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  The Ultimate Linguist

  By

  T. Mason Gilbert

  Copyright 2015 by T. Mason Gilbert

  Published by Mjollnir Enterprises LLC

  eBook ISBN: 978-0-9863646-7-9

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Some locations, businesses, and brand names are real but are used fictitiously.

  License Notes

  Table of Contents

  Foreword

  Chapter 1: The Peculiar Neighbor

  Chapter 2: An Arboralum Appears

  Chapter 3: The Chuckling Bush

  Chapter 4: Night Riders

  Chapter 5: The Bucket of Gold

  Chapter 6: Manna from Matilda

  Chapter 7: Allyson in Wonderland

  About the Author

  Other Books by T. Mason Gilbert

  Connect with T. Mason Gilbert

  Foreword

  I hold a contest on my T. Mason Gilbert Author Page on Facebook. To begin the contest, I declare the contest open for submissions and ask people to write just one random sentence in the comments section of the post.

  The first ten people to submit a random sentence are the declared the ‘winners.’

  I take the first ten sentences submitted and write a story containing those ten random sentences. This is the short story that I came up with from the fifth such contest and is entitled "The Ultimate Linguist." It is a high fantasy story.

  The rules for the contest are pretty simple and they are:

  i) An entrant must not have participated in a prior contest.

  ii) The entry should be a sentence. But sentence fragments sometimes sneak in.

  iii) I won’t change the order of the words or grammar but I may change or add some punctuation and correct misspelling.

  iv) It must be an original sentence of the entrant’s own creation.

  v) By entering the contest the entrant releases all future rights to their sentence.

  Here are the ten sentences submitted prior to the creation of “The Ultimate Linguist,” along with the names of the people who submitted them:

  1) While walking through the cold, dark forest, I suddenly saw a clearing, beautiful rays of sunlight appeared just ahead. – Berta Jones Graaf

  2) As I was rounding up the kids for school, I noticed that strange neighbor walking barefoot down the street and thought to myself, “put your damn shoes on.” – Kris Robinson

  3) Sitting down by the river and listening to the sound of the river flowing by and look up in the sky to see two eagles soaring by. – Tina Lint

  4) The highly incompetent waitress, now three tables deep in dirty looks and loudly bellowed insults, slid her trembling hand up her smooth left thigh and unsheathed her pearl handled knife she kept ready for moments such as this. – Diane Anderson Justus

  5) Rule #6 really sucks. – Tom Spalding

  6) And the day rolled on just like the day before until I heard the scream. – Carl Butch Stockstill

  7) He couldn't believe this petite and pretty girl before him was half-way through her third cheeseburger. – Eric Dileo

  8) While I was walking down this very dark road I got frightened half out of my skin by some weird sound in the bushes and it was a laughing hyena. – Donna Babcock Proctor

  9) Nothing had ever felt as terrifying as standing in a middle of a crowded room, and not being able to hear a sound. – Lorie Click

  10) As they drove toward the sunset he could see a tear in her eye but could not hear the hysterical laugh in her heart. – Lynn Campbell

  I would like to thank all the people who offered up their sentences for the fifth Ten Random Sentences Contest. I would also like to thank my editor, Julie Tabler. You will find the submitted sentences in bold in the story. Enjoy!

  T.M.G.

  The Ultimate Linguist

  1

  The Peculiar Neighbor

  When I woke up that morning, I had no idea the day would turn out to last for several months.

  I walked outside and looked around my neighborhood as I was rounding up the kids for school. I noticed that strange neighbor walking barefoot down the street and thought to myself, put your damn shoes on.

  Every neighborhood has a peculiar neighbor. The problem was, mine lived next door. Here’s the peculiar part. Even though I had not told the old woman out loud to put her shoes on, she had looked over and smiled at me as if I had spoken to her. Her smile seemed out of place, like she knew something I didn’t. It gave me the creeps.

  I watched her walk away for a couple of moments, then I shook off the image of her crazed grinning face and continued to herd the kiddies together for our walk to the bus stop.

  The humidity was already thick in the morning heat, another typical summer day in Heaven’s Gate, Georgia. After waving goodbye at the bus stop I walked home, feeling a little nervous and wondering if I would run into the old bat again, but she was nowhere to be seen.

  Back in the comfort of my home, I settled down and the day rolled on just like the day before until I heard the scream—her scream. At least, it sounded like her.

  It was about ten to eleven when I had finished cleaning the kitchen. I had curled up on the couch in air-conditioned comfort to continue reading Maris Blongett’s new high fantasy novel, Tangible Storm, when my calm was interrupted by a female shrieking at the top of her lungs. Shrieks aren’t normal in our middle-class neighborhood.

  I opened my front door and looked out to see if anyone was in trouble. The humidity slugged me in the face, accompanied by more shouting. I could tell the cries were coming from next door.

  I usually avoided ‘Crazy Daisy,’ as my husband, Cade, referred to her. She had moved into the home where her daughter, Abby, and her family had lived. At least that was the story all the residents of Willow Street had spread around the neighborhood.

  Gossip is like Superman—faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive.

  Cade insisted Daisy was harmless, but I wasn’t convinced. She seemed off—weird and not quite right. The few times I saw her about I’m sure I caught her watching me. The kids in the neighborhood (mine included) already referred to her as ‘the Witch.’ I acquired this sacred knowledge from my eldest son, Trevor, a typical ten-year-old with a vivid imagination.

  One of his friends told him the bizarre story that Abby hadn’t moved away two weeks ago; the witch had put a spell on Abby and her family, banishing them to another dimension. After my son relayed this story to me, my feelings softened for the old woman. I’m sure the truth was she just missed her daughter. I missed Abby too, but I was mad at her. We were best friends and I found it maddening she had left without the slightest warning or a forwarding address.

  Two weeks before, our family had gone on vacation for a week. The day before we came home Abby and her family had disappeared in the middle of the night, leaving all their furniture, according to Joline, the neighborhood gossip. Abby’s mother had arrived the day we got back. Cade had insisted the house probably belonged to the mother in the first place. Either that or Abby was in some sort of witness protection program. Witness protection. Yeah, right. That’s believable. Men.

  I had tried to talk to the old woman about where Abby had gone, but I soon realized she must have some sort of dementia, because she seemed to have trouble expressing herself and even understanding who I was talking about.

  2

  An Arboralum Appears

  The screams persisted, and I walked out onto my porch. Closing my front door behind me, I became tightly enveloped in a glove of humidity. I followed the elderly woman’s pleas for help. They definitely cam
e from somewhere inside her house. I looked around the neighborhood, but saw no one else leaving their home to investigate. It seemed unusual that even Joline hadn’t poked her head out of her house across the street.

  I walked over my driveway and heard the woman’s scratchy voice pleading for help through the side window facing our garage. I hurried to the steps of her porch and had the fleeting thought that I should call the police. I knocked on her door; it creaked open slowly. Visions of ‘B’ horror movies flashed through my head. I had the urge to run back home, but the poor woman’s frail voice beckoned me onward. I expected to find her in the living room, but her cries were coming from the kitchen.

  I crept toward the kitchen area and it came into view. I could see straight through to the back door, which was wide open. Daisy was not in the kitchen.

  “Help me ... help me.” The voice came from the backyard.

  I ran toward her cries, relieved to exit the house and get back outside. I surveyed the backyard but she was still nowhere to be seen. Looking around the backyard shocked me. The yard looked neglected and lost, a tangle of overgrown bushes and vines dangling from the trees that