Miss Julia's Marvelous Makeover (20 page)

As soon as Etta Mae left, I headed for our new library and began pulling out the built-in file drawers. With a vague memory of having seen some copies of the plats of several properties that had come to me upon Wesley Lloyd Springer's demise, I hoped to find the one I was looking for.

Of course they were all in the lowest drawer, so I got on my knees—knowing full well I'd have trouble getting up—to flip through the folders. Finally finding the one showing the Springer Road property, I struggled to my feet and began to study it. Most useful for my purpose was the drawn outline of the property—I could understand it. It was shaped like a lopsided rectangle, which probably had a specific mathematical name unknown to me, and was bordered by Springer Road on the east and Longview Road on the west. As for the north and the south boundaries, I suspected we'd find nothing but undeveloped, thickly wooded areas which I feared we'd have to traverse on foot. Except, from marks made by the surveyor across both Springer Road and Longview and pretty much following the south border of my property, there had at one time been a railroad track.

That was interesting, because I knew there were no railroad crossings on those roads. Maybe, I thought, we'd find an old railroad bed once used by loggers, but now abandoned.

Peering closely at the plat, I tried to interpret the numerous jottings on it, wishing for Sam, who would know in a minute what each one meant. I mean, there were latitudes and longitudes, and apostrophes and commas indicating I-knew-not-what, but most likely had something to do with the size and location of the area. Then I saw
29.9 acres
written in blurred ink, apparently by the
surveyor, in the upper-right-hand corner of the page. I looked up and smiled.
Ha! Not big enough, Rodney.

His plans for the Hillandale Trailer Park had just been put permanently on hold, and I couldn't wait to tell him.

Then I looked closer, trying to make out what looked like a smudge. But, no, it was a faint ink mark that the copying machine had barely picked up. Then it became clear: +/-.

Plus or minus, that's what it was, meaning that there could be a little less or—have mercy—a little more than thirty acres. No wonder Rodney had people out there looking around, but with what? They couldn't have had surveying equipment. No licensed professional surveyor would do so much as set up a tripod without the owner's permission. So what kind of long-handled instrument-looking thingys could they have had?

I shrugged it off because it didn't matter what they were lugging around or whether the acreage was plus or minus thirty, the title was staying right where it was. But I had wanted the property to prove unsuitable, thereby avoiding an uproar when I had to tell Trixie's beau that I wouldn't sell if it'd been a hundred acres. I could just see her start sulling up, a slow burn flaming her face, at my selfishly standing between Rodney and his dream of a scattering garden, even though by now it seemed he'd fired her before he'd fully hired her.

Did I care what Trixie thought? Not really, but on further thought, maybe I did.

So absorbed in interpreting the surveyor's marks on the plat, I jumped when Lillian called me to lunch. “Be there in a minute,” I called back. Quickly folding the plat, I put it in my pocketbook and hurried not to the kitchen, but upstairs.

Not having strolled through any woods recently, I wasn't sure of the appropriate attire and didn't have time to give it much thought. I quickly exchanged my Ferragamos for a pair of clunky rubber-soled walking shoes, then grabbed a hat to ward off sunburn.

Hurrying back down to the kitchen where Lillian was waiting with a ham and tomato sandwich, I started to eat standing up.

“You better set down an' eat right,” she scolded. “You make yourself sick, eatin' like that.”

“I know, but I've got to get to the hardware store, then out to Delmont. Etta Mae will be waiting for me.” Then I had to tell her what we were planning to do.

She just shook her head. “Why don't you hire somebody to do that? You and Miss Etta Mae don't need to be trompin' through no woods. You gonna get eat up with chiggers an' redbugs.”

“I don't have time to find somebody else. I have to get the signs up before Sam thinks he has to do it, and he certainly doesn't need to be tromping through the woods. And I want them up so Rodney will take his business elsewhere and stop scaring the residents half to death. For all I know, some of them may already be planning to move.” I swallowed the last bite of sandwich, washed it down with iced tea, then said, “My garden gloves are out in the garage, aren't they? And didn't Sam have some nails left over?”

Rolling her eyes because I was blatantly ignoring her advice, she went to the pantry. “Nails in here where Mr. Sam left 'em after puttin' up his signs. An' where you left them gloves las' time you cut some roses.”

She handed me a pair of green gardening gloves and a box of nails, shaking her head as she did so. Picking up my sun hat and pocketbook, ready to leave, I said, “Lillian, don't worry. It won't take us thirty minutes to get those things up, and I'll be back before you know it.”

Frowning, she put her hands on her hips. “Uh-huh, but I don't know why ever'body 'round here got to be puttin' up signs all over the place. Ever'time I turn around somebody pickin' up a hammer an' nailin' something.”

—

I drove as fast as I dared to the Ace Hardware store, not even considering Walmart's, which would've taken me half an hour just to walk to the entrance and another half hour to find what I wanted, much less anybody to help me.

As soon as I walked into the hardware store, I was met by a clerk who took me straight to the counter where all kinds of signs—
FOR LEASE
,
FOR RENT
,
FOR SALE
, and, finally,
NO TRESPASSING
and
POSTED KEEP OUT
—were stacked waiting to be purchased.

“I'll take eight of those,” I said, pointing at the last named. “No, let's do ten—five each of these two. On second thought, maybe I'd better have six of each.” Actually, I had no idea how many signs we'd need. A couple nailed up at the entrance, I thought, then certainly one at each corner of the property, if we could find the stakes. At the thought of searching for stakes on twenty-nine-point-nine acres, plus or minus, I had a sneaking suspicion that keeping Rodney out might take longer and more effort than I'd originally counted on.

