5.

      ALEX WATCHED AS HIS GRANDFATHER shuffled across the cluttered basement, kicking the odd cardboard box out of his way. At the far wall he moved rakes, hoes, and shovels to the side. Half of them fell over, clattering to the floor. Ben grumbled under his breath as he used a foot to push the errant rakes away until he had cleared a spot against the brick foundation. To Alex’s astonishment his grandfather then started pulling bricks out of a pilaster in the foundation wall.

      “What in the world are you doing?”

      Holding an armload of a half-dozen bricks, Ben paused to look back over his shoulder. “Oh, I put it in here in case of fire.”

      That much made sense—after a fashion. Alex was perpetually surprised that his grandfather hadn’t already burned down his house, what with the way he was always using matches, torches, and burners in his tinkering.

      As Ben started stacking bricks on the floor, Alex turned to check. Just as he’d suspected, his grandfather had forgotten the soldering iron. Alex picked it up just as it was starting to blacken a patch on the workbench. He set the hot iron in its metal holder, then sighed in exasperation as he wet a finger with his tongue and used it to quench the smoking patch of wood.

      “Ben, you nearly caught your bench on fire. You have to be more careful.” He tapped the fire extinguisher hanging on the foundation wall. He couldn’t tell if it was full or not. He turned over the tag, squinting, looking for an expiration or last inspection. He didn’t see one. “This thing is charged and up-to-date, isn’t it?”

      “Yes, yes,” Ben muttered.

      When Alex turned back, his grandfather was standing close, holding out a large manila envelope. Traces of ancient stains were visible under a layer of gray mortar dust.

      “This is intended for you…on your twenty-seventh birthday.”

      Alex stared at the suddenly ominous thing his grandfather was holding out.

      “How long have you had this?”

      “Nearly nineteen years.”

      Alex frowned. “And you kept it walled up in your basement?”

      The old man nodded. “To keep it safe until I could give it to you at the proper time. I didn’t want you to grow up knowing about this. Such things, before the right time, can change the course of a young person’s life—change it for the worse.”

      Alex planted his hands on his hips. “Ben, why do you do such strange things? What if you’d died? Did you ever think of that? What if you’d died and your house got sold?”

      “My will leaves you the house.”

      “I know that, but maybe I’d sell it. I would never have known that you had this hidden away down here.”

      His grandfather leaned close. “It’s in the will.”

      “What’s in the will?”

      “The instructions that tell you where this was kept and that it’s yours—but not until your twenty-seventh birthday.” Ben smiled in a cryptic fashion. “Wills are interesting things; you can put a lot of curious things in such documents.”

      When his grandfather shoved the envelope at him Alex took it, but only reluctantly. As strange as his grandfather’s behavior sometimes was, this ranked right up there with the strangest. Who would keep papers hidden in the brick wall in his basement? And why?

      Alex was suddenly worried about the answers to those questions—and others that were only beginning to formulate in the back of his mind.

      “Come on,” his grandfather said as he shuffled back to the workbench. With an arm he swept aside the clutter that covered the work surface. He slapped his palm on the cleared spot on the bench. “Put it here, in the light.”

      The flap was torn open—with no attempt to be sneaky about it. Knowing his grandfather, he would have long ago opened the envelope and studied whatever was inside. Alex noticed that the neatly typed address label was made out to his father. He pulled a stack of papers from the envelope. They were clipped together at the top left corner. The cover letter had an embossed logo in faded blue ink saying it was from LANCASTER, BUCKMAN, FENTON, a law firm in Boston.

      He tossed the papers on the workbench. “You’ve known all along what this is?” Alex asked, already knowing the answer. “You’ve read it all?”

      Ben waved a hand dismissively. “Yes, yes. It’s a transfer of deed. Once it’s executed, you become a landowner.”

      Alex was taken aback. “Land?”

      “Quite a lot of land, actually.”

      Alex was suddenly so full of questions that he couldn’t seem to think straight. “What do you mean, I’ll become a landowner? What land? Why? Whose is it? And why on my twenty-seventh birthday?”

      Ben’s brow creased as he paused to consider. “I think it has to do with the seven. Like I said, it went to your mother on her twentyseventh birthday—because your father had died before his twenty-seventh birthday when it would have gone to him. So, the way I figure it, the seven has to be the key.”

      “If it went to my mother, then why is it mine?”

      Ben tapped the papers lying on the workbench. “It was supposed to go to her, because your father had passed away, but the title to the land couldn’t be transferred to her.”

      “Why not?” Alex asked.

      His grandfather lowered his voice as he leaned closer. “Because she was declared mentally incompetent.”

      The silence dragged on a moment as Ben let that sink in before he went on.

      “The stipulations in this last will and testament specify that the heir to whom the title is transferred must be of sound mind. Your mother was declared not to be of sound mind and has been in that institution ever since. There’s a codicil to the will that stipulates that if the heir in line isn’t able to take ownership of the title to the land because of death or mental incapacitation, then it remains in abeyance until the next heir in line becomes twenty-seven, whereupon it is automatically reassigned to them. If there is no heir, or if they are likewise declared in violation of the stipulations—”

      “You mean crazy.”

      “Well, yes,” Ben said. “If for any reason the title can’t be transferred to your father, mother, or any