“Please help yourself to another scone, Earnest. They’re best fresh.” Earnest Arbuthnot and Ivy James were at her table, sharing afternoon tea. She was very pleased to have found a soul-mate in the ritual of afternoon tea and always encouraged Earnest to join her as often as he was able. As he also very much enjoyed her company, he was a frequent visitor.
“Very nice, thank you, Ivy. It seems so quiet here, without the girls.”
“Yes, that’s certainly true. But all the same, it’s good to be able to converse quietly, too. Not always possible these days.”
“I keep many social engagements, as you know, but this is one at which I can completely relax.” She beamed her pleasure at this remark. “In fact, some of them are damnably awkward. Yesterday, the developer of the project next door was at the same luncheon table as I was. And instead of doing the graceful thing, he went on and on about the project to our table mates. And in a grandiose manner as well. He was positively speechifying.”
“Morris Mangold? Perhaps that was a blessing, Earnest, and you emerged more poised than he. He appeared ill-mannered, and you were not required to reply.”
“You’re quite right. I refrained from any remarks. It was clearly embarrassing to some others at the table. Thank goodness he didn’t address me directly about it.”
“You would have done splendidly had he done so, I’m sure.”
“It does make me treasure less my social rise here, I may say, when I observe the behavior of others who share in my ascent.”
“Oh, Earnest” she chided, “I hope you’d never admit that to any but your closest friends!” He had the decency to look abashed. She continued, “It does remind me that I was going to share a snatch of verse with you. It’s from “Mending Wall’, a poem by Robert Frost. May I?”
At his nod, she opened a book and read out the same lines she had shared earlier with Hans.
“Before I built a wall I’d ask to know
What I was walling in or walling out
And to whom I was like to give offense.”
Earnest said, “You’ll be pleased to know that Hans did share that with the committee. It seems that for all his public pronouncements, Mr. Mangold has very little interest in either asking, or in not offending.”
“I’ve been thinking about this lighthouse, the old one, that is. I have a theory about this “preservation” proposal. It’s this, that by incorporating it into the new design, the old structure, and all the history it retains, is in effect destroyed.”
“Go on, but first another cup, please.” She poured, and offered him another scone. He took half of one, and another scoop of jam.
“The only way it can actually be ‘of the past’ is as it is now. We all thought, I suppose, that it would always be there, a crumbling relic it’s true, but there, going on being what it was. To move it, or restore it, or to build around it and replicate it, all of those options remove it from the past, and place it in the future. That may be all well and good, but I don’t see how it really addresses the concerns of the preservationists. Not strictly.”
“There are similar cases in the English countryside, Ivy. I don’t mean the incursions of say a theme park, in a rural area. When the old village tea shop becomes Ye Olde Tea Shoppe, it ceases to exist in the way it was. It’s been tricked out to serve a new interest. Is that what you mean?”
“I think so. It’s not just a case of the old lighthouse being swallowed up by a larger version, like Jonah inside a whale. The old lighthouse simply ceases to exist. Whereas if it was still standing on the same spot in whatever condition, it would still mean the same thing. It will never be spit out intact again, as was Jonah.”
“Forgive me, but right now I’m seeing a series of lighthouse type shapes, all fitting inside one another, like Russian dolls. First a cute little tabletop glass pepper pot that gets inside a Dalek. Do you know them?”
“Tell me.”
“The Daleks are an alien species, an enemy of planet Earth in the long-running sci-fi series, Dr. Who. A remorseless, tone-deaf, six foot pepper pot bent on universal conquest and domination. Does this sound like our developer, I ask myself? And the cruel Dalek fits inside our old, normal size, historic lighthouse. And this is absorbed, devoured, by the gargantuan lighthouse-like edifice called progress, or in our own case, by The Alchemy.”
“Bravo, Earnest!” She clapped, applauding his fanciful rendition. “Though if the Dalek were to have too much pepper, would he huff and puff and sneeze down the lighthouses? Death by pepper?”
“Very good question. All I know on the sci-fi front is that the aliens often land on the tallest structure. Better on an Alchemy than on a POPS, I’d say.”
“Wherever do you suppose they got that Alchemy name from, anyway?”
“Speculation abounds. You know of course that it derives from Greek words meaning to separate and to join together. Rather apt, wouldn’t you agree? It refers to the ancient attempt to transform base materials into gold. Or into the elixir of life, hence immortality.”
“So, the name is referring to the developer’s wish to transform something into money, or perhaps fame?”
“Possibly. Though I can’t quite credit him with that degree of accuracy.”
“How is the committee getting on? Any developments?”
“Since the fiasco at the opening night, you mean? You heard about that, I’m sure. Guy Karon found a reporter willing to listen to our issues that evening. That’s why we are starting to get some local coverage. Privately, Hans has been very good about supplying us with some recent city history, filling us in on what has happened in other similar situations. So we are taking some other steps now, too.”
“Such as? And do have that other half, Earnest.” Earnest complied.
“Well, instead of challenging the proposal, per se, we’re beginning to investigate past performance on other developments. Will the work be up to snuff, in other words? Have there been any legitimate grumbles about other buildings where his firm has been involved? Are there any lawsuits? Anything that would suggest that the construction itself might be questioned? Anything to suggest an inability to handle a project of this size?”
“You mean, if there are problems occurring in other developments Mangold has done or been a party to, that might suggest that any new building might have similar flaws?
“Or at least might be subject to more scrutiny, certainly. Of course, it may turn out that he is completely in the clear in that regard. It’s a risk you have when you undertake to discover the truth. As I say, it’s just another avenue of approach at this point. And it could turn into an expensive one, if attorneys get involved.”
“Imagine that…if flaws proves true, the newer lighthouse might fall down faster than the older one.”