Chapter 38

I knew I was still sleeping next to Millie, holding Mom's hand in my bed, but I was also walking behind Dad, Ben, and Eliza, just those three. I couldn't figure out where we were until I recognized that we were near Eliza's and Bud's tombstone. We went behind the cedars, up near the sheer rock bluff, and stopped. Eliza looked at me and it seemed like she walked into the rock and disappeared. Ben smiled at me and followed Eliza. Dad looked at me, smiled, and walked into the rock, as well. Now I was confused. What could that mean?

A dog must have been nosing Sheryl, because she softly said, "Go away, I don't want to get up yet."

I crawled over Sheryl as gently as possible to get out of bed. After letting the dogs out, I hit the head, john, bathroom, that place where relief comes with a sigh and a long splashing sound. Deciding that I should go ahead and do what was necessary, I shaved and showered. I was under the water spray, getting suds from my head and eyes, when a female form came behind me. Whoever it belonged to hugged and stroked my morning little Mike with gentle touches. I could tell it wasn't Millie, since there was no baby tummy. It wasn't Mom, as the boobs weren't big enough. It wasn't Marita, as the invader was too tall, and it wasn't Karen, as this one had big hands. It could only be...

"Sheryl," was whispered in my ear.

I turned in her arms and held her as I kissed her. "It had to be you because you are taller, with a flat tummy, not heavy on top, and you have big hands."

Sheryl giggled as she pressed her body to mine. "Think you might want to help rub an itch this morning, Champ?"

"Oh Baby, you know how to tease, don't you? I love ya, Sheryl, but you aren't the woman I do that kind of stuff with."

The wonderful lady said, "I knew you were going to say something like that. I love to sleep with you, but it's frustrating as hell. All ya gotta do is bend me over and fuck me good. You don't even have to fill me up with a load of that wonderful man stuff you're packing."

This caused me to begin laughing. "Oh, Doc, you are something. If I so much as got close to the welcome wagon tunnel you have, I would be squirting it so full of grade 'triple A' baby makers, that your little squigglies would be swinging to get one."

"Oh, be still my heart, Mikey. We should see if that is what would really happen."

Thank goodness that I was done in the shower. I pulled the curtain and stepped out. Mom was leaning against the door jamb, and as she checked out my almost fully erect injector, told me, "You are so cruel, Michael. That poor girl is going to be in agony with a case of purple pussy lips all day."

It was my turn to laugh. "Purple pussy lips? That's kind of extreme, isn't it?"

"No different than guys complaining about blue balls." The answer had come from the illustrious Doctor Sheryl Rivers behind me.

Mom was giggling as I passed her to go get some different clothes to put on.

This day was a good one, as Gene called me to tell me he had the plans done for the presentation to the county council. I think I was ready to do the show and tell when I could get the appointed time, and called Benson. "I have the plans for the development. When can I get to see the council?"

"Don't be in such a hurry, Mike. I'll make the calls and see when they want to meet. It might not be until next week. You know they don't see any urgency for tomorrow, much less what you see for next year."

When Mom was done with her morning stuff, I pulled her into the office. "I didn't get to talk to you about this last night, but we need to count and list the coins in the chests. The coin dealer wants a list by type and date. I'll bring the chests in here one at a time, and we'll stack and record them by type, then by date. I think Marita can help without running her mouth off, and I think we both feel Karen can handle it."

Mom sighed. "They might as well be co-conspirators with us. I know there isn't anything wrong with what we're doing, but it sometimes feels like it. Let's get started as soon as Sheryl gets on her way."

After morning chores were done, we ate a hearty breakfast and sent the good doctor back to her clinic. It was raining, so after the ladies from below had breakfast, Mom gave them the day off and told them to come this evening for chores since it was possible that we might have to go into Lexington later.

Mom and I sat at the little table with Marita and Karen, while Millie fed a hungry John some cereal and fruit. Mom told the two girls, "We need your help with a special project. When Mike was looking through the caves on top of the mountain, he found some old chests that were filled with gold coins. We've checked with our lawyer and know that anything we find on our land is ours. The problem is that we don't want others to know we found something here so that crowds don't show up poking through the property looking for treasure."

