Chapter 7 - THE GOLD WASN'T HIS
The gold bars created another problem.
Charles claimed them.
Then a Boston bank claimed them.
Then a mining consortium did.
The markings told the story.
They were collateral.
Ambrose had borrowed against personal gold reserves to fund independent research after Northstar Electrical’s board tried to seize his patents.
The gemstones belonged to his late wife’s estate.
Legally, those assets did not automatically become Eliza’s simply because they were found aboard.
The auction deed covered abandoned ship contents, but active estate claims complicated ownership.
Eliza was disappointed.
Then strangely relieved.
She did not want her fortune built on property that clearly belonged to someone else.
The patents were different.
Ambrose’s research had never been filed fully.
His notebooks and physical prototypes created valuable rights, but ownership had to be negotiated with his estate.
Charles was the heir.
That was dangerous.
Unless Ambrose had another will.
He did.
Hidden in the ledger’s oilcloth lining.
It named Clara Finch as scientific executor.
Not Charles.
And instructed that any commercial value from the research be divided:
forty percent to the surviving research team,
thirty percent to maritime safety charities,
twenty percent to his family,
ten percent to “the finder who preserves the work when others abandon it.”
Eliza read that line three times.
Ten percent.
Of something potentially enormous.
She laughed.
Then cried.
Seventy-five dollars had not bought her everything.
May you like
It had bought her a chance to become part of something honest.
That mattered more.
