“I do hope you don’t mind a little rain,” said Samuel Sharpe.

“Not if you don’t mind a hint of drizzle,” said Bartholomew Blunt, motioning to an empty expanse of grass for Sharpe to park his lounge.

“I do believe it’s been about a week since we last met,” said Sharpe.

“I have personally counted one hundred and sixty-eight hours,” said Blunt. “Time does indeed fly when one is waiting for one’s favorite fantasies to make their presences known.”

“We could use a mailbox of sorts,” said Samuel Sharpe.

“An auto-forwarding telegraphy system for our reveries would be nice,” said Bartholomew Blunt.

“With notifications sent to us directly,” said Sharpe.

“A sort of messaging service from that world to this world,” said Blunt.

“It will be a methodology for easy communications,” said Sharpe.

“They need to be able to let us know that they want us when we’re asleep,” said Blunt. “We work best when we drowse.”

“Shall we then traipse forth?” said Sharpe. “We can see in our dreams that which we are not able to see when we’re awake.”

“First allow me to give us these hats,” said Blunt.

“Ah,” said Sharpe. “Straw Fedoras. We will be the sophisticated, corn-cob, pipe smoking hillbillies of the land of Nod.”

“It obliges us to now close our eyes in order to find what the fates have in store for us,” said Bartholomew Blunt.

“Our dreams allow us that which life prohibits,” said Samuel Sharpe.

“It’s a blasted mystery,” growled Captain Elias Young while puffing furiously on his La Gloria Cubana Coleccion Reserva cigar. The dichotomies of his life lay in the fact that he knew it was his job to solve mysteries while all the while he hated mysteries. ‘Clear’ was a much easier noun to digest than ‘Mystery.’ It had less syllables to stick in his gullet. He chomped upon the stump of his stogie. He frowned at the nemeses that had placed him here. He took another long drag on his favorite roll of tobacco.

“You seem a tad upset,” said Samuel Sharpe while adjusting his red striped ebony tie so that it lay in a perfect vertical position on his freshly starched white shirt covered with his midnight black sport jacket.

“You actually do not seem too happy,” said Bartholomew Blunt who was wearing a gray V-neck sweatshirt over a white T-shirt and green cargo shorts with white socks and white sneakers.

Elias Young stared at him for a moment, made some sort of statement about there being limits to going casual, and then added, “Bah.” One word. Spoken with his now perfected British accent. He did not like to waste time with useless verbal tripe, contemptuous or otherwise. Unless of course it was to cull the favors of a pretty young thing waiting in the wings out there somewhere to express her admiration. He pulled out a sheaf of papers. “Here,” he said. “Read while I explain.”

“We are dressed pretty much exactly on the same level of elegance, are we not?” said Bartholomew Blunt who did not want to let Elias Young’s statement about ‘casual’ go un-addressed.

“Some would say we appear to be very much alike while still seeming different,” said Samuel Sharpe, while looking at Bartholomew Blunt as though he were looking in a mirror as he was combing his hair.

“It is in our differences that we are the same,” said Blunt.

“It is the very fact that we are indistinguishable from each other that sets us apart,” said Sharpe.

Captain Elias Young grinned. He had to admit he liked these two. Their most outstanding traits were that they had no fear of him. They knew it and they knew he knew it and it was this that formed the unbreakable bonds of their friendship. “You gentlemen ready?” said the captain.

They settled back in their seats. Captain Elias Young began his presentation.