When Alicia arrived that evening, Marcus showed her the damaged frame and told her what had happened. She listened without interrupting, took photographs with his permission, and asked whether the restaurant's camera system had recorded the visit. Marcus shook his head; the old camera above the register had stopped working after a lightning storm, and he'd postponed replacing it to pay the last heating bill.
"You need to report this," Alicia said. "Not to me over dinner. Officially."
"Will a report bring Eleanor's picture back?"
"No. But it makes the next person who comes through that door answer a different question."
Marcus looked at the broken frame. "Then show me where to sign."
He gave a statement that evening and kept the incident number on a folded piece of paper beside the register. The document seemed small compared with the damage, but Eleanor had once told him that a door stayed open only if somebody maintained the hinges. He began to understand that preserving the diner might require a kind of maintenance he had not practiced before.
Derek returned the next morning with a thick manila folder, and Marcus knew from the expression on his face that he had come to punish him for filing the report.
The folder landed on the counter between the coffee pot and the donation jar. Derek took off his sunglasses and looked at the ceiling, allowing himself a slow, theatrical sigh. "You really ought to invest in this place," he said. "An inspector could find all kinds of things wrong with it."
Marcus opened the documents. There were photographs of exposed electrical wires, a pest-infested pantry, a cracked foundation wall, and a handwritten calculation of potential penalties adding up to fifty thousand dollars. The city seals were carefully reproduced and the paragraphs used language that sounded official enough to frighten someone who had never worked with an inspection office. Marcus had spent twenty years dealing with routine inspections. He recognized two photographs as belonging to a different building and a third as a close-up of damaged drywall his landlord had repaired the previous winter.
"Who issued these?" he asked.
"The city, obviously."
"Which inspector?"
Derek tapped the bottom of the page. "You're missing the important part. Thirty days. That's what you have before everything becomes much more expensive."
Marcus read the document number. It was one digit shorter than the numbers printed on his legitimate inspection reports, a small inconsistency Derek had probably never noticed. He kept reading instead of pointing it out. Derek interpreted the silence as concern and opened another document, a transfer agreement giving Collins Development control over the remainder of Marcus's lease and any rights associated with the business name.
"Sign this, and the problem becomes manageable," Derek said. "Ten thousand dollars to start fresh. I'll even help you find a smaller place somewhere quieter."