Part 2
A week or two passed by with not much more interchange between the Army and the Navy much to Nimcock’s relief. No one liked blow-ups between neighbors because it gave Nimcock a bad name. But occasionally there was an eruption of sorts, human nature being what it is — eruptible.
“Perhaps ruffled feathers will settle,” Mr. Snippet, the town barber, told his customers. He was a sensible, cool-headed man who had the reputation of being quite wise. He led his customers getting a haircut through lessons in good sense. It was thought that his technique, perhaps not quite Socrates’ famous system of teaching by asking his students questions. No. The barber used a more cutting edge system — the “snip and advise” system.
The townspeople let out one large sigh of relief. Perhaps, they thought, things would calm down and peace would settle once again on the charming land of Nimcock.
Just as things were becoming a bit sleepy, one morning the general popped into his Army Jeep, World War II vintage, and sped over to his lone line of pine trees that ran down the boundary line from the road to the river between the two estates. He unloaded some lawn chairs and a table under the shade of the first tree right at the river’s edge. “Aaaahhh,” he said as he settled into a chair and pulled out a book for a good read. Some suggested the title of the book was “War and Peace.”
A squawk close to how a heron sounds as he takes off across Nimcock Creek could be heard from the admiral’s house. Fopna, the admiral’s wife, was on her patio watering her roses as her husband was reading the Southside Sentinel as he lolled on a chaise lounge in the morning sun.
“That Army ape has parked his tacky Jeep on our property! And he has unloaded furniture and has settled down to read a book! Can you beat the nerve of that man?”
The admiral jumped up and glared at the general. “We’ll see about that!” he said. Well, actually, he said a lot more than that.
Merrypen was writing the tale from her desk in her home on Kent Street and was used to blue words from the Navy, because of her husband Stickler’s stint in the Navy during the Vietnam War era. But Stickler never uses vulgar language, because such vulgar words are only used by coarse people, and she will continue writing with only laundered language.
The admiral ran off to his garage and ignited his vintage souped-up yellow Cadillac which flew a four-star Navy pennant from his left antenna and sped across his empty field to where the general was so comfortably seated.
“Get off my land!” began the neighborly exchange followed by a blue streak of more vulgar language. I am happy to report the general, in every way much to the Army’s pride, was well able to match the admiral’s wide breath of vulgarities which ended up with both the general and the admiral claiming to own the line of trees. Each jumped into their individual vehicles to go roaring off to their homes to fetch the deeds and surveys that would prove their ownership.
It took the Big Brass just a few minutes to fetch their respective paperwork and roar back to the point reconnaissance. “This clearly shows I own the line of trees,” the admiral shouted while pointing to his survey and deed.
“Hardly!” shouted the enraged general. In the presence of such insubordination his face had turned red like the wattle of a rooster. “My survey clearly shows I am the owner!”
The two stood facing each other poring over each other’s deed and survey. Both surveys clearly stated each owner had claim to the line of trees. However, under close inspection there was a huge discrepancy. The admiral’s survey showed the line of trees 15 feet off from the general’s survey. Fifteen feet might not sound like much, but 15 feet of waterfront on the Rappahannock River is indeed much.
It turned out that each had a deed and survey proving they owned the property. But it seemed as if one survey was an old survey done by a surveyor from the past known as Linus Crooke who had surveyed most of the county more than 80 years ago (and you had better hope he had done your survey in the morning and not after lunch) and many of his surveys done in days when there wasn’t such precise means of measurement that there may be today had caused to understate the problem some confusion. The admiral had closed on his property using a Crooke survey and the general’s survey had been done just last month with a new surveyor in the area for his closing. That apparently was the reason why his survey showed the line of trees 15 feet off Crook’s whack.
(Merrypen stopped to laugh at her characters who were already wildly out of control. Yet, she knew perfectly well that hilarious things happen in small towns.)
Both gentlemen denied the veracity of the other’s survey and swore to hire a lawyer and get things straight. They turned tail and went storming off to their vehicles and roaring back home.
So it was to be war. But not in bombs, torpedoes and bullets but with lawyers! The two men will go to court! After all, lawyers have to earn their keep and they have lots of expenses such as private school tuitions to pay to educate their children so they will be more than happy to settle the case. But don’t expect a rush decision. Expect first that the lawyers will get the last dime that can be charged to settle the case.
The townspeople were giddy with gossip. But then a monumental event happened. One that caused the lady who ran the dry-cleaning business to become so excited she actually started to stutter.
For the general and his wife Greta had joined the same church that the admiral and his wife belonged to. That did it for the town’s people. You could say the steam heat of rumors had popped the cork. Not even the wise old barber could calm things down.
Before this case was settled several private tuitions would be paid in full and the said church left rocking in the spirit of God.
→ Part 3
Note: This story is fiction. All characters and events described herein are the product of the author’s imagination. Any suggestion to real people or events is purely coincidental.
