The Law of Nines

5.

ALEX WATCHED AS HIS GRANDFATHER shuffled across the cluttered basement, kicking the odd cardboard box out of his way. At the far wall he moved rakes, hoes, and shovels to the side. Half of them fell over, clattering to the floor. Ben grumbled under his breath as he used a foot to push the errant rakes away until he had cleared a spot against the brick foundation. To Alex’s astonishment his grandfather then started pulling bricks out of a pilaster in the foundation wall.

“What in the world are you doing?”

Holding an armload of a half-dozen bricks, Ben paused to look back over his shoulder. “Oh, I put it in here in case of fire.”

That much made sense—after a fashion. Alex was perpetually surprised that his grandfather hadn’t already burned down his house, what with the way he was always using matches, torches, and burners in his tinkering.

As Ben started stacking bricks on the floor, Alex turned to check. Just as he’d suspected, his grandfather had forgotten the soldering iron. Alex picked it up just as it was starting to blacken a patch on the workbench. He set the hot iron in its metal holder, then sighed in exasperation as he wet a finger with his tongue and used it to quench the smoking patch of wood.

“Ben, you nearly caught your bench on fire. You have to be more careful.” He tapped the fire extinguisher hanging on the foundation wall. He couldn’t tell if it was full or not. He turned over the tag, squinting, looking for an expiration or last inspection. He didn’t see one. “This thing is charged and up-to-date, isn’t it?”

“Yes, yes,” Ben muttered.

When Alex turned back, his grandfather was standing close, holding out a large manila envelope. Traces of ancient stains were visible under a layer of gray mortar dust.

“This is intended for you…on your twenty-seventh birthday.”

Alex stared at the suddenly ominous thing his grandfather was holding out.

“How long have you had this?”

“Nearly nineteen years.”

Alex frowned. “And you kept it walled up in your basement?”

The old man nodded. “To keep it safe until I could give it to you at the proper time. I didn’t want you to grow up knowing about this. Such things, before the right time, can change the course of a young person’s life—change it for the worse.”

Alex planted his hands on his hips. “Ben, why do you do such strange things? What if you’d died? Did you ever think of that? What if you’d died and your house got sold?”

“My will leaves you the house.”

“I know that, but maybe I’d sell it. I would never have known that you had this hidden away down here.”

His grandfather leaned close. “It’s in the will.”

“What’s in the will?”

“The instructions that tell you where this was kept and that it’s yours—but not until your twenty-seventh birthday.” Ben smiled in a cryptic fashion. “Wills are interesting things; you can put a lot of curious things in such documents.”

When his grandfather shoved the envelope at him Alex took it, but only reluctantly. As strange as his grandfather’s behavior sometimes was, this ranked right up there with the strangest. Who would keep papers hidden in the brick wall in his basement? And why?

Alex was suddenly worried about the answers to those questions—and others that were only beginning to formulate in the back of his mind.

“Come on,” his grandfather said as he shuffled back to the workbench. With an arm he swept aside the clutter that covered the work surface. He slapped his palm on the cleared spot on the bench. “Put it here, in the light.”

The flap was torn open—with no attempt to be sneaky about it. Knowing his grandfather, he would have long ago opened the envelope and studied whatever was inside. Alex noticed that the neatly typed address label was made out to his father. He pulled a stack of papers from the envelope. They were clipped together at the top left corner. The cover letter had an embossed logo in faded blue ink saying it was from LANCASTER, BUCKMAN, FENTON, a law firm in Boston.

He tossed the papers on the workbench. “You’ve known all along what this is?” Alex asked, already knowing the answer. “You’ve read it all?”

Ben waved a hand dismissively. “Yes, yes. It’s a transfer of deed. Once it’s executed, you become a landowner.”

Alex was taken aback. “Land?”

“Quite a lot of land, actually.”

Alex was suddenly so full of questions that he couldn’t seem to think straight. “What do you mean, I’ll become a landowner? What land? Why? Whose is it? And why on my twenty-seventh birthday?”

