“I suppose so,” Binny said, looking around dejectedly. “I mean, this is the only office that I know about. I wish I could help more.”
“No, it’s okay,” I said. “You’ve helped a lot just by letting me in here.” More than Junior Bradley had with his obstructionism, I thought.
“Well, if there was—or is, rather—a Turner Wynter Construction Company, then you and I might end up being co-owners of at least part of this mess. I’m going to need help to figure it out.”
That wasn’t a welcome prospect, because it tied me more firmly to a place I needed to leave, sooner rather than later. But if there really were lawsuits filed, maybe that could be resolved by the two of us more equitably than if Tom had still been involved. “Let me just riffle though the plans, see if I can come up with anything.” I pulled a stool over to the cabinet and read the labels, looking for anything that referenced Wynter property. None of the labels made any sense to me, so I just started at the top.
I soon figured out that most of the big jobs had been done years ago, and that lately—whether it was because of the economy or something else—the jobs had been getting smaller and smaller. The most recent big project appeared to be Binny’s bakeshop remodel. Turner Construction had redesigned and rebuilt the place to include room for the ovens and front shop area. The upstairs apartment had been renovated. Other than that, there were some sloppy-looking drawings for an addition proposed to the Brotherhood of the Falcon clubhouse, and a proposal for another addition to Gogi Grace’s Golden Acres.
I was vaguely aware that Binny was looking over Shilo’s shoulder, and I wondered what they were up to. I was about to ask when I suddenly came across charts and drawings that appeared to reference Wynter Acres. I pulled them out of the drawer and rolled my chair over to the drafting table, turning on the powerful light over the desk.
My first impression was that whoever had done the plan was a rank amateur.
First, the plat. A plat is a scale map showing the proposed subdivision of the land, and often includes vegetation and other considerations. This plat was crude; barely legible; and with few markers to show landmarks, elevations or even the lot sizes. It didn’t look like they had had a surveyor do the necessary work to mark out the proposed subdivision of the land. If this was the plat registered with Junior Bradley’s zoning office, it should have been rejected immediately. Would my uncle have understood enough to know that?
I sat and stared at it for a long time, trying to figure out what was going on. There was no way they could have intended to proceed in subdividing the Wynter land using this plat as a planning device. It was impossible. There wasn’t even a compass indication on it, or access roads marked. Why would Rusty’s office draw this shoddy plan up in the first place? And it was while Rusty was still in the mix; I could tell by the date, which indicated the plan was from the previous spring. If that date was legit. Careless work like this could have numerous mistakes or deliberate errors.
There were so many considerations if they planned on subdividing Wynter land into a community; what about water? Roads? Drainage? Electricity?
And what about buyers?
The town of Autumn Vale was barely viable as it was, with empty storefronts along Abenaki, and more houses for sale than anyone could ever want. Who did my uncle and Rusty Turner think was going to buy these condos at Wynter Acres? Silvio had claimed the idea was to attract aging boomers who wanted to live in the country but have the convenience of condo living, but the plans I saw were for sizable, single-family dwellings, not condos.
It was ridiculous. Maybe my uncle had been a pie-in-the-sky dreamer, but from all evidence Rusty Turner had been a pragmatic man with many years of experience in the building and development business. He had sent his daughter to culinary school. He had taken whatever small jobs were available in their town. Why have this shoddy plat drawn up? To fool Melvyn?
But . . . why?
I remembered something Andrew Silvio had said; Melvyn accused Rusty of cheating him. Based on the plat I had examined, that could well be, if Mel was paying to have the advance work done, and this pathetic piece of crud was what Turner had come up with.
I rolled back to the drawers and leafed through anything else I could find, and concluded that there was no way anyone had had serious plans to develop Wynter Acres. I had gone through a few of my uncle’s papers so far, and hadn’t come across anything to indicate some long-term strategy . . . unless . . . I cocked my head as I remembered the envelope I had found in my uncle’s desk to Turner Wynter Global Enterprises. Was that related to the real estate development? It had to be; it was the only thing the two men were involved in together, as far as I knew.