Meet Sojourner

 This is a chapter from my upcoming novel, Talisgate. Troy Cooper and Molly McPherson have just met a strange, thin, mysterious man. Chapter 20 of the book covers the first significant conversation with Sojourner, but it doesn't completely reveal who (or what) he is. You'll have to wait for the rest of the book to be completed before you find that out. I hope this sample piques your interest. Keep in mind this is in rough draft form. Changes and corrections are inevitable.

Chapter 20

“Who are you?” I demanded, trying not to sound as nervous as I was and shuffling to get between Molly and the stranger. “Where did you come from? How did you get in here?”

“What do you want to know first?” the man replied. He slowly and casually leaned back against the wall, crossing one foot over the other and lightly touching the brim of his hat. 

“Tell me who you are,” I said, gritting my teeth and striking my best no-nonsense pose. I had a lot of practice at this. It was my go-to posture when I felt I needed to repel the bullying attempts of a bigger, less sophisticated schoolmate. My arms were as straight as arrows, tight to my sides. My fists were clenched so tightly I could actually feel my knuckles turning white.

“I am a sojourner. Yes. Sojourner. That is what I am called.” The man said this in such a way that I thought he must not be used to anyone calling him anything. It seemed like a foreign concept to him.

I pressed. “Sojourner? Is that your name or your job?”

Before he could answer, Molly piped up. “Did you say you are a soldier? It sounded like you said, ‘soldier-er’.”

“No, silly,” the man chuckled. “Sojourner. Say it like this. Repeat after me. First, say ‘so’.”

“So,” Molly complied.

“Right,” the man continued. “Now say, ‘ger’ like the first part of ‘geranium’.”

“Ger.”

“Perfect! Now say ‘ner’ like… well, I don’t know any words that start with ‘ner’ so just say ‘ner’ and let that be it.”

“How about ‘nervous’, like I am right now,” I said.

Molly ignored me. “Ner.”

 “Right-o,” Sojourner said. “Now, put them all together and you get ‘Sojourner’, and that’s me!”

“Sojourner,” Molly said, nodding slightly with self-satisfaction. She seemed oddly at peace with this weirdo, but I still wanted to know more about him. I mean, he just kind of appeared out of nowhere. I didn’t even hear him come in.

I lowered my brow and crossed my arms. With my best attempt at sounding tough, I asked, “Name or occupation?”

The stranger cocked his head sideways a bit and slid the fingers of his left hand underneath his hat, giving his scalp a gentle scratching. Sounding genuinely perplexed by my idea of the simplest question anyone could be asked, he said, “Whatever do you mean?”  

“Is your name Sojourner or are you employed by someone as a sojourner?” I was dimly aware of Molly asking what the heck a sojourner was, but I mentally pushed the question away and kept my gaze fixed upon the strange, skinny man in the hat. 

“I certainly do sojourn. I am a person who sojourns. Employed by someone? Ah, yes. I suppose you could call it employed and I suppose you could call it someone, but I still don’t understand your question.”

I was getting frustrated. “Listen,” I said. “Are there other people like you? People who sojourn, as you say, where you come from?”

“Where I come from? Come from? From? You ask strange questions indeed. But yes, there are others like me. Well, they are somewhat like me in that they sojourn like me.” The stranger continued to look confused. I got the sense that he was trying to answer my question, but it was like I was speaking in terms he couldn’t comprehend. 

I tried another approach. “OK,” I continued. “There are others who do as you do. When you meet one of them, how do you greet each other?”

“Oh, why didn’t you ask that to begin with?” His face brightened. 

I could feel Molly tapping me on the shoulder. She still wanted to know what sojourning was. I absently brushed her hand away. “I guess I just didn’t,” I answered. “Go on.”

“Well,” the man went on, flashing a grin and looking much more at ease now that he felt he could fully take part in the conversation. “I would say something like, ‘Greetings, Sojourner!’”

“And what would he say?” I prodded.

“He? Might be a she, you know.”  

“Whatever. How would he or she respond?”

“Fair greetings in return, Sojourner!” A beaming smile covered the lower portion of the man’s face when he said this. He was so proud that he had the right answer. 

