Beyond the Mirror
Copyright© 2012/2014
Chapter 17
The pace of Tom’s life shifted into a higher gear in the next few days. In fact, it had begun to accelerate from the moment he agreed to purchase the Morgenstern properties. Following an early supper in the late afternoon, he drove Russ and Liz back to the motel. He returned home, only to have Sandy run out of the house and hop into his truck the moment he parked.
“Rachel called again, and her husband used a snow blower mounted on a Jeep of some kind to clear their driveway and their side road, so she’d really like us to visit. Besides, I could use a break away from your family for a while. They’re nice people, but right now they’re not acting like themselves, and I think they deserve to be alone for a bit, just to clear the air.”
“What about Laura?”
“Oh, she’s visiting Charlie and his wife. I’m not sure why, but he came around to pick her up in a brand-new Jeep, and she rushed off with him.”
“Oh, okay. So Ann, Mom, and Dad are here, but no one else?”
“Yep, I think they need to talk,” she shrugged. “I imagine they’re going to clear the air and make a few decisions, but I’d really like to see Rachel, and it sounds like her husband went to a lot of trouble just to make that possible. Besides, you need to see the place we’re buying.”
So Tom followed Sandy’s directions, and they drove about five miles from the center of town, climbing halfway up Bear Paw Hill on a narrow road that had been recently cleared of snow. Actually, since the road they had turned onto was flanked on both sides by trees and scrub brush, only the last few hundred yards showed any signs of heavy drifting. There were signs that a few large drifts had been cleared right near the entrance of the driveway to the property, but other than that, the road was remarkably clear, so they had no problems at all.
The Morgenstern house sat at the end of a long driveway, on the high side of the road and faced south, so the front windows had a clear view of the town of Bear Creek. Two stories tall and built in the style popular at the turn of the previous century, it looked totally different from the modern house Sandy and Tom had just left.
Somehow Tom felt an affinity for that house the moment he saw it, but part of that feeling might have been brought on by the delighted look on Sandy’s face. He had hardly pulled to a stop before Sandy was diving out of the truck, racing toward the front porch of the property and up the steps, into the arms of a tall, flaxen-haired woman dressed in black. They had both turned to face him by the time he had gotten out of the truck and walked toward them.
“Rachel, this is Tom, my intended. Tom, meet Rachel, my best friend from my university days,” Sandy introduced them.
The next few moments were awkward as Rachel tried to apologise for her error in timing and Tom did his best to make her understand that he had only been momentarily disappointed by her actions. After that, though, Tom met Rachel’s husband, Sheldon, and greeted Mrs. Morgenstern, then was given a quick tour through the century-old house. He was definitely impressed. The house had been virtually rebuilt from the ground up only ten years previously, so although it appeared to be old, everything inside the outer walls was new. He was even more impressed when Mrs. Morgenstern gave them a summary of all the things she and her husband had done to the building.
“We bought this acreage twelve years ago because I loved the view and I liked the looks of the exterior of the house. I even liked much of the interior design, but the place was cold and drafty. The interior walls, ceilings, and floors were in terrible condition, and the foundation was crumbling into the cellar. We didn’t pay a great amount for the house, so once we took possession, we had the whole place renovated,” she waved a hand in a sweeping motion, then explained what had been done to the house.
Since the foundation was bad, they’d had a new basement dug, then poured concrete walls and a concrete floor before having a house mover shift the house to its present location. Next, they had the whole interior stripped out, only saving the wood trim, the doors, and a few built-in cupboards that could be resurfaced. Everything else was gutted out of the house and buried in the former cellar - after anything that could be was burnt - later the hole left behind was backfilled and landscaped over. Once the interior of the house was stripped to bare studs, they had an architect redesign the interior to change the many small rooms into larger ones and to add bathrooms, which the old house had lacked.
With the plans firmed up, they had all the old windows removed and replaced with modern triple-pane units. Next, they installed a propane furnace and heat pump system using forced air for warmth in the winter and air conditioning in the summer. Then, they had new wiring, new plumbing, and insulation installed before covering the interior walls with a vapour barrier and gypsum wallboard. Next, they had modern bathrooms and a modern kitchen installed, then had all the flooring redone, with tile in the bathrooms, kitchen, and utility room, but hardwood throughout the rest of the house. Lastly, they had the old trim, doors, and built-ins reinstalled, and finally, ten years ago, they had moved into their ‘renewed’ old house.
