“Improvise, adapt, overcome.”
Bock chuckled. “Yes, sir. Fubared everything there is to fubar.”
“How long did it take you?”
“Nine years. I was living in a tent for the first two, till I got the roof on. Half the time it was too wet to work, and the other half it was so hot I didn’t want to.”
Along the way, he’d gotten to know Emil Bergstrom.
“I’d had some dealings with him when I applied for permits. He was always polite, and when I first showed up, he came by to introduce himself. He had the boy with him. He wasn’t much more than a kid then, Beau. Emil goes, ‘Nice to meet you. You need anything, give a holler.’ I thought, There’s a neighborly fellah. Week later I get this notice stuck to my truck from the Board of Supervisors. Assessment. Seven hundred bucks.”
“Same amount the acquisitions guy wanted you to sell for.”
“Got a sense of humor, Emil does.”
Not knowing any better, Bock paid the assessment; the next couple, too. Then he tried to get his water and power hooked up.
“I got a notice. Eight grand.”
“Big jump.”
“He was testing me. See how deep my pockets were. I canceled the request, bought a couple of used four-hundred-gallon tanks, and put in a rainwater catchment system.”
“Smart.”
“I thought so. Then I get another notice, saying I still had to pay the fee. I went over to see Bergstrom. He and Beau live in this big house down by the water.”
“The third mansion.”
“What’s that?”
“I was at the other two residences on Beachcomber, the Clancys’ and the doctor’s. I was wondering who lived in the third house.”
“You get around, don’t you...? Yeah. That’s them. I’m talking to Emil, explaining the problem, and Beau walks in and sits down on the sofa. I didn’t think he had any place listening in, and I said so. Emil said, ‘My son’s my business partner, I don’t have any secrets from him.’ The whole time Beau was there he didn’t say nothing. He watches Emil, watches me.”
“Learning the ropes.”
“You said it. I told Emil, ‘Look, I did the work, it doesn’t affect anyone.’ No problem. He’ll issue me a variance, and they can approve it retroactively. The application fee costs five hundred dollars.” Bock paused. “You see what he’s doing? He didn’t want to run me off before they squeezed out every last cent they could.”
With the next assessment, he’d had it.
“I refused to pay. They threatened to take me to court. I told them, ‘Go right ahead.’ ”
Then the real trouble started.
“I was waiting forever for the phone company to put the landline in. The first time they sent a truck, it got stuck, and they didn’t want to come back. I wrote ’em a hundred letters before they agreed to do it. I haven’t had the line for three days before it goes dead. I go outside, start following it. Few blocks away, a tree’s come down and taken it out.”
“Cut down or fell down.”
“Cut. They weren’t trying to hide it. They wanted me to know who it was.”
“Did you call the cops?”
“No, sir. What are they gonna do? No offense, but I worked with my fair share of cops. My experience, they’ll do as much as they have to and no more. I can take care of myself.”
Al Bock’s version of self-care was to load up his rifle and drive to Bergstrom’s house.
“I told him I was using his phone till he got the phone company out to fix mine. He just smiled. ‘Okay, Mr. Bock, calm down.’ What do you know? Two days later there’s a truck.”
A war had begun.
“They’d shoot off guns in the middle of the night to scare the pup. Block the road, so I couldn’t get in or out. Every time I left for a supply run, I took a chain saw with me, and I’d let Godzilla loose in the yard, to keep them from trespassing. One time he starts puking. I rushed him up to the animal hospital in Eureka. Vet tells me he got sick from eating onions. I don’t grow onions. I don’t keep ’em around. Where’s he getting onions?”
“You think they fed it to him.”
“I don’t think it, I know it. Can I prove it? No. I was gone all day, getting him looked at. I get home that evening, every one of my windows is broke.”
“Oh my God.”
“Yes, sir. I had raccoons running around my kitchen.”
“What did you do?”
“Shot his windows out. And he’s got a lot more of ’em than I do.”
I laughed. “Did he get the message?”
“Yes, sir, he did. He even wrote me a check for three grand.”
“I have to tell you, Sergeant, you’re the first person I’ve spoken to who ever pried a cent out of Emil Bergstrom.”
“I’ll add it to my list of accomplishments.”
The harder the Bergstroms tried to dislodge Bock, the more determined he became to stay. Five years in, he realized he had accidentally fallen in love with Swann’s Flat. Abandoning his plan to flip the house, he replaced it with a new goaclass="underline" build his dream home.
“You didn’t want to just cut bait?” I asked.
“Why should I? It’s my land. I bought it, fair and square. I worked it and made it what it is. I’m a United States Marine. I ain’t gonna let some buncha clowns push me around.”
“I get that. My question is if it’s worth the trouble.”
“Oh, we’re past all that by now. I’m not gonna say we like each other, but we have an understanding. They leave me alone, and I don’t depend on them for nothing. I got my water, I got my solar, I grow my own food, I keep to myself.”
“You’re still paying fees.”
“No, sir. I put an end to that.”
“How?”
“I told ’em I wasn’t paying no more.”
“He agreed? Just like that?”
“Well, maybe I made my point a little more directly.”
“Do I want to ask how?”
“Let me put it this way. Inside every bully is a chickenshit pissing his pants.”
“Did you ever consider taking legal action?”
“I don’t have the money for that.”
“You wouldn’t have to, if you joined up with other people.”
“Like who?”
“Other folks who got burned. Other residents. You can’t be the only one who’s been harassed.”
“Ain’t no other residents.”
“The doctor. The Clancys.”
“I don’t think you’ll find them to be too helpful.”
“Why not?”
“They’re on the Board of Supervisors, too.”
“All of them?”
“Maggie is, and Jason.”
“They work for Bergstrom?”
“Other way around,” he said.
“He works for them?”
“Well, for Jason, anyway.”
“Why would Bergstrom take orders from Jason Clancy?”
“Because he’s married to Leonie Swann.”
The name threw me for a loop; I had filed her away as Leonie Clancy.
Bock confirmed that they were one and the same. “She used to be married to Kurt, so that’s still how I think of her.”
The roadside memorial. “Kurt Swann.”
“Yes, sir.”
“What about Shasta?”
“You really do get around.”
“She’s Kurt and Leonie’s daughter?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Kurt’s dead, though.”
“Yes, sir.”
“How?”
“Accident. His truck went off the road. Now she owns the town.”
“What’s that mean?”
“Bylaws state that the majority landowner holds veto power,” Bock said. “You follow? Nobody lives here less they want ’em to.”
“Except you.”
“Yes, sir. Although maybe they want me, now.”
“Why would they?”