Chapter 04

Building the New Block

The official approvals will take a few days to come through but H J and Smoky can now start preliminary work while they wait for it. Part of Smoky’s work on Friday is to buy tools and gear to get things ready.

Saturday morning he has the teens removing the boards from the interior fences then they remove all but the last section of rails and posts before the street fences. While they do that he digs holes to erect several posts and rails to build a twelve foot by six foot section of fence in the field on the edge of the cut grass. He installs two of the gates then he moves the two showers to inside the new fenced in area. This will give them privacy when the boundary fences are removed. Just before dinner he has them move all three tents to be closer to the new shower location and they also use the shower unit as a windbreak on the stables side.

Sunday Smoky works with the teens to move all the timber stored in the basement of the industrial building to the ground level on the other side to the one he’s been using. The stable’s gear is moved across too.

For the next week the teens are busy pulling up the floorboards in the middle of all the upper levels of all the buildings except the stables. They also remove the lowest level floor except in the stores building. In the stores building the dock floor is removed. All of the removed wood is stacked in the industrial building with notes of where it came from.

On Wednesday Smoky visits the landscaper the teens work for. He walks up to the man doing maintenance on a bobcat and asks, “Marty Hawkins?” The man nods as he starts to stand upright. Smoky holds out his hand, “Morning, I’m Moses Grey, call me Smoky.” Marty grins, wipes his hands on the towel hanging from his belt, and shakes hands. “Alex and Rick tell me you do anything in the way of landscaping and general contracting work. They also say you’re a terror on making sure it’s done right and you don’t overcharge.”

Marty smiles, “No point in doing a less than perfect job and few here can pay big bucks so there’s no point in asking for more since you won’t get the work. I believe a little profit off more work is better than no income most of the time. I wish I had more work so I can keep Alex and Rick working a lot more because they do good work, but I don’t have it. What can I do for you, Smoky? And how do you know that pair?”

“Well, I’ve got some work that needs doing. First is several hundred feet of utilities trenches to be dug, the pipe laid, and then filled in. Some tricky pits to be dug inside buildings, over eight hundred feet of paths to be prepared and made with tinted concrete, over seventy-four thousand feet of concrete floor to be made, plus a sixty-six hundred square foot park to be landscaped. It can’t all be done at once because other events limit the process. That’s why I think an innovative small businessman like you may be the best person to do it all. Are you interested?”

“Yes. But how long it takes will depend on approvals and staffing as much as anything else.”

“The approvals will be handled by my lawyer and architect. If you want to come and look at the job I can show you what needs to be done. We’ve got a verbal approval from the County on the general plan but the specific plans still have to be finished and passed by the engineer. We can get started on a lot of the work while that’s happening. Things like the trenches have to go in and can be dug prior to approvals.”

“OK. Lead the way and I’ll drive over with you.”

“It’s only a few miles. I walked over, so I can ride with you.”

Marty gives him an odd look because he’s not used to people who walk around unless they’re poor. They get in Marty’s pickup and Smoky directs him to the Block. They park on the street in front of the stables and Smoky leads him through the stables. Marty asks, “You got the County to approve work here at the Grey buildings?”

“Yes. It wasn’t easy. However, when given the choice of approving a lot of renovations to modernise the buildings or I build a feed-lot hog farm in the middle they thought it wiser to go with the renovations.” Marty laughs as they exit into the centre of the block and Smoky gestures at the many holes of the old boundary fences while saying, “The six properties are also being made into the one property so the boundary fences are going for paths in their place. These two off this street behind us are fifteen feet wide. They’ll run from the street and across the back of all of the buildings to let us have trucks in here to deliver to all of the buildings. The ten foot spaces between the buildings to the other streets will also be paths. I want them all to have a nice look but to have the different sizes obvious by the look too. Now, the trenches will run under three of the fifteen foot paths, one going through where we’re standing and two on either side. All three will need to go right up to the street wall of the buildings and two will run into the street behind us. There’ll be one into the building behind us and a few out into the open area in front of us.”

“What’s going to be in them? That affects the depth and width.”

“The building on our left has a basement. Pipes will run from that into the street on our left to hook into the water mains, power lines, and phone lines. Those two buildings in front of us will have a sewer pipe run from inside them back to the sewer line in the street behind us. Each of them will have a branch into the building they run behind and the one on our left will have a branch to a toilet in the centre here. The water pipe will run from the building on our left, across under where we stand to the building on our right. Branch lines will go down to the front two buildings, into the building behind us, and into the open area in front. The power and phone lines will do the same.”

