FICTION SHORT STORY SERIES

The Violin

Chapter 4: A mystery I need to solve.

Image by Brigitte Werner from Pixabay (cropped by the author)

“Hey, Busky, I’m back from lunch,” I announced, expecting a reply. Silence muffles the room like a thick velvet cloak.

The old man in the portrait hanging on my living room wall remained unmoved. His eyes are fixed in an eternal, loving gaze on his cello as if undisturbed by my presence, my greeting, or anyone in his environment.

I see you are still playing your cello, my old friend. Man, was my lunch interesting? Mike was a bit late for our appointment at the bistro, so I waited for him at the fountain.

The strangest sequence of mysterious events I ever encountered, happened this afternoon. While sitting on the edge of the fountain wall, minding my own business, a teenager strolled up to me.

He gave me a letter and told me that he was asked to hand me the letter by an old man. I asked where the man was and he pointed to the edge of the piazza. Somehow the man disappeared and didn’t want to be located.

I asked the teenager to describe the man. I put two and two together and got five. It must have been the cello-playing man I met earlier this morning at the same fountain.