The Broken Engine Came With Shares And A Track Lease

I went home and set my fire box on the kitchen table.

Inside were my birth certificate, Grandpa's last birthday card, and an envelope marked October 18, 2024. His old lawyer's office had given me the original for safekeeping and kept a scan.

The first page said Codicil To Last Will And Testament.

Grandpa had added it to his 2020 will. That will left Victor the land. The codicil changed the gift to me.

"Together with the locomotive known as June Bug," it said, "I give my granddaughter, Aniela Kowalski, all my shares in Lantern Loop Railway, Inc."

The company owned the cars, tools, and service engine. It also held the recorded track lease. Twenty years, through 2044, with rent of $600 a month.

The lease covered the station, shed, parking area, and track route. Its terms stayed in force if the land changed hands.

I read the attached list twice. Grandpa had made each asset plain, down to the spare crossing bell.

Then I called Mara Bell, a probate lawyer in Tavares.

"Do I own it now?" I asked after reading the gift aloud.

"You have a claim we need to put before the court," she said. "Keep that original safe. Don't confuse a right to inherit shares with authority to move company money tonight."

I liked her at once.

Her consultation was $300, credited toward a $4,500 retainer. I had $5,180 in savings, most of it meant for my truck's transmission.

"I can pay," I said.

At nine the next morning, she laid both wills and the codicil side by side.

"If the February will is valid, it may undo this gift," she said. "We need facts, not just a better story."

"The railway assets aren't Grandpa's loose property. They're the company's."

"Exactly. Even whoever inherits his shares must respect that. Victor can't sell company equipment just because he expects to get the shares."

She checked the public probate file. Victor had filed a petition, but no judge had appointed him personal representative. His auction form claimed more power than he had.

Mara called the auction office while I sat there.

"I'm sending written notice of disputed ownership and the corporate records," she said. "Please preserve the seller's full file."

The manager promised to review it. He did not promise to cancel.

We filed the original codicil with the clerk and asked for urgent protection of the equipment. Mara kept certified copies for our hearing packet.

Then I drove to Bea's house near Lake Gertrude.

She answered in a purple house dress, with a pencil stuck through her white curls.

"You look like a woman who found a bolt in her soup," she said.

"Did you notarize Grandpa's will last February?"

She held out her hand.

I gave her the copy.

Beatrice Rios was sixty-seven, Puerto Rican American, and retired from a title office. She read every line while I stood on her porch. Then she stepped aside.

"Come in. Do not put that on my good table without a folder."

Her dining room held three locked file cabinets. She brought out a ledger with square corners and a cloth cover.

"Florida did not require me to keep this appointment book," she said. "I required me to keep it. There's a difference."

Each line had a date, time, client, fee, and document type. Small tabs marked trips and office closures.

She turned to February 2025.

A heavy line crossed the week of the twelfth.

"Madrid," she said.

"You were in Spain?"

"My sister turned seventy. She asked for dancing. I gave her dancing."

She tapped the copied notary block with one bright nail.

It said Grandpa and both witnesses had appeared in person before her in Lake County on February 12.

"Could someone have signed with you by video?" I asked.

"I never registered to do remote notarizations. And this says in person. Words mean things, child."

Her voice had lost its stage music.

"A bad notary page alone may not defeat a will," I said, repeating Mara's warning.

"Then we'll give your lawyer more than a page."

Bea found an airline receipt, her passport, and an email confirming her return on February 19. She put each item in its own sleeve.

My phone rang. Victor's name filled the screen.

I let it go.

Bea opened a smaller locked drawer. Inside lay her old stamp, its rubber face cut through when she retired.

"I want to see the original they filed," she said. "Because that mark on your copy looks like a mark I made on a very different paper."