Chapter 6
Al felt surrounded by a vast spaciousness. It was dawn, twilight just beginning to leave the black behind. In the sky overhead no stars were visible. The air was heavy with moisture. He held a heavy piece of metal in his hands. It was cold and damp to the touch. Lowering it down onto his lap he looked at what he held. There was just enough light to make out the object.
It was a shotgun in his hands. A shotgun! Its stock and forearm were Circassian walnut polished to a warm glow.
“Circassian?” he questioned himself. “What is Circassian walnut?” It was like one of those questioning thoughts within a dream where you know who the person is in the dream, but they don't look like the real person. You just know they are one and the same.
He shifted the gun about in his lap. His eyes followed the lines of the hammer less, double barrel. The grip and forearm of the shotgun were sharply checkered. Along both sides of the grip there was a spade-like design set within another slightly larger device. The butt plate was gutta-percha. It bore a checkered background surrounding a circular field. Within the field a spaniel held a bird in its mouth. Above and below the circle were the words “Parker Brothers.”
The two ten gauge barrels were works of art, “Damascus“ barrels wrought out of the best Belgium made metals. The barrels bore a tiny, overlapping, muscle shaped, seashell pattern. The triggers and front sight were trimmed with gold.
Al saw he wore light clothing, a cotton shirt with stiff paper collar, knickers, vest and a jacket. On his feet were heavy leather boots topped with canvas gaiters. A small, quilt lined, woven hat protected his head.
With the slow rising of the sun the marshland surrounding him came into focus. He sat in a duck blind. Cattails stood stoically between him and the open water. A dense ground fog blanketed large parts of the marsh.
Al felt a faint breeze from behind. He smelt the increased presence of the ocean and breathed deeply, holding the clean, moisture laden air in his lungs for a long while before releasing it.
The slight wind began to shred the fog. Large gaping holes appeared. To his right Al heard the muffled creak of an oar. With the light increasing he peered into the dense fog covering that area of the marsh.
The breeze touched the area of fog and ripped a jagged hole in it; leaving white, whispery tentacles trailing across the water. On the now visible expanse of open water floated scores of waterfowl; green-headed ducks intermixed with light brown, pinstriped, black ducks, and a few geese.
At the right edge of the fog bank, a disturbance of motion caught Al's attention. He watched a dark, tubular projection emerge from the white cloud. It grew two feet before the bow of a skiff showed. The tubular projection was attached to the skiff like a cannon. “A punt gun,” Al said to himself, his third “understood“ thought.
The sixteen-foot skiff moved into open water. Two rough glad men, one near the bow the other at the stern, sculled quietly toward the flight of birds alight on the marsh.
Small patches of dismembered fog floated about the area. The boat maneuvered whenever it could to keep the satin veil between it and the birds. Quietly the boat moved in close to the flock and brought its gun into alignment. The man at the bow bent over the gun. It roared, throwing shot across the marsh, and covering the water with a suffocating fog of gun smoke.
Through the thunder of the gun's discharge and its dense smoke Al did not the know the fate of the birds. It took several seconds for the air to clear.
Most of the birds had escaped mortal injury. A score, or so, floated on the surface. The two men in the boat busied themselves retrieving the floating bodies.
“God damned market hunters,” a voice cursed just to Al's left. At the sound Al looked and saw the two men seated in the blind with him. They both held shotguns and were dressed similar to him.
The man nearest was dark, heavyset, self-confident looking. He was clean shaved but had a deep blue tint to his face from the denseness of his black whiskers. He stood to peer over the blind at the men in the skiff.
He sat back down and turned to Al, “Those market hunters are going to ruin the hunting for all of us if we don't do something to stop them.”
“That's right Charles,” the second man assented in a high-pitched voice. He was not much taller than the first, but thinner, much thinner than what looked healthy. The sleeves of his jacket were worn thin by his elbows. His face was narrow, with a beak-like nose above a full, drooping mustache and a receding chin.