Ben’s brow creased as he paused to consider. “I think it has to do with the seven. Like I said, it went to your mother on her twentyseventh birthday—because your father had died before his twenty-seventh birthday when it would have gone to him. So, the way I figure it, the seven has to be the key.”

“If it went to my mother, then why is it mine?”

Ben tapped the papers lying on the workbench. “It was supposed to go to her, because your father had passed away, but the title to the land couldn’t be transferred to her.”

“Why not?” Alex asked.

His grandfather lowered his voice as he leaned closer. “Because she was declared mentally incompetent.”

The silence dragged on a moment as Ben let that sink in before he went on.

“The stipulations in this last will and testament specify that the heir to whom the title is transferred must be of sound mind. Your mother was declared not to be of sound mind and has been in that institution ever since. There’s a codicil to the will that stipulates that if the heir in line isn’t able to take ownership of the title to the land because of death or mental incapacitation, then it remains in abeyance until the next heir in line becomes twenty-seven, whereupon it is automatically reassigned to them. If there is no heir, or if they are likewise declared in violation of the stipulations—”

“You mean crazy.”

“Well, yes,” Ben said. “If for any reason the title can’t be transferred to your father, mother, or any of their issue—that means their descendants, and you’re the only one of those—then the land goes to a conservation trust.”

Alex scratched his temple as he tried to take it all in.

“How much land are we talking about?”

“Enough for you to sell it and buy yourself a new car. That’s what you ought to do.” Ben shook a cautionary finger. “This business with the seven is nothing to fool around with, Alex.”

For some inexplicable reason beyond his grandfather’s admonition, Alex didn’t feel at all fortunate at the windfall.

“Where is this land?”

Ben gestured irritably. “Back East. In Maine.”

“Where you used to live?”

“Not exactly. It’s farther inland. It was land that has been in our family forever, but they’re all dead now, so it goes to you.”

“Why not to you?”

Ben shrugged. “Don’t know.” He suddenly grinned and leaned in. “Well, actually, it’s probably because they never liked me. Besides, it’s just as well—I’ve no desire to live there again. Blackflies and mud in the spring, mosquitoes in the summer, and endless snow in the winter. I’ve spent enough of my life hip deep in mud and bugs. The weather here suits me better.”

Alex wondered if the people who made up the will had discounted Ben because they didn’t consider him of sound mind in the first place.

“I’ve heard that autumn is beautiful back East,” Alex said.

Autumn would soon arrive. He wondered if there was enough land to get away and be alone for a while to paint. From time to time Alex liked to hike into wilderness areas to be alone and paint. He liked the way the simplicity of primeval solitude allowed him to lose himself in the scenes he created.

“How much land are we talking about? Is there at least a few acres or so? I’ve heard that some of the land in Maine is pretty expensive.”

“That’s on the coast,” Ben scoffed. “This is inland. Inland the land isn’t worth nearly as much. Still…”

Alex gingerly lifted the cover letter, as if it might suddenly bite him, and scanned the legal jargon.

“Still,” his grandfather went on, “I’d venture to say that this is enough to buy you a car.” He leaned closer. “Any car you want.”

Alex looked up from the papers. “So how much land is it?”

“A little under fifty thousand acres.”

Alex blinked. “Fifty thousand acres?”

His grandfather nodded. “You’re now one of the largest private landowners in Maine—other than the paper companies. At least, you will be once the title is transferred.”

Alex let out a low whistle at the very thought. “Well, I guess I very well might be able to sell a piece of it and buy me a car. I might even sell enough to build—”

Ben was shaking his head. “Sorry, but you can’t.”

“Can’t what?”

“Sell a part of it. The covenants to the deed say that you can’t sell any part of it. If you ever want to sell, you have to sell the whole thing, all in one lot, all together and intact, to the conservation trust that’s holding the land. They own the surrounding land.”

“I’d have to sell it all—and just to this one group?” Alex frowned. “Are you sure I couldn’t just sell some of it if I wanted to? Just a little?”

