Chapter 3: Six Gardens
By Wednesday morning, Mark had learned that talking to his neighbors was more exhausting than planting an entire yard.
He started with Bernard and Elise Moreno, a retired couple who lived at the far end of the six-house row.
Their front garden held lavender, rosemary, and a cracked stone birdbath.
Elise remembered June Bellweather as a stubborn woman who wore men’s work boots and gave away cuttings in coffee cans.
“She could grow a rose from a complaint,” Elise said.
Bernard laughed until Mark showed him the Crownleaf advertisement.
His smile disappeared.
“That’s June’s color.”
“Red flowers are fairly common,” Mark said.
“Not those.”
Bernard fetched an old biscuit tin from the garage.
Inside were photographs of neighbors gathered beside flowering plants under a hand-painted banner.
They were celebrating the Bellweather Garden Walk.
In one picture Diane, much younger, held a watering can beside June.
“Diane organized those walks for years,” Elise said.
“She stopped inviting people after June moved away.”
“Why did June leave?”
Elise shrugged.
“Her sister became ill, and June went to help.”
“Did anyone take over the collection?”
Bernard touched the edge of the photograph.
“We thought Diane had.”
The next house belonged to Omar Velez, a paramedic whose teenage daughter Lucia had inherited his love of fixing broken things.
Omar had found an old watering schedule nailed inside his garage when he bought the house.
He showed Mark a narrow metal rack with faded names stamped into six brackets.
“I thought the previous owner had labeled a tool collection,” Omar said.
“Each bracket has a different number.”
Priya joined them and examined the marks.
“These aren’t tool labels.”
“Then what are they?” Lucia asked.
“They might correspond to plant lines from June’s breeding records.”
Lucia had never heard of June, but she liked the mystery immediately.
“Does that mean my garden might have a plant nobody sells anymore?”
“Maybe,” Priya said.
“It also means we should avoid pulling up anything unusual before we identify it.”
They crossed to the fourth house, where Nate Sullivan worked nights at a bread factory.
Nate opened the door in slippers and listened while holding a mug of coffee.
“I pulled out a bunch of red flowers last spring,” he admitted.
“They looked scraggly.”
Priya asked whether he had saved any roots or cuttings.
“I tossed the stems behind the compost bin.”
They went to look.
A few new shoots had emerged from a patch of loose soil.
Priya crouched and photographed the leaves without removing anything.
“This plant is alive.”
Nate blinked.
“After a whole winter?”
“Many salvias can come back from the base in a mild climate.”
He looked suddenly embarrassed.
“I was going to build a shelf there.”
“Then I’m glad we visited before you did,” Mark said.
The fifth house stood empty while its owner, Harper Wynn, worked out of state.
Mark called the number Harper had left with the neighborhood contact group.
She remembered a red plant beside her back fence and gave permission for Priya to look at it with her landscaper present.
By late afternoon, they had identified four promising plants or root crowns across the six lots.
The collection was not neatly preserved, but it was not entirely gone.
Diane had refused to join the search.
She watched from her porch while the neighbors compared photographs and argued over leaf shapes.
At five, a silver SUV pulled up beside her house.
Nolan Pike climbed out wearing an expensive jacket and carrying a slim sample case.
Mark noticed Diane grip the porch rail.
Pike glanced toward the flower beds before walking to her door.
Their conversation began quietly.
It became loud enough for Mark to hear when Diane said, “You promised not to bring anyone here.”
Pike lowered his voice.
“We have a schedule, Diane.”
“Not anymore.”
“Then you should consider what happens when people discover your part in it.”
Diane went still.
Pike returned to his SUV and drove away.
Mark crossed the street after the vehicle turned the corner.
“What did he mean?” Mark asked.
“It means you have made trouble for people who can afford better lawyers than you.”
“Did you give him the plants?”
Diane looked at Mark for a long moment.
“I did something worse.”
She opened her front door and stepped inside.
For the first time, she left the door open for him to follow.
