The Dinner Party

The academic paced across his home-library and stopped for a few moments, while contemplating the tragic suicide. Why did his friend kill himself? Sudden death is tragic enough, emotional enough; but the resolve to kill oneself. How cryptically extreme. He wasn’t sick; he wasn’t in physical pain. Then why?

The academic was financially well-off. He didn’t earn; he didn’t inherit; and he didn’t cheat to get it. He lived comfortably in a large home, with a gardener, a live-in housekeeper, a chef with servants he could call upon, and many dogs to care for. He dressed up every day regardless of need in a way that made him appear to be a pipe smoker but wasn’t, he abhorred it.

He considered that he was responsible for the suicide. Not as a matter of law, but as a matter of ethics. “I didn’t know he contemplated suicide,” he professed, while continuing to pace his library. “Did I really know he had nothing to live for?” He considered. “Why didn’t he tell anyone he was a friend in need?” Then again, was he a friend or merely an acquaintance?

A few steps to the right and he was able to admire through tall windows his sprawling garden where birds of different types and squirrels alighted. He looked into the next room, the dining room. Even larger than the library, it was the centerpiece of the home. The room was for dining, entertaining, and significant conversation. The invitations were for assorted types, the reward was great food and great wine. But the obligation was to speak one’s unfiltered mind — and that mind must enthrall. Conversing to triteness was a bore. And being a bore was a felony. Were there exceptions? There was no accounting for spouses or escorts as they were considered an appendage. Usually, there was a winner; and there was a loser. It was safe to be somewhere in the middle. Most prepared for the dinner outside of dress. Some through the years were never invited to return.

Reminiscing on the particular night, it was a glorious night. The outdoor temperature was suitable to open the windows. Once all gathered, the gracious host toured from room to room with the evening’s guests — the doctor, the magician, the lawyer, the musician, and the businessman. Each had a spouse or escort that followed in tow. The host knew much about each, having researched them all in depth. He motioned as if to kiss the hand of the magician’s wife, the only one he had met previously. Then each sat in their assigned chair at the dining table — spaced six-feet apart.

The doctor must be addressed as Doctor Xi; the magician as Fantastic Franklin; the lawyer as Mr. Baker, Esquire; the musician as maestro; and the businessman as Mr. Cohn (pronounced Con). And of course, there was the host — the academic — who carefully studied each of his guests as they took their places around the dining room table.

The host encouraged each guest to introduce themselves, and announced “Please determine the one thing you all have in common.”

The doctor declared herself as a woman of science, and spoke about immunology and how she treats patients from the spread of viruses threatening the world. The magician declared, “I create illusion.” Then explained how he would sever his lovely wife in half and put her back together again before an audience’s very eyes. The lawyer created truth, and, he boasted, with his sheer force of personality, he persuaded judges and juries. He regaled us with his latest courtroom victory that saved money for an important entity. The musician created music, conducted orchestras around the world, provided escape from reality, and lifted the audience to a heavenly sonorous place. The businessman created wealth and his last venture, he established the value of a company, made the value go up and then sold his shares; and then the value plunged down. He pursued his next venture.

The doctor’s spouse sipped the wine and pretentiously remarked about the denseness, the nuttiness, the body; to which cutting looks from the others and a slow discrete shake of the host’s head accompanied by eye contact was sufficient to end his complex, angular, jammy explanation. No one has ever been asked to leave from a dinner. A revisionist retelling might label the academic as rude. The doctor’s spouse excused himself to the lavatory so he might regroup.

Then a dreadful conversation of pop philosophy emerged. The past being complete, the future not yet reached. The working unit of time is the present. The only thing real, the true experiential mechanism is the present moment in time.

“That’s why I always live in the present,” the collective group minus one agreed upon.

And the Fantastic Franklin, the magician pounced. “Live in the present? It is the future that is only real. The present is the illusion, as false as the horizon — the illustrative line between the past and the future. Like witnessing light from a star, we are witnessing the past and our brains chronicle the moments behind actuality, we only perceive the past. This is the key to magic. This is where the turn of the trick lays. The prestige (the product of the trick) is your belief that you perceive reality in real time.” They were all fascinated by this turn. But where in time do we live? Perhaps all of them would be considered interesting enough to survive the dinner.