Ben was shaking his head. “Back when the papers first came your father and I studied the documents. We even went to a lawyer friend your father knew. He confirmed what we thought from what we’d read. It’s airtight. Any violation of the stipulations will result in the title reverting permanently to the conservation trust.

“It’s a very tricky document. It’s drawn up in a way that ensures that any deviation from the stipulations will cause the land to go to the trust. There’s no wiggle room. It’s constructed so as to tightly control what happens to the land. You might say that it doesn’t grant an inheritance so much as it offers choices among very limited options.

“With your father’s premature passing, and then your mother getting sick, the transfer of title wasn’t able to go forward, so it was put in abeyance, in limbo, until you were twenty-seven.”

“What if I don’t want to decide right now what I want to do?”

“You have the year you are twenty-seven to decide to take title or not. You don’t have to take the land. You can refuse it and then it goes to the trust. If you don’t act while you’re still twenty-seven, title to the land automatically transfers to the trust—except under one condition: your heir.

“You’re presently the last heir in line, Alex. You aren’t allowed to will the land to anyone other than a direct descendant. If you never have children, then, when you eventually die, the land goes to the trust.”

“What if next week I get hit by a bus and die?”

“Then the title immediately transfers to the trust—permanently—because you don’t have an heir, a child. If you become a father, even if you don’t act to claim rightful ownership during the time you’re twenty-seven, then that child becomes part and parcel of the will. It waits for them to come of age. In fact, that’s how you came to this place. If you’re hit by a bus it doesn’t affect any offspring’s rights, just as your father’s death didn’t negate your rights.

“You can take title and enjoy the land all you want and if you ever have children you can pass it on to them, providing you haven’t sold it to the trust. Once sold to them it’s theirs forever.”

“If I can only sell to the trust, then they can set the price cheap.”

Ben flipped through the pages, searching, until he found what he was looking for. “No, look here.” He tapped the page. “You have to sell it to the Daggett Trust—that’s the conservation group—but they must pay fair market value. You can name your own appraiser to ensure that the price is fair. And I can tell you that at fair market value that much land, even being inland, is worth a fortune.”

Alex stared off in thought. “I could paint all I want.”

Ben smiled. “You know that I think a person should prepare for the worst but live all they can of life. You could sell the land and then paint the rest of your life and never have to sell one of them. I hate to see you having to sell your paintings. They hold such love of life. I hate to see you part with them.”

Alex frowned as he came back from imagining. “Why would this trust want to buy this particular piece of land?”

Ben shrugged. “They already own all of the surrounding land. None of it has ever been developed. Most of it is virgin timber that’s been in trust for ages; they want to keep it that way. Our family’s piece is the last remaining part to the puzzle.

“The land owned by the trust is closed to people. No one is ever allowed onto the land—not even hikers. The Nature Alliance is a little miffed that they aren’t allowed in. They think they should have special access since they’re so devoted to preserving nature and all. I guess they went along, though, since the conservation group’s purpose seems so high-minded.”

“Well, what if I decide I don’t want to sell it? What if I want to keep it and build a house on it?”

Ben tapped the papers again. “Can’t. The deed comes with a conservation easement. That’s why we’ve never had to pay any property taxes. It’s some kind of special state wilderness area act that exempts land from taxes if it has a conservation easement constructed in the way this one has been drawn up.”

“So, then, the land is of no use to me. I can’t use it for anything?”

Ben shrugged. “You can enjoy it, I suppose. It’s your land if you want it. You can walk it, camp on it, things like that, but you can’t build any permanent buildings on it. You also must abide by the trust bylaws that you won’t allow strangers—hikers, campers, and such—on the land.”

“Or I can sell it.”

“Right. To the Daggett Trust.”

It was all so unexpected and overwhelming. Alex had never owned any land, other than the house that had been his parents’. The house, just down the street, the home where he’d partially grown up and now lived, was now in his name. In a sense it still felt like it belonged to the ghosts of those long gone. With his home on an ordinary lot Alex had a difficult time imagining how much land fifty thousand acres was. It seemed enough land that a person could become forever lost there.

