Greetings, dear reader.
I propose to describe to you a most extraordinary and
fantastic situation which has befallen me. I maintain that despite the
overwhelmingly improbable nature of the tale I am about to recount that such
happenings did indeed occur, and that it has been my curious fate to interpret
the discovery I most inadvertently made and assemble the facts into the best
logical picture as my position warrants. I would beseech the reader to suspend
his measure of rational doubt in order to assimilate the content of my story
before proclaiming his outrage at the audacity of a wordsmith such as I
proffering such an unordinary story as to be true. By that allowance, I shall
begin.
My tale begins on March the
14th, 1890, when I made my attendance as per usual at my position as
a telegraph operator for Western Union here in Columbus, Ohio. According to my
taste for punctuality, I arrived at an early hour only to discover that one of the
machines to which I was assigned had by unknown circumstances somehow depleted
it entire roll of paper tape, which I had diligently renewed the night previous
after disconnecting the battery from the wires. Not only that, but the paper
dispensed was, much to my surprise, completely filled to the hilt with code...
