The Case of the Clashing Coroners

December Ace Insura

The Case of the Clashing Coroners

Bells tolled, echoing across the rolling green hills of the Eternal Slumber Cemetery next to the Brown & Brown Funeral home. It was my Aunt Betty’s birthday, so I came to give her a present: a bottle of White Zinfandel.

She always loved a cool glass of wine, even though it put her to sleep faster than a Woody Allen movie—a drowsy state of mind she referred to as Zin meditation. She even liked to sneak a few drinks while working at the carnival, which probably wasn’t the best thing to do since she worked the taffy-making machine. One night she fell asleep at the controls and slid right into the contraption. Let’s just say it stretched her to her limits and then some.

Always the jokester, she wanted to be buried upside down so that the whole world could kiss her…well, you get the idea. But after the accident, it was impossible to determine her front from her backside. Even if she did have a derriere left to kiss, it would have tasted like peppermint.

As I placed the bottle on the soft grass, I looked up and spied the Brown brothers, Buster and Bill, up by the funeral home. They were either arguing vehemently or rehearsing for parts in the new Quentin Tarantino film.

As I approached, I picked up the main points of the fight quickly.

“Save the tree!” Buster screamed.

“Save the pipes!” Bill replied.

The rest of the dialogue steered a similar course, tree versus pipes, with a few salty expletives sprinkled on for taste.

“Buster, Bill, what are you fighting about?”

“A rotting elm tree,” Bill said. “I want to get rid of it, but Buster, the treehugger, wants to keep it.”

I looked around cemetery grounds and saw no elm.

“Fellas, I hate to put a bee in your bonnet, but I don’t see any elms.”

“Not here, back at our house,” Bill said. “You see, we have a sewer line that runs from the house to the main line. This revolting elm tree in our front yard wrapped its roots around the line, and now it’s damaged. My gut said there isn’t any coverage in our HO-3, but I can’t find an exclusion to kill coverage. I’ve heard of claim denials based on ‘wear and tear’ and lack of maintenance, but how do you ‘maintain’ a sewer line?”

“Good question,” I said, “but it’s one you don’t have to answer.”

How will Ace get to the root of this dilemma? For help solving this mystery and to check your solution against Ace’s, click here.

Jonathan Hermann (hermannism@gmail.com) is an IA contributing editor.