Chapter 71: Settlement

Bill arrived just before 8am and took everyone to Brisbane. They arrived just on 9.45. Collecting some coffee’s they went to the top floor room for the settlement. The legal team wanted to see the cheque first, Zac showed them but did not release. Paperwork please. They handed over a folder with all of the title documents and signed transfers. Both Ben, Suzanne and Jane thoroughly check every document. They were being very careful.

Zac asked for the tenants list. Everything appeared to be in order, then Helen and Suzanne stood and shook hands with the other legal team.

Harry advised ‘Ok but care they are not revealing something.’

The cheque was handed over they then passed over the keys advising all items in the building now belonged to them including this table they were unable to remove. The other people left them alone. Sitting around the table Jane said. “That was a funny settlement. I bet they have banked the monies straight away. Something just does not feel right.”

Helena and Suzanne looked at each other. Suzanne replied “Yes. Everything legally was correct.”

Zac replied “Don’t ask me why I asked for this list but this building has never had more then 25% occupancy. Maybe they feel it’s a bad building?”

Helena advised. “Well lets inspect every floor from the 3^rd basement up?”

They all left in the lift for the lowest basement. Looking around it was empty. The next level empty. The first level had three cars. Ground floor the shop tenant and Bill’s limo parked. The tenants advised the three cars were theirs. It been like that for 6 weeks. Helena smiled she knew why.

On the first floor were some tenants. They took up ½ of the floor. 2^nd level had one tenant using 1/3 the rest was empty and never fitted out. 4^th floor again one tenant ¼ floor. Floor 5 to 12 were empty, they look like people had been there but no formal fit out. On the 12^th floor Bill asked “Helena do you mind if Jane and I went to the titles office and lodge the transfer. That will make sure from the time we lodge them we own the building?”

Helena replied “Yes OK. Ring me when you have done it please.” They left to lodge the documents.

Bill drove them to lodge the title documents. On the 13/14/15 all empty. The 17 floor was where they settled. Helena mentioned “The 16^th was missing?”

In the end lift was a key access to the 16^th. They found one master key fitted. On this floor was a lot of empty boxes, mainly liquor/spirit. It looked like a party floor. There was a room next to the lift well besides the fire stairs. On opening the door they found a large safe door to a strongroom.

It needed two keys and a combination. They had the keys but not the combo.

Fred tested the combination and found it has a six cylinder system. He showed Helena how it worked by back and forth turning similar to her wall safe.

Helena asked everyone except Suzanne to leave the room and be quiet. They asked Harry to help. He made their hearing very acute. Turning the numbers they found the combination in around 15 minutes. Just as they were about to open the door, Ben rang. Fred came in. Documents lodged it officially now ours. Andrew and Zac came in, They opened the safe door. Inside were bars of gold and silver. Together with a heap of treasury bonds. Everyone looked astonished. Andrew took a photograph of the room contents.

Helena and Suzanne looked at each other questioning Harry ‘Did you know?’

Harry replied ‘No. but it is now all yours, Please check the gold bars, you girls know how?’

Helena stepped into the room Suzanne stopped the others entering. Helena picked up the first bar with her right hand, held it in the left hand for a second, then replaced it back. Picking the bar back up again Harry advised ‘All OK.’

They entered the room Andrew looked at the treasury bond and mentioned “These are untraceable but there must be millions here?” There was no paperwork, no paper currency just gold, silver bars and the treasury bonds some dating back 15 years as the interest coupons had not been removed. They had found a treasure trove.

On one of the shelf was the keys to change the combination. With Fred help they changed the combination number. One of Helena safe number plus their wedding date. They closed the safe door then noticed some stairs upwards to the 17 floor. They went up and exited in the wall panel. Fred found the way to open it. The others all sat down in silence. Suzanne advised, “Lets wait for Jane and Ben to come back before we discuss. Who needs a coffee?”

Suzanne grabbed Zac and they went down to get the coffee and some biscuits.

Some 10 minutes later they returned with Ben and Jane. Sitting around the table Fred asked Ben and Jane. “We have taken over this building, if we find anything, I mean anything and we cannot identify any floor owner, does the contents that we find belong to us?”

Ben and Jane looked at everyone. Andrew held Jane hand. Ben asked “What did you find?”

Andrew replied “Gold/Silver bars and some treasury bonds. Nothing traceable to any party.”

Jane replied “Then yes as building owners we own everything in the building except what is tenanted.”

Ben replied “Yes I concur”

Suzanne replied “Lets finish this coffee then we will show you what we found.”

In a few minutes Helena led the way. Fred opened the secret passage down to the strong room. Helena did the combination and opened the door. Both Ben and Jane were astonished. “Yes this is now company property.” advised Ben and Jane together.

Andrew and Zac carried over a table to the safe door. They removed the treasury bond and started to count them. They found the face value was around $2 billion. Placing them back in the safe they then counted the gold and silver bars. Rough estimate was around $900 million.

Placing everything back in the safe they returned back upstairs. They all looking drained.

Helena stated, we need to get some food then return here for discussion. This floor and the floor below will be the company floors. No tenants. Other than that, lets go and have some lunch, no talking about the subject and come back here to discuss. Just as well all of the directors are here.

They returned to Bill, who took them to the Marriott for lunch. It was a quiet lunch. They returned back to the building just after 2pm.

Helena spoke “Well I was going to finance the building of the new centre, which I had personally named ‘The Edward’. Named after the street. We now appear to have the funding to build. We will need to get the bonds into our bank account, but we need to make the whole thing legal. That I will leave to Ben, Andrew and Jane with Fred. We will need to justify in the balance sheets etc. Andrew can you find out the best way to change the volume without causing any panic. Possibility sell in 50 to 100 million lots, what ever. Any other comments?”

Jane advised “There are legal precedents to happening like this I would like some time to read, study. Who has the combinations?”