After the tour of the house, Sheldon grabbed a flashlight so he and Tom could look around the rest of the acreage and the buildings on it. First, they went through the little house where the former wrangler for Rachel’s horses had lived, then they glanced through a couple of small sheds and next the big barn. Lastly, they approached a large steel building that Tom hadn’t even heard about before.
“According to Mother Morgenstern, this building was Abe’s domain for the last four years.” Sheldon grinned at Tom as he opened a small door inset into the huge rolling door on the front of the building.
Once they were inside with the lights turned on, Tom could only stare in amazement. The whole building seemed to be full of older cars and one old trailer, but most of what was there looked to be in showroom condition.
“This was Abe’s hobby, although he farmed out most of the restoration work,” Sheldon waved a hand at the display. “We will be taking the five finished cars, the unfinished Cord, and the restored Airstream trailer with us. My job will be to drive the ‘56 Chrysler Imperial and tow the trailer. Mother Morgenstern loves the old ‘37 Cadillac LaSalle convertible, but she won’t be driving that in this weather. If we can crowd them in, it’ll be shipped to Arizona in a forty-foot shipping container along with the ‘24 Doble sedan and the partially rebuilt Cord. Mother Morgenstern will be driving her ‘67 Jag, and Rachel will follow us in the ‘57 T-bird hardtop. I understand Abe bought the Chrysler Imperial and the old Airstream trailer planning to make the trip down to Arizona in them, so I can’t argue my way out of the drive. I’m not looking forward to driving that distance in the winter, but the two women are insistent that they want to do it in Abe’s memory. I’ll be damned if I’ll sleep in the trailer every night, though. I feel they make motels for a reason, and they’ll be a lot more comfortable to sleep in than a tin can on wheels.”
“What about all the other cars?” Tom asked.
“Well, starting on the far side, the two old Model ‘T’s and the old Model ‘A’ pickup are junkers, so we’re just abandoning them. You won’t have any trouble selling them though, because people are always looking for parts for those things,” Sheldon turned to the three vehicles near the wall on the side of the building nearest them. “These three vehicles are gifts to you folks. Rachel wants to give the old ‘52 Chevy convertible to Sandy - it’s the car the two of them ran around in while they were going to school together. Then she wants you to have the old ‘40s military Jeep as a gift for ‘stealing your thunder’ by telling Sandy about what you’d done before you could. Then for helping Mother Morgenstern sell out so quickly, we all thought you could use the Mercedes-made Unimog either here or at your airport, after all, it’s so ugly it won’t fit in with our lifestyle in Arizona. Not only that, but it’s the only machine around that can use the snow blower and snowplow attachments, so you need it more than we ever would.”
“We can’t accept all these as gifts. This whole place is a bargain as it is, and being given these cars on top of that is just too much,” Tom protested.
“That’s an argument you’re going to lose,” Sheldon shrugged. “The three on this side are gifts, and the three old Fords would cost us more to ship to Arizona than we could sell them for when we got them there. If I were you, I wouldn’t bother arguing about it, because you’ll never win.”
When Tom and Sandy were driving back to town later, she dropped another bombshell on him.
“They aren’t just giving us those cars,” she said quietly. “They’re leaving that huge bedroom set in the master bedroom behind, along with all the leather-covered chairs and sofa in the living room. Then on top of that, they’re not taking a stick of furniture out of the little cottage. I tried to argue with them about it, but that’s like arguing with a brick wall. They won’t take anything for the furniture, or for the cars.”
“We’ll see about that,” Tom snorted. “I can give gifts too.”
That evening, the family had hardly finished eating when the office phone rang, and Tom rushed downstairs to answer it. It was JJ, and he said he had a proposal he wanted to run by Tom, Ann, and his dad, so he asked Tom to invite the others to sit in on a conference call. Once the others were there and they were all listening in on the speaker phone, JJ explained that he wanted to leave Dunn-Redding and join White Out as a pilot, but not as a manager. He explained that he’d already talked to Jim, Ron, and Harry of White Out and had discussed their needs and concerns, but felt he had a solution that would satisfy them and his family as well.
