Yesterday I spent some quality time with my .22’s, punchin’ paper, getting my new-to-me 1985 vintage Marlin Model 25 sighted in…
Dad bought me a Marlin 25 years ago on my 16th birthday, I loved that little gun, and spent many happy hours plinking, target shooting, and popping the caps off plastic soda bottles, that gun saw many hundreds of rounds through it, and was my summer companion for many years, up until I moved to Vermont, where some freinds got into paintball, wanting to join in, and because I was in my “.22’s are for wimps” phase, I stupidly sold my M25, just so I could get some paintball gear
I quickly got bored with paintball and began kicking myself that I had stupidly sold my first gun, the one Dad gave me
Dad’s still here, thank Og, he never really cared that I sold the gun, after all, it was my property to do with as I pleased
Still, I’ve been missing that gun for the longest time, so I promised myself, when I found another M25 in good shape, I’d buy it without hesitation
Last week, I found one, brought it home, and was at the range sighting it in on Sunday, it has a nice little Japanese made Tasco 4x32 scope on it (newer Chinese made Tascos are unfortunately far lower quality than the original Japanese sourced models)
anyway, to get to the point of the story, I had my three rifles (wasn’t that an old TV show in the sixties? “My Three Rifles”? 
) and was comparing them for accuracy, one of the other guys at the range had never shot a bolt action before, so I let him try one of mine
While we’re chatting between shots, another shooter walks up, compliments me on my Savage rifle and says he has one like it in .17HMR, and offers to let us shoot it…
(this is one of the best things about a commercial shooting range, the camraderie and the “you try mine, I’ll try yours” sharing
I put a few rounds downrange, NICE GUN, extremely accurate, he let me finish up the last 20 or so rounds he had left, and he went back to his handguns…
After I was done with his .17, I went over, put it back in it’s soft case, let him know I was done with it, and thanked him for letting me shoot it, offered to let him try mine, which he thanked me for, but declined, we all went back to our respective guns and continued paperpunchin’
about 20 minutes later, the owner of the .17 packed up, said goodbye to us, and left, after he drove off, one of the shooters on the far side of the shooting hut came over and asked me
“did that guy just leave his rifle behind?”
Sure enough, I look over, and there’s that .17HMR, in it’s bag, unattended, he forgot it!
The guy that was trying my gun decided to pack his guns up and see if he could catch the .17’s owner, as he may have been headed to the gunshop 15 minutes down the road, I gave the other guy my cell phone number, and asked him to give me a call if he found the guy, or give the guy my cell #
I waited at the range until it began to get dark, the owner never showed up, so I stapled a note to the bulletin board with his name and a message to call me, left deliberately vague, that he had left his rifle here and I had secured it to keep it safe, sent an e-mail with my contact info and the situation to the club president, and let the other shooters know what was going on and to have the owner call me if he came back
No response from the gun’s owner for the rest of the night and into today, after work, I called the gunstore, gave them the gun’s serial number and had them check their records, they took my name and cell number, saying they’d contact the owner and have him give me a call
About 10 minutes after I called the gunstore, I recieved a call from a very relieved sounding man, it sounded like the owner, so I had him tell me the serial number and describe the gun and case, his descriptions and serial number matched, he is the owner of the gun, he profusely thanked me for protecting his gun, and we made arrangements to meet at the range next Sunday where he will bring his proof of purchase and drivers licence, so I can confirm he IS the owner of the gun and release it back into his custody
I’m so relieved that I was able to contact the owner, as I really hated being responsible for his firearm, this gun is NOT mine, and I did not want to have it anywhere near me or in my possession as long as he was unsure of the gun’s wherabouts, with my luck, I would have gotten pulled over or something and had the car searched, and the police would find me in possession of a gun that I didn’t own…
However, since the owner knows that I am in possession of his gun and we have planned to meet so I can return hi gun to him, I feel FAR better now knowing the rifle will be going home with its rightful owner on Sunday, I wanted to get the gun back to him sooner, tonight, ideally, but he lives a good distance from the club, and that would be inconvenient for him, I live 10 minutes away, so I can hit the club whenever I want
He knows where the gun is now, he knows it’s under the care of someone responsible, and he knows it’s safe, so he’s in no hurry to get it back
When I discovered the forgotten rifle, I had two options, none of which I particularly cared for;
1; do nothing, it’s not my gun, if he wanted to be stupid and leave it unattended, that’s his problem, not mine…
the problem with this option is that there would be an unattended rifle left at the range, where it could be stolen, broken, used for mischief or criminal acts, sold by a thief, any number of bad things could happen to it…
there’s also a condo development down the hill from the range (the range was here first) and the condo development would like nothing better than to shut us down, to find some way, any way, to put the club out of business, imagine the damage to the club’s rep if they discovered an unattended rifle there… we need to remain as professional and upstanding as possible
2; take control of the rifle for safekeeping, and make every effort to contact the owner so he can get his rifle back, that means I will be in possession of a firearm that is not mine until I contact the owner, but as a responsible firearm owner I have a duty to make sure any firearms under my control do not get into the wrong hands or misused
And no, at the moment there is no need to involve the police, perhaps if I hadn’t been able to contact the owner, I would consider releasing custody of the rifle to them, but they would more than likely make it difficult for the owner to get his legally owned property back to him
anyway, since this story has a happy ending, there’s no reason for me to worry anymore, and don’t think that I’ve done anything unusual or out of the ordinary, this kind of behavior/accountability/personal responsibility is normal in the sport shooting community, firearms ownership is a big responsibility and must be respected
Only half kidding. I have no idea what BTVS stands for in this context.