Potpourri Story Book
by
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BUGSY'S HIDDEN TREASURE OF SILVER DOLLARS
'Shortly after Bugsy was assassinated, I was shot in the back and paralyzed from the waist down. I'll no doubt have expired by the time this note is discovered, and you'll be the only one aware of the secret hiding places. Having no living relatives and loathing the Mafia, I chose this book to place the note in with hopes that someone would find it that's interested in searching for hidden treasure.'
My mind was racing a mile a minute thinking what a million silver dollars would be worth in today's coin collector's market. I grabbed the yellow pages and phoned a coin dealer, and was informed the value would be in the neighborhood of ten million dollars.
I excitedly made my wife, Mary, aware of the note's contents and the coin dealer's estimated value of the silver dollars. Being pessimistic in nature, she asked, 'How do you know the note isn't just a hoax?'
SUDDEN CHANGE
When Jennifer became of school age, she was enrolled in the most prestigious private school around. In meeting kids that were not as well off as her, she enjoyed talking down to them, and treating them with disrespect. She only had a few friends and they were all just like her. Most of the kids shied away from her because of her arrogant personality.
At sixteen, Jennifer had developed into a pretty young girl. Her straight, shoulder length, blond hair glistened in the sunlight. She wore it parted in the middle, which allowed it to flow forward, engulfing her perfectly featured suntanned face. Her perky nose, blue eyes and full lips made her appear to be an angel. No one would ever suspect her as having the personality of the devil.
SPIRIT OF SINGAPORE
There was a spiral staircase just a few feet inside the front door leading to another floor above. I flipped a switch just inside the door and a ceiling light came on, casting a dim glow upon the room. We had to walk around the lower part of the stairs to enter the front room. The first thing to catch my attention was the thick carpet on the stairs; it was lifting off the steps in places and was full of wrinkles and tears. The floor was covered with the same kind of carpet, it was also worn and uneven. It was probably the source of the strong odor from being mildewed. Even in the dim light, I could see the place was old and run down and had a spooky look and feel about it.
DEATH! BELOW DECK
It took less than an hour to reach the graveyard sight and they were taken aback with what they saw, there had to be at least twenty derelict boats scattered around the area. Boat hulls protruded out of the water from those that sank and were lying on their sides in the shallow water. In some cases, only the masts were visible above the surface of the water from smaller boats resting upright on the bottom.
****
In their excitement, they wasted no time in heading for the hatchway to descend the ladder that would take them below deck. Jim turned on his flashlight as they slowly made their way down the ladder into the pitch black, foul air interior. When reaching a lower deck, they stopped and Jim swung the light around. There was nothing but bulkheads with passage ways leading fore and aft. They chose to go aft. It was one spooky place to be but neither one would admit they were frightened. They hadn't gone more than ten feet along the passage way when they came upon a gaping hole where the deck boards had rotted away.
****
As Jim flashed the light down into the blackness, they saw nothing but the light reflecting off the surface of the water about six feet below. As Jim moved the light around, it shown on something white in the water.
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About the Book
Potpourri Story Book contains four stories, fiction and non-fiction.
'Bugsy's Hidden Treasure of Silver Dollars' is fictional. It's about a modern day treasure hunt by a husband and wife. The husband finds a note in a slit in the front cover of an old book on prospecting for gold he purchased in a used bookstore. The note was written by Bugsy's right hand man who had since passed away, revealing where he and Bugsy had hidden a million silver dollars. Bugsy had skimmed them from the profits when he managed the Flamingo Hotel in Las Vegas for the Mafia. The husband checked with a coin dealer to find the silver dollars are now worth around ten million dollars in today's coin collector's market.
'Sudden Change' is fictional. It's about a girl who was born to very wealthy parents and raised primarily by a nanny who catered to her every need. She was totally spoiled and at age twenty-one she had become an arrogant, selfish, self-centered individual. Even her parents couldn't tolerate her unforgiving behavior. They now realized they were the ones responsible for creating this unsociable monster.
They felt it was their duty to try and correct the situation, otherwise, she would live a very lonely life without love. Realizing it was too late for psychotherapy, they deemed it necessary to take a more drastic corrective action for her own good. What the parents had planned for their daughter was beyond anyone's imagination.
'The Spirit of Singapore' is non-fiction. It's about a close encounter with the spirit world. It began when I went to Singapore to work for three months for an Asian man who owned a small aerospace company. My wife accompanied me and we stayed in a condo unit on the twenty-fifth floor, owned by the man I was working for. We were unaware of the horrible tragedy that took place there involving the owner's wife, six months before we arrived. It wasn't long before strange, inexplicable thing began to happen, making it clear we were not welcome to stay there.
'Death! Below Deck' is non-fiction. It's about two guys in their kayaks exploring a boat graveyard in the San Diego bay. They boarded an old wooden schooner that was sitting on the bottom in shallow water, listing badly but with most of its' hull exposed. With a flashlight in hand they went below deck and made their way aft along a passageway. They soon came across a gaping hole where the deck boards had rotted away. Shining their flashlight down into the darkness, they discovered a horrific crime scene. One so terrible, it turned the stomachs of the Police Chief and the two hardened homicide detectives assigned to the case. The investigation eventually led to an international manhunt.
About the Author
OCCUPATION: Aerospace engineer.
HOBBIES: Photography, Kayaking, Archery, Writing and Traveling.
FAVORITE VACATIONS: Florida Keys, San Diego, California.
FAVORITE BOOK: 'Love by Neshaminy Creek' (Available through '1st Books Library')
FAVORITE MOVIES: Key Largo, Casablanca, Full moon in blue water, Green Ice and Five Easy Pieces.
FAVORITE SINGER: Bertie Higgins.
FAVORITE SONGS: Key Largo, Another Day in Paradise, Casablanca, Port of Call, Kokomo, and Margaritaville.