“I see! A major multi-use trench in the shape of a ’H’ with a couple of branches off the bar of it.” He thinks for a moment then adds, “The two main ones with the sewers will have to be deeper and wider than the bar. I can do all that. What else?”

“All of the paths will have to be prepared and then cemented. The ten foot ones can be done at any time but the wider ones will have to wait until after the trenches are in with all of the pipes laid before they can be filled and the concrete paths laid. Those will have to be good enough to take big trucks and we’ll need inspection points for the pipe joints too.”

Just then the boys exit a building with a load of removed boards. The two men watch them carry the boards across to store them. They wave to the men when they head back a little later. Marty says, “You never did say how you know the boys!”

Smoky waves to the second commercial building while saying, “When I first arrived on site I found the five of them squatting in that building. Instead of just kicking them out I put them to work and paid them. I also have them living in tents of mine down near that makeshift shower in the area in front of us. Better for them and I get good helpers.”

“Ah! I understand that. They all work hard. It’s good to know some of the staff will be close at hand for this job,” and laughs.

“I’m kind of hoping you’ll use those five as much as you can and teach them new skills in the process. Now, back to the work. The trenches will need to extend into each building so the pipes are easy runs and aren’t exposed to the weather at all. That means digging the trench plus a pit inside the buildings. The teen team are busy removing the wood floors so that can be done. The difficult one will be this one on our left because it’s the only one with a basement. We’ll have to lower the equipment in to do the work. It’s worth the effort because it puts the pit for the incoming main lines at the same depth as the mains in the street, thus making that an easier job.”

Marty slowly nods and says, “You better get the utilities people to do those runs for you. They have the gear to quickly drill a pipe tunnel.”

“I know. But I’ll get you to dig and concrete the pit in the building they’ll work from and they’ll run the pipe into it.” Marty nods again. Smoky waves at the building the two shops are in while adding, “We can dig a pit and run the trench into that building but we can’t finish the work there until after we finish the ground floor of the one beside it and move the shops over. The other task is to landscape this entire open area into a park with a set of toilets on our left, two enclosed playground areas in the far right-hand corner, and some picnic type places in the left-hand bottom half. I want this top half as an open run and play area.”

“You’re talking about a lot of work. A few months worth. I do have some other commitments so I can’t concentrate on this exclusively. I don’t do the concrete work but I have a friend who does, is that OK? I’ll also have to get another friend in to do some of the pipe laying.”

“At this time the only urgent work is getting the trenches and pits done with the pipes into the buildings. I’ve no trouble with you working this while doing your other jobs as long as this keeps going forward and we don’t have other contractors held up by the work you should have done. For example: at some point we’ll need the concrete floors in so the lifts and stair people can do their work. They don’t all need to be done at once. I do want the trenches in, the pipes laid, and the paths in as soon as you can do it because that will make a major change to the look of the area and it’ll let the other work crews know where they can and can’t drive. I’ll also have some work for the teen team later. When the new windows are here I’ll want them to install them, but I can work around your needs at that time. I want the work contract to set out the details of the work with a clear schedule of payment when each task or stage is done. That way we can pay you when you have to pay your sub-contractors. I want to see a list like: trenches dug for so many dollars, pits dug for such an amount, pipes laid for this amount. Get the idea?”

“Yes, I do. I’ll be along tomorrow with some gear. Can I steal Alex and Rick tomorrow? I’ll teach them how to use the gear.”

“Good. Bring the contract with you so I can sign it. You can use any or all of the teens as you need them. Just let us know each morning.” The two men shake on the deal then Marty gets some gear from his car to make measurements and take notes so he can work out the costs for the contract. For the next hour he’s wandering about the site looking at everything and taking notes, then he leaves.

The teens have a lot of questions during dinner that night.

Marty arrives early Thursday morning, he has a truck with a bobcat in the back and he’s towing a trailer with a trencher on it. Smoky answers the phone call and unlocks the gate. Alex and Rick are working with Marty today so they help him unload the equipment. Alex knows how to move the bobcat about so he drives it in while Marty shows Rick how to drive the trencher. Marty has a few words with Smoky about the contract and where to stack the dirt, then he’s busy showing both boys how to work all aspects of the trencher. He has a wide digger on it and is cutting a trench from the big street gate beside the residential building, the trench is about twelve feet from the building wall.

Smoky rings H J about the contract and is told to check his email. A quick check shows Marty sent a copy to both him and H J late last night, plus there’s an email from H J saying he can sign the original. A check to be sure they match then Smoky signs the contract: all four copies of it.

