The Table Drawer(Jay Dubya) "The Table Drawer" is a sci-fi/paranormal story that has been added to Jay Dubya's Kindle and Nook e-book Ninety-Nine Novellas. The story also appears in the author's hardcover/paperback/e-book The Psychic Dimension (543 pages).



Charles and Marie Sceia felt immensely glad upon returning to their comfortable 537 Central Avenue two-story four-bedroom Hammonton, New Jersey gray colonial home after enduring a marvelous-but-tedious two-week-long “Italian Dream Vacation” accompanied by close friends Franco and Nancy Scianni, Carl and Dottie Mortellite and also very reliable trip organizers Pete and Barbara Santilli. A full week had now passed since the fantastic late April scenic tours of Rome, Florence and Venice, along with informative explorations of Messina and Taormino, Sicily. Finally, daily life had gradually returned “back to normal” for Charles and Marie Sceia in their quiet South Jersey community.

“Half of Hammonton's fifteen thousand population can trace their ancestral roots back to Italy, especially the Messina area of Sicily,” Charles calmly stated to his usually garrulous wife. “I'm happy that we had a chance to visit my grandfather's village of Rometta Marea on the Tyrrhenian Sea and stroll through the old church where his name is inscribed on the white marble altar, listed as a generous donor from Hammonton, USA. In fact Marie, my grandfather Antonio was your grandmother Antoinette's Sicilian next door neighbor back in the early 1900s before the Sceia, the Giacobbe and the Battaglia tribes migrated from there to Southern New Jersey.”

“The legendary story goes that your grandfather and my grandmother used to eat out of the same bowl with dual large spoons back in rural Rometta Marea,” Marie Sceia added to the kitchen table conversation. “It's too bad that our teenage sons had to attend school and stay at my brother's place while we were away gallivanting around Italy those terrific fourteen days. Charles,” Marie fondly suggested, “Tony and Kevin would've found the trip to be very educational. And I had tossed three coins into the Trevi Fountain over my left shoulder with my right hand and that time-honored tradition means that you and I will be returning to glorious Rome sometime in the future. For me,” the opinionated wife excitedly continued her monologue, “the Vatican Museum with its spectacular Sistine Chapel, St. Mark's Square in Venice, Florence's Renaissance art treasures and last-but-not-least, Sicily's beautiful Taormino were the top highlights of the whole vacation.”

“Thank goodness Franco could speak Italian fluently since he had been born in Sicily and had lived on the island the first ten years of his life,” Charles added as he gingerly sipped his second morning cup of delicious hot coffee. “Rometta Marea, Gesso and Franco's village of Serro were only several miles apart and my pal Pete, being thorough and conscientious as is his habit, had arranged for us to see all three places, seemingly frozen in time for the past century. And the most memorable moment of strolling around Serro was when Franco casually stopped and spoke in Italian with a middle-aged resident, asking the citizen about a huge rock he had played upon as a child and then the chance stranger remarkably turned out to be....”

“One of Franco's closest buddies Giuseppe, who as a youngster had played with our friend on a large stone object that turned-out to be a millstone that had been conveniently discarded in a vacant field back in the early 1950s,” Marie marveled and earnestly stated. “It was absolutely heartwarming to witness the old childhood friends reunited by fate a full half-century later, the sudden reunion a fantastic geographic coincidence, and Charles, the entire event occurring with us tourists all observing with our mouths agape the enormous now-iconic abandoned grindstone!”

The wife then momentarily paused to gather her fleeting thoughts. “And Serro has a meager population of only a hundred and two residents, most of whom are retired folks like Giuseppe, who have loyally returned to the serene mountain village to live-out the remainder of their lives on pensions.”

“Right Marie.” Charles Sceia readily verified. “Franco had originated from Serro, our two families from Rometta Marea and the Santelli and Mortellite clans immigrating to America from nearby Gesso, all Sicilian suburbs of Messina. And incidentally,” the husband enthusiastically elaborated, “when you weren't looking, I also had tossed three coins over my left shoulder into the Trevi Fountain! Say Marie,” Charles characteristically prattled, “did I ever tell you the story of how my grandfather, an impressionable eight-year-old boy at the time, had gotten so horribly seasick voyaging the Atlantic in the bottom of a stench-laden cattle-boat all the way from Sicily to Ellis Island that he never again ever stepped into an ocean, sea, lake or river for the remainder of his lengthy life? ”

“About as often as you've told me about how the Sceia clan had given their last names to immigration officials upon arriving in New York and how half the family have the spelling 'Sceia' and the other half the different spelling “Saia,' both renditions sounding exactly the same when pronounced!“

“The same holds true for the Hammonton last names 'Santelli' and 'Santilli',” Charles knowledgeably contributed to the general discussion, “and let's not forget 'Mortellite' and 'Mortillite', as their separate spellings are graphically represented on many granite headstones over in Oak Grove Cemetery!”

