"I realize that this is a family thing," Nicole protested lightly as Randy drove the Chrysler through town to his parents’ house. "But with Crystal and Preach still here, I feel like we’re not being very good hosts."

"Well, yeah, but I think tonight is when the other shoe drops, and I’m wondering what it is."

"What do you mean?"

"If I knew I’d tell you," he sighed. "Dad has hinted several times that there’s some things he didn’t want me to know until we got done with the distribution of assets, but he hasn’t said more than that. Besides, were you listening to the lawyer today?"

"Yeah, but I didn’t pick out anything."

"I sure did, and I’m sure Dad was trying to pull a fast one on Joel. You remember the other night when I was explaining how the value of the company is different to different people? Schindenwulfe gave the value of Clark Construction as taxable valuation, and the forest land as assessed valuation, which are two way different things. I mean, a factor of two different! There were a couple other things in there, too. Those forest lands might be worth $1.4 million to the right buyer in ten years or so, but not today."

"Are you sure?" Nicole blurted.

"Sure, I’m sure. Like I said, I don’t know what’s going on, but I’m dead sure that Matt Schindenwulfe knows the difference between taxable valuation and assessed valuation, which means he was as deep into whatever is going on as Dad is. I’m also pretty sure that Dad wants you and Mom up to speed on whatever he’s doing, too. So now, I expect we’re going to find out."

The atmosphere at Ryan and Linda’s house seemed a lot lighter and quieter with Rachel and Joel gone. "Randy, I know ham and lima bean casserole isn’t your favorite meal," his mother said. "But I really wasn’t in the mood to do anything more elaborate."

"No problem, I don’t mind," Randy replied, being both cautious and courteous. While in general he liked his mother’s cooking, in his days at home he had a habit of going far out of his way to avoid her ham and lima bean casserole.

The conversation over dinner was light and innocuous. "Grabbing Preach to do the service sure worked out well," Linda commented. "He’s a very good speaker, very warm and human. I’m sure he did a better job than that O’Conner character would have done."

"Preach is pretty good about that," Randy said. "I’ve heard him give some of-the-cuff teachings that will really sit you back and make you think."

"It’s almost a shame that he decided to not make a career out of the ministry," Linda said. "He would have been very good at it."

"No doubt about it," Randy said. "But he decided that wasn’t his calling and stuck to his decision. Doing something off the cuff once in a while as a favor is one thing, but he decided that he didn’t want to make a life of it. I actually respect him for that, turning his back on a career that he didn’t think was right for him, even if he’s a little uncomfortable about it at times."

Ryan put down his fork. "Randy, that’s just too good of a lead-in to pass up for what I wanted to talk to everyone about. Look, it’s no secret that you’ve been a little uncomfortable at times about what you’ve been doing, is it?"

"Well, no real secret," Randy said. "But you remember when I came home from college at the end of my sophomore year? When we talked about the problem of someone to take over the construction company? Well, I was hunting around for something useful to do at the time, and even though there have been some times that it’s been uncomfortable I have no doubt it was the right thing to do."

"To be honest, back then I wasn’t sure. I’m sure you realize the whole thing was a test for you. You could have bombed out along the way and we’d have had to do something else, even though that something else would have involved a manager from outside the family with me holding the ownership. But you passed the test, and this proved to be a much better solution all around."

"I hope it works out," Randy sighed. "Even though I’ve been more or less running it on my own for a couple years, the total responsibility is in my lap now. I didn’t exactly figure on getting what amounts to the whole thing."

"There was a reason for that," Ryan smiled. "Believe me, Randy, this is something that Dad and I talked about a lot, because we both realized that when he died there were going to have to be some changes made. What his death means is that we’re now looking at another big challenge. We’ve got some time to work on it, but we’ve got to get our ducks in a row."

"Clark Plywood?" Randy ventured a guess.

"Right," Ryan said. "Fortunately, you’re not going to have to learn to manage it. I’ve told you before that if something should happen to me, Steve Augsberg is thoroughly capable of stepping into my management shoes and running things without missing a beat. Steve will probably be retiring not long after I do, but by the time he goes, there are a couple of other people who should be ready."

"But I don’t own any of Clark Plywood," Randy protested. "And if I recall correctly, you said one time that your assets would have to be evenly split between Rachel, Ruth, and me."

"I did say that at the time," Ryan said. "Because that was back when I wasn’t sure you were going to be passing the test at Clark Construction. In fact, I figured the odds were against it, but I was very happy to be proved wrong. In fact, when that happened, I was really thinking more in terms of Rachel getting the lion’s share of the plant so Joel could run it, but time has proved just how wrong I was."

