Chapter 01

A New Future

Morton ’Mort’ Moreland walks into his home at four thirty in the afternoon to be greeted by his sister, Laura, asking, “Any luck today?” He shakes his head no, and she gives him a wry smile while saying, “Well, the big envelope on the bench is for you. Maybe it’s a job offer.”

While waving his acknowledgement Mort changes direction to pick up the envelope mentioned. He glances at the return address and frowns at the Altoona, Pennsylvania, USA address of the law firm who sent it. He wonders what it’s about while he opens the envelope. In it there’s a bunch of photos, a genealogy chart for his mother’s side of the family, a map, and about fifty pages of text for him to read.

The Inheritance

The photos are of a very run-down two story house in some woods while the map is of its location a few hours drive south-east of Altoona. The house sits just outside of a small town on the side of a valley with a single road in and out of the valley. The ridge behind the house is very steep with a major road on the other side of the ridge that’s inaccessible from the valley until it crosses the ridge twenty miles to the south of the town. The road generally runs east-west but it goes in a north-south direction beside the ridge because it runs down the valley on the other side of the ridge. The map shows the land belonging to the house is quite large and goes to the road on the other side of the ridge. Morton can’t see how you’d be able to use the other land due to the long drive to get to it. So he thinks it′s a case of a boundary drawn up with no local knowledge.

The genealogical chart lists a lot of people in his mother’s family since the late seventeenth century. It isn’t a full chart because it only follows the one line: the direct line of Ben Mallard, Mort’s first ancestor to live in Pennsylvania. The chart shows Ben’s family, children, and grandchildren. For all of the subsequent generations they show the nominal head of the family, their siblings, all of their children, and their grandchildren. Beside each name are the dates of birth, marriage, and death. Some of the names are in bold with the letter ’H’ beside it and a note at the bottom of the page shows the ’H’ stands for Heir / Head of the Family. In some cases the ’H’ is beside a name of a person who isn’t the direct descendant of the one before. However, an examination of the chart shows the reason is due to the property going to the eldest male of the next generation who is closest in line to the direct line. Thus, sometimes the Heir is the brother or nephew of the previous Heir. This movement of the Heir in and out of the direct line happens a number of times.

The second last Heir is Mort’s great grandfather on his maternal line with the last Heir being his grandmother’s nephew who died last year. Mort is the eldest living male in the direct line and is now the Heir to the Mallard Estate. His grandmother was born Amanda Mallard then she married Howard Cable and they had three daughters with the youngest being Amanda Cable, Mort’s mother, who married Bob Moreland. Both Howard and Bob are Australians who can trace their other family lines back to the First Fleet. However, Amanda Cable was the only one of their daughters to be born in the USA while on a family visit over there, and also the only one to confirm her US Citizenship when old enough to do so. She had her two children confirm their US citizenship as well.

The bulk of the papers are details of the Mallard Family Trust which Mort is now the manager of, with the lawyer as the trustee. There’s also a list of the trust assets: most of it is the house and land marked on the map plus twenty thousand dollars in a bank accoount. Mort has two hundred thousand dollars in his bank account from his parent’s estate. He’s also a half owner of the house where he lives with his sister and her family. It’s been in their father’s family since it was first built when an ancestor settled in Windsor, west of Sydney, over two hundred years ago.

The last few pages are instructions from the Altoona lawyer, Sissy Long, on how to contact her to arrange the transfers of control to Mort.

Actions

While eating dinner Mort tells his sister and brother-in-law about the inheritance and it’s location. He asks for their opinions on it. The meal is over at the same time they finish listing the good and bad points of the inheritance. Mort is still undecided when Laura says, “Mort, we both know neither of us want to leave this house, nor can both of us raise a family here. One of us has to leave. Accepting this inheritance and going to Pennsylvania means you’ve a house of your own so far away you won’t be visiting here often enough to be upset about having left here.”

Mort’s brother-in-law, Mike Wells, says, “By the way it looks in those photographs you’ll be busy fixing it up for quite a while too. That’ll help you get over being homesick about leaving here.”

While laughing Mort responds, “More than you think, Mike! More than you think. The papers describe the house very well. Water is from a well by a hand-pump in the kitchen, there’s no electricity, the loo is an outdoor privy with an ancient style septic tank and leach field. The utilities and services are over a mile away and it’ll cost a fortune to connect, so they haven’t done that. The good thing is the ridge looks to be a perfect spot for wind turbines and it’s part of the property.” After some more discussion he sends the lawyer an email telling her of his acceptance and he’ll send Sissy his travel plans when they’re finalised.

