightened them too much, although they seem to take no note of me at all. Curious."

   The King, still in the ashes, seemed to be reacting slowly to all about him and it took some time for him to respond to his Queen's fiery protestations. Finally he said, "What Volcano?" as he looked into the fire, as if he thought that was the most likely place to find one.

   "Blew--me--forward," panted the Queen, who was still out of breath. "Mind you come here--the regular way--don't get blown forward!"

   Boris watched as the White King slowly wriggled his way among the tables and chairs toward his Queen, till at last he said, "Why, you'll be hours getting to the Queen, at that rate. I'd far better help you, hadn't I?"  But the King took no notice of the question; it was clear that he could neither hear him nor see him.

   So Boris picked him up very firmly with both hands and lifted him more slowly than he had lifted the Queen, that he mightn't take his breath away; but before Boris could place him beside the Queen, he thought that he might as well dust the King a little, he was so covered with ashes.

   Boris said afterward that he had never seen in all his life such a face as the King made: he was too much astonished to cry out, but his eyes and mouth went on getting larger and larger.

   When He set the King near the Queen, the King immediately fell flat on his back, and lay perfectly still. However, he eventually recovered to some extent and soon he and the Queen were talking together in frightened low whispers.

   The King was saying, "The horror of that moment. I shall never, never forget! We must hunt down that dangerous terror-inducing Volcano. Soldiers, Soldiers! Go out at once and hunt it down!"

   At that, the four Knights and many of the Pawns started going to every part and corner of the room trying to find that Volcano but finding it nowhere.  They continued in this pursuit for ever such a long time, going about and about in straight lines, diagonals, and L-shapes covering the whole room but never finding a thing, although they eventually gathered together quite a pile of frightening furniture, noisome newspapers, ferocious fire pokers and other assorted aggregious junk, all-in-all, creating quite a stir in the once quiet chess club.

   (As the eye of Boris was following the antics of these pieces--and therefore espying the whole room--he noticed that the two white Bishops didn't move from their chairs and that they even seemed somehow restrained in their places. Like Lily, they looked familiar, but again their costume made it hard to place them.)

   "You will soon forget about the Volcano, though," the Queen said, "if you don't make a memorandum of it."

   Boris looked with great interest as the King took an enormous memorandum book out of is pocket, and began writing.  A sudden thought struck Boris, and he took hold of the end of the King's huge ostentatious pen, which came some way over his shoulder, and began writing for him.

   The poor King looked puzzled and unhappy, and struggled with the pen for some time without saying anything; but Boris was too strong for him, and, at last, the King panted out, "My dear I really must get a more tractable pen. I can't manage this one a bit; it writes all manner of things that I don't intend--"

   "What manner of things?" said the Queen, looking over the book (in which Boris had put, "Where can I find Catlan? I believe He is about somewhere near.") "That's not a memorandum of your own thoughts, are they! Nor are they the thoughts of the White Rabbit, either, who usually composes your thoughts for you."

   While Boris thought he had already seen the King frightened to the utmost, this was nothing compared to the look of sheer terror that now lurked on the King's face. When a log slipped in the fireplace and ushered into the quiet room a huge roar of air, the King and Queen jumped two lengths into the air and then landed on their feet again.  When they recovered their wits, the Queen quickly gathered poor Lily in her arms and the King ordered all his men to surround him and soon all were off in a flash--including the Bishops who were carried by some pawns--emptying the room most quickly and most totally.

   "A most skittish bunch, I dare say," said a slightly puzzled Boris. "I'll never get an answer to any of my queries around here, I would think."

   Therefore Boris then looked about to see if he could find any sort of written material that could direct him to Catlan. Fortunately, there was a book lying near Boris on a rather important looking podium. It was called The Path Through the Grass to the Garden of Bright Promise. "Ah," thought Boris, "this seems most, uh, promising." So he turned over some leaves to find some part that he could read--"for it's all in the English language and uses words that I know, but somehow I can't quite understand it," he said to himself. "In addition it is written in a peculiar type of font that seems to wriggle and writhe all over the page."

   It was like this:

JABBERWORLDLY

Care for the Earth

Protecting and restoring the diversity

Integrity, and beauty of the planet's ecosystems.

Live sustainably,

Promoting and adopting

Modes of consumption

Production and reproducton

That respect and safeguard human rights

And the regenerative capacities of Earth.

Establish justice,

And defend without discrimination

The right of all people

To Life, Liberty and spiritual well-being.

