Satiricus was perplexed. He’d heard about the conundrum, “If a tree falls in the forest and there’s no one to hear it, does it make a sound?” He’d never been able to figure out the answer. But then he knew he wasn’t as smart as most – as for instance the brainboxes in the leadership of the KFC party – notably the Jhaat and Naga Man. They’d solved the philosophical enigma just like that! Well, it wasn’t exactly a tree falling – even though NoGel certainly had the girth of a hundred-year-old Saman tree.
But that was only to be expected to one born in a family named “Huge”. Name and nature and all that sort of thing.
Anyhow, here it was that NoGel had fallen (from on high – all the way from the top of Amaila Falls) but not a sound was heard since.
To be strictly truthful (and Satiricus, simple soul that he was, liked being truthful), Satiricus conceded NoGel hadn’t exactly fallen. It was more like he was hit in the solar plexus, doubled over and just collapsed after the revelation that he was a “company secretary”.
Satiricus figured if NoGel was just a company secretary, why should he tell everyone? Jeez!! The fellow must have attended law school and everything, no? For him to take such a lowly job of taking shorthand, must’ve really embarrassed him. That’s why he kept mum.
As he collapsed, NoGel croaked weakly he was resigning as chairman of the KFC party. (This was before the Integrity Commission closed them for a week to clean up their act. There were all kinds of messy evidence from their dirty tricks department lying around.)
And this was what created the conundrum as far as Satiricus was concerned. If NoGel had made no sound subsequently, how did the Jhaat and Naga Man maintain that NoGel was still chairman of the KFC? And Satiricus figured that either the Jhaat or the Naga Man must have heard a sound – even though no one else did. And then suddenly, the answer struck Satiricus. My God!! How dense he’d been. It was Naga Man!! The man had a history of hearing sounds when no one else did.
Wasn’t there that incident with Dr Cheddi Jagan in the deepest Rupununi? The Naga Man maintained stoutly, that from a stage in front of hundreds of people (plus dozens on the stage) Dr Jagan had announced that he, Naga Man, was to be the next leader of the PPPEE. No one else heard anything. But the Naga Man did. “And he wouldn’t lie, would he?” Satiricus asked himself.
Naaah! It was just that the Naga Man had solved the eternal conundrum. Does a Huge NoGel make a sound when he falls (or is pole-axed) and no one is around to hear? Yes! But only the Naga Man can hear it.
