The first thing Brenda Hale said when she came through my side gate was not hello.
“Give him the keys,” she ordered, pointing at the pool behind me.
Her husband stood one step back, dressed in the dark blue uniform of the Bellwether Police Department, with the late Georgia sunlight shining off the badge on his chest.
He had the expression of a man who had been told this errand would be simple.
I had been trimming the dead blooms from the hydrangeas along the patio, and the gardening shears were still in my right hand.
I put them on the table where everyone could see them.
“For what?” I asked.
Brenda looked at the water as if I had neglected to clean something that belonged to her.
“This pool is causing problems for the neighborhood.”
“What problems?”
“Noise, safety, complaints, and your refusal to respect our standards.”
No one had been swimming that afternoon.
The pool cover was folded neatly beneath the cedar bench, and the only sound came from a cicada in the maple tree.
Mark Hale extended his hand, palm upward.
“Ma’am, let’s not make a scene.”
“I’m not making one.”
“Then give me the keys so we can resolve the complaint.”
“You should check the address first,” I told him.
Brenda laughed so sharply that the cicada seemed to stop.
“We know whose house this is.”
Mark took the brown folder from beneath her arm, opened it, and began to read.
At first he seemed bored.
Then he turned back to the first page.
He read the line beneath the county parcel number twice, and the muscles beside his mouth tightened.
“Where did you get this?” he asked Brenda.
“From the neighborhood records.”
“No, this page.”
She grabbed for the folder, but he held it beyond her reach.
I could see the exact moment he understood the name printed above the property description.
MARA HALE MEMORIAL RESCUE TRUST.
His sister’s name sat there in plain black letters, followed by the name of the trustee who had asked him to check the address.
That trustee was me.
“Mara?” he whispered.
Brenda’s face changed, though not in the way I expected.
She looked less surprised than frightened that he had read the page before she could explain it away.
“It’s an old organization,” she said quickly.
Mark turned to me.
“My sister died when she was thirteen.”
“I know,” I said.
