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Ernie Alone

When bears hibernate, do they dream away the winter? In this age when we are told that science has explained the universe and answered all the big questions, it seems that we ought to know if bears dream. However, we lack this knowledge because, sadly, those intrepid scientists who have ventured into the dens of bruins to study their brain activity with a compact, portable battery-powered electroencephalogram have never gotten further than shaving small spots on the sleeping subject’s scalp and attaching electrodes with a conductive paste. Before an adequate reading can be taken, there occurs either a violent mauling or dismemberment or evisceration with extreme prejudice—or all three. Nothing good happens to the electroencephalogram machine, either.

We might expect that the sleeping bear would be injected with a powerful sedative, administered from a distance by a hypodermic-dart gun. Any competent scientist would dismiss that notion with scorn if not searing contempt, and rightly so. Hibernation is a natural state to which bears succumb, whereas sedation is unnatural . If the bear were to be sedated with a significant dose of zolpidem or zaleplon, whereafter brain patterns indicative of dreaming were observed, that would prove nothing about whether the animal dreams during natural hibernation. This vital information will be acquired only after some fortunate scientist chances upon a bear that is a particularly deep sleeper, which may well require the sacrifice of a great many more highly educated individuals before the right bear is found.

This raises the obvious question, “What about worms?” Recently, scientists discovered long, pale worms frozen in Arctic ice, where they had been in stasis for thousands of years. When thawed, these worms came back to life, as vigorous and inquiring as contemporary worms that had not suffered such an ordeal. During those centuries, did the hibernating worms dream? What fascinating fantasies might they have experienced as they slept? Scientists very much want to know, but they are foiled by the fact that the brains of these worms are so small that no electroencephalogram has yet been invented with electrodes so tiny they can be securely attached where required. And then there is the problem of determining which end of the worm is the head, if either.

If the question of whether hibernating bears and worms dream remains unanswered—and it does—we cannot hope to know if Ernie Hernishen was dreaming in suspended animation while swaddled in the space under the lid of the window seat. We could speculate, but to no useful end.

What can be said is that, after the three amigos departed, the house remained quiet for some time. Not silent, you understand, for even deserted houses produce small sounds. The creak and crack of expanding and contracting wood. The knocking of a trapped air bubble making its way through the plumbing. The refrigerator motor cycling on and off.

When a louder noise arose, it was a strange squishing sound combined with what might have been the mortal gagging of someone choking on a wad of inadequately chewed beef caught in his windpipe, punctuated by the metallic trilling of a cricket or other insect. Whatever the source of this guggle and swash, no cry of distress accompanied it, as it seemed ought to be the case.

The disturbance progressed from the kitchen, along the hallway, into the living room. The lid of the window seat made a distinctive sound as it was raised, after which a couple of minutes passed in a contemplative quiet except for brief spates of insectile vibrato. No hiss or sigh could be heard, no inhalation or exhalation. Then came sounds that were clearly those made by a clumsy individual trying to extract something of considerable weight from within a window seat. The lid closed with a clonk. The peculiar and unpleasant mélange of squishing and gagging and trilling receded across the living room, along the downstairs hallway, and into the kitchen as a mysterious individual conveyed its burden toward an unknown lair with a purpose that was no doubt unholy.