Share equitably the benefits

of natural resources

And a healthy environment among nations,

Between rich and poor,

Between males and females,

Between present and future generations.

Affirm that gender equality

Is a prerequisite for

Sustainable development.

Secure the rights to sexual

And reproductive health

With special concern

For women and girls

Promote the participation of youth

As accountable agents of change

For local, bio-regional,

And global sustainability.

Do not do to the environment of others

What you do not want done to your environment.

   "It seems very pretty," he said when he had finished it, "but it's rather hard to understand (You see, he didn't like to confess, even to himself, that he couldn't make it out at all.) "Somehow it seems to fill my head with ideas--only I don't exactly know what they are! However, somebody promoted, affirmed and reaffirmed many somethings or other, that's clear, at any rate. Perhaps it contains some sort of clue on how to find Catlan. Well, I think I'll just take the book and try to find someone who could translate it for me."

   Just as soon as he took the book, Boris felt a faint tremor coming from the floor under him; Boris thought that odd: perhaps some underground geological movement was underfoot. Then Boris noticed that the objects on the tables and the mantleplace had started to shake and shimmy so much that they were soon spilling and crashing all over the place almost hitting poor Boris. Boris just stood there not moving an inch to protect himself, for at this point he had inhaled much of the room's pestilential vapours and he was at that point quite sleepy on his very feet. But he was not long on his feet, for soon the shaking of the room became so great that it knocked Boris off these very same feet. Almost instantly pieces of the ceiling were shook loose from their moorings and started to fall most incessantly unto Boris's poor addled-brained head.

   Boris would have sat there indefinitely until he would have been pummelled and crushed by the objects injudiciously raining down upon him.  Fortunately for Boris, help was on the way in the form of one Mr. Walter Pigeon who had been enjoined by his wife--the very Mrs. Pigeon Person that Boris had had a run in with before that very day--to keep an eye on this poor lost soul.

   Soon Boris could feel much flapping of wings about his head, and cooed with  much delight because of this most refreshing fanning of fresh air unto his countenance.  However, this did little to wake poor Boris from his gas-induced slumber, so poor Mr. Walter Pigeon had to take another tack, a much more forthright and aggressive tack in the form of a very pointed and sharp thumb-tack directed towards the regions of Boris's nether lands. This did the trick and in a instance Boris had flown quite high into the air and landed on his feet in a quite furious mood.

   "What the heck was that?" shouted the still confused and much pained Boris.

   "One must experience some sufferings if they are to get on in life, my dear sir," said Walter.

   "Who said that?"

   "It is your very able servant,  Mr. Walter Pigeon, at your service, sir. No time for small talk, sir. We must be getting out of here before all comes tumbling about us."

   "Yes, you are right. What had got into my mind?!"

   "It was more what got into your brain, I would say.  But no time for that. Follow me now, sir."

   With his mind back in some order, Boris now followed Mr. Walter Pigeon out until they found themselves in a small cramped tunnel. Walter had no trouble here, but Boris, still being quite big and grand, had some troubles for he soon got stuck at one point; he was in much despair until he remembered the vials that he had fortunately placed in his pockets and taking some of the red one, or was it the blue: well, he tried both, and after much bumpings and scrapings, he had got hold of the right vial and had soon shrunken down to a right proper size, small enough to pass quickly down the tunnel (Perhaps, thought Boris, that sometimes even psychiatrists accidentally find the truth; and that our hookah smoking one may have inadvertenly hit the mark when he talked about the need to shrink to a proper size every now and then.) 

   However, being small now presented Boris with other problems: while being tall, small rocks had only scratched and bruised him; now these very same rocks became engines of bone-crushing death, and one large round boulder was now heading down a small gully right for our small hero, big enough and fast enough to put a crimp into Boris's current lifestyle. And if this wasn't enough, he soon tripped on some tree roots trapping him on the floor just as he felt the air from the big boulder's movement swaying his hair.  Just as it was about to crush poor Boris, Boris felt something surge under him and soon his body was afloat in the tunnel being carried by the strong and tireless wings of Mr. Walter Pigeon.  Soon they reached an exit, and, as they zoomed out into the bright sunshine and fresh air, the ball came tumbling out of the hole brushing them within an inch of their lives. 

   Boris--now on the wings of freedom--revelled in the fresh, crisp air; however they had to find safety, and to that effect, Mr. Walter Pigeon slowly circled lower and lower until they were back in the dark wood. As soon as Walter deposited Boris on a bed of soft ferns, Boris passed-out to sleep a very deep and peaceful sleep.