“They will most certainly ruin the hunting if something isn't done to curb them,” he said in a high-pitched whining voice.
“Shut up James,” Charles ordered curtly. “I don't need you to repeat everything I say. After all, I have said it.”
“Yes, James,” Charles answered, nodding.
“Al,” James turned thumping Al heavily on the back. “We're glad you could come. Fine morning isn't it?” James continued without allowing Al an opportunity to answer. “It's amazing what four ounces of #2 shot will do to a flock of birds, isn't it?” The question was put to Al but Charles answered.
“Yes, it sure is. That's over three hundred forty of those little jewels, drop jewels that is,” he added proudly.
“Shut up, Charles,” James said flatly.
Charles shut his mouth tightly and looked out at the marsh.
“Charles talks too much, he does,” James said to Al in an undertone. “As I was saying, we're happy you could join us.” James sat facing Al his hard face trying to look friendly.
“Isn't that a Parker Brothers gun you have there?” he asked Al.
“Yes, it is,” Al answered. “Would you care to see it?”
“No, thank you,” James shook his head slightly. “I've got a AAH Pigeon grade Parker at home. I went all the way up to Meriden, Connecticut to get it. Bought it from the old man himself. The asshole didn't come off a dime from the catalog price either.”
“How much was that?” Charles asked, returning to the conversation only to provide the lead for James.
“$499.00,” James replied. “I don't really like it much though, throws a bit to the right. That's why I carry this Purdy. It's a better gun.”
Al noticed the gun James held. It was an exceedingly beautiful weapon with handsome Damascus barrels and a delicate floral pattern engraved on the receiver. “It's a pretty piece,” Al acknowledged.
“I like it,” James condescended, adding, “I let Charles use my 12 gauge Smith since he owns the newspaper.” They both laughed until they noticed Al had missed the joke.
“Don't you know who Smith is?” Charles demanded. “He builds all those typewriter things.” The two again broke into laughter.
James stood and looked over the blind. “Those two are gone. Maybe we can get some ducks now. Charles, if you will begin.”
When Charles began blowing into the duck call it was obvious why he was along. He had a talent for the device.
The morning was still very young, the sun just fully up. It was not long before several birds neared the blind. First James, then Charles, bounded to their feet and fired. Al followed their example. They all brought down birds.
They sat back down and Charles started calling again. He was a gifted bird caller. The birds would arrive from nowhere. Again and again the men stood and fired creating a much greater loss to the bird population than the “market hunters“ had done.
Resting on the bench in the blind with a small silver flask raised to his lips, James smiled. Tucking the bottle away in his jacket pocket he nudged Charles, then Al, and pointed up into the sky. High above the marsh a long V-shaped flight of birds were visible. James nudged Charles again. Charles pulled a second wooden call from his jacket and placed it to his lips. A loud “ka-ronk, ka-ronk,” with the second syllable higher pitched than the first, filled the air. It was not long before the flight of geese lowered toward the marsh.
The geese were gray-brown colored with black heads and a white chinstrap. They were no more than twelve feet above the water when James leaped to his feet and fired. Neither Charles nor Al rose. James brought down the lead goose and the flight veered away to safety.
“Gentlemen, gentlemen, it's been a fine morning for a shoot hasn't it,” James exulted. “I hope we do this again soon.” He tipped his cap and started to work his way out of the blind.
“What about all those birds?” Al asked indicating the bodies floating on the marsh.
Charles, following closely behind James as he walked, answered, “Oh, those are just mallards and teal with a couple of pintail thrown in. If you want 'em, you're welcome to 'em. Really though,” he added over his shoulder, “that goose is the only bird worth cleaning. If you like goose.” Al watched them disappeared into the trees at the edge of the marsh.
Chapter 7
Mark and Mary were seated in the back booth of a bar-b-que place on Elm Street near the office. Their backs were to the door, their food mostly eaten. The restaurant was not busy. Most of the lunch crowd was long gone.
Mark sat his glass of ice tea down and looked into Mary's eyes. “You know that I love you madly.”