Marty has Alex working the trencher while Rick and Marty watch. A short talk then two copies of the signed contract are handed over. After a moment more of watching Marty has Rick on the bobcat to show him how to pick up and move the dirt Alex is digging out. Ten minutes later Rick is on the bobcat by himself and Marty is asking Smoky, “Can I steal Barry as well?” He gets a nod yes in reply, “Good, I’ll get the other cat and we’ll get to work on the ten foot paths.”

Smoky smiles while he walks away to help the girls with the floors as he figures Marty knows what he’s doing.

When they stop for lunch Smoky sees all of the post holes are filled in and the intended road behind the residential building has three trenches in it. A deep wide trench well away from the wall and two more between it and the wall that are a third the width and half the depth as it runs for half the building’s length. Marty and the small bobcat aren’t in sight. A little later Marty exits the industrial building and he joins them for lunch.

After lunch Smoky checks what Marty is up to. Smoky finds Marty has a set of plans from H J and he’s in the basement working on the pit there. Smoky doesn’t understand how Marty got the small bobcat down there, but he must have done it, somehow.

Just before dinner Smoky is carrying boards across the field when he sees Marty’s truck in the yard near the industrial building. He’s got a cable on a winch he’s using to tow the small bobcat up a steel ramp. Smoky looks around the field, and he’s surprised to see all of the trenches are dug and Alex is skimming dirt out of the areas for the ten foot paths.

When they break for dinner Marty walks around and inspects all of the work the boys did for him today, smiles, and pays them for the day. Because they worked the equipment he pays them fifty dollars instead of the usual thirty dollars a day he pays for unskilled labour.

Marty sits with them and says, “Tomorrow Nick and Rolfe will be on hand to start work on the pipes and cementing the short paths. They may or may not need extra hands. I’ll do the inside work for the other buildings in the morning while Alex readies the wide paths.” Smoky nods in acknowledgement while he hands over a check for the first two progress payments for the trenches and the industrial building inside work. Marty smiles and goes home.

The next day the sub-contractors arrive and start work at the same time as Marty. Over the next week Smoky is stunned by how much of the work they get done. Mid-afternoon of the Friday of the week after the contract is signed Smoky is looking around the block while he hands the latest cheque to Marty. All of the pipes are in the ground and run into the buildings, the paths are finished and look like two types of sandstone, plus the inside pits are all done.

The only items of concern are the two pits in the street for the sewer connection. Rolfe took the pipes as far as he legally can then he covered the work pits with plates. The pits will be filled in after the County does the final connection then Marty will rip up the footpath to put in a proper driveway across the footpath at both points.

The concrete floors of the residential building, the stables, and the other commercial building are poured and drying. The rest of them must now wait on other events.

Another very busy week of work follows. Smoky doesn’t know how H J organised it but the new windows arrive on Saturday morning and the teens are busy all week removing boards to put the new windows in. These triple glazed security windows look like period sash windows with shutters. All of the windows are the same size so it’s a simple job. The hardest part is using the high pressure cleaner to clean the stone of the window gap with an air stream before installing the windows. The windows without any glass are put in the stables first so the building has a good air flow through it to get rid of the future car exhaust fumes. Then the windows with the glass are installed in all of the other buildings.

Monday Nick has a large crew working in the stables to turn it into a car parking building by replacing all the removed wood floors with the designed concrete floors and ramps plus the supports for them.

On Tuesday a crew arrives with the gates. They’re put in and locked shut by the end of the day. It’s still a construction site so they’re locked to restrict access for now. When the work is all done they’ll be opened and locked to the side walls of the buildings.

Wednesday another crew organised by H J arrives to replace the roof of every building. In most cases it’ll just be sturdier and have some solar panels on it with a triple glazed translucent composite skylight over the front stairwell. The industrial building will have two large skylights of the same material run from the front of the building to the back over the office areas. H J found out Smoky would like a photography studio so he had two designed in.

Thursday morning Smoky is looking at all of the work going on, and he’s happy it’s getting done so fast. However, he’s concerned about how it got out of his control so fast with H J and the architect taking over a lot of the work. At least they have the decency to involve the local workers Smoky wants to give the business to.

There’s still a real lot of work to do on the buildings. The basic floor layout was approved by the County Engineer after the meeting, but now Smoky has to make decisions for the final floor plan layouts and get them approved. He also has to set out how he wants his apartment.

He has four buildings of three floors each. The ground level of each is to be a retail or commercial area of eighty feet by fifty-five feet on each side of the entrance area. It’s what to do with the other levels. The core part of each building will be the same with stairs at the front and back, a freight lift opening to each side, and a dock on the ground level beside the freight lift. The floors of commercial areas will have the toilets off the front entry and stair area, and each side will have a lunch room, these will be used as extra space in the residential apartments.