Note: One important side issue is for Laura and Mort to write and sign a contract for her to buy his share of the family home in Windsor over the next ten years at zero percent interest.

Mort is on a plane to the US two weeks after reading the letter. The hardest part about organising to go is to establish a bank account in the US with fifty thousand dollars. He’ll transfer his remaining Australian funds when there’s a better rate of exchange. He does have a new VISA Card on the US bank and traveller’s cheques for five thousand dollars in US currency.

The Details

The travel agent arranges good connections for Mort: all the way from Sydney to Pittsburgh by plane and then bus to Altoona. Although there’s very little time spent waiting around the terminals it’s a long and tiring trip for Mort. His appointment with Sissy is for the morning after he arrives in Altoona, so when he gets to the hotel he takes his time to have a hot bath before having a meal then going to bed in the early evening.

After the introductions the next day Mort asks Sissy, “Is the cost the only reason the utilities aren’t connected to the house?”

“Correct,” is her reply. “That, and the fact it’s not really worth it.” Mort frowns, “The leach field is sound, the well is into a good source, so that only leaves electricity. Henry was looking at the cost of putting wind turbines on the ridge. It is feasible but also expensive while he was used to the wood stove, wood fires, and coal oil lamps so he didn’t do it.” Mort is confused for a moment, until he remembers many people in the US use ’coal oil’ as the name for what he knows as ’kerosene.’

“So the place is liveable if you accept those limitations?”

“Yes. Another issue with the wind turbines is the ridge is the line between two townships and both of them claim the right to rule on taxes for them. It’ll be cheaper on taxes and easier paperwork if you can get the ridge declared as under the control of just one of them.”

“Will that be possible?”

“Legally possible, but expensive to get done. Better to build just off the ridge on one side or the other so it’s all in one or the other. It’s only the turbines that’ll be affected, not the cables you run from them.”

“From what I can see in the photos you sent me and the terrain maps of the area there’s a very steep slope, almost straight up, on the house side of the ridge. Why don’t you write to the council with a request they get up there to mark what they see as the township boundary. Tell them if they don’t want to provide a clear boundary before anything is done you’ll accept the boundary as being the bottom of the steep slope.”

“What do you hope to gain out of that?”

“Sissy, if they do the climbing to mark the boundary I can tell where to build off the border. If they claim too much we ask the other township council to confirm the line and then they can fight it out. If the township staff don’t want to do the climbing they’ll accept what we say because our next request will be to have them mark what they say is the top of the slope. However, they can mark the bottom without climbing up it.”

“I should hire you as an assistant. I like the idea of getting them to pay to mark the border or to declare the change. Whatever happens, you get a clear decision on where you can build without the conflict.” Mort nods his agreement with her. “Now, one other thing you need to be aware of.” Her tone of voice triggers a higher level of attention by Mort. “The house is in the Appalachians and most of the locals are best described as Hillbillies. Most of them are descended from the first four families to settle in the area and they’re very clannish. One of the clans, the Cullen Clan, have had a feud going with the Mallard Clan for nearly two hundred years. Also, Henry upset many of the Hawk Clan during his life. I’m not sure if that will be directed at you or if it was buried with Henry. When you take over they’ll all test you to see what you’re like. So you need to take care when you go there.”

“Do they know I’m coming?”

She shakes her head no as she adds, “The only public information is to the effect I’m tracing the relatives to find a suitable live heir. Why?”

“While you do that wouldn’t it be reasonable for you to hire someone to look after the place and to fix it up?” She nods her agreement. He adds, “So I’ll go there as an employee to fix it up and to look after it.”

Sissy smiles, “I’m sure you saw you have to change your name to Mallard to take full control, but there’s no need to do that right away. So they won’t immediately link you to the Mallard House heir.” He nods his agreement and they move to the many minor details. For eighteen days Mort and Sissy are very busy organising things he needs to have done.

Cleaning House

Three weeks after his Altoona arrival Mort is riding a motorcycle into the town where his new home is. Sissy did tell him the town’s name but he was busy reading the map with the directions and he didn’t listen. He still doesn’t know where he is because there isn’t a sign on the edge of town and all of the businesses he can see in the town are named after people. It doesn’t matter since he thinks of it as ’the town.’ Mort is riding a motorcycle because he passed the tests for driving a car and riding a bike but he finds it easier to ride the bike than it is to drive a car. The different rules and driving on the other side of the road is easier than learning to control the car from the left side of the front seat. This is due to the differences in perspective throwing his judgement out a little bit.