“You say that to all the girls don't you?”
“You have to say something to them,” Mark smiled.
Mary moved into the corner of the booth and looked him up and down, her eyes filled with mirth. “Well at least I know what you love,” her left hand moved smoothly following the contours of her figure down to her lap where her index finger circled for a moment before it rose quickly back to the table and toyed with an empty glass.
“You're right, you know,” he agreed. Shifting around he blocked any view into the booth with his back.
Mary reclined in the corner of the booth, extending her legs out under the table until they made contact with Mark's.
His eyes followed the reclined body down from her face to the hem of the soft, dark blue dress ending just below her knees. With his body twisted in the booth, his left elbow rested on the table and his right arm lay across the back of the seat. He lowered his left hand, resting it on Mary's knee.
“Did you talk to Al?”
Mary's hand moved away from the glass. Mark watched its movement as it neared his mouth. The soft index finger touched his lips and rested there in a sustained kiss. Pursing his lips against the warm fingertip Mark looked at Mary. Leaning back until her head rested against the wall she closed her eyes and shook her head languidly. The hand left his lips and settled at her side. “I don't want to think about that right now,” she said softly.
Drawing his hand down along her leg to the hem of her dress Mark watched the rippling effect his hand had on the fabric. At the bottom of the hem his hand slipped underneath.
Mary's legs were bare, soft, and warm. Slowly his hand slid up along her inner thigh. Her head rolled to the right and rested against the wall. Opening wider, her legs gave room to the hand until it stopped in the moist warmth at the juncture of her thighs.
“Let's get out of here,” he said huskily. “Your place is only five minutes away.”
Mary nodded yes without opening her eyes.
It was after two o'clock when Mark returned to the office. Mary followed him by a few seconds. She pushed open the heavy glass doors to the reception area and crossed to the receptionist. “Were there any calls for me, Sally?”
“Yes, Ma'am. There was a call from a...,” the young blond girl shifted through a small stack of notes until she found the right one, “a Miss. Collins. She said it was some kind of emergency with Mr. Martin and that you should call her at this number.” She passed the slip of paper over to Mary.
“Shit!” Mary murmured under her breath. Taking the paper she hurried to her office. Seated behind her desk she pulled the telephone over and dialed the number.
“Baylor Emergency Room, may I help you?” a woman answered. Mary's mouth went dry. She forced words out, past her wooden tongue. “Yes, my name is Mary Martin and I was given a message to call this number about my husband Al, Alfred Martin? What's happened? Is he alright?”
“Alfred Martin, hold for a minute please,” the woman said.
Mary gripped the telephone receiver tightly. She breathed rapidly through her mouth swearing at herself for the long lunch break. “I knew something like this would happen. No good deed goes unpunished.”
“Mrs. Martin?” the phone came back to life.
“Yes?” Mary tensed.
“This is Robin Collins from work, Al's work. He's in the examination room right now. The doctor said it would be a while before he could tell me anything.” Robin's voice was filled with emotion.
Mary was instantly annoyed by the tone of Robin's voice, it's concern for Al. “Who is this woman?” Nancy asked herself. Her mind raced to associate the voice with a face. Then she remembered Robin. A very young woman smiling at everyone at some company function she had attended with Al. “What's she doing there?” Mary's initial concern for Al was lost in her annoyance.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.
“What happened?” Mary demanded sharply.
There was a pause before Robin answered. Her tone chilled, “Al just dropped out of his chair at work and blacked out.” Mary heard an emphasis on the word “work“ that she did not like.
Robin continued, “When he didn't come to immediately we called the ambulance. I couldn't get a hold of you and I didn't want Al to be there alone, so I just did what I thought was best and followed along behind him.”
“The audacity of this, this girl,” Mary snapped to herself.
In her best courtroom voice Mary answered sweetly, “That's fine Robin. You did fine and I know Al would appreciate it. I'll be there just as fast as I can.” Mary hung up before Robin could be reply. She gathered up her things and hurried to the door. It opened as she neared it and Mark blocked her way.