“If I can’t really do anything with it, maybe I should just sell it,” Alex said, thinking out loud.

Ben pulled his soldering project closer. “That sounds wise. Sell it and buy yourself that car you want.”

Alex suspiciously eyed the back of his grandfather’s head. “I like the Cherokee. I only want a starter motor.”

“It’s your birthday, Alex. Now you can buy yourself a proper present. The kind none of us could ever afford for you.”

“I never really wanted for anything,” Alex said in quiet protest as he laid a hand gently on his grandfather’s shoulder. “I always had everything I needed, and what I really needed the most.”

“Kind of like my coffeepot,” his grandfather muttered. “Never wanted anything better.” He abruptly turned back, looking uncharacteristically stern. “Sell the land, Alex. It’s just trees and rocks—it’s good for nothing.”

Trees and rocks sounded good to Alex. He loved such places. That was his favorite thing to paint.

“Sell it, that’s my advice,” Ben pressed. “You’ve no need of Castle Mountain.”

“Castle what?”

“Castle Mountain. It’s a mountain that sits roughly in the center of the land.”

“Why’s it called Castle Mountain?”

Ben turned away and worked for a time bending the tubing on his essence extractor to some plan known only to him. “People say it looks like a castle. Never saw the resemblance, myself.”

Alex smiled. “I don’t think Indian Rock looks much like an Indian.”

“There you go. Same thing. People see what they want to see, I guess.” Ben didn’t look back as he handed the papers over his shoulder. “Get the deed transferred, then sell the place and be rid of it, that’s my advice, Alex.”

Alex slowly made his way to the stairs as he considered it all. He paused and looked back at his grandfather.

A dark look shadowed Ben’s face. “This is one of those things that I mentioned before, Alex, one of those things that doesn’t make proper sense.”

Alex wondered at seeing such a forbidding look for a second time that day. “Thanks, Ben, for your advice.”

His grandfather turned back to his soldering. “Don’t thank me unless you take the advice. Unless you heed it, it’s just words.”

Alex nodded absently. “I’m going to go see my mom.”

“Give her my best,” Ben murmured without turning.

His grandfather rarely went to visit his daughter-in-law. He hated the place where she was confined. Alex hated the place, too, but his mother was there and if he wanted to see her he had no choice.

Alex stared down at the envelope in his hand. It seemed that such an unexpected birthday present should make him happy, but it didn’t. It only reminded him of his dead father and his mother lost to another world.

Now this unknown connection to the past had found him.

Alex ran his fingers lightly over the age-dried label made out to his father. A faded pencil line ran through the name. Above, in the same nearly vanished, ghostlike pencil, was written his mother’s name. Her name was stricken through with a dark, angry line drawn in black ink.

Above that, in his grandfather’s handwriting, it said “Alexander Rahl.”

When Alex reached the landing on the stairs he thought that he saw someone out of the corner of his eye.

He turned only to see himself looking back from a mirror.

He stared for a moment; then his cell phone rang. When he answered it, he could hear only weird, garbled sounds, like disembodied whispers churning up from somewhere deep on the other side of the universe. He glanced at the display. It said OUT OF AREA. No doubt a wrong number. He flipped the cover closed and slipped the phone back in his pocket.

“Alexander,” Ben called.

Alex looked back, waiting.

“Trouble will find you.”

Alex smiled at his grandfather’s familiar mantra. It was meant as a world of love and concern wrapped in a call for vigilance. The familiar touchstone made him feel better, feel resolute.

“Thanks, Ben. I’ll talk to you later.”

Alex picked up the painting that he had brought from the gallery and headed up the stairs.

6.

ALEX HAD BEEN FORTUNATE. His Jeep Cherokee had started on the first try.

After the long drive to the older part of downtown Orden, Nebraska, he parked near the end of a side street that sloped off downhill. That way, if his Jeep wouldn’t start, he could let it roll to get the engine to turn over.