I crushed his hubris by snapping back, “That tells me nothing! You both just call each other ‘sojourner’? That’s like everyone going around calling each other ‘man’ or ‘woman’. Don’t you have names?”

“Names? Heavens, no. Names are for people and pets and streets and buildings and such. A sojourner needs no name.” This last statement seemed to be a point of pride for him. He narrowed his eyelids and tilted his head slightly back, elevating the angle of his nose. 

“People? So, you’re not a person?” The stranger just blinked at this question and broke eye contact with me. This was apparently a touchy subject. I decided to get back to my current line of questioning. “How do you tell each other apart?” I asked.

“We know ourselves. That is enough,” he replied and offered no more. 

“Well, we’re going to have to call you something if we’re going to talk to you, and I have a bunch of talking to do. I will speak to you as if your name is Sojourner, OK?”

“It will result in none of the epidermis being removed from my posterior regions,” Sojourner said, fluttering the fingers of both hands in the air near his head, just outside the perimeter of his hat’s ample brim. “Suit yourself.”

“What?” I spat.

“It’s an old saying here in this culture, no? It refers to something being of no trouble or causing no inconvenience. I’m sure of it. I’m certain I’ve heard it here before.”

I thought about what he had said and mulled it over. “Oh, you mean it’s no skin off your back?”

“That’s what I said,” he replied.

“No, it isn’t. You said something similar, but you used a lot more words and made it hard to understand.”

“I only want to be clear,” the sojourner offered. “Clarity is important.”

“Too much clarity darkens,” I said, sounding as grave and important as I could.

“What does that mean?” the man asked. Molly was rolling her eyes. I could feel them. She knows me.

“It means,” I said, “that by over-explaining things, you made your point difficult to understand. Too much clarity darkens. That’s a quote from Blaise Pascal.”

Sojourner’s eyes brightened. “Did you say ‘Blaise Pascal’? France? Seventeenth century?”

“Y-yeah. Blaise Pascal.” Sojourner’s burst of enthusiasm rattled me.

“Oh, yes! Bright fellow! I loved him. I remember him well.” Sojourner turned his gaze upward, as if picturing a scene from his memory. After a brief pause, he looked at me with a veil of sadness lightly covering his face. His eyes drooped along with the corners of his mouth. “He’s gone from everywhere now, you know.”

“What are you talking about?” I shot back. “If Pascal were still alive, he would be over three hundred years old. So yeah, he’s gone. Are you trying to tell me you met Pascal personally? You’re that old?”

Molly forced her way into the conversation and kept me from pursuing my line of questioning. “Look. I’m fine calling you whatever you want, and I’m not as impressed as Troy that you know about his all-time historic hero, but can one of you please tell me what a sojourner is?”

Sojourner opened his mouth to speak, but I beat him to the punch. “A sojourner is someone who doesn’t stay in one place very long. It’s kind of like a traveler without a home.” I glanced over at the nodding Sojourner.

“That’s essentially accurate,” he said. “Of course, there’s more to why I’m here and more to what my purpose actually is, but as far as a dictionary definition, that will do. It doesn’t really do me justice, but it’s the closest thing to a one-word description.”

“OK, so now you’ve hit on it. That’s exactly what I want to know,” I said, punctuating each word with a jab of my index finger in the stranger's direction. I didn’t touch him, but I was feeling particularly brave at the moment and wanted to establish my ground. I’m not sure where my courage was coming from, unless it was adrenaline. This guy had really startled me with his sudden appearance, and I was riled up—at least as riled up as an eleven-year-old boy can get. “Why are you here? What gives you the right to barge in here and scare the snot out of me and Molly? You’d better not try anything. I’m tougher than I look and I’m no stranger to a fight.” I bowed out my chest and tried my best to look threatening. I glared at Sojourner and, through teeth clenched so hard I could hear their surfaces grinding against each other, I said, “What do you want with me?”

Taking a deep breath and trying very hard not to laugh at my belligerent display, Sojourner simply said, “It’s not really about you, Troy. I’m here because of Molly.”