“Excuse me Mark,” she squeezed past him through the door, kissing him lightly on the cheek. “Something has happened to Al and I've got to get down to Baylor Hospital. Tell everyone for me, okay? That's sweet,” she said not waiting for an answer.
“I hope he's alright,” Mark called after her, but she did not hear him as she left the office.
It was a short drive from downtown to the hospital. Mary parked behind the hospital and hurried to the emergency entrance. The weather was still warm and damp, with overcast skies, but the wind had shifted to the north and there was a cool smell in the air.
She passed through the electric doors and into the receiving area, hurrying to the admissions counter. Out of breath, she said, “My husband, ... Al Martin, was brought in earlier. Where is ...”
A hand placed on her shoulder interrupted. She turned at the touch and saw it was Robin. Mary gave her a hard glare. It was a wife's place, her place to be there with Al, not anyone else's.
Robin returned the look and said, “Mrs. Martin, Al's regained consciousness and seems to be okay. They've transferred him to a room upstairs.”
Too much was happening to Mary. And it was all happening too fast and from too many directions. Suddenly she was bewildered by all the events of the day and week. She did not know what to do next.
“I could show you the way,” Robin offered her tone of voice softening somewhat.
“Alright,” Mary answered a little stiffly, “but don't I need to fill out some forms or something?” She turned back to the counter.
“No, Ma'am,” the admissions clerk answered. “This woman,” indicating Robin, “has already taken care of everything.”
Mary's head snapped around to question Robin.
Robin calmly answered the questioning look, “I filled out the forms so they would start checking him out. You know how they are at hospitals. I hope you don't mind.”
“I listed Al's insurance company from work. You may want to put your insurance down too. Oh, yea. I almost forgot.” Robin reached into her purse and pulled out a wallet. “This is Al's wallet. I needed to get his Social Security for the hospital.” She handed the wallet to Mary and began walking down the hall.
All Mary could do was follow, stuffing Al's wallet into her purse as she hurried to catch up.
Robin led her to a bank of elevators where they waited silently for a car. When it arrived they had it to themselves.
“Al is in 312,” Robin said as she pressed the button for the third floor. The doors closed and the elevator began to rise. Both women stood looking to the front of the car. Neither spoke, they both thought about the others “lunch.”
The elevator opened and the two women stepped out into a small foyer facing the nurse’s station. Two corridors lined with closed doors branched out from there.
“This way,” Robin said, leading Mary pass the station and into the left corridor, stopping at the third door.
“He's in here,” Robin stated quietly, as though she was talking in the library. She opened the door for Mary and followed her inside.
It was a small private room, the bed running width wise across the back of the room, underneath a double wide window. The television set mounted on the wall was off. At the foot of the bed a doctor was writing in Al's chart. Al seemed to be sleeping peacefully.
The doctor spoke to Robin. “Mrs. Martin, your husband has been given a sedative. He should sleep for several hours now.”
Before Robin could begin to correct him, Mary waded right into him, “I'm Mrs. Martin doctor. This is a friend of the family, Miss. Collins. And who, if I may ask, are you?”
“Doctor James Peters, Ma'am,” he answered coldly. Peters was in his early forties, brown eyes, thinning brown hair. He added brusquely, “I was on call when your husband was brought in. If you would like to call your personal physician that would be fine. I'll do anything I can to help him.” He waited for Mary's reply.
She said tersely, “We don't have a doctor. I'm sure that you will do very well. I, I'm sorry Doctor. This has been a great shock.” Mary's tone trying to soften by the end of the statement. No one offered her any comfort. She turned her gaze down to Al. He slept childlike before her.
“What's happened to him Doctor?”
“We don't really know, Mrs. Martin. Your husband seems to have gone into a coma-like state. Let me emphasize that, a coma-like state. His blood pressure had dropped, not drastically though, and his heart rate was considerably slow. Nothing imminently dangerous though. It was a lot like a trance.”
