At the foot of the steps, Patricia Voss was standing with an accordion folder beneath her arm. I recognized the sunglasses first, then the blonde bob, then the lanyard with the laminated association identification. She had apparently come to file something in small claims court, or to speak to someone about a filing. I never learned which errand brought her there that day. What mattered was that she looked from Ellen to the robe to my face and understood exactly who her new neighbor was.
I had expected surprise. I would even have understood embarrassment. Instead, she went still for a moment and then smiled, as if a question she had been working on had just supplied its own answer. She said nothing. I nodded once and walked on with Ellen, but I felt that smile following me through the door to the cafe.
That evening, the motor home was still there.
Patricia was three houses down, talking to the Okafors on their front walk. She gestured broadly while the father stood with his hands in his pockets and the mother held a toddler against her hip. When I passed, the conversation stopped for half a beat and began again after I entered my house. The next morning she was at Dale's door. By Friday she had visited every home on the street.
Dale told me afterward what she had said.
"He is a judge," she told them. "Brand-new, and the first thing he does when he moves in is order the community to remove its property. He's threatened the cart, the storage, the Christmas lights, and now my motor home. Next he'll decide who gets to park where. You want a man like that making rules for the street?"
She said it with variations, depending on her audience. To Bev, who borrowed the golf cart to get to church on Sundays, she spoke about seniors losing a helpful service. To the Okafors she spoke about higher association dues if the neighborhood had to rