“I’m here about the ad in the paper?”
Harry peered shiftily around the door, “Oh yes, the racing pigeons, come in through. I’ll take you down to the loft.”
In carpet slippers, Harry padded out into the cold, overgrown yard. “Just down here, mind out for that old tricycle.”
Gavin pirouetted around the rusty trike, bronze water oozing from a handlebar spilt.
“Here that are chief. The rarest South American racing pigeons. Direct descendants of a Mayan grand champion. They’re great value at a monkey.”
Gavin approached the grating. “Streptopelia turtur,” said Gavin, sternly, breath folding into the white, cotton sky.
“Say what, chief?”
“Turtle doves. Not racing pigeons.”
“Three-hundred, then. And you’re robbing me. See how slick and speedy they look. It’s all that time zooming through the Andes.”
“No.”
“Look,” replied Harry, with exasperation. “Give me two, and you can take them now?”
Gavin, holding his ground, held the gaze of the dubious salesman. “What else might be for sale?”
They stood in silence, for what seemed like an age before the vendor broke the silence: “You had better come inside.”