I took over, "We're going to use this money for the new hospital, the school, the church, scholarships for as many kids as we can send to school, and to begin building developments that will bring good people to our community."

"Enough with the commercials, Mike," Mom said with a smile pointing at me. "That man will try to put every man, woman, and child to work if he could. What we're going to do today is count all of the coins and put them in stacks by type and date. The European coins will be just by Spain and France. The American coins will be by type and date. Here's the important part, we need you to promise to never tell anyone about this. We'll be selling them now and putting the money into the trust that is helping the community. We have enough money from the farm and the other things that Mike does, so this money isn't for us, it's for others."

Marita was grinning. "That's why I love you guys so much. You don't live high, but you share everything you have with others. You could live in a mansion with servants and fancy cars, but you're just regular folks. I won't tell. I want this mountain to be a place I can come to for the rest of my life for the peace it brings."

Karen was weeping, and Mom hugged her. "What's the matter, Honey, what's the problem?"

"That you trust me to help you do something as important as this is more than I can believe. I want to be a good person, and you all have given me a home, clothes, fed me, and most importantly, loved me. I know I should go to college, but I would give it up to just stay here if it was not important for the rest of my life, and it could also be important to all of you, my real family. I'm going to go to school and come back here and be the best teacher this town has ever seen. But then, I might be a nurse for Doctor Rivers. I'll have to decide."

When Karen was settled down, Mom gave the go ahead, "Okay, Mike, bring the first couple of chests into the office and we'll get started. We'll stack them up on the floor because there are too many for the table. That way, if someone comes by, we can shut the office door and just act like it's any other day around here."

Millie put John in a playpen near the office door, and the five of us began separating and stacking. The first chest had a mixture of coins, and the next three all had only double eagles. The next couple had all French or all Spanish coins, so we were moving right along. By noon, we were through fourteen chests and picking up speed because we had developed a system. Three separated coins, one stacked, and one counted and recorded.

We had pulled up the throw rug that had been on the floor, and were all on our knees, working fast. Millie had to stop every once in a while to change John or give him a little attention, but she had been steadily separating coins. Mom had Millie fix us some sandwiches so that we could quickly eat and try to finish up.

Nearing four o'clock, we had emptied, separated, and counted the last coin. Mom totaled them up and gave me a sheet to call into the coin dealer.

"Hi, this is Mike Grayson."

"Glad to hear from you, Mr. Grayson. Are you getting close to knowing exactly what you have?"

"Yes, I have a list. Do you want to take it over the phone, or should I e-mail it to you?"

"Give it to me over the phone now; that will be best and fastest."

There was a rather extensive list of coins, with a couple that were a different type of gold eagle that they would have to identify after some research. I heard other voices and realized that the investors must be in the shop with the dealer. There was a lot of excitement in their voices, and the dealer finally talked into the phone again. "How accurate is your count, Mr. Grayson?"

"Everything was counted twice by the way we did it, so it should be within one or two."

"Can you bring it in this evening, or are you going to make us wait until the morning?"

"Hang on, let me ask."

"Mom, they want them now, but will wait for morning if we want. What do you think?"

"We'll have to take your truck to haul all of this, so we can't take everyone. How about just you and I go? We'll put everything into separate containers so a recount should be fast. Tell them we'll be about an hour and a half, considering the time of day and that the roads are wet."

I spoke into the telephone handset, "We'll be there in about an hour and a half. We'll have everything separated for you so we can quickly recount. Is that going to be too late for you?"

"No, no," the dealer exclaimed, "We'll get something to eat before you get here and be ready to count. We're very excited to be able to do a deal this big. I've been instructed to tell you we are reducing our fee to ten percent because of the quantity. This is going to be a major purchase and trade. Drive carefully."

We used all of the chests, some pickle crocks, some Tupperware, and some small felt bags that Mom had. Each container was numbered and had a slip of paper with the count of what was in it.

I pulled the truck up to the back door and carried the twenty-three chests and the other containers to it. I had put a tarp down and pulled it over the coins to keep them dry. I had to tie the tarp down so that it wouldn't blow off while driving. I put my Beretta in a holster, an extra magazine in a pocket, and checked to make sure Mom had hers. There was no sense in being stupid.