In this older section of town there wasn’t much parking other than on the tree-lined streets. The needs of a hospital, parking being only one of them, had long ago rendered the facility obsolete and so it had been converted to a private asylum: Mother of Roses. The state paid for patients, like Alex’s mother, who were placed there by the order of the court.

In the beginning Ben had tried to get his daughter-in-law released into his and Alex’s grandmother’s custody. Alex had been too young to understand it all, but the end result had been that Ben had eventually given up. Years later, when Alex had pursued the same course, he had likewise gotten nowhere.

Dr. Hoffmann, the head of the psychiatric staff, had assured Alex that his mother was better off under professional care. Besides that, he said that they could not legally give him the responsibility of caring for a person who in their professional opinion could still become violent. His grandfather had put an arm around Alex’s shoulders and told him to come to terms with the fact that while there were those who went to Mother of Roses to get help, to get better, his mother would likely die there. It had felt to Alex like a death sentence.

The mature trees on the streets in that part of town and on the limited grounds of Mother of Roses asylum made the place look less harsh than it was. Alex knew that the somewhat distant hill where he’d parked made a convenient excuse to delay walking into the building where his mother was imprisoned. His insides always felt like they knotted up when he went into the place.

On the way over he had been so distracted by scattered thoughts competing for attention that he’d nearly run a red light. The thought of Officer Slawinski scowling at him had dissuaded him from trying to make it through the yellow. As it turned out, the light had switched to red before he’d even reached the crosswalk.

For some reason it felt like a day to be careful. Staring up at the glow of a red light that had come quicker than expected had felt like cosmic confirmation of his caution.

Walking beneath the enclosing shade of the mature oaks and maples, Alex headed around the side of the nine-story brick building. The front, on Thirteenth Street, had broad stone steps up to what he supposed was a beautiful entrance of cast concrete meant to look like a stone façade of vines growing over an ornate pointed arch framing deep-set oak doors. Going in the front was a lot more trouble because it required going through layers of bureaucracy needed for general visitors. Close family were allowed to go in through a smaller entrance at the rear.

Grass under the huge oaks in back thinned to bare dirt in patches where the ground was heaved and uneven from massive roots hidden beneath. Alex glanced up at the windows all covered with security wire. Flesh was no match for that steel mesh. The back of the building was more honest about what it was.

The sprawling lower floors of the hospital were for patients who went to Mother of Roses for treatment for emotional disorders, substance abuse and addiction, as well as rest and recovery. Alex’s mother was imprisoned on the smaller ninth floor, a secure area reserved for patients considered dangerous. Some of them had killed people and had been found to be mentally incompetent. Several times since Alex’s mother had been confined at Mother of Roses there had been serious attacks on other patients or staff. Alex always worried for her safety.

He scanned the top row of almost opaque windows, even though he had never seen anything more than shadows in them.

The steel door in back had a little square window with safety wire crisscrossed through it. When he pulled open the door he was hit by the hospital smell that always made him resist taking a deep breath.

An orderly recognized him and nodded a greeting. Alex flashed a wooden smile as he tossed his keys, pocketknife, change, and phone in a plastic tub on a table to the side of the metal detector. After he passed through without setting off the buzzers, an older security guard, who also knew Alex but didn’t smile, handed over the phone and his change. He would keep the knife and keys until Alex left. Even keys could be snatched from a visitor and used as a weapon.

Alex bent at the steel desk beyond the metal detector and picked up a cheap blue plastic pen attached by a dirty string to the registry clipboard. That string was the most lax security in the entire building. The woman at the desk, Doreen, knew him. Holding the phone to her ear with a shoulder, she flipped through a ledger, answering questions about laundry deliveries. She smiled at Alex as he looked up from signing his name. She’d always been nice to him over the years, sympathizing with him at having to visit his mother in such a place.

Alex took the only elevator that went to the ninth floor. He hated the green metal doors. The paint had been scratched off in horizontal patches by med carts hitting into it, leaving dirty metal to show through. The elevator smelled musty. He knew the tune of every clunk and clatter it made on the way up, anticipated every shimmy in its labored travel.