It took some time to settle all the details, but in the long run, JJ would no longer be involved with Dunn-Redding, except as a shareholder. Jack readily agreed that might be for the best at the moment, and with that part of his proposal accepted, JJ forged ahead with the rest of his idea.
Since he knew Ann was somewhat cash-strapped at the moment, JJ offered to buy out her share of the airstrip, leaving him as co-owner of the airstrip with Tom. His offer would leave Ann with enough cash to be able to buy into Sandy’s business, yet she’d now have the ability to buy Sandy’s house outright, and she wouldn’t be saddled with a mortgage. As soon as she heard JJ’s commitment for the purchase of the airstrip, Ann jumped on the offer, then rushed upstairs to tell Sandy the news. At that point, JJ made sure to mention to Tom that since he’d be working at the airstrip, he’d be on hand in case there were any emergency decisions that had to be made concerning the property lease, but that Tom would still be making any final decisions. At the same time, he made sure to stress that he was only talking about the land, not the operation of White Out, since he only wanted to be an employee and didn’t want to be involved in management decisions concerning the business operation.
Next, JJ brought up Jim’s concerns about JJ working for White Out as a pilot, but actually owning one of the planes. His solution was to sell his Twin Otter to Tom for a 5% share in White Out, leaving Tom still owning 51% of the firm, but making JJ an equal partner with the other eight main shareholders. Only Russ and Liz owned a smaller share, since they split 4% between them. That way, Tom would own all three of the leased aircraft that White Out would be operating.
That offer almost became a sticking point though because Jack pointed out that even a new Twin Otter wasn’t worth nearly as much as the old Chinook. He felt the deal wouldn’t be fair to Russ and Liz, but he offered an alternate solution. He would give JJ two of Dunn-Redding’s used tractor-trailer units as a parting gift, and JJ could include those in his deal with Tom for the shares. That way, White Out would have more available transport for their upcoming move, and after the move was done, Tom could sell the two semitrailer trucks if he wanted to. Tom knew full well that those two semitrailers were a gift to him, probably as a form of apology, and he expected that JJ knew it as well, but the way the offer was couched, Tom couldn’t very well turn it down.
In the long run, Tom and JJ agreed that the proposal was a go and that they’d get their lawyers on it as soon as possible. Then, they wished each other a good evening and hung up. Actually, Tom was extremely happy with the whole idea. The deal still left Ann holding the reins concerning supply and shipping, but shifted day-to-day responsibility concerning White Out’s lease to JJ. At the same time, it cleared up any apprehensions Jim and his crew had about JJ working for White Out and gave Tom some relief about managing the actual airstrip. Not only that, but Tom was going to end up requiring less money for the real estate deal with Mrs. Morgenstern, which meant he wouldn’t deplete his stock portfolio as much as he had expected.
As far as Tom could see it, everyone came out on the winning end of the deal, everyone but Jack, who had lost JJ’s services. Still, his dad was smiling and seemed quite happy with the situation. That didn’t make sense to Tom unless JJ hadn’t been pulling his weight for the company, either that or perhaps his dad actually wanted his kids to be happy. Stranger things had happened, but for now, Tom decided not to ask any questions for fear of stirring up a subject that was better left alone.
Just then, the phone rang again, and when he answered it, Tom found it was Jim.
“Did your brother talk to you?” Jim asked immediately.
“Yep, the deal is complete. Are you happy with the whole idea?”
“Uh huh, a lot happier with this deal than I expected to be. After talking to him, I found out that your brother is more like you than your old man, so I’m certain he’ll work out fine. I’m a lot happier with you owning the Twin Otter than having him own it while working with us as a pilot. Besides, having him there onsite as part owner of the airstrip makes a lot of sense and will make life a lot simpler for you because we won’t be driving you or your sister nuts with little details. Anyway, I won’t hold you up, I just wanted to know if the whole deal went through so I knew where we stood.”
“Okay, Jim. We’ll chat later.” Tom said, then heard Jim’s phone disconnect.