Smoky decides the industrial building will be all commercial space like the ground floor, except he’ll have an apartment in the front of the side with two streets. It’ll have a bedroom and a lounge of fifteen by twenty feet each with a bathroom of fifteen by fifteen feet. The lounge room in the middle with doors to the bathroom beside the stairs, the bedroom in the corner, and the studio space. An office area of twenty-five by ten feet beside the bathroom will store his equipment as well as his files and work desk. All of the lunch rooms are to be set out as kitchen dinettes and fully equipped, that way his won’t look any different to the other ones. After a careful study of the reports H J’s staff researched and prepared Smoky decides to have the upper floors of the stores building as all commercial with the other commercial and residential building as residential apartments. This gives them sixteen quality apartments and eight commercial offices with eight retail spaces plus the car park.

When H J is told of the decision he says, “The basic plans for all of the buildings are exactly the same and this means we only need three sets of drawings to give to the County engineer for approval.”

“H J, make sure you cost out and include good security in the rental fees. We need to have the whole inside courtyard lit up like daylight all night and security guards patrolling the whole property twenty-four hours a day. Downward aimed bright wide-area Light Emitting Diode (LED) lights mounted below the middle level windows will do the job of lighting up around the buildings, the paths, and the park area without annoying the people in the residential apartments. I want to discourage drug users and thugs from hanging around the area. I want this to be a premium site for living and business.”

“Sorry, I didn’t realize you wanted to be ‘the’ up-market site.”

“We need to make a splash to get high rents. Except we need to peg Abe and Frank at their current rents for the next ten years, but the discount isn’t passed on to their kids or who they sell out to.”

“OK. I’ll sort that out. I’ve also heard about a group who clean up old stone buildings then cover them with a polymer sealant to protect against weather and pollution. I’ve booked them, so watch out for them to turn up to go to work on the buildings.”

Smoky usually has dinner at the Mexican eatery three nights each week. While there he spends a lot of time talking with the workers, so he gets to know most of them a lot better but he can never get many of them to tell him their names. He does enjoy exchanging quips and jokes with the young woman and young man who usually serve him his meals. He also jokes with the woman he speaks to when paying them his usual tip while returning his plate and glass.

Six weeks after the County meeting four of the five buildings are done and an estate agent is taking rental applications. Both Frank and Abe appreciate the offer of maintaining the cheap rents but they’re using the changes to the buildings as an excuse to finally retire. Their shops are soon empty of their stock to allow the work crews to get very busy in the building. They expect to finish the work by Friday.

All of the materials collected while doing the work are stored in the basement and only Smoky can access the area. He plans to have someone refurbish all of the coaches and gear as well as selling the wood to local craftsmen at reasonable rates so they can make things from it to sell.

The teens have moved away from the park to live in a four bedroom above-garage apartment belonging to Marty, and they all now work for him full-time. Smoky let them keep the sleeping bags but he has the tents and other gear he bought in his apartment which he now lives in. The park is almost finished too.

Grey Block Original Site Plan

Grey Block New Site Plan

On a nice Saturday morning Smoky is looking out his studio’s rear window at the park where he camped for several weeks. Nothing looks like it did when he arrived, nor does it look like he thought it would when he did the planning. Others took his concepts and they made a few changes to them, but he’s very happy with the results. Already children are in the two playgrounds while they play and laugh. Marty has a crew at work putting the finishing touches on the gazebo style picnic and eating areas beside the two playgrounds. The open grass area between there and the stables has some teens playing flag football, plus some people just lying back to enjoy the sun out of the wind.

The Grey Block is on the edge of the down-town business district with a few more businesses around it, but only two blocks away is the start of a poor housing area with few places for kids to play. Many of the kids from there now come here to play when they can. Grey Park triples the amount of open play areas accessible to people in this part of town.

When the people clean up the building exteriors Smoky finds they all have names engraved into them, but they were full of dirt and grit. This building is Grey Industries with the rest being (in clockwise order) Grey Mercantile, Grey General Store, Grey Housing, and Grey Stables (which they already knew). The Grey Farm is now Grey Park and doing much better as a park than it ever did as a farm. The full property is now called the Grey Block. Smoky organises for some lighter grey stone to be precision cut to match the buildings’ letters then pegged and glued into place so the names stand out to be read from the street level. The ground level properties are all rented out except for the one on the same corner as Smoky’s apartment. It’s still free because he reserved it. Even the two not yet finished in the Grey Mercantile building have signed rental contracts. That’s one thing where he shocks H J. When shown the recommended rental rates Smoky more than doubles them and all of them have been snapped up. He now thinks he could’ve tripled them. They didn’t need to borrow as much money as was offered and they’re paying it back faster than anyone expected them to repay it.

