~ 49 ~

Sunday, February 15th Port Alberni, BC

Harry Thorn fired up his computer around two-thirty that afternoon. Checking e-mail first, he was pleased to find the letter from George Luke on the north end of the island. They had developed a viable plan for the park that could soon come under their ownership and management. The existing provincial park staff would be kept on, if they wished, but the changes would create 15 additional positions. That, Harry calculated, should almost cover the number of people in George’s area that will need work. Good, they’re starting.

Of the two hundred messages he’d received over the last six months, each asking for Harry’s input, most had proposed some workable ideas. The real test, he knew, would be after they were in place. It would take time for any new venture to establish, and some will fail because they just weren’t a good idea to begin with, but he felt optimistic about most of them. The best part of this, he breathed, was that finally they had something to do. "Not everybody can carve or paint," he said to Wilma’s childhood attempts that adorned his shelves. "And not everybody can create a new country." It was difficult for Harry to find words when he wanted to tell his granddaughter how incredibly proud of her he was. But, she knew.

He had watched Wilma closely over these last few months. Along with keeping the New Moon alive, she had found work for many people. Townsend Foods was adding warehouses all over the island, most of which needed upgrading, and Hank MacDougall had stepped up production in the lumber mills – even retrofitted and opened one that had been closed down since early 2002, a casualty of the lumber trade wars. "No more of those," Harry chuckled. He rose from his desk and walked over to the small wood stove in the corner. Winters this close to the ocean were always like this. Chilly and wet. ‘Which,’ he thought as he tossed in another log, ‘a good stick of pine can quickly fix.’ Just this morning, he had attacked the cord of pine logs piled up behind his house. They were already cut to stove length, but the bigger ones still needed to be split and stacked. Working up a sweat, he had barely noticed the chilly rain. "Wood warms you twice," he had said to the axe, "once in the making, once in the burning."

Harry latched closed the stove’s cast iron door, brushed the wood chips off his jeans, and walked over to the small window on the east side of his kitchen. Looking out, he could now see the tall rigging that was in place over on the H&E drill site. Ben and his crew have been busy. Another example of Wilma’s magic.

He sat down on the chair by the table under the window and thought about the ancient mounds in the Appalachians of Pennsylvania, the Petroglyphs and Pictograms in the caves along the waters of great rivers in canyons in the south-west. He thought about the Statues of Easter Island, the remains of Syria, Sumaria, Mesopotamia, and the great medicine wheels that had not turned to dust.

Great things may happen here too, he felt, especially with the new financial system that Gloria Townsend had devised. Harry was glad Wilma and Gloria had become friends. ‘Wouldn’t want to tangle with either of them separately, and together? Not in this lifetime.’

Wilma had told him of the new economic structure, and Harry wished that he could tell the others of it. It would benefit their planning efforts, but it was not a critical part. The situation would become critical, however, if it were known this new country will have no taxation. The masses would come to establish residency before the island became its own country. No, he’d decided, this stays secret.

It was quite simple. Every transaction made on the island would be charged a ten-percent handling fee, deposited instantly and directly into the general funds account of the new government. There would be no income tax, no withholding taxes, no property taxes, no PST or GST, nor would there be special taxes on this product but not on that. There would no longer be the need for the forms or reporting. Business and individuals would be suddenly free of the time-consuming paperwork and filing requirements.

Standing, Harry went to check the fire to see if it needed pushing around, and then crawled onto his bed to spend the next few hours consumed by fantasy, visualising what Pictograms these actions would leave; this beginning of the new times, this new country.