The Bench Problem

I was woken early by a knock on my back door. I quickly dressed and rushed downstairs to find an elderly stranger at my door.

 

"Do you have a bench?" he asked me.

 

"No, but if you need to sit down I can offer a kitchen stool, or a comfy chair?"

 

"You misunderstand," he said, "I'm looking for an island that has a bench. I came to this Archipelago with my wife before we were married and proposed to her on a bench on one of the islands. Only I can't remember which island it was."

 

"Does your wife not remember?" I said.

 

"My wife died last year. The big 'C'."

 

"A lot of people get washed away by the big C," I said thoughtfully, a line typical of Happy Island humour. He merely nodded in response.

 

"Can you remember anything else about the island?" I asked.

 

"Only that there was a bench looking out towards the sea, and a wood, where we went for a walk. Does this island have a wood?"

 

"Not really. There are only 16 trees on the island in total, the local birds are all on a waiting list for nesting sites. We call it a 'wood' in the tourist brochure, but that's so that we can claim tax rebates."

 

"Can you think of anywhere that has a bench AND a wood?"

 

"No, there aren't many benches on the Archipelago, most of the islands don't welcome strangers, the rest prefer to charge them for deckchair hire rather than provide free seating. I can't think of any island that has both a wood and a bench on it."

 

"Well I'm not going to give up," the man said. "I'm going to visit every island on the Archipelago until I find the one my wife and I visited."

 

"Be careful," I said. "A lot of the islands haven't even been written about yet, there's no telling what you might find there."

 

Later that day there came another knock on my back door. It was an elderly woman.

 

"Do you have a bench?" she asked me.

 

"No, but if you need to sit down I can offer a kitchen stool, or a comfy chair?"

 

"You misunderstand," she said, "I'm looking for an island that has a bench. I came to this Archipelago with husband before we were married. We visited an island, I remember it had a bench looking out to sea, and a wood we walked though. Only I can't remember which island it was. Can you think of anywhere that has a bench AND a wood?"

 

"No, I can't think of any island that has both a wood and a bench on it."

 

"Well I'm not going to give up," the woman said, before leaving to explore the entire Archipelago alone.

 

I told Alun about the two unexpected visitors when he called round for his daily natter and the next morning I was woken early by a distant hammering. I quickly dressed and left the house to locate the source of the noise. I found Alun, installing a bench on the hilltop overlooking the sea.

 

"Do you think that the two of them will meet on a bench somewhere and hook up?" I said.

 

"It's not that sort of Archipelago, Jed," Alun said. "The best we can hope for is that they both find somewhere they think is the place they're looking for and leave the Archipelago contented."

 

We sat next to each other on the bench, starring out to sea. Neither of us said anything.