“Jim Burke?” his dad asked, and Tom nodded. “Good man that. He stays on top of things.”
“Yep, that’s why he’s the boss at White Out,” Tom nodded. “I think the whole crew is darn good.”
‘Well, I’m favourably impressed.” Jack smiled. “I think JJ will fit right in, and Jesse will be in seventh heaven. He’ll probably split his time between your gold mine and the airstrip, but who knows? That kid is a lot like you, independent as hell and stubborn as a billy goat. Both of you make mules look cooperative.”
“What you’re saying is he sounds like a member of our family, Dad.” Tom broke into laughter, and even his dad had to smile.
Then the phone rang again, so Tom was still grinning as he grabbed it. This time the caller was Adam Horowitz.
“What’s up, Adam?” Tom asked.
“Well, it looks like I’m going to need a new office, so I hope you’ll rent me one in your new building.” Adam sighed. “ John West was just here and he’s offering you what I estimate to be market price for this building and I can’t afford to get into a bidding war with him.”
“Market price? You mean what I guaranteed to pay for it?”
“Nope, I’m here working because both you and Mrs. Morgenstern left word you’d bought both her properties, so I was writing out the final papers when John walked in with his offer. He’s offering you 10% over assessed value, which is close to market value, so you’d be stupid not to sell it to him. Even at that, he’s getting a good deal because prices around town are skyrocketing and I’d be willing to wager that it will be worth 10 or 15% more in six months.”
“Adam, I haven’t even paid for that building yet, so how can I be making a profit on the sale?”
“Oh no, according to the rules of real estate, you are the present owner because you guaranteed the sale of the property and registered that fact at the land titles office. As a result, the land titles office preregistered the deed in your name and even though the payment is outstanding, you are listed as the owner of record. Essentially, it’s the same as if you had already bought the property and Mrs. Morgenstern held the mortgage.”
“Well, in the next few days, I won’t own either of them.” Tom sighed softly. “My sister Ann has made a private deal with Sandy to buy this house, so Sandy is going to be buying the Morgenstern acreage. As for a lease of office space in my new building, I think we can come to an agreement. I imagine we can even find space on the ground floor, so you can have the normal real estate ads in your windows, but I’m going to pass the buck and let Ann handle that deal.”
They chatted for a moment or two more, then after the phone was free, Tom placed another call to his stockbroker to cancel the sale of stocks that he’d planned to have him make. Afterward, he sighed deeply and leaned back in his chair to relax, only to have his dad chuckle.
“Since this is Sunday night and there’s a blizzard blowing, just think what the rest of your week is going to be like.” Jack laughed.
“That thought isn’t even funny.” Tom sighed again. “My head is spinning, and I’m going to have to cross off a lot of the jobs on my to-do list because several of them are already done.”
“Well, while you update your records, I’ll head upstairs to make sure there’s some coffee on the stove so you can relax for a bit before the next flurry of phone calls,” his dad grinned as he got up and left the office.
Tom finished making a few notes, then went upstairs and found everyone sitting around the kitchen table, drinking coffee or tea and snacking on some oatmeal cookies that his mom had just baked. Of course, the general chatter was about the deal with JJ and how it would affect everyone. One good thing about it was that Laura was Tom’s lawyer, and he could give her a heads up about what was coming down the pike in the next few days. Thankfully, the phone didn’t ring again that evening, and Tom was quite happy that there was no further excitement. Still, when he went to bed that night, he fell asleep almost instantly and slept like a baby.
That was probably a good thing because the next day was a real humdinger!
Tom woke early, had a shower, and was down in his office with a coffee in hand by 7 a.m. and had hardly taken his seat before the phone rang. It was his stockbroker, calling to check on the messages he’d received on Sunday.
He’d hardly dealt with his broker when he got a call from JJ, who had found a message on his desk from Ann asking if Dunn-Redding was thinking of selling any of their ‘Atco’ camp-trailers. After Tom explained what he needed and why he wanted them, he found that the costs wouldn’t be as much as he’d expected, so he arranged to buy a half dozen of them, including a cookhouse trailer. If nothing else, they could use two or three of them at the airfield as temporary accommodations during the move. Not only that, but the trailers were designed to be moved easily by either truck or helicopter, so they suited his needs on the lease to a ‘T’ and would give him some leeway in case of surprise visitors. Tom arranged to have the six trailers shipped to Bear Creek, but told JJ there was no rush on delivery, since he wouldn’t need them for a few weeks.