Peters warmed to the subject and his voice and opinion eased towards Mary. “While he was in the emergency room we tried several things to revive him, nothing worked. Then he just came to on his own. It was strange. He's just resting now.”
Peters stopped and looked at the two women for a second before continuing, “I need to check some results of your husband's blood tests and then maybe I'll be better able to answer your question.”
He gathered his things together and then told Mary, “Please ask for me at the desk on your way out, we need to talk about some other tests I may need to run on your husband before we release him.” He left the room pulling the door almost closed behind him.
The two women stood there for a short, clumsy moment before Robin excused herself, “I guess I need to get on back to work and tell them that Al's okay. Is there anything I can do to help?”
“No. No, I don't think so.” Mary stood up straighter and looked Robin in the eye to say, “But thank you for watching after Al. You've been a lot of help.”
Robin's surprise showed on her face, “Well, that's okay, I just wish there was more I could do. It is alright if I come back, isn't it?”
“Any time Robin. I know Al will be happy to see you.” Mary took Robin's hand in a quick handshake. After Robin was gone, Mary sat at the foot of the bed and watched Al sleep. Her mind swirled with thoughts of Al, Mark, hospitals, and Robin.
Chapter 8
“You just can't imagine how real it was, Mary!” Al exclaimed. He was sitting up in the hospital bed leaning toward her. His eyes looked feverish to her as he described the latest dream, hoping she would understand.
Mary sat in a chair pulled close to the bed. She had been holding Al's hand when he woke up from the sedative enforced sleep. They were no longer in contact. She had slowly withdrawn her hand from his as he went on and on about the duck hunt. Now she sat firmly back into her chair as he talked.
“You just wouldn't believe it,” he continued. “The air was so fresh, the contrasts so sharp between the birds and the marsh. And those “market hunters,” God it looked like their clothes hadn't been washed in a year. And there we three were dressed to a fault. It was wonderful, just wonderful.”
“Oh my god,” Mary struggled to repress her fears as she listened to him. “What is happening. He acts possessed. This is just what I need right now.” She smiled at Al and forced her way into the conversation as much to buttress her own courage as to calm him.
“Now dear,” she said, leaning slightly forward in her chair, “you need to calm down, at least slow down. You know it was only a dream.”
Al stopped, his mouth slightly opened, showing the tip of his tongue. He closed his mouth, cocked his head a small amount to the left and looked his wife in the eye. “That's not true. It was real. How could I remember all of that if it wasn't real?”
The look he gave Mary was more frightening to her than his wild talk. She was sure he was losing his hold on reality. She pressed on reasoning with him, “Darling, dreams can seem terribly real sometimes.”
“Don't patronize me Mary, I'm not a child. How do I know about those birds? I know what kind of ducks we shot. And those shotguns? What about them? I don't know anything about shotguns. How could I make that up? Answer me that!”
“Exactly Al, you didn't know anything about them but now you do. Did those men tell you about them in your dream?”
Mary moved out of the chair and onto the bed nearer him. “No, they didn't. So you must have already known those things. You must have read them or heard them sometime in your life. You didn't learn about them in a dream.”
Al lay back in the bed without comment. He knew it was real. Mary reached out a hand to him, he took her hand in his, but he was not thinking about her.
Dr. Peters and Mary stood in the hall outside of Al's room, “But Doctor, Al believes it really happened to him.”
“Yes, I know. When we spoke, he was most emphatic about it. I can only say that all of our tests have shown nothing. I'm hoping that with a little time and distance from the trauma of the blackout your husband will allow the dream to become just that, a dream. He's fine physically.”
“I hope you're right,” Mary said with little conviction. “Al can be very stubborn when he wants to be.”
Peters laughed at that, “Everyone can be, Mrs. Martin. If you have any questions don't hesitate to give me a call.” Then he added, “If your husband should continue to pursue this idea, his dream, let me know. I might know of someone who could help him with it. Please take care.” He turned and walked briskly down the hall toward the elevators.
“That doesn't sound good at all,” Mary thought as she watched Peters leave. “Someone who can help him with it.”