On the way to Lexington at that time of day, we realized how many people must live in our direction and commute every day. There was a steady stream of traffic coming from the city.

We backed up to the door of the dealer at six fifteen. The rain had stopped up there, so we didn't get wet unloading the truck. They were set up to count everything with special machinery and scales that wouldn't mar the coins. The investors worked on all of the foreign coins first, while the dealer, Mom, and I worked on the chests with double eagles. We did have almost a full chest of regular ten dollar eagles, but they were proportionately worth as much, or more in some cases, as the double eagles.

We finished counting right at nine fifteen. It had taken an extra fifteen minutes to figure out the odd coins and their exotic value. We all had a cup of fresh coffee while the dealer totaled everything. He showed the two adding machine tapes with the same number to the investors, then to Mom and me. Oh shit, that was a hell of lot more than I had thought. It was like four times more than the maximum amount that I had figured on.

Banking today is strange, as you don't do anything normal any longer. You don't go to the bank and smile at the tellers while you hand them cash or checks with your deposit slip. You get on a computer and enter information, then press enter, go, or whatever you want to say to 'get'r done'. The dealer handed me a printout of the transaction that we checked to make sure all the numbers were correct. Mom and I sighed with relief that we were rid of those coins.

Amazingly, we now had all of that money in the trust accounts and Benson didn't have to swap coins to make things happen. He and Maude were going to shit when they saw the account balance.

The dealer said to me, "We want to thank you for trading with us and want to assure you that we will welcome any more business we can do with you. This has been extraordinary, but very lucrative to us, as well as to you, I'm sure. I've discovered how you are giving these monies away to your community and investing in the future of the youth with scholarships. I went to the University of Kentucky and am on their scholarship board. When your name came up as part of the trust, I knew where the money was coming from."

One of the investors or coin traders was holding one of the fancy leather satchels or folders like the one I had been given before. He held it out to us and said, "We thought that you should have some of the proceeds of the coins to use for your family. Take this, and use it over the years as you need it. Please use us again."

Mom was going to look inside, but I kept it shut. She didn't need to know these guys put a bunch of bucks in there. She could count it one bill at a time on the way home.

We shook hands all around and left the coin dealer's at ten o'clock. From the front of the store, I called home to tell them we were done and coming home now. I could hear Marita and Karen behind Millie as I talked to her. My sweet wife told me to drive carefully, but to hurry home.

As we exited the strip mall where the coin dealer was, Mom pointed at a Burger King across the street and said, "Please feed me, Michael. I want a Whopper, fries, and Coke; I am so starved."

Mom got her Whopper and I got a couple of double cheeseburgers with all the trimmings, fries, and a Coke. We wheeled out of there, proceeded to the highway, and headed home. After Mom finished her Whopper, she opened the leather folder and began pulling out bundles of cash. "Michael, you won't believe this. Michael, this is, ah, this is, oh shit; this is like a half a million dollars. Mike, they gave us five hundred thousand in cash. We can't keep all of this."

"Mom, I bought that safe and put it in the floor under the desk. It's pretty big and you really can't tell where it's at because of the desk chair pad. Whatever you have in the folder will fit there right now. Just leave it in there for when we need something. There are always reasons to have cash handy."

"Michael, I know how you are about extra money, and I haven't spent hardly any of it. I even used farm money for your Jeep. I know you'll do something good with what we have, so go ahead, put it in the safe and use what you need when you need it."

As we topped the hill to the house, Mom gasped as the house had a glow around it. I told Mom, "The moon is behind the house right now. It is beautiful, isn't it?"

"Mike, I've had the most pleasant dreams of your dad lately. It's like he's telling me to go on with life, to do more as a woman. It's funny how I enjoyed Ezra, but he just didn't ring my bell. I don't think I rang his either, as he hasn't been that interested in being with me lately. I asked him if he was feeling okay, and he said he was fine, just not into doing anything. I wonder if there is someone else who will be interesting to me."