While he was talking to JJ, he asked for a list of the exact make and model number of the various purchases he’d made on Saturday when they were clearing out surplus equipment. JJ said he’d have his secretary fax the full list to Tom later that day. Then he told Tom that the truckloads of equipment would be leaving Calgary sometime that morning, but not to expect them to arrive in Bear Creek until late Thursday, or more likely, sometime Friday. Since nothing he’d chosen would be damaged by frost, Tom asked that the trailers be delivered to the airport and left near his two containers.
That’s when JJ dropped the bombshell that he already had his house in Calgary listed for sale and that he expected to be flying the Twin Otter to Bear Creek within a month. Jesse was planning to stay in Calgary until the end of the school year, then would be finishing his last year of high school in Bear Creek, but he was hoping to spend the summer working for Tom. Of course, Tom said he was welcome to do that, but was surprised that Jesse wouldn’t want to be around the planes and copters out at the airstrip. That’s when he learned that Jesse would rather have his feet on the ground because he said flying was boring.
“Are you sure he’s a Dunn?” Tom laughed.
“Yep, when you consider the colour of his hair, he couldn’t be anything else.” JJ laughed just as hard. “Anyway, the clock here reads ten to nine, so I’d better get to work and put in one of my last few days for Dunn-Redding.”
“Well, as excited as Ann was about your deal yesterday, and since Mrs. Morgenstern is cramped for time, I expect we’ll be talking later today about trades and purchases and such. From what I understand, Mrs. Morgenstern’s deal has to be completed by Friday, and to complete that, Sandy has to sell this house. I think you’ll be hearing from Ann before long, so don’t count on getting much Dunn-Redding work done today.”
“Well, in order to pay Ann, I should sell you the Twin Otter and those semi-trailer rigs first, just to keep my accountant happy.”
“We can easily do that, but I’ll have to get my lawyer and Ann involved in that because we’ll have to work out the stock transfer. This whole deal is starting to get damned involved.”
“Tell me about it. You should see things from my end.” JJ broke into laughter. “Look, I’ve got to run and get some of this mess in hand. If I don’t talk to you before, I’ll call you this evening about some thoughts I have about making some more money for White Out. I’ll talk to you then.”
Then JJ hung up, leaving Tom wondering what sort of scheme he had come up with now. Still pondering that question, he headed upstairs to get some breakfast and ran into a heated discussion between Sandy and Ann.
Sandy wanted Ann to pay less for her house than the amount she’d originally suggested, since she felt she was getting a bargain on the Morgenstern house. In her mind, if Ann only paid the exact amount she needed to buy the Morgenstern house, then Ann could invest more in the business.
Ann, on the other hand, wanted to go with the original agreement. She couldn’t believe that Sandy had just pulled a number from the air when she’d first suggested a price, and she didn’t want to cheat her future sister-in-law.
Since his dad wasn’t getting involved and the disagreement wasn’t getting loud, Tom just sat down and began to eat his breakfast, completely ignoring the dispute. He did wink at his dad and got a grin and a wink in return, but other than that, neither of them was having anything to do with the discussion.
Then Sandy turned to him. “Alright, Tom, what do you think?”
“I think you’re being exceptionally generous, but at the same time, I think Ann is trying to cheat herself.”
“What?” “Explain that!” Ann and Sandy both spoke at once.
“Okay, real-estate prices are dependent on two things: the economy and the old supply and demand bugaboo. A business is dependent on the economy and on the business owner’s reputation. You’re both math whizzes, so you know that if a factor appears on both sides of an equation, you eliminate it, right?”
“Yeah, of course!” Ann snapped.
