Totally Off Topic - Complete. For now.

We interrupt this blog to bring you an entirely unrelated story.

Joe here. I'd love to get your thoughts on a mystery I stumbled onto this week.

On Tuesday night, I was hurriedly painting three giantic tropical fish for an April Fools' joke I had planned for the call center. A voicemail had come in before dinner from a former-cow-orker-turned-bar-owner who was disappointed that I hadn't visited his establishment lately. I finished the finger-painting of one side of a blue and green specimen and decided I could take time out for a single cocktail while the paint dried. I backed out of the drive (we live in the early '50s neighborhood of Mt. Vernon, north of Cooper Dr. and west of Tates Creek) and turned my car toward downtown.

My headlights lit a piece of paper on the pavement. I got out and looked. A $100 bill. Another piece of paper fluttered nearby. Another c-note. Another bill nearer the gutter — a one. Then a five. Another hundred. And another. 

Pretty soon I was clutching something over $950. The bills were scattered across the street from one gutter to other, but not farther down the street than our property line. They couldn't have been there long when I backed out. 

I slowly drove down to the corner and then, telling myself it would be careless to leave any other bills littering the street, I turned back for other inspection. And then my bubble burst. In the middle of the street lay a wallet. Damn, I thought. It's not free money any more.

I looked in the wallet. Another hundred. A health plan card. A Sam's club card. Name: Nicholas Fugate.

I had stuck the wad of cash in my right front pocket, where I never put money, thinking it a hilarious windfall. But now that the billfold had been found, now that it was Nick Fugate's money, it changed in my pocket. Grew heavy, like the Ring would when grown tired of its possessor.

At the bar we searched for Nick Fugate — google, white pages, facebook, myspace. Nothing. The next day I called our next door neighbors, the Millers, and Karen called back 10 minutes later with an email address. She has access to UK databases and found Nick Fugate, a UK employee. And a neighbor in the next block.

The next day I emailed him "Did you lose something? If so, I think I found it. Please describe and I'll return it to you." A day went by. Another.

And that perplexing freeze frame was how things hung, until yesterday, when my iPhone told me I'd gotten an email, between the 5th and 6th race at Keeneland.

"I lose things all the time, but most importantly I lost my wallet a few days ago. It had more than $1000 in it, can't tell you the exact number. But it didn't have my visa in it, because that's about all I have. But I lost my cell phone about 2 months ago though. Thank you so much! Sincerely, Nick Fugate."

I emailed back, "Hi, Nick! Sorry to say, I didn't find yer cell phone. 8~(> But I did find yer wallet, with $100 inside — and $954 blowing down the street! Will you be at home later? I live just down Providence and would be happy to drop it by. BTW, the only cards in the wallet are yer health card and Sam's Club card. Cheers, Joe."

So after the races (thankfully, I resisted the urge to double Nick's grand at the track — for it turned out Will was the only one of the three of us who came out ahead for the day, him and his $2 show bets), I traipsed down the street, wallet and bills in a ziplock sandwich bag.

Will said I might be given a reward. "The only reward I want, is the story," I proclaimed — though I thought the odds were even that I might be invited in for a beer, too.

It was not to be. I rapped on the door — Cathy had cased the house and proclaimed it a rental full of students — and the baby-faced guy who emerged certainly could've passed for 20, though he was probably 25 or so. I hadn't thought to ask for an ID, but, after all, he had access to Nick's email account. Who else could he be? He shook my hand as I handed over the baggie and said, "Thanks."

"Tell me the story," I blurted. "How did you lose your wallet?"

He seemed not to understand what I was asking. What I needed.

"It must've fallen out of my truck," he said, his eyes sliding away from mine.

Liar, I thought. I want the real story. You owe me that. 

Or at least pretend to be interested in my story. "The wallet was closed when I found it. I don't know how all the other bills could've escaped. They were lying in both gutters, and spread across the road."

Nothing. Interview over. 

He didn't want to relive it. Though all smiles and dimples, he just wanted me gone. "Here ya go," he said, and held out a folded bill I couldn't read.

"No, thanks. I just wanted the story."

With a jolly wave, we each turned. Him back to the house, me to the sidewalk — already kicking myself for all the things I should've done. 

Why didn't I photocopy his cards? Write down the serial numbers of the bills? Take one of the c-notes to the bank and ask if it was genuine?

There's a story there, I just don't know what it is. And will likely never know. 

But I'm watching the obits and the crime stories just in case. And if they find the real Nick Fugate's body next week, for example — showing two weeks' decomposition — how much time do I have to get Cathy and Will out of town before I go to the police?

Maybe he thought I was a cop. 

Or maybe he thought I was just an old fat guy, not worth wasting time on. "We're always the same age behind our eyes," says my friend Bob. Those on the outside see something very different. And that difference can be an unbridgeable chasm.