Hammonton High students Anthony and Kevin Sceia had already left the house that morning to catch their all-too-familiar yellow school bus in order to travel to its ultimate Old Forks Road destination, and Marie was about to depart for her weekday responsibilities as the main secretary for Adamucci Oil Company over on the White Horse Pike and Broadway. Meanwhile Charles, a recently retired insurance company computer programmer, was about to drive his black Nissan Murano into town and purchase a morning copy of the Atlantic City Press. All was quite tranquil, predictable and normal in good old somnolent Hammonton, New Jersey.

Nine hours later on that apparently ordinary and nondescript Monday afternoon Marie Sceia returned home from work and was immediately surprised to notice a 13-by-13 inch dark piece of Victorian furniture occupying the north wall of the upstairs computer room. Naturally the wife had to mildly interrogate her good-natured spouse about the “fairly attractive” acquisition, in truth a rather peculiar-looking late nineteenth century twenty-six inch high table featuring one drawer and a square dark brown shelf situated seven inches off the polished hardware floor.

“While driving down Bellevue Avenue after buying a newspaper at Bagliani's Grocery Store,” Charles almost guiltily explained, “out of sheer curiosity I stopped at an estate sale at Francine Neville's dilapidated home, you know, the one with the weird Victorian tower on the right-hand side,” the husband commented. “According to town gossip, the old maid spinster had disappeared from local civilization nearly three years ago and her niece is now in the process of liquidating her aunt's estate. Who knows whatever had happened to reclusive and mysterious Francine Neville? I lacked the courage to ask that question to the only heir, the oddball introverted niece. Realistically, I was only interested in getting the table.”

“I remember when Tony and Kevin were kids ambitiously trick or treating on Halloween Night,” Marie recollected and mentioned. “All of their friends along with our curious sons fearfully avoided walking-up to the ramshackle dwelling and begging for candy! Everyone in Hammonton believed the house to be haunted and inhabited by a wicked sinister old witch, the seldom-seen recluse, Miss Francine Neville!”

“387 Bellevue Avenue to be exact!” Charles recalled and verbally indicated the precise address. “Yes, that's where the eccentric Old Dame lived! Anyway Marie, after persuasively negotiating with the grim-faced unkempt-looking niece, I managed to purchase the exquisite table for the bargain price of twenty-five dollars. Notice Our portable flat-screen TV is on the wooden stand right next to the unique Victorian curiosity piece, and I plan to neatly stack my DVD disc collection on the bottom shelf and keep my trusty Webster's Dictionary inside the top drawer. I think that the splendid table really complements the room, wouldn't you agree with my honest assessment Dear?”

“If it doesn't work out for you,” Marie jested and suggested with a contrived weak smile showing upon her lips, “perhaps we can donate the rare artifact to the Hammonton Historical Society Museum! It certainly isn't good enough for the Smithsonian! Quite frankly Charles,” the wife expressed with a demonstration of utter dismay, “to me the ancient-looking decrepit table positively looks like a total eyesore!”





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Seated around the Tuesday morning breakfast table the Charles and Marie Sceia family informally conversed while slowly swallowing-down hefty portions of buttermilk pancakes, bacon and cold orange juice. As usual, out of polite courtesy, apathetic academic scholars Anthony and Kevin reluctantly and lethargically contributed to the general ongoing dialogue.

“It was pretty tough getting last year's income tax returns filed prior to the April 15th deadline,” Charles seriously remarked. “That terrific Italian spring adventure of ours really caused me to put pressure on rushing our by-the-book accountant, but Bill Lemons managed to responsibly get the vital statements organized and professionally submitted to the IRS just in time. I suppose that's how statistics-oriented Bill got that CPA designation emblazoned on the shingle that's tacked outside his office!”

“Say Dad,” high school junior Anthony Sceia piped-up, exhibiting that he had been remotely interested in the mediocre early breakfast chatter, “where did you get that weird table that's now up in the computer room? It looks like it was obsolete decades before John Wilkes Booth had entered Fords Theater and evilly assassinated President Lincoln!”

