“I thought there were supposed to be six bagatelles?”

“What?”

“You said you were bringing me six bagatelles; I count only five. Look.”

“Uh... right.”

“It was supposed to be six. Six bagatelles, we said. And I've got: one, two, three—”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, don't keep counting them out like that. I can see we're short one. I can count.”

“Six bagatelles. Six. And this is only five, right? Let me just arrange them in a handy quincunx form so you can see the whole problem. So. What happened?”

“Let me think!”

“What are you doing? What? What's that?”

“There! Here you go.”

“What is it?”

“It's another bagatelle. I had it in my pocket all along, silly me. Must be gettin' old.”

“That won't do, I'm afraid.”

“... No, I know.”

“Well, I guess that's that then. You know, I don't have a lot going on in my life, it's very dull, I've no particular interests or anything, but one thing I can tell you: I'm going to keep at this. I'm never going to let you forget it. As long as there is oxygenated blood somewhere in my body, I will keep on demanding that bagatelle.”

“Okay, fine.”

Labels: From Buxtehude