The First Riddle The First Riddle

Defending the Answer

This time, the student waited for a moment.  When she was certain that the knocker was finished, she said, “Here is the explanation.” To the eagle, it appeared that her eyes suddenly shifted focus onto some point far beyond the door.  “The Ambulatory Diurnal Mandrake is a species of Mandrake which has the characteristics defined by its identification.  At first light, this extraordinarily rare species unroots itself from the ground and begins crawling toward the rising sun.  When direct sunlight falls upon the sensitive leaves, it lifts its twin upper roots in a manner which presents its leaves to best advantage toward the sun, continuing its ponderous progress upon its two limb-like primary roots.  Finally, as the sun lowers in the sky, the animated vegetable sets one upper root upon the ground for balance while attempting to absorb every last gleam of sunlight with the leaves of its other upper ‘limb.’  To date, all witnesses of this phase agree that the creature is left-rooted.  When the sun finally falls below the horizon, the clever vegetable replants itself to await another glorious day of travel.  During the entire day, the creature may travel as far as twelve inches, but more frequently finds itself returned to the same rooting hole from which it crawled that very morning.“

The knocker was silent for a moment, and then said, “The explanation demonstrates understanding, but this is still not the correct answer to the question.”

She replied, “Is it your contention that every question has only one answer?”

“What?” replied the eagle in surprise.  “I’m the one asking the questions here!  No, of course a question may have more than one answer.”

“Then,” urged the student, “does my answer correctly answer your question?”

One Minor Quibble Remains

Once again, the knocker was silent for a few moments, and then said, as grudgingly as a musical bronze bird can, “Your answer satisfies the question.  However,” it continued with a chime of satisfaction, “there remains the fact that no such creature exists.  An answer must not only answer the question, it must also be a true answer.”

“They do exist,” she assured him.

“I have been privy to centuries of answers, from the brightest and most well-educated of wizards, to questions covering every area of human knowledge,” replied the eagle in a ringing, haughty tone.  “Never have I heard of this species.”

“That doesn’t mean that it doesn’t exist,” replied the student.  “There was an article about it in the paper just last year.”  It seemed to her as if the knocker was peering at her suspiciously. 

“You have proof of this?” it asked.

“I have loose-leaf-bound copies of every issue of the paper since its inception,” she replied.  “For some reason, the library here doesn’t carry them.  Maybe someone who checked them out needed them so badly that they decided to keep them.  If you let me in, I can get the original article for you.”

The eagle continued to look astoundingly suspicious for a piece of cast metal.  After a moment, it hesitantly replied, “Alright, I’ll allow entrance on that condition.  If you’re trying to trick me, though,” it warned, “I guarantee that the questions I present you for the remainder of the year will be of such obscurity and difficulty that you will have no chance whatsoever of entering without the assistance of a seventh-year student.”

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