“I have discovered the significance of the bell.”
Professor Quillibrace continued reading.
Miss Stray looked up from her tea.
“Have you?”
“Yes.”
“That's unfortunate,” said Quillibrace.
Blottisham ignored him.
“The bell rings.”
“Yes.”
“The fox hears it.”
“Yes.”
“The fox stops.”
“Yes.”
“And therefore the bell communicates.”
Stray tilted her head.
“To the fox?”
“Obviously.”
“But sometimes the bell rings when the fox isn't there.”
Blottisham waved this away.
“An irrelevant technicality.”
Quillibrace lowered the newspaper.
“An interesting definition of irrelevance.”
“The essential point,” said Blottisham, “is that the bell possesses meaning because it produces a response.”
Stray looked thoughtful.
“Does it?”
“The fox stops.”
“Yes.”
“So?”
“So perhaps the fox stops because it hears a bell.”
“Exactly.”
“Does the bell know that?”
Blottisham paused.
“Know what?”
“That the fox has stopped.”
“Don't be absurd. Bells don't know things.”
“Then how can the bell possess meaning?”
Blottisham looked irritated.
“It doesn't need to know.”
Quillibrace smiled.
“Now we are getting somewhere.”
“We are?”
“No.”
Blottisham sat down.
“The meaning is in the relation between the bell and the fox.”
“Better,” said Stray.
“The bell signals the fox.”
“Possibly.”
“Again with the ‘possibly’.”
“The fox might simply be startled.”
“But it stops.”
“Many things cause animals to stop.”
Blottisham considered this.
“Then the bell's meaning is not intrinsic.”
“Apparently not.”
“It's relational.”
“Apparently.”
“Contextual.”
“Apparently.”
“Emergent.”
Quillibrace put down the newspaper.
“Please don't.”
“Why not?”
“Because you are beginning to put adjectives where evidence should be.”
Blottisham looked wounded.
“I am synthesising.”
“You are decorating.”
Stray smiled into her tea.
Blottisham continued.
“Very well. The bell becomes meaningful because the fox responds to it.”
“Only when the fox is there,” said Stray.
“Yes.”
“And what about the times when the bell rings and nobody hears it?”
Blottisham thought.
“It still has meaning.”
“For whom?”
“For the fox.”
“The fox isn't there.”
“For the potential fox.”
Quillibrace closed his eyes.
“The potential fox.”
“Yes.”
“A fascinating creature.”
“Professor.”
“I merely hope it doesn't become another technicality.”
Stray looked towards the window.
“I think the story is interested in something else.”
“Such as?”
“The bell and the fox gradually becoming part of the same place.”
Blottisham frowned.
“But the bell doesn't intend to become part of anything.”
“Neither does the fox.”
“Then nothing is happening.”
“Something is happening,” said Stray. “It just isn't being done by anyone.”
Quillibrace nodded.
“The forest is acquiring a pattern.”
Blottisham brightened.
“Exactly! A semiotic pattern.”
“No.”
“A communicative ecology?”
“No.”
“A distributed meaning system?”
“No.”
Blottisham looked at Stray.
“What would you call it?”
She thought for a moment.
“I don't know.”
Quillibrace nodded approvingly.
“Excellent.”
Blottisham looked from one to the other.
“You both seem remarkably pleased with not knowing.”
“Not knowing,” said Quillibrace, “is sometimes the most accurate description available.”
“But surely the bell means something.”
Stray smiled.
“Perhaps.”
Blottisham groaned.
“Not again.”
Outside, somewhere beyond the garden, a bell rang.
The three of them stopped talking.
For a moment, nobody moved.
Then Quillibrace looked at Blottisham.
“You see?”
Blottisham nodded slowly.
“Yes.”
“What do you see?”
Blottisham considered this.
“That we have all become foxes.”
There was a silence.
Stray began to laugh.
Quillibrace picked up his newspaper.
“Don't tell anyone.”
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