“Ah, but not in this case. This case is the exception that proves the rule. When the economy is strong, people consult accountants because they can afford it; that way, they can be lazy and let the accountant burn skull sweat. However, when the economy is weak, people come to their tax consultants because they can’t afford to lose any more money than they’ve already lost. In other words, people need accountants no matter what the economy does, unless the whole bottom drops out and the country falls into a full depression. Even then, you’re going to have people with money socked away that they want to hide from the tax man, so they’re going to need advice.” He winked at Sandy. “Besides Ann, I think Sandy would sell you up to 49% of the company if you could afford it. Then, as an accountant, you must know that since the money is being effectively ‘laundered’ through the company, she’d pay less taxes on it than from money brought in from the sale of a house. Of course, I’m not an accountant, so what I’m spouting might be pure bullshit.”
“Damn, you are right. As smart as you are, why the hell did you ever come to me to have your taxes done?” Sandy snapped.
“Well, I happened to glance in a window and saw this pretty lady sitting at a desk looking bored, and I didn’t have a date that night, so...” He grinned as he paused and winked at her again. “But mostly, I hate doing fiddly little math problems, and the instructions the government put out with their tax forms are like reading a foreign language, so you can class me as one of the folks who got lazy.”
That made Ann giggle, and even Sandy had to work to hide a smile. Tom was happy as well; he was quite certain that he’d prevented a disagreement from becoming an argument.
Unfortunately, that meal was the longest period of time when any one of the three of them had time to waste until five o’clock that afternoon. They weren’t the only people busy that day, though.
Laura and Sandy got involved with Tom’s transfer of shares to JJ. Meanwhile, JJ had his lawyer involved with the transfer of a fax of the title of his Twin Otter to Tom. Then Ann had to send a fax of title for her half of the airstrip at Bear Creek while JJ made a deposit to Ann’s business account in Calgary. After that transaction was complete, Ann had to transfer those funds to her bank account in Bear Creek. Next, Charlie was involved in the sales of both Sandy’s house, which she had gotten in her divorce settlement from Sheridan Lister, and 33% of the shares in Sandy’s business, both of them going to Ann. Once that was complete, Sandy could deposit that full sum into her bank account, and everyone could move on to the next step of the convoluted sale.
That afternoon, both Charlie and Adam Horowitz were involved in the four-way sale of the two properties between Mrs. Morgenstern, Tom, Sandy, and John West. In the long run, Mrs. Morgenstern ended up being paid for the sale of both her properties. As a result, she had the cash to purchase the place she wanted in Arizona several days earlier than she’d expected. John West ended up owning Mrs. Morgenstern’s former commercial building but now owed Tom’s investment company for a large mortgage. Ann sold her share in the airstrip and dug into her savings, but she ended up buying Sandy’s former house, as well as one-third of Sandy’s tax consultation business. Of course, Sandy ended up with the money from her two sales, but she’d spent more than half of that for the former Morgenstern acreage. Meanwhile, Tom got back his original deposit, but as well, he had earned almost 15% on the sale of the commercial property to John West. Even after paying all his legal transfer fees and taxes, he had come out of the final agreement with a marginal profit, not to mention the future interest on John West’s mortgage.
That evening over dinner, Sandy, Laura, Ann, and Tom discussed the convoluted series of sales. They knew they were all going to be extremely busy in the next while because each of them was involved in a move. However, they all felt that they had swung a fantastic deal because each and every one of those involved seemed to feel they had done exceptionally well that day. Sandy was happy that she would no longer be in the house she had ‘inherited’ from her ex, but instead would be moving into a home that had been owned by former friends. Besides that, she now had a partner in her business, which would free her from quite so much responsibility. Laura was happy to be moving into a separate house where she could feel independent. Ann was ecstatic that she would not only own a home in a good neighbourhood, but she was now an independent businesswoman. And Tom(?) – well, Tom was simply satisfied that everyone else was happy with their new purchases and situations.
Then Tom noticed that his mom and dad were both being very quiet, so finally he asked them if anything was wrong.
“No, not really,” his dad shrugged. “Kelly and I have been quite busy today, and as soon as this weather clears up, we’re going to have to fly back to Calgary. For the time being, we’ve been on the phone a lot, so your phone bill is going to be outrageous this month.”
“I expected that.” Tom smiled. “I imagine since JJ is leaving the company, you’ve had to make quite a few changes.”