"Joel?" Randy frowned.

"He does have a good business and financial background," Ryan pointed out. "However, what he’s done with it takes him out of consideration, as far as I’m concerned. We could stand to have a good chief financial officer. I’ve basically been doing it, and I know I’ve been missing some tricks, but I’ve tried to keep things sound and conservative. However, while that’s a bridge that has to be crossed it doesn’t have to be crossed now. I made up my mind years ago that it’s fairly important to keep Joel from having any significant involvement with the plant, or else it’s going to turn into another Donna Clark situation, or worse. That went on for twenty years, and your grandfather and Frank Matson were only able to keep things under control by the skins of their teeth. You don’t need that happening again."

"From what I’ve heard about it, no," Randy said. "You’re saying that I’m going to be winding up with Clark Plywood, too?"

"Pretty much," Ryan told him. "All the pieces aren’t in place yet, but they’re pretty close. I don’t know if Joel could have held up the transfer of your grandfather’s estate considering the living trust arrangement. If he’d figured out what we were doing before Rachel signed the paperwork there could have been trouble, which is why your grandfather, Matt Schindenwulfe, and I pulled a little double shuffle."

"I picked up on a little of that," Randy said. "The taxable valuation of Clark Construction and the assessed valuation of the timber lands."

"Yeah, I wish Matt hadn’t said that, but he did and Joel didn’t pick up on it. Joel is not as smart as he thinks he is, and he proved it right then. He’ll probably make trouble when he figures it out, but what’s done is now done, and he’s behind the eight ball in several ways if he wants to file legal action, starting with the fact that any action would have to be started here. Joel is after the quick buck, and doesn’t want to think about the long range, which is why Matt and I pulled a last minute shuffle to make sure that Rachel didn’t wind up with any Clark stock."

"Last minute?" Randy frowned, realizing that there had been more going on than he’d perceived.

"I had quite a bit of latitude," Ryan explained. "Up until Monday both Rachel and Ruth were going to get five percent of the Clark stock each. But the way the trusteeship is set up, I’m the one who got to make that decision. After Joel mouthed off the way he did, I decided that I didn’t want him to be able to get his fingers on any of the Clark stock, so we switched things around to the land deal. Dave and Ruth were going to get the cabin and eighty acres anyway, so it was easy to change things around. That proved to be a good move, because Joel and Rachel stopped at Northwoods Realty to see about getting the land listed at $1.4 million. Of course, as soon as they were out of the door Binky called me to let me know about it."

"If you’re telling me right they have no hope of getting anything like $1.4 million out of it."

"Not in the near future," Ryan smiled. "I’ve given some thought to having a dummy corporation make an offer for about a tenth of that sometime in the next few months. But maybe not, too. We’ll have to see what happens. But for now that’s neither here nor there. What’s here now is the fact that Brent is gone now, so the board of directors is now down to just me and your mother. We need to get you and Nicole on the board as soon as possible."

"But," Randy pointed out, "I don’t own any Clark Plywood stock."

"Yes you do," Ryan said. "It’s a little buried in the list of Clark Construction assets you got from Matt today, but Clark Construction owns ten percent of Clark Plywood. Since you own Clark Construction, that makes you a Clark Plywood stockholder."

"Wow, you really were working under the table, weren’t you?"

"No more than I had to," Ryan smiled. "Now, just in case I were to drop dead tomorrow, we need to do a little stock exchange. I want to swap twenty-five percent of Clark Plywood for twenty-five percent of Clark Construction. That way, you come out with a majority of Clark Plywood assuming an even distribution of my estate. In time we should be able to fudge some more of it around. I don’t know that I can get all of it to you, but I should be able to get enough to you to avoid another Donna Clark situation for at least another generation."

"Wow," Randy said. "I guess I always realized that I’d wind up with a chunk of Clark Plywood, but I never figured majority ownership."

"In the beginning I didn’t, either," Ryan told him. "But then you proved yourself. Now, the situation with Clark Plywood is a lot different than it is with Clark Construction, mostly because when you wind up with it you’ll only be providing oversight, not actively managing it. That still means there’s a lot to learn about the ins and outs of it, but you’ve already got a start on that and we still have some time to work on it. For the moment, all the board does is set policy as suggested by the managing director, which is me, and set dividends, which again are recommended by the managing director. In practice, Dad and I worked together on a lot of issues and I hope you and I will be able to do the same thing."