Smoky sighs and turns away from the window while thinking, Time to get started with the rest of my life. However, there’s one last scene in this act.

Act Three, Final Scene?

Smoky is walking up the street when he sees Rod putting out their sign. His name is Rodriguez but he wants to be called Rod. Despite the numerous visits Rod is still the only worker Smoky knows by name. The boy smiles and Smoky smiles back while asking, “Rod, who makes the business decisions for your little operation? I’d like to talk to them.”

Rod frowns a little before saying, “I’ll pass on your request,” while accepting the fifteen dollars as payment for tonight’s first customer. A moment later Smoky is seated and Rod is talking to the young woman who brought out the test plate the first night and now often serves Smoky his meals when he eats here.

She walks over and asks, “Why do you want to know about our business?” She emphasises the word ’our’ very hard.

“Actually, I don’t want to know anything about your business, other than knowing it continues to operate,” is Smoky’s reply. “However, I do want to speak to whoever makes the business decisions to ask if you want to get established in a proper restaurant.”

“There are no suitable facilities around here anyone will rent to us at a rate that isn’t triple of what it should be. Which is a rate we can’t afford!”

“I’ve a property available. It’s eighty feet by fifty-five feet in a good location on a corner. I’m prepared to pay for a build-out of your design and to rent it to you for the same rate I rent the other half of the building or five percent of your gross profit each month. Whichever is lower. The only thing I insist on is your cooks stay on. Are you interested?”

“We’ll talk while we finish cooking your dinner. I understand about the difference between gross profit and net profit. Make it net profit!”

“How about ten percent of nett profit before wages?” She turns, walks back into the kitchen, and is soon talking to all of the others at work in the kitchen. All there seem to have an active interest in the conversation.

Several minutes later the young man who normally brings his food out delivers a plate with a number of foods on it and the usual large glass of milk. He sets it down while saying, “The first time you arrive you get the attention of my sister and mother. Since then my sister seems to be more than a little interested in you. Grandmother wants my sister to be your wife and says you’re a good man. Mother is in favour of the idea. But my sister wants a better life for the family, especially her children in the future. No one who lives around here has much of a future. Yet you often come here and tip well. Now you want to rent us space. Who are you? Where is this restaurant? Who can we speak to about you? And what do you do for a living? Yes, I know you carry a gun too.”

“Let me eat this while it’s hot then we can talk. OK? I come here for the quality food and not for conversation during the meal.”

He laughs and says, “I’ll be back,” in a very good imitation of a well known actor. He’s so good Smoky smiles and laughs.

Looking down he notices there’s more food than usual and all are items he’s never eaten before. He grins and eats another good meal.

As soon as Smoky finishes his glass of milk the young man and woman are at the table. From the corner of his eye Smoky notices two older women and a man watching them. The man’s hand is inside the door. Smoky thinks he may have a gun in his hand.

Opening his coat Smoky gets out his wallet, extracts the usual ten dollar tip, and passes that over before taking out his firearms license and diver’s license then he puts them on the table. The young man looks at them, holds them up to get the light hitting in a certain way, puts them down, and says, “Both are valid and very new, Mister Grey. How come?”

“I was born in Australia. My father came from around here. He died a few years ago. I was recently asked to come here to look at some of his family’s property to see if I can make it profitable again. I took the job and I moved here. Thus the new identity documents.”

“I see. Any relation to the Grey family who were one of the first to settle in this area?”

“I didn’t know about that until after I arrived. But, yes, I am.”

The young woman says, “You go armed. Do you know how to use a gun?” He nods in reply. “Did you ever shoot or kill anyone?”

“My father was a Marine in the Gulf War. He taught me how to use guns of many types. When I arrived here I was warned to get a gun for self-defence. So I did. In Australia all I ever shot were paper targets and clay pigeons.” The other two smile. “Until very recently I’ve been living in a tent camped on some land near here. A couple of weeks after I got here some gang members were breaking into the place I was staying at. I told them to leave and they got out guns. When I had an opportunity to safely do so I pulled mine and opened fire while diving for cover. The shooting lasted less than a minute. I fired several rounds but they scored a few own goals and all nineteen of them were killed. The police found they had two big meth labs in the vans they’d driven down. I’ve been told I won’t be charged because the police see it as self-defence.”