The door to the room opened and Al walked out dressed in his suit. “Mary, let's get the hell out of here,” he swore in a relieved voice. “And I hope I never see the inside of this place again.”
Mary looked at her husband. “He looks alright,” she thought appraising him from head to foot like she would a new client. First impressions are important. “He might even look better.” Mary smiled at Al in agreement about the hospital and they walked to the elevators.
On the ground floor Al pushed the heavy glass door open for Mary. A blast of frigid air nearly pulled it out of his hand. In the three days he had been in the hospital the Texas weather had changed dramatically. Winter had arrived in the form of an Arctic front from Canada with near zero temperatures and thirty mile an hour winds.
Virtually no one was outside in the weather as they hurried to the parking tower. When they reached Mary's car on the third floor of the garage, they felt frozen to the bone. Mary drove home.
Chapter 9
Mark Edwards sat in the visitor's chair across the desk from Mary. He enjoyed sitting in her office. The chair was comfortable, the room was pleasant, and Mary was pretty. With the cold weather she was dressed in a long, gray camel hair skirt and jacket with a ruffled white blouse.
Edwards' attraction to Mary was for the obvious reasons, she was pretty and desirable. Her attraction to him was more complicated. Mark was tall and handsome, but she had not noticed him for over a year, despite his attempts.
Only nine months earlier Mary and Al had argued over attending a company party, her company's party. Her argument was, he was standing in the way of her future advancements by his lack of respect for her company commitments. Al said, he did not want to “waste“ his evening “developing contacts.” When Al refused to go she went without him. At the party she met Mark.
Mark was retaliation. Al led his life as he saw fit and would not let anyone or anything alter its course. Mary no longer enjoyed that trait. Mark's tastes were simple.
“What are you doing for lunch today?” Mark asked casually, but with transparent motive.
Mary looked up from her desk, unsmiling, and answered, “Is that all you think about Mark? With all the time I've missed because of Al, I've got enough work to keep me busy for a hundred lunches.” She lowered her head and resumed working.
Mark set silently across from her for a while before he said, “How is the old boy doing?”
Mary looked up sullenly. “He's fine.” She paused before saying, “Except he thinks this dream he had was real.”
“What dream is that?” Mark asked off handily, not caring about the answer, just carrying on the conversation. He was shocked when Mary told the dream to him.
“He is so sure its real, he's going to the library tomorrow to check his facts on all that shotgun stuff. And he wants to see if he can find when and where it happened.”
“How's he going to do that?”
“He thinks he can find a date by what the guy said about buying that shotgun; and he plans to locate the area by the ducks that were there. He says the geese were migrating and with them and the ducks in the same place at the same time, there's only a few spots in the world it could be.”
Mark whistled softly under his breath, “Sounds like a good idea to me. A little crazy though.”
Ignoring the comment Mary went back to her work. Mark leaned forward in the chair and asked, “What are you going to do while he's at the library? It is Saturday and he'll be gone for a while. We could meet somewhere.”
Mary stopped working but did not raise her head as she debated the proposition. “What am I doing? Sex is all this guy thinks about. And Al just thinks about his damn dreams.”
She raised her eyes from her desk but only as high as Mark's mouth when she answered. “I'll give you a call when he leaves the house.” Mark did not see the pain in her eyes.
Chapter 10
Saturday afternoon just after 1 PM Al made a right-hand turn into the parking lot on the corner of Young and Ervay Streets downtown. Across Ervay was the main branch of the Dallas Library. The architecturally receding face of the eight-story building reminded Al of eight giant stair steps. A design, which had been fostered on it by the arrogantly jutting facade of City Hall just across Young Street. Only four years old, the library no longer had a new look to it, a result of the long Texas summers.
Al slipped money into the collection box of the unattended parking lot and waited at the corner in the bright sunshine for the light to change. “Damn, it is nice today. Why can't it be like this in the summer?” Al smiled to himself, “It wouldn't be Texas then would it?”
