It was a contemplative
kind of morning,with
each member of the vaunted World Dilemma Think Tank seeming
content to think
silently for a change, just sipping on the coffee refills and
waiting for
Loretta to bring more.
Steve, the
professional cowboy of the bunch,
was reading the house copy of the Valley Weekly Miracle.
Somebody else had
already done the crossword, the sports page was old news, and if
he wanted to
keep up on church news, he’d probably attend every now and then.
So Steve was
belly deep in the personal ads in the classifieds.
He looked more
closely, then glanced around
the philosophy counter at his fellow thinkers. “Here’s something
you don’t see
every day,” he said.
The room grunted in
reply.
“I’ll read you the
whole ad,” he said,
“’cause it’s short.”
Doc looked up. “What’s
it say?”
“Send one dollar to
Box 87 here in town.”
“One dollar for what?”
“Doesn’t say. Just
says to send one dollar.”
“You’re kidding.”
Steve handed Doc the
paper and pointed to the
ad.
“That’s what it says,”
Doc said, nodding.
So then
the conversation got going. Some were of the opinion that a
mistake was made
when the ad was put in the paper, and you’re supposed to get a
cookie recipe or
something for your buck. Others were of the school that this was
placed by some
joker as a gag.
“When I was packing
mules,” Steve said, “the
pack boss swore he was going to put a wooden box with a slot in
it at the
trail head and write ‘Scenic Route. One dollar’ and see if
anyone was dumb
enough to pay extra for scenery.”
“Aren’t all those
trails scenic?”
“Of course. He never
did it, though.”
“And this ad,” said
Doc, shaking his head.
“How many people would be dumb enough to just mail a dollar to
Box 87 for no
reason?”
Dud looked up and
smiled. “Seven so far, Doc.
Seven so far.”
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Brought
to you by Home Country (the
book), published by Rio Grande Press and now available as a
Kindle ebook on
Amazon..