Mort stops in front of the best hotel in town, ’Harry’s Hotel,’ it’s also the only hotel in town. He gets off, locks the bike, lifts his large pack from the back of the bike, and goes into the hotel. In a few minutes he’s registered and unpacking in a room. It’s only mid-afternoon so he goes down to the front desk and says, “I’ve been hired to clean up and keep an eye on a place called Mallard House. Can you please tell me how to get to it?” He knows how, but he doesn’t want them to know that yet.

The man at the desk stares at Mort for a moment before saying, “It’s the place you can see on the hill just past the end of town. You go down the road until you see a road off to the right side just past the house and follow the road to curve up through the woods to it. How come you got the job of cleaning the place up and looking after it?”

“Thanks for the directions. I finished university a few months back and I haven’t found a job yet. A friend told me this lawyer in Altoona wants a cheap hire to do some cleaning, fixing, and checking of the place. Since she’s paying for me to stay here while I spend a few months to do this it’s cheap living while I earn some money and I can still look about for a job on the Internet.” Mort hands over Sissy’s business card, “I have to send her the bills each week and she’ll reimburse me unless it’s small enough to charge on the VISA card she gave me or you bill her direct.”

“I prefer cash in hand, thanks.”

“Is a credit card, OK?” The man nods to show it is. “Good! That makes it easier for me. She’ll pay the bank before the bill hits it. Now to have a look at the job I’ve signed up for. Thanks for the help. Have a nice day.” The man waves at the door while picking up the phone at the same moment Mort is turning away from him to walk out the door.

Mort takes a few minutes to ride the few miles to Mallard House, park, and unlock the front door. He makes a lot of notes while he walks through the house to see what it’s like. It’s clear Henry only used a few of the ground floor rooms which are close together. What Mort thinks was originally the parlour is set up as a bedroom and lounge, the front entry is the entrance, and the kitchen is obvious. The other rooms are covered in dust and their shutters are bolted shut. There’s some light coming through cracks and holes in the shutters while some of the holes look like bullet holes. All of the windows are cracked or broken. There’s no food in the place but there is a lot of old cooking gear, cutlery, and crockery.

After inspecting the inside Mort walks around the outside to look at what needs to be repaired on the exterior, followed by checking out the stables, privy, and workshop. His pocket notebook is very full by the time he’s checked it all out and he noted the work he needs to do, along with the tools and materials he needs to do it all. The workshop has a lot of hardwood boards that’ll be useful to make the new shutters needed.

When he’s finished Mort goes back through the house to lock it up. He’s turning away from locking the front door when a Sheriff’s Deputy parks his car beside Mort’s motorbike and a deputy gets out of the car. He asks, “Who are you, and what ya doing here?”

Mort hands over his driver’s license as he says, “I’ve been hired by the Altoona lawyer looking after this place to clean it up, list repairs, fix the ones I can, and supervise the rest being fixed. She also wants me to see it doesn’t get damaged any further.” He holds up the bundle of keys to show he has them, and he also gets out his copy of his work contract with Sissy so the Deputy can see he’s an employee.

The Deputy checks the license is valid by calling it in on his radio then he hands it and the work contract back while saying, “If you see anyone here to cause trouble call it in to let us deal with it, OK!” Mort can see this is an order and not a request so he simply nods his agreement while he gets out his new mobile phone to show he can call it in. He takes the opportunity to check the phone has coverage: which it does. The Deputy gets in his car while Mort puts his helmet on, and the two drive back into town together. Mort stops at the hotel while the Deputy keeps going.

As soon as he’s back in his room Mort sends an email to Sissy to tell her of his day so far with a list of materials, tools, and cleaning gear he needs. He closes his computer, washes up, and gets changed.

When Mort walks downstairs the guy at the desk says, “No food service here unless we have four or more guests. Our restaurant is shut but ’Kevin’s Kitchen’ puts on a good feed for a fair price.” Mort smiles at the man as he keeps on walking. The eatery isn’t exactly opposite as it’s just one building up on the other side of the road.

Dinner

The first indication of how fast the local gossip network operates comes when Mort enters Kevin’s Kitchen to be greeted with, “Please sit at that table, Mister Moreland,” while the man points to a table near the back wall. Mort smiles and waves at the man as goes to the table.

A sad looking young woman in her late teens comes out to hand him a menu and Mort asks, “How come I’m given this table?”

She looks at him as she replies, “All of the regulars have their specific tables which we keep open for them until well after their normal time.”

“Thank you,” he glances at her name tag, “Diane.”

She frowns, looks down, sighs, and says, “I’m Jenny. Diane is my sister and I’ve grabbed her name tag by mistake. It’s a good thing you saw it because the regulars will give me hell for a week for doing that.” She leaves to fix the name tag while he studies the menu.