Good weather had returned. The high temperature was to be near sixty-six, an “average“ day for late fall in Dallas. Cold spells seldom lasted for more than four days in North Texas. The last one had only made it for two days.
The light changed and Al crossed Ervay and entered the library foyer. He quickly crossed the distance to the electronically monitored entrance ports and continued to the card catalog/computer terminals.
The “new“ library had put its card catalog and all the branch catalogs on line. The 40 odd access terminals were busy with a cross section of Dallas citizens: African Americans, Latinos, Anglos, male, female, wealthy, poor, young and old. The few terminals not occupied were off line for technical reasons.
“Computers! Making our lives easier,” Al thought to himself as he waited for a terminal to open up. When one finally did he hurried over and began inputting his subject matter starting with, “Migrating fowl.”
The machine came back with “No match.” After several variations Al at last hit upon the simple entry “Birds“, from which he found a long list of books showing birds by each state. He wrote down some of their call numbers and the floor number, the fifth, “Business and Technology.”
Al, until now concentrating only on the terminal and his search, finally took notice of a young black seated at the terminal to his immediate left. The man looked as though he had run short of luck.
He was dressed too warmly for the weather. A long brown corduroy coat covered a quilted greenish jumpsuit and a dark blue ski cap sat on his head. The coat was dirty but not filthy.
The man's socks, hanging loosely around his thin ankles, did not match. Both of his scuffed brown shoes had large holes in their soles, the right shoe was burst out on the instep.
He sat at the terminal singing lightly under his breath in a hip style, “Anybody got them pills like I got them pills? No, no, nooo.” At that point the song lapsed into incoherent mutterings until he returned to the chorus of “Anybody got them pills like I got them pills?” He accompanied his singing by striking the keys on the terminal keyboard.
Al tried to ignore the singing, but now that he had heard a little of the song it was difficult not to try and translate the rest. He was not sure if the man was wasted on his pills or trying to pedal them.
With call numbers for shotgun reference books, also on the fifth floor, added to his list of “bird“ books Al left the terminal and the babbling keyboard player behind.
There was a short wait for an elevator, then Al was quickly lifted to the fifth floor. He searched around a little until he found the area where “shotguns“ were filed. He scanned over the titles ignoring the Dewey Decimal System. The catalog search had been to get him close. “I just need a good history book,” he said under his breath as his gaze ran over the titles. “Ah, this looks like the spot!” He pulled two books off the shelf and rapidly flipped through their pages. “These are perfect!” Al took the books and headed quickly to the reading tables to give them a closer look.
It took ten minutes to date the dream, 1899. According to both texts that was the year the Parker Brothers offered a AAH Pigeon grade ten-gauge shotgun for $499.00. The price James had quoted him for that same gun. “Damn! I knew it, I knew!” Al said excitedly. Several people near him gave him the same look he had used on the keyboardist downstairs. Al jumped up ecstatic with this confirmation of his 'dream.' Leaving the shotgun books on the table to hold his seat he headed into the shelves after the birds.
There were scores of books of all sorts on fowl. Al was at a loss as to where to start. “I could spend the whole day looking through these. Well, I guess this is as good a place as any.” He pulled a couple of large tomes off the shelves and returned to his table.
“I know James and Charles were Americans. And I know we were near the ocean. I could smell the salt in the air.” With those facts Al concentrated his search on the states that bordered the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, and the Gulf of Mexico.
In one book Al found the statement, “Galveston Island, Texas receives 95% of the migratory birds of North America.” With that information he was back in the shelves looking for a Texas bird life book. He found “The Birds of Texas,” a book listing all the fowl, their areas of habitation, and the time of the year that they were present in the state.
“This has got to be the book.” Al went back to the table and quickly turned to the section on ducks. He found, as he knew he would, that mallards, pintails, teals, and even Canada geese could be found on Galveston Island, Texas between late August until April.
“Yes! Every blessed one of them are in Galveston. That's were we were, Galveston, Texas! Let me see Mary try to argue with this!”