The house was quiet when we went in. I checked on the girls and they were asleep. Mom and I put the cash into the safe, washed up, and after I put a log on the fire, went to bed.

There was Dad again. He was standing by the end of the vineyard with Eliza and Ben. All three were smiling at me and waved for me to follow them. We did it again by going to where Eliza's and Bud's graves were and a little behind the cedars framing the area.

All three looked at me and waved for me to follow as Ben disappeared into the bluff, Eliza did the same thing, then Dad headed toward the bluff, stopped, smiled, nodded, winked, then turned and walked right into the rock bluff. I was going to walk to the bluff, but something was keeping me from moving. That's when I heard something ringing.

My cell phone was ringing, so I scooted out and answered it. "This is Mike."

"Mr. Grayson, this is the coin dealer in Lexington. I need to advise you that three of the coins you gave us are extremely rare. The other collector investors insisted I call you to advise we are going to deposit an additional two hundred fifty thousand, three hundred dollars into one of your accounts. Tell me which one, and I will make the deposit."

"Geez, don't you sleep?" I looked at the bedside clock and it was two-thirty in the morning.

"This is too important to sleep right away. We are all working to arrange for shipments of coins to dealers all over the world. It took a while to correctly identify these coins for us to sell them, and we have been offered premium amounts for them. Into which account do you want this to be deposited?"

"Put it in the newest account, if you would. That one will be supporting a lot more activities."

"Thank you, Mr. Grayson, and forgive me for waking you, but this was too important to let go until morning."

I went to the bathroom, then to the kitchen area for a drink of water. The dogs decided they wanted to go out, so I let them run for a few minutes. It was a little chilly, and there were still embers in the fireplace, so I nursed a log to get a fire restarted. While I sat in one of the rocking chairs staring at the fire, I felt as if I was with others. I looked to my left and saw Ben, and back to my right sat Eliza. Both were rocking back and forth, looking at the fire. I wasn't asleep; I was awake, wasn't I?

The dogs scratched at the door, so I got up and let them in. Both dogs went to Eliza and Ben to get their ears scratched, then curled up on their rug and went to sleep. I was nervous with the two of them in the living room, rocking in chairs. This can't be.

Eliza said, "We're with you, Mike. We're all with you all the time. We'll take care of you."

Ben smiled, then I saw Dad standing by the fireplace, smiling at me. He nodded just before all three of them disappeared. Both dogs raised their heads and looked around, then went back to sleep. I was too shaken to do anything more than go back to bed and snuggle up to Millie. On the other side of Millie, Marita and Karen were spooned. That gave me a smile as I drifted off.

When I got up in the morning, I was wide awake and not feeling drugged from less sleep or the experience in front of the fire. For some reason, I was feeling really good as I put my boots on and went out to do the heavy barn stuff and stoke the smokehouses.

I had been working on an automatic stoker for the small pieces of wood I used for smoking and how to keep the draft moving the way it should. I had a small conveyor belt that held the pieces of wood. It was a wide flat chain that carried pieces of wood from a hopper to the firebox. It dropped a small piece of wood about every five minutes. The draft was assisted by a fan that was operated by a thermal relay that kept the fan turning at a very low rpm to pull the smoke into the individual rooms.

I built one and modified it until it seemed to work consistently, then built the others to match. Even the old smoke house now had its own stoker. I kept thinking that I was being lazy, but I still had to remove the ash and refill the hopper. Now that I had a chipper to run the hickory through, it was easy to get the right size for the hopper.

Back inside, I was met by Mom going a hundred miles an hour. Smiling, she confided, "I'm so glad we got that done. I really feel good about the whole thing. I think I'm going to get Sheryl's Jeep and fix it up like she wants. I'll bet the guys will have a blast making her an old Army medical Jeep."

Give mom a mission in life and look out, or should I say, duck. She is going to influence a hell of a lot of people and events within a hell of a short time.

As we ate breakfast with the ladies from below, Mom stated, "You know, we talked about finding out about Millie's folks as far as when they were killed in the fire at the factory they worked in. I want to follow up on that. I'll bet the person to handle something like that is Benson. He can represent Millie, and Summer too, if she was born before the fire occurred."