“Yeah Pop!” argumentative Hammonton High freshman Kevin Sceia forcefully chimed-in. “Where did that grotesque-looking antique come from? Outlaw Jesse James's filthy attic or maybe from the notorious bandit's moldy cellar?”

“Actually Boys, your father had shrewdly bought the table at an estate sale on old Miss Francine Neville's property over on Bellevue Avenue,” austerely disclosed the lady of the house. “Your dad purchased it for only twenty-five dollars from Miss Neville's only remaining niece, a self-exiled hermit who, I believe, lives as an absoluter loner somewhere over in Mays Landing. At least, that's the latest Hammonton scuttlebutt on her current existence!”

“That suspected haunted house has been abandoned for over three years,” Anthony Sceia observed and confidently injected into the breakfast discussion. “Both the front and side lawns look like a dense jungle, having an excess of tangled vines and hideous high weeds! Why hasn't that nasty-looking house been condemned? It looks like it's going to collapse into its foundation any day now!”

Feeling inspired, the younger Sceia sibling instantly became compelled to communicate certain knowledge he had acquired in his ninth grade College Prep history class. “Tell me Dad, where did that old hag Francine Neville really disappear to?” Kevin sarcastically inquired. “Did she stubbornly go out west in a Conestoga wagon and get stranded alone in the snow-covered Donner Pass on her way to live out her lousy existence in the spooky Disneyland Haunted Castle?”

“Stop being so cynical and disrespectful of your elders,” Charles admonished his ultra-critical sons. “Some day you two callow delinquents will be old and feeble too! Say now, has anyone seen my missing car keys? You know the Smart Key to my SUV? I've already searched everywhere inside the Murano without any luck.”

“Did you look on top of your bedroom bureau?” Marie constructively asked. “It's important that you didn't lose the thing because you have a front door spare key fastened on the ring. Did you check the counter in the laundry room?” the wife plausibly continued her litany. “How about rummaging through the roll-top desk in the den?”

“If the misplaced item doesn't show-up soon, I'll have to use the spare set hanging on the hook on the mud room wall,” Charles answered in a slightly defeated tone of voice. “And if the missing key doesn't turn-up at all, I'll have to drive sixteen miles over to Nissan of Turnersville and have a duplicate one made. I suppose that since I'm now fully retired from my former employment,” Charles mused and emphasized, “I'm having one of those lackluster senior moments often referred to on the stupid TV comedy shows. The actors claim that the so-called Golden Years can be mentally challenging, if not completely annoying!”

“Lots of times, lost things show-up when you least expect to discover them,” Marie Sceia sympathetically counseled. “I'm sure Charles that your car keys aren't playing hide and seek with you and that they're lying somewhere inside this spacious house. Did you search inside your pants and jacket pockets?”

Three hours later Marie Sceia received a phone call from her relieved spouse while the efficient secretary had been simultaneously busy typing monotonous data into her computer at the Adamucci Oil Company's main office. Charles had eagerly contacted her to report that he had “amazingly” located his Nissan vehicle's elusive Smart Key.

“Marie, don't ask me how this extraordinary thing has happened, but after I had made repeated expeditions all over the house,” Charles neurotically conveyed, somewhat out of breath, “I finally came across the Smart Key lying inside the dull-looking Victorian table drawer up in the computer room. I don't remember ever opening the drawer once, let alone placing my Smart Key inside. This whole confusing fiasco is quite an uncanny enigma, I gotta' admit!”

“Perhaps Tony or Kevin is playing a juvenile-type practical joke on you?” speculated and stated Marie with the office telephone safely lodged between her chin and right ear. “Or maybe the two mischievous devils have collaborated on tricking you into believing that Miss Francine Neville's antique table is somehow magical? Perhaps in fact black magical in nature!”

“I won't give either of those two adolescent jokers the satisfaction of me openly accusing them of implementing successful family skullduggery,” Charles confided. “At any rate Marie, I've found the key and now, that particular worry has been permanently erased from my mind. What's for dinner tonight?”

“Grilled hot dogs, pork and beans and an abundance of coleslaw,” the wife revealed as she competently proceeded with her multitasking. “And Hubby, here's a minor secret. I'm picking-up an apple pie at ShopRite on my way home. We'll have a special treat for dessert to make our supper into a small feast. See ya' Hon around five! Still love ya'!” Click.