A minute or so later she’s back with a name tag saying ’Jennifer’ and is ready to write his order. Mort asks, “What do you recommend tonight since I don’t know the menu? Also, some of these foods are new to me.”

“If you stay here long enough I’ll train you in our local delicacies. But the roast pork is perfect tonight. Have it with the vegetables and not the salad. Then follow it with the apple pie and cream.”

“Sounds delicious, put me down for all of that. If you have home-made lemonade I’ll have that with the roast and a mug of hot chocolate after the apple pie.” She nods to him as she writes it down before taking the menu and disappearing into the kitchen area.

The food is plentiful and well cooked. Mort enjoys the roast dinner, and when Jenny delivers the apple pie she asks, “How do you like it?”

Mort grins as he says, “It’s very good. As Isaiah said, ’Let us eat, and drink, for tomorrow we diet.’ I prefer to include being merry.”

Jenny laughs and says, “I’m sure the quote is ’die’ not ’diet,’ when you look it up.”

Mort notices how everyone else in the place turns to look at them when she laughs. He ignores their behaviour and replies, “No, that’s a long ago copying error. If you’re dead you have no worries, but if you’re alive and dieting then you have a good reason to worry.” Jenny laughs again and walks away while slowly shaking her head at his reasoning for messing up the Bible quote from Isaiah 22.

After finishing his meal Mort pays the bill and returns to the hotel.

Getting Ready to Work

The next morning Mort has an email authorising him to purchase a lot of the smaller tools and other things he’ll need to work on the house from the local sources. He stops at Kevin’s Kitchen for breakfast as well as buying some cold drinks, ice, and sandwiches to eat during the day. They all go into the cooler bag he has in the backpack on the bike.

Next is the town’s general store so he can buy most of the cleaning gear and the tools he needs. He uses the trust’s credit card to buy them. He buys enough gear the store owner agrees to deliver it all to the house for him. Mort doesn’t need to say where as the man already knows.

On reaching the house Mort opens it up and goes around the rooms opening up the shutters. When he gets back downstairs he finds the store owner unloading today’s purchases onto the front porch. Mort is quick to help him unload it all and to take it all through to the kitchen. The man helps Mort to carry it into the house and the man has a good look around at the place while he carries the gear in. At one point he says, “Don’t look like Henry had much of anything here, do it?”

While nodding his agreement Mort says, “The most he had of anything is dust. I’ll be a long time getting it all collected and taken out. Also, the broken glass will be a big pile. I think I’ll be working here a very long time just to get this place up to a reasonable standard to live in.”

“Yep. Ya got ya work cut out. That’s for sure.” The store owner grins while he walks out the door. Mort gets busy sorting the things out.

Denny Cullen parks his pickup truck beside his store, walks in, and picks up the phone. He dials a number, waits for it to be answered, and says, “Just got back from Mallard House. It looks like Henry only used a couple of rooms and the rest have been gathering dust for decades. All the furniture I saw looked well past it’s prime and not worth much. He must’ve been selling off the good stuff they used to have up there.” The Cullen Clan Patriarch, Colin Cullen, agrees with him then hangs up.

Mallard House and Grounds

Mallard House Floor Plan

High definition images are also available for viewing at:

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ebk8ve052m0c1rs/AACohN7e_x8OuRFrn0EbQ2L6a?dl=0

Mallard House Grounds Plan

First Day of Cleaning

Mort takes both of the eight foot ladders upstairs where he sets the extending ladder against the wall with the ’A’ frame ladder under the manhole to the attic area. On his next trip he has a two foot high bin with his cleaning items inside it: a hand broom, a pan, a filter mask, a hand coal shovel, goggles, thick gloves, a lantern, and bags for the bin.

After opening up the ’A’ frame ladder he puts on his protective gear of gloves, mask, goggles, and ball cap then he climbs the ladder to lift the cover to the attic manhole and push it to the side while some dust falls on him. Then down the ladder, shift it aside, place the extending ladder under the hole, and extend it out to its full fourteen feet. The ceiling is ten feet from the floor so the ladder sticks about four feet into the attic to make the transfer to the attic easy and safe. He grabs the bin with the other gear by it’s handle, climbs up the ladder, and steps into the attic.

He puts the bin down, takes out the lantern, turns it on, and looks at the attic area. There’s five trunks and six wooden boxes with tops plus a huge amount of dust. He walks along the beams to the nearest end of the house and he opens the two small windows there, each is about a foot square and is a simple hole with a half inch thick wooden shutter cover. He clips them open to the metal fastenings on the outside wall then he walks the length of the building to do the same at the other end.