Chickamauga Antietam Charles, otherwise known as Chick, is an old man living in the Safe Haven homeless shelter. Lame and destitute, his only valuables are cached away in a secret pocket of his ancient pea coat. It is Christmas. He awakes to find he has been given a present by a stranger who passed through in the wee hours of the morning when all were asleep, save for one little girl who insists it was Santa. The gift is a lottery ticket. And when it hits, the others want him to share the wealth, but he has only one goal, and it obsesses him to his very marrow. He must go to Spain. To retrieve what was taken from him so many years ago-a theft that made him into the wreck he has been ever since. But to do it he must relive the sea story that started it all.