Chapter 12: The Hearing

"Don't send me that page," I said. "Don't send me anything she can trace to you."

"Then how will you prove it?"

"The county has the same copy," I said. "With the same stamp."

On the first of May, the county hearing room was full of yellow T-shirts.

I hadn't asked anyone to wear them.

The bait shop man wore his under a sport coat. The surf school couple wore theirs with board shorts. The snow-cone lady had cut the sleeves off hers.

The Ohio couple had put off driving home for it.

Nana sat in the front row in her church hat with her pocketbook on her knees.

Dale sat next to her with his cap in his lap.

My mother sat on the other side of the aisle in cream.

Her assistant was at her elbow. Her engineer was at the end of the row with a leather folder.

She didn't look at me once.

Five commissioners sat up at a long desk under the county seal.

The chairman called the engineer first.

The engineer took the microphone at the little table in front of the desk and read his findings.

Rotted pilings. Compromised load. A risk of collapse under a crowd.

"Under a crowd," the snow-cone lady said, not quietly. "That deck's held up my brother."

The chairman tapped his gavel.

"Does the owner wish to respond?" he said.

I stood up.

"The owner's my father, Dale Bledsoe," I said. "I'm the manager. I'd like to ask the engineer two questions."

The chairman waved a hand.

I walked up the aisle.

I could feel my mother not looking at me. It was heat on one side of my face.

"Sir," I said to the engineer. "When did you inspect the Lantern?"

He opened his folder, though he didn't need to.

"Tuesday, April twenty-first."

"How long were you there?"

"Long enough."

"Four minutes," said the snow-cone lady.

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