—

As soon as I pulled up beside Etta Mae's single-wide, out she came, hammer in hand. She'd changed from her uniform and was now wearing a pair of jeans, a long-sleeved shirt, a baseball cap, and, of course, her pointy-toed cowboy boots.

“Hey, Miss Julia,” she said cheerily, as she crawled onto the front seat beside me. “This is a great idea. He'll think twice from now on when he sees our signs.”

Putting the car in reverse, I backed out onto the drive that ran through the park and headed toward the entrance. “I hope so. Is he still wandering around? What about the men who walked off into the woods?”

“Haven't seen hide nor hair of any of 'em since I got home. They're either way back in the woods or they've left.”

“Doesn't matter,” I said. “These signs are going up, and they'd better pay attention to them.”

I parked where the entrance drive to the park fed onto Springer Road, put on my hat, gathered a couple of signs, the box of nails, and stepped out. “I'll hold the sign, if you'll nail it in. We can take turns with the hammer.”

And that's what we did, but first we had to struggle through a
weed-filled ditch to get to a suitable tree, then do it again on the other side of the entrance.

By the time we were back in the car, I was hot, sweaty, and complaining. “I don't know if it's the county or the state that's supposed to mow the roadsides, but whoever it is, they're not doing the job.” Pushing back my hair, I said, “My goodness, it's warm today.”

Turning to the right on Springer Road, I handed the plat to Etta Mae. “We have to find the corner stake, Etta Mae. See if you can figure out how far we have to go before I slow down to look for it.”

She studied the plat for a few seconds, then said, “It's a pretty far ways. Maybe we ought to put a couple here and there between the corners.”

She was right, so I stopped on the roadside twice, while we scrambled into and out of ditches—once sinking into a damp spot—and pushed aside weeds and laurel bushes to reach the trees, where we nailed up two more
NO TRESPASSING
signs and a
POSTED
sign.

On the road again, and thankful that we were on a county road with little traffic, I drove slowly, glancing now and then to the right to find a corner stake. “Etta Mae, how in the world are we going to find those stakes?”

“I was wondering that myself.” She was looking to the right, too. “They usually just stick up a few inches out of the ground, and they could be covered with leaves and vines and I don't know what-all. We may have to get out and beat the bushes to find them.”

“My goodness,” I said, leaning down to look out her window. “There's nothing but trees and clumps of laurel and rhododendron. And vines and briars, and no telling what else. This might not've been such a good idea—there's no way we're going to find little tiny stakes in all that. And on all four corners, too.”

“Not from the car, we're not,” Etta Mae said glumly. “I guess we'll have to beat the bushes after all.”

“Well,” I said, letting the car coast along the road, “I should've listened to Lillian and hired—”

“Oh! Oh!”
Etta Mae suddenly cried, bouncing up and down on the seat. “I know, I know!”

“What? Know what?” I came to a stop right in the middle of the road.

“
Metal detectors!
That's what those men had. I
knew
I'd seen those long-handled thingys before. I'll bet you anything they've already found the stakes, and all we have to do is look for whatever they tagged them with. And it'll be something that can be
seen
, 'cause they'll want to be able to find 'em again.

“And look!” she cried, pointing. “See that? Right there across the ditch at the top of the bank. See that little orange tie, or whatever it is?”

I looked, and sure enough, there was something bright orange and low to the ground, easy to see among all the green leaves, branches, and weeds—some of which had been trampled down around it. “It could be a sock or something thrown from a car.”

Etta Mae laughed, her good mood restored. “That's a plastic tag tied to a stake. Miss Julia, we've just found the first corner.
And
,” she went on brightly, “it just may be that the other three corners will be just as easy to find.”

“You mean,” I said, brightening a little myself, “Rodney's done all the work, and all we have to do is look for something orange?” I braked and pulled to the side of the road. “I'll remember to thank him when I tell him to stay away.”

The ditch was deeper here than at the entrance, and the climb up the other side steeper. I had to use hands and knees to get up it. As I scrambled to the top, a hemlock branch knocked my hat off, sending it to the bottom of the ditch. I just left it, while Etta Mae, even carrying the hammer and two signs, clambered up with little effort. “Why don't you wait in the car?” she said, noticing my heavy breathing.

“No, I'm all right,” I said, pulling a briar tendril off my skirt tail. “Let's get this done.”

As she finished hammering a sign onto a tree, I looked through the trees along where I assumed the property line would run to the west. “While we're up here, why don't we go a little farther in and put up another sign? It's clear enough here for two to be seen from the road. See that huge oak? Let's put one on it.”

We started for the tree, but it wasn't long before the underbrush got thicker, and I stopped for a quick survey. “Hold on, Etta Mae, we better go around this laurel thicket.”

I attempted to detour, but kept being pulled by briars reaching out and snagging my dress, my stockings, my arms, and my legs. Trying to push on by through thick weeds, I began to think that the bush was alive and determined to ensnare me.

“Wait, Miss Julia!” Etta Mae said, backing out. “Don't go any farther. Come on back outta there.”

I started backing out, but more briar tentacles tugged at me and scraped along my skin. I thought of Brer Rabbit—he'd been happy in a briar patch, but I was fairly close to panicking.

Etta Mae gingerly pulled briar limbs off my dress, then took my arm as I carefully backtracked. Scraped and bleeding a little, I finally got free, but she kept urging me to hurry.

After manuevering down and across the steep-sided ditch, grabbing my hat as I went, and climbing into the car, I looked over the damage. “My stockings are ruined. Look at that, Etta Mae, they're in shreds. And look at this! There's a rip in my dress.” I flung the hat in the backseat and began to mop the sweat from my hairline.