“You are all liars!” The host interrupted. “You’re all so important — Doctor, Fantastic, Esquire, Maestro, Mr. Con. Get over yourselves. Doctor you’re not a scientist. If we are permitted to talk about the past, you were a scientist in medical school. Now do you really do science? No, you do what science tells you to do. Give this medicine when the test results report that. But you do not contribute to science. Thus, you’re not a scientist.”

“Fantastic Franklin, you confess you are an illusionist. Your wife is alive. You didn’t saw anyone in half or make anyone disappear. The present is time’s horizon between the past and the future,” his tone mocked, with no hint of decorum. “You lie from the moment you step on stage until you bow. You’re a huckster in a cape.”

“Baker, Esq., please. You don’t create truth. You’re also an illusionist. Project the illusion of truth for lucre. And either point of view will due as long as your conditions for retainer are met.

“Maestro? Maestro? Cosa crei? Nothing. You create nothing. You have others perform the music of those who created it.

Mr. Cohn. You pump up the value of a stock. You create wealth? The zero sum gain means you destroy wealth when you dump the stock at its high value. And the remaining shareholders are stuck with worthless shares. You create nothing.”

“And how are you a soothsayer as an academic, sir?” It didn’t matter who asked. “Science does not lie,” the host replied. He did enjoy observing others, hypothesizing about what others will do, and making money doing it.

“Why are we really all here? Do you toy with us for your amusement? Or perhaps for some academic paper that 42 professors might read.”

“I guess we know what we have in common. We all create nothing,” the magician’s wife said. “But this doesn’t mean we are all unethical.” She directed her tone toward the host, who smirked back.

“Speak for yourselves,” Mr. Cohn’s escort said. “I am the mother of two children.”

“Nothing ethical about having children,” the maestro’s escort, the first chair violinist, quipped. She had no children.

The lawyer said, “These are equivocations. Nothing but a play on words. Economic wealth isn’t a measure of success. If you invest in me I can find us a cause to champion in court.”

The doctor said, “Follow me and we can discover the vaccine for all. We can live and love and touch again.”

The musician said, “Follow me with your money and I could fill the world with music. Music can connect the world even when we remain apart.”

“I can create the greatest show in the world. Not only would you make money, you would expand the imagination of the world, if you were to follow me,” the magician said.

“Wealth is creation if one creates wealth. Even if another loses,” Mr. Cohn said with confidence. “If you give me your confidence, I could create the wealth you seek.”

There was a moment of silence. The host nodded to have the main course placed in front of each guest. The cover still atop of the plates the host asked, “If you were meant to follow anyone who would it be?” For dramatic flair, the staff lifted the covers off the plates and the chef announced, “Bon appetite.”

The night had concluded. There were no promises; there were no debts. There were no new predictions. Months passed without a word to the host. For this reason the academic concluded there were no undue influences.

As the academic took another pause from pacing his library, he removed his pocket watch and noted the time. Suddenly, dressed in black, the magician’s assistant appeared in the library. She placed a bag upon a desk in the corner of the library. It contained a large sum of cash. She teared up for reasons that were arguably mixed between shame and regret; the loss of money and losing the bet.

The story went, after that dinner, the doctor, magician, and their families invested in Cohn’s current business opportunity. All made out well except for Baker, Esquire. He did not invest. Did he overlook, did he feel left out? Didn’t he claim so much of what life offered?

“I told Baker not to invest,” she said.

“You violated the terms of our bet then and there,” the academic replied.

“I honor my debts,” she replied.

“You have honor,” he responded.

She sighed and said, “I loved him. I can’t believe you were right,” and left.

The host also received a fee as a fundraiser from the businessman, Mr. Cohn. He received gifts for his dogs and garden from the other dinner guests.

People meet each other. They make their choices. Their choices, a product of will, free or determined, which transition into actions and consequences. Should the host, an academic willing to risk his money hold himself responsible? And so the academic host freed his conscience, washed his hands, and planned his next dinner.