Serendipity on the Island of Nantucket – A True Story

On Veteran’s Day, November 11, 2011, we hosted eight active military and veterans and their families for a free night at the Brass Lantern on Nantucket, part of the BnB for Vets program.  Most of the guests were couples but one young couple, Justin and Andrea, brought their ten-month old son with them and stayed for several days for, as we say, ‘a break from the real world’.  Deborah and Bill also stayed but just for one night.  Deborah was friendly and outgoing – very keen on knowing about local and resident ghosts when they arrived for check-in.

At breakfast on Friday, the guests were chatting and, upon hearing that Justin and Andrea had been here for a couple of days, Deborah asked their opinion on what to see in their few hours left on Nantucket and they suggested the Old Mill, one of the sites of the Nantucket Historical Association – where they had been the day before. (A walk to the Old Mill is a lovely way to spend the time between breakfast and the noon ferry departure.)

Justin, Andrea and their little one checked out after breakfast to take a last look at Nantucket Town before their departure on the ferry and Andrea and Bill headed off for the Old Mill.

Now for the serendipity – when they arrived at the Old Mill, they saw a shopping bag from a local shop that contained a child’s book under a bench. Deborah, the lady who was interested in ghosts, just ‘knew’ that this left behind treasure was connected to Justin and Andrea. Deborah called the Inn, told me the story and asked to speak with Andrea or Justin, and learned they had already checked out.  She had put all the pieces of the ‘mystery’ together but could not confirm her suspicions!

But, (I said) is there a credit card receipt in the bag? Yes (she said)!  What (I said) are the last four digits? 6XX7 (she said). YOU ARE RIGHT! (I said)!  She wanted to return the book to the little one so I called Justin and Andrea, who were at the ferry terminal waiting for their boat –

Andrea (I said), did you buy a book yesterday at Nantucket Bookworks? You know (she said), we were just saying that we didn’t see that bag when we were packing…

So I told them of Deborah’s sleuthing skills and the serendipitous finding, gave them Deborah’s cell phone number, as she had requested, and the two couples met in time for the return of the book – and they all still caught their ferry on time…and that is the happy ending of our Nantucket serendipity story.