Two hours later while seated at her somewhat cluttered business desk Marie received a second phone call from her now-beleaguered husband, who then nervously divulged that his new expensive Seiko wristwatch (that his wife and sons had given him for his last birthday) was not situated at its usual spot upon the computer desk in the upstairs spare bedroom.

“Marie, I looked everywhere, in all the rooms, and guess what?” Charles rhetorically and urgently asked. “Out of desperation I then opened the Victorian table drawer and lo and behold, there my watch was, gleaming like a shiny silver bracelet! To tell you the God's honest truth, this whole bizarre relationship with this new-found haunted table is beyond mystical! Confidentially, it's borderline diabolical!”

“Well Charles, Tony and Kevin are still at school so they can't possibly be involved in contriving such an in-progress nefariously clever trick on you!” Marie alertly theorized and acknowledged. “And obviously Charles, no one else is presently in the house besides you, so therefore, I strongly recommend that you quickly imbibe two aspirins and next gulp-down a tall glass of cold water; then take a much-needed nap on the soft leather sofa and calmly meander off into Dreamland. Maybe the true solution to your odd Victorian table dilemma will creatively enter your distressed imagination after you've visited 'Mr. Sandman', that is, without the Chordettes!”

“Okay Dear! I insist that you should've gone into either the psychology or psychiatry field of endeavor,” extremely bewildered Charles nervously related. “I'll honor your sage advice and sleep-off all my accumulated anxiety! See you at five Sweetie! I promise to have the table set! I can already taste those delectable grilled hot dogs smothered in delicious mustard and relish! That's an excellent starting point to now venture off into a desirable deep sleep! Bye now!” Click.





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Late Wednesday afternoon Charles had his scheduled 6:30 pm bi-weekly Hammonton Lions Club meeting, regularly slated for Marcello's Restaurant at Bellevue and Horton Street, so naturally Marie was elated that she would not have to prepare the standard big meal for her remaining two family members. At five pm on that pleasant May afternoon the now-concerned husband had become exceptionally baffled upon his recognition of still another missing possession.

“Marie, have you in your travels seen my VISA debit card anywhere? I want to buy a hardcover copy of Bill O' Reilly's book Killing Kennedy from Amazon.com but the evasive card isn't where it belongs, tucked inside my wallet! I hope it didn't plop out on the ground this morning when I had gone to the news store up on Route 30 to get a copy of the Atlantic City Press!”

“Have you used it lately to buy gas at Al and Rich's or for any other specific purpose?” Marie questioned. “You said yesterday that you planned buying some new health care vitamins on the Internet. Now before going crazy frantically searching every conceivable nook and cranny, why don't you simply go and inspect the supernatural Victorian table in the computer room?”

Several minutes later Charles gleefully entered the laundry room where his dedicated spouse was carefully pouring detergent into the opened washing machine door's hatch. However, the man's apparent expressive euphoria was counterbalanced with a degree of overt awe and trepidation.

“Sweet! Eureka!” the husband bellowed as he proudly held the bona fide VISA debit card in the palm of his right hand. “Are you sure Honey that you're not playing a cute prank on me now that the boys have been eliminated from suspicion? If so Marie, I want you to understand that I'm beginning to drastically suffer from the overall mental duress of it all!”

“Don't be ridiculous!” the always-optimistic wife answered before slamming the washing machine door shut. “Actually, I'm just as baffled by the whole phenomenon as you are. Perhaps you ought to consult a clairvoyant or a skilled fortune teller about this recurrent mystery of yours. I'm beginning to think that I too need an effective tranquilizer plus a powerful sedative too!”

Fifteen minutes later Charles was in the midst of another aggravating dilemma. His customary Lions Club badge along with his diamond-studded Past President pin were not detectable being positioned anywhere inside his ebony pirate jewelry box stationed atop his varnished bedroom bureau. The man's emotional apprehension was rapidly rising to a crescendo. A severe migraine headache seemed virtually inevitable.

After notifying Marie of his most recent crisis, the affected pair scurried into the north-side computer room and a moment later Charles aggressively opened the Victorian table's only drawer. Inside was the highly coveted President's pin and its accompanying Hammonton Lions Club identification badge. The astounded man and his rather disturbed soul-mate were totally overwhelmed and immensely perplexed by their ever-evolving ordeal.

Thursday morning Marie could not find her Bank of America checkbook and she and her distraught spouse swiftly exited the dining room and promptly marched up the thirteen steps, ambled down the ordinary green carpeted hallway and then further on their intense mission, entered the formerly quite-ordinary computer room. Much to their cerebral consternation, the woman's missing checkbook was indeed situated securely inside the mystical table's top drawer.

Before leaving for work that same morning, Marie lifted the lid to the kitchen cookie jar and her twelve one dollar bills that she had secretly stashed inside for the purpose of buying coffee and donuts for the Adamucci Oil Company office crew had somehow vanished. At first the frustrated wife hypothesized that her coy husband had been the devious culprit who had temporarily pilfered the small cache of singles, but in terms of common sense logic, Charles had earlier gone into town to get his SUV washed and gassed-up at Al and Rich's Full Service Station. Being a trifle mentally unhinged, the now-disheveled housewife dashed up the thirteen green rugged steps, made a left turn into the hallway and soon hastily stepped into the now “haunted” computer room.

'Oh for Heaven's sake!' the upset wife marveled. 'The twelve one dollar bills have been arcanely transported from the downstairs kitchen gingerbread house cookie jar upstairs to this accursed Victorian table drawer! I honestly think that Charles should dispose of this possessed evil object once and for all!'

On Friday morning vernal Tony Sceia couldn't locate his standard Gillette razor inside the boys' bathroom medicine cabinet. Marie automatically recommended that the all-too-meticulous high school junior advance to the Victorian table inside the converted spare bedroom, and sure enough, the disappeared item was gratefully found precisely where it hadn't been placed on Thursday morning.

And just prior to leaving for school, neurotic freshman Kevin Sceia had difficulty locating his favorite ball point pen that was used daily to take notes in the lad's four core curriculum College Prep classes, and after sharing his sudden emergency with his emotionally unsettled mother, the overzealous pair stormed into the “satanic” computer room, opened the table drawer and incredibly discovered the missing favored writing utensil inside.

“Mom, I'm afraid that either you or Dad will soon be mystically abducted and then later I'll fearfully open this dreadful table drawer and find one of you violently stuffed and crushed inside!” Kevin almost-hysterically lamented. “I promise I won't tell any of my friends or teachers about this abnormal chain of events or else I'll definitely wind-up being mercilessly examined while lying horizontal on the couch in the back room of the guidance office, being given the full third degree by the school nurse and by the high school psychologist! The kids at my cafeteria table call her Florence Nightmaregale and call him Dr. Nutcase Strangelove! Even if I have an enormous major brain meltdown, those two weirdo zombies are the last two people on this mixed-up planet I ever want to see!”





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On Saturday afternoon Charles had driven Tony and Kevin in the black Nissan SUV down to Wildwood to stay with their three male cousins at an aunt and uncle's seashore home, and that May evening, Mr. and Mrs. Sceia had made arrangements with Franco and Nancy Scianni to drive east to Absecon to the popular Ram's Head Inn where the four would meet-up with Carl and Dottie Mortellite and Pete and Barbara Santilli to indulge in a sumptuous four-course supper. Tickets had already been obtained for the eight friends to later enjoy a highly publicized Huey Lewis and the News concert at nine o'clock that evening inside Atlantic City's Harrah's Casino Theater, the much-anticipated stage show to be followed by several hours of exciting table gambling and slot machine entertainment at the frequently visited North Atlantic City resort facility.

As Marie and Charles waited for Franco's white SUV to arrive inside the circular driveway, the impatient duo exchanged a few personal predictions with the cheerful husband initiating the conversation. “I just know that Franco and Nancy are going to reminisce about the romantic Bridge of Sighs and about the sensational Grand Canal gondola rides we all enjoyed in Venice, and surely,” the talkative husband pontificated and resumed, “I think that Carl and Dottie will fully review our stellar tours of St. Peter's Basilica, the Roman Forum and the Eternal City's massive Colosseum ruins. And also Marie, I prognosticate that Pete and Barbara are bound to remind us of....”

“Michelangelo's inimitable Statue of David in Florence along with that cultural mecca's magnificent orange-domed Cathedral of Santa Maria,” the wife amiably finished her spouse's valid and accurate evaluation. “Oh Charles! You don't know how much I desire returning to picturesque Italy just to see the rest of Tuscany with all of its alluring rolling hills, its prodigious olive groves and its myriad wine vineyards!”

Just then the front doorbell rang and Charles and Marie cordially greeted Franco and Nancy Scianni. In the foyer, beneath the overhead crystal chandelier the couples began talking about the imminent Huey Lewis and the News concert that the eight adults would be attending later that evening. All was harmony and tranquility at 537 Central Avenue.

“I couldn't get the much-in-demand tickets to see the Doobie Brothers at Trump Taj Mahal so instead, I secured from Stub Hub eight tickets for the next best show in town!” Franco declared without any evident trace of modesty in his baritone. “I know that Huey Lewis and his talented band won't disappoint us!”

“Well Frank, you've never failed us before!” Charles sincerely qualified and commended. “That fabulous Fleetwood Mac show two summers ago at Boardwalk Hall was quite unbelievable. Stevie Nicks is a really great lead singer, and Lindsey Buckingham was absolutely in high gear that night playing his unique-sounding guitar. That guy's in a league of his own, not to mention Mick Fleetwood banging away on drums and John McVie excelling on bass guitar! The only downside to the Fleetwood Mac concert was that Christine McVie was not touring with the group at the time.”

“And let's not forget that terrific Eagles concert given last year, also at Boardwalk Hall!” Marie lavishly praised Franco's fine concert selection history. “If I recall, you again had gotten the tickets for that super performance. I can still hear the smooth lyrics to Lyin' Eyes bouncing around inside my head.”

“Frank really loves his rock and roll music!” Nancy instinctively confirmed. “As you know, my obsessive/compulsive husband has a CD album collection in our recreation room that's second to none in all of Hammonton! I think that down deep in his heart Frank keenly wants to be a late-night radio DJ when he finally retires.”

“Here's three crisp Ben Franklins to cover my two tickets for tonight's show,” Charles suavely offered and then handed to Franco. “Actually, Marie and I measure this minor expense as an important investment, basically designed to soothe our restless souls! It sure beats visiting a three-hundred dollar an hour psychiatrist.”

“Thanks Charles!” Franco Scianni replied as the jovial guest graciously accepted the three one hundred dollar bills. “It's really a decent pleasure for me, listening to superb rock and roll music in the company of my wife and our six closest friends. I know that Pete and Barbara and Carl and Dottie will have a good time tonight too! Here's a little secret. I already have Elton John lined-up for the fall!”

As Franco Scianni reached for his back pocket wallet in which to insert the three crisp hundred dollar bills, his tanned face suddenly turned from crimson to pallid upon realizing that his wallet was suddenly and mysteriously not there in its proper place.

“That's awfully strange!” Franco self-consciously commented to his three now-astute listeners. “My wallet's gone! Now this is really bothering me to the nth degree!”

“When's the last time you used it!” Nancy Scianni interrogated her embarrassed husband, mildly sounding like a determined court prosecutor. “Did you get gas at Al and Rich's today or drive for some sweet snacks at Dunkin' Donuts? Or did you stop for a few candy bars and chewing gum at the Fairview Avenue Wawa?”

“Actually Honey, I remember putting the wallet in my back pocket just before we left our home and then drove over here,” Franco awkwardly insisted as an element of color again appeared upon his blushing countenance. “Believe me Nancy, I would testify to that fact with my right hand upon a stack of Holy Bibles!”

Charles ruminated for a moment and then proposed a rather peculiar hypothesis. “Frank, please follow me upstairs to the computer room. I want to perform a type of oddball experiment.”

Franco, Nancy and Marie skeptically followed Charles upstairs, paced left into the green-carpeted hallway and then proceeded stepping into the seemingly enchanted computer room. Upon opening the singular drawer to the incomparable square-shaped Victorian table, much to everyone's heightened astonishment, inside its center was Franco's expensive brown Italian leather wallet.

“Holy Hallelujahs!” a totally dumbfounded Franco Scianni exclaimed in loud exultation. “How in the world did my valued wallet ever get transferred inside that commonplace table drawer? Charles, is this some sort of preposterous practical joke you're playing on me, or what? Honestly now! I haven't been inside your home for over a week! And certainly not upstairs!”

“What's going on here?” Nancy Scianni incredulously asked no one in particular. “Is this some sort of crazy aberration? I think I need to visit my optometrist first thing Monday morning! My eyes must be deceiving me!”

“Nancy,” Charles anxiously responded in a rare-and-weak jittery voice. “Would you care to buy an exquisite antique Victorian table for only a very modest ten dollars?”

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