Chapter 26

Mrs. McWilliams was delivered of a boy ... and a girl ... and a girl ... and I hope triplets aren’t a communicable disease ... myself being in an ‘interesting’ condition. Junior fretted. Junior has yet to make the ‘startling discovery.” She shall fail her punctuation quiz next week.

We all said appropriate things concerning babies in delivery ... including comments about ‘milk factory depletion’ and the inconveniences of insufficient floor space and lack of production machinery. Cynthia fell asleep in mid rebuttal. A nurse entered and we were shooed.

Then we had to ‘check in.’

With the Port,

And the Coast Guard.

As they say, Therein lies the rub.

I am the registered owner...

Of the 65 foot (20 meter) SV Basilisk registered Port of Origin: Pentwater, Michigan. United States of America. The Coast Guard knows she is mine.

AND

The SV Flint Ninety feet (27.5 meters) of South African built, registered Port of Origin: San Diego, California. Republic of Mexico. The Coast Guard has not a clue.

*AND”

The Princessapality Coast Guard KNOWS me.

The lieutenant in charge of the Ludington station rubbed his chin, sent his eyebrows skyward and said,

“This is going to be so much fun.”

“You’re going to be mean ... I can tell.”

The Lieutenant nodded, “First things first... Basilisk is improperly registered.”

“She was fine when we left 12 years ago.”

“The Port of Origin no longer exists,” he said.

“Does too.” I expanded, “Pentwater is 20 miles south.”

“Okay ... the Country of the Port of Origin no longer exists. How’s that?”

“Technicality.” Thinking about that, I passed the buck, “How do I fix that?”

“Junior?”

“What?”

“The United States of America no longer exists ... Surprise’s boat is improperly registered ... and it’s your doing.”

“Piece of paper ... as in gimme one,” Junior held out her hand. “Pen?”

She scribbled on the paper using the pen. She handed the sheet to the Lieutenant.

He read, “Boats owned by a resident of the Princessapality are, by Royal Decree, registered to the Princessapality. Wendolyn Elizabeth Wanzor Austin, III.

“I can see many arguments to this.”

Junior said, “There won’t be ... no recreational boating tax.”

“That works.” He looked at it again, “We tax out of country boats?”

“You got it,” Junior said.

“Reciprocal?”

“Exactly.” Junior said, “They tax ours ... we tax theirs.”

“You aren’t just another airhead.”

Junior grinned. “Thank you for noticing.”