"I hope we can," Randy said. "I’m not sure how much I’ll be able to contribute, though."

"Probably more than you think, but you’re going to be in a learning situation, too."

"I really feel like I’m breaking in," Nicole said. "But how large are the dividends?"

"Generally speaking, not large," Ryan told her. "For the most part, we’re capital asset rich and cash poor. That’s been with intention, to keep taxes down. Dad and I preferred to put money back into the plant and the work force, and when we had anything left over, to put it into real estate assets. That has meant that we had to scratch for cash at times. It was something of a reach to come up with the cash assets involved in Dad’s settlement. Randy’s grandfather ran Clark Construction pretty much the same way."

"I have to point out," Randy said, "that this is all pretty much on a higher level than I’ve ever had to deal with."

"Sure it is," his father said. "Which is why I didn’t want you brooding about the implications and maybe tipping off Joel that we were pulling a fast one on him. And, I’m sure it’s him that we’re pulling a fast one on. I doubt that Rachel sneezes without his permission."

"I saw that," Randy nodded. "It makes me wonder what’s really going on. I told Ruth it would be tempting to set a private detective on the two of them to get a better idea."

"I’ve thought about that, too," Ryan agreed. "I haven’t made any contacts yet, because I want to be sure I’m going to someone who can handle the financial stuff and be discreet enough that Joel doesn’t find out what’s going on."

"You seem to have all this planned out pretty well," Randy said. "I’m wondering what happens when you find out what I think you’re going to find out."

"I don’t have all the answers," Ryan sighed. "I guess that’s a bridge we’re going to have to cross when we get to it."

In time, they cleared the dinner dishes from the table and headed into the living room, where they still mostly talked about Clark Plywood. Randy learned things about the company that he’d never known before, despite growing up around it.

Among other things, he learned that profit margins were low. He’d always known that, but they were lower than he’d thought. Part of that, of course, represented the decision to plow money back into the company and into forest lands, and part of that reflected the policy to purchase or build new assets out of cash, rather than borrowed money. The wood products business was very competitive, and Clark Plywood had to price accordingly. Once upon a time Ryan had told his son that Clark Construction was more profitable than Clark Plywood despite the great disparity in sizes, but now Randy found out that it was true in absolute terms, not just numbers fiddled with the tax man in mind. However, it had been that way for many years and the situation was getting slightly better as time went along.

One thing was clear, though: the more that Randy knew about Clark Plywood, the better it would be in the long run. That meant that he had to spend some time learning about it, and it was likely to be no small job.

When Randy and Nicole finally made it home they were both a little dazed and just as happy for once that they didn’t have guests in the house. They didn’t talk about it while getting ready for bed, though this was earlier than normal for them, but once in bed they snuggled close together, both of them ready for a serious talk. Nicole threw a leg across Randy’s legs and whispered. "Randy, I’m just a little worried about this."

"There really isn’t anything to worry about," he said. "Granted, it’s a lot of responsibility with a lot of money behind it, but I’ve got some time to learn how to handle it."

"That’s not what I’m worried about," she said. "You take this stuff seriously, and that’s good, I guess. But I’m worried that you’re going to take it too seriously and try to learn everything yesterday. For years you’ve griped that you’re busy as hell in the summers and bored to tears in the winter. Now, there go the winters. Any free time you have is probably going to be spent at the plywood plant."

"Come on, Nicole, it’s not going to be that bad."

"Yes it is. Randy, I know you. I think I need to remind you that we have a child on the way, and that’s going to have to draw some of your attention, too."

"I know we have a child on the way, Nicole," Randy protested. "Let’s face it, if I screw up bad we still come out pretty good, and we could wind up with close to the whole ball of wax. It’s important that I conserve that capital so we can pass it on to our kids."

"It’s a matter of priorities and proportion," she sighed. "Randy, you’re going to have to learn to manage your time better than you’ve done in the past, or it’s going to eat you up."

"I realize that. And, I realize I tend to get focused on things. It’s an issue we’re going to have to work on, and not just a little. It’s going to have to be an ongoing thing."

"And I’ll have to fight with you about it," she sighed. "So, here we go again."

"Isn’t it going to be worth it?"

"You know, I’ve always known the money is going to be there with you. I guess I knew that way back when we were kids in school. But it always struck me as a little bit strange to have that kind of money and not be able to spend any of it. I’m not saying we have to go out and splurge, but it would be nice to have some good times with it, and not just be stuck here all the time. That’s pretty much what your folks have always done. I’m not sure I want to be that conservative about it."

