Stand Off...Part Two..."The Bitter Old Woman"
The day that Ruby Kay showed up for the competency hearing, she drove up in the new bright red Jeep 4w she had bought to navigate the narrrow and twisted back road and highway up to the Dome. The Dome was the McLeod's mountain and small valley at its base. The land had been in the McLeod family for almost two hundred years ever since Magnus McLeod had come to America and settled the frontier area. Magnus was Ruby Kay's multiple great grandfather and the Dome (called that because the actual summit of the mountain was nothing but bald stone). The mountain and valley had passed from generation to generation always to the first born like some Scottish monarch, whether or not, they were male or female. The challengers of Ruby Kay's competency were far spread out members of the original family but they had deserted the Dome and the small town years long ago and could have cared less until a mineral deposit had been discovered on the Dome's property and the mining company had made a very, very generous offer to buy the mineral rights from Ruby Kay and she had adamantly refused them. The Dome was still virgin wood and home to a great many wildlife. The other family members were incensed over her refusal and also her clear statement that they had no rights to the Dome. As the sole owner of the property, she had willed the property to the Wildlife Refuge of Tennessee upon her passing.
The real reason for this competency hearing was the greed of her relatives and they were determined to convince a judge that Ruby Kay was just a bitter old woman suffering from dementia. As soon as they saw the new Jeep, they thought Ruby Kay had sold out already but most of them had never heard of the word "frugal" or the fact that the Jeep was actually five years that Da and Ruby Kay had bought just before he passed away. Ruby Kay kept it in the barn and covered up and she seldom used it except to go to town.
Ruby Kay had come well prepared for the stand off that she knew she was going have with her estranged family in a court of law.
(to be continued)
