Carl coughed. He stuck his finger in his ear and waggled it about but detected no blockages.

“I’m sorry,” he said, “could you repeat that?”

The dwarf fixed Carl with what seemed to be a glare, though the lenses over his eyes obscured the true expression.

“Luunchpael Bukzemwynch,” the dwarf grated out.

Carl blinked. He rubbed his temples with his fingers. He rubbed his forehead with his hand. Then, just to make sure, he closed his eyes and rubbed his whole face with both hands, slapped himself on both cheeks, and pinched his nose. Then he opened his eyes. The dwarf was still there.

“Your name is Lunchpail Buxomwench.”

The dwarf said nothing, just stared, then nodded.

“Lunch. Pail. Buxom. Wench,” said Carl, looking straight into the dwarf’s lenses.

The little man was completely still, his face expressionless, his beard unmoved.

“That is my name, overlander,” he said, twisting the last word into an epithet with a quirk of his lips and a quiver of his beard. “Do you have any complaint with it?”

Carl looked at the other man for a moment more, studying the wrinkled features minutely, but his keenly tuned interpersonal skills detected no evidence of disingenuousness. This was no joke.

Carl leaned back in his chair, still keeping an eye on the dwarf. Having eliminated the possibility that the aged little fellow was some exceedingly lifelike gambit in a convoluted practical joke perpetrated by a friend or acquaintance, Carl defaulted to the next explanation which fit his circumstances. He began to assume that he was dreaming.

It made perfect sense, of course. As in a dream, he had no idea how he had come to be in the place he was. And who had ever heard of a dwarf named Lunchpail Buxomwench? The whole scenario was a construction of the dream world, perhaps made, as the oracles might suggest, to bring him greater wisdom. It hadn’t worked yet — or had it? Was the entire context in which he found himself — the dingy tavern, the wine-soaked table, the angry dwarf named Lunchpail — really a message, an impaling of Absolute Truth through the spongy flesh of everyday life? Carl began to search for meaning.

The sign over the door! “Don’t forget your coat.” It surely indicated that he would soon be traveling to a colder clime, perhaps up into the North.

Or the ink-splattered table nearby! An omen that a scribe or other writing-prone person would soon be having a great effect on his life.

And the sleeping barman! Clearly it signified the danger in his present condition, that if he went on without finding a cure he would soon end up like that miserable creature: fat and ugly, friendless and snoring.

And the angry dwarf! The dwarf who — the dwarf who was now in the midst of pounding his closed fist into the table. Carl wondered at it. He stared at the gnarled fingers as the fellow began to speak. They looked like the roots of trees curled into a ball. Perhaps he was going to spend some time as an arborist. In such a career it wouldn’t matter much if he fell asleep from time to time, it wouldn’t matter if –

“Sir!” said the dwarf.

“Yes?” Carl replied, peering into the cave-dweller’s dark lenses and wondering what message they carried.

“I am not possessed of infinite time, and even if I were I would not waste it entertaining folk who seem determined to ignore me. Are you interested in my proposal? Or shall I leave?” The dwarf’s beard quivered.

“Ah,” said Carl. He had known a woman once who’d said that people met in dreams have important things to say, and that it was best to let them talk. So Carl did.

“My apologies, ah, Lunchpail,” he said. “You see, I’m a stranger to this, ah, land.” Carl waved his hands around in circles, indicating that he referred to the entirety of the dream world. “Though your message may be couched in the terms of mystery common to this place I’ll, ahh, I’ll do my best to, ah, figure it out.”

Expressionless glass regarded him coldly. The dream-dwarf seemed unimpressed by Carl’s knowledge of the dream. That woman had also said that opening the mind to the realization that one was dreaming was very important, but Carl didn’t perceive any changes or omens now that he’d done it. He looked around the room, waiting for something strange and dream-like to happen. It didn’t, so he shrugged and went on.

“Please continue, ah, Lunchpail.” He grinned and winked at the dream-dwarf, intimating again that he was in on the secret.

“Everything alright, Carl?” said a familiar voice from the left.

Carl turned his head in this direction and saw his sometime-partner, the warrior Helmar, standing near the table looking between Carl and the dwarf quizzically. The dark-haired adventurer nodded to the dwarf across the table.

“How goes it, Lunchpail?”

Lunchpail grunted. “I know you said this man was the best burglar in the business, but he seems a little — distracted, I think, is the word.”

Helmar suddenly looked a bit worried. He sat down next to Carl, but he spoke to the dwarf.

“Carl’s fine. He’s just, oh, I don’t know, unconventional. Aren’t you, Carl?”

Carl leaned in close to Helmar and whispered: “Helmar, I’m dreaming. You’re a dream person, and that dwarf means something to me. The dream world calls him Lunchpail. What do you think that means?”

Helmar looked Carl in the eye. Then he slapped him across the cheek, none too gently.

“Carl. Stop playing around. Master Buxomwench is a client. This is no time for games.”