"Well, me either," he said. "I haven’t taken a real look at the numbers, but it seems like there ought to be something there that we could have some fun with. Maybe not right away, but soon."

"You know what I was thinking about the other day? After Nellie was here, I got to thinking that she’s right, it’s a shame to have all this waterfront and not have anything bigger than a sea kayak. Ever since you made that trip to the Bahamas with Scooter and the gang you’ve talked about wanting to learn more about sailing. I’m thinking that maybe we ought to get a sailboat that we can park out front. That would give you something to do that wouldn’t take up a lot of time."

"It’s a thought," he agreed. "We probably ought to have something big enough to take the gang out on, not just a little sailboard, like a Sunfish or a Hobie or something. But what that would be, I don’t know."

"I don’t know, either," she sighed. "And with as big a lake as we have here I think it would be nice to learn something about sailing myself."

"I don’t know where we’d find someone to teach us that stuff," he said. "Sailing isn’t all that big around here."

"Oh, hell, that’s easy. Nellie may be old but I’ll bet she’s forgotten more about sailing than either of us would ever be able to learn."

"Well, yeah," he admitted. "Maybe we ought to have her over to dinner sometime so we can pick her brain."

"We need to have her over again," Nicole said flatly. "She’s nice, and I get the impression that she doesn’t have a lot of friends, at least not younger ones."

"Yeah, I think so, too," he agreed. "Crystal and Preach are leaving the day after tomorrow, so I think we really need to plan on spending the evening with them. Who knows when we’re going to see them again?"

"It could be a while, especially if they do something besides being booth bunnies next winter," Nicole agreed. "You sort of have to wonder what kind of big idea they’re going to come up with."

"With Crystal involved the sky is the limit," Randy sighed. "You know, more than once today I found myself wishing that we’d just gotten a big cash settlement instead of the company. We could go run rafts with Crystal, or sail around the world like Nellie, or something. But you know what?"

"You’d start thinking that you ought to be doing something useful and before long you’d be hating it. I know you, Randy, and I saw that one coming."

"Yeah, you’re right. I would. And with a kid on the way it would make it just that much harder. I’ll tell you one thing, Nicole. I hope that we can raise that kid so they’ll get the idea that they have to work for a living, not just have everything handed to them. I think that’s one thing the folks did right with me. With Ruth, for that matter, although Rachel didn’t seem to get the lesson very well."

"Yeah, but how much of that is Joel?" she replied.

"That is an interesting question, isn’t it?" he sighed. "I’m glad Dad picked up on that idea to have a little investigation done. I still don’t have a good feeling about that, even less of one than I had before."

"Me, too," she sighed. "I wonder about Jared, too. He seems kind of quiet for a kid, and, well, it makes the teacher in me worry a little bit about the things he’s not saying."

"I hadn’t picked up on that, but then, I’m not a teacher," Randy sighed. "It sure makes you think, though. Really, it’s none of your and my business, and really none of Dad and Mom’s. But still, you have to wonder what’s really going on there. Maybe we shouldn’t speculate about it until we know more."

"Probably not a bad idea," she replied.

They were silent for a while there, pretty much talked out after what had been an eventful day, one that had come out in some ways pretty close to what Randy had imagined, but in other ways well beyond that. They just held onto each other, enjoying the closeness – it was one solid and reliable thing in a world that now promised new stresses they hadn’t quite imagined before.

Randy was half asleep and thought Nicole might be as well when she spoke softly. "Randy?"

"Yeah?"

"I’ve been thinking about it," she announced. "We still haven’t settled on a name for a boy. What would you think of ‘Brent?’"

"I’d have been against it until a few days ago," he said. "Now I’m not so sure. It’s an honorable name for a Clark in this town, but until Granddad died I wouldn’t have wanted the confusion."

"That’s kind of what I was thinking," she agreed. "I kind of like the idea, but maybe we ought to bounce it off your dad."

"Probably not a bad idea," Randy agreed. "What are you thinking about a middle name?"

"How about Wayne?" she asked. "Granted, it carries some baggage with it, but good as well as bad. I don’t think I’d quite realized it until the last few days."

"Yeah, it does," Randy said. "In spite of Wayne’s faults, and he had a lot of them, he was a businessman with the right gut calls and a lot of vision. I don’t think I’d want to use it as a first name, but I kind of like the idea of Brent Wayne Clark."

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