NINETEEN

 

 

October 18th, 2018

Boise, Idaho

 

IF NOT FOR holding Wade’s hand, Sophie wasn’t sure if she would have been able to go with Dawn and Madison down into the big cavern. Her mind was just not processing what was going on and what she was seeing.

In the middle of Boise there was a huge cavern carved out of the rock? How was that even possible?

None of this made any sense at all.

And then the man at the long kitchen counter had turned around and it was the man from the pictures out of the past. The very same man, yet that wasn’t possible either.

Why would this guy pretend to be a historical figure?

Sophie and Wade stopped, hand-in-hand, facing the two new people and Madison stopped beside them. Dawn went around the end of the counter to stand beside the woman.

“Professor Silverman, Dr. Wade,” Madison said, “I would like you to meet Bonnie and Duster Kendal, two of the greatest mathematical minds of all time.”

Wade actually moved first and shook Bonnie’s hand, then Duster’s hand.

Sophie did the same, just staring at Duster.

Mathematicians? What were they doing here and why was one pretending to be a person from the past? Dressed the same and all.

Dawn handed the picture Sophie and Wade had found to Bonnie who glanced at it and laughed and slid it to Duster, who also laughed.

“Seems you might know who I am,” Duster said.

“You got photographed enough,” Bonnie said, shaking her head like a wife would shake her head at her husband. “Anyone looking at any picture from the west would know you.”

“How?” Wade asked.

Dawn held up her hand. “We have a story to tell you and we need to tell it in some sort of order, but first let’s all get something to drink and move over to more comfortable chairs.”

Both Sophie and Wade just wanted water.

Sophie wasn’t sure with all this if her stomach could handle any more than water, actually. She had no idea what was going on, but two of the greatest historians of all time were going to try to explain it all to her.

Thank heavens Wade was beside her, going through the same thing.

The seating area they went to was close to the long kitchen bar and consisted of two couches and two large chairs, all done in brown cloth. An area rug was under the grouping that was of a light-tan pattern color and a large wooden coffee table sat in the middle.

Bonnie and Duster sat on one couch and Duster put his cowboy hat beside him on the edge of the couch. Dawn took one end-chair and Madison another and Sophie and Wade took the other couch facing Bonnie and Duster over the coffee table.

Dawn then handed them each tablets she had brought from the kitchen counter area. “Before we go any farther, we need you to look up Bonnie and Duster Kendal.”

Sophie did just that as beside her Wade did the same thing.

Thousands of articles came up about the two people sitting silently across from her in this impossible cavern.

It didn’t take long for her to discover that they really were major mathematicians. And from a quick glance, they also had funded hundreds of scholarships in history and mathematics, and buildings on many major campuses were named after them.

She came across picture after picture of them. Clearly the two people sitting across from her were who they had been introduced to be.

So now she found herself sitting in an impossible cavern with two top mathematicians and two of the most acclaimed historians of all time. This was just flat strange.

And getting stranger by the moment.

There was the sound of a door closing and Director Parks came walking in, smiling.

“Got you a bottle of water,” Bonnie said, pointing to a bottle on the coffee table in the middle of the chairs and couches.

“Thanks,” Parks said. He pulled over another chair to sit beside Dawn and then took his water.

“This place is really something, isn’t it?” Parks asked Sophie and Wade as they put the tablets on the coffee table.

“It is,” Wade said. “But what is it?”

“And that’s the story we’re about to tell you,” Dawn said.

“Oh, good, I got here in time for the fun,” Parks said, settling back in his chair and smiling.

Sophie looked at him and grew even more tense. What in the hell was going on?

She reached over and took Wade’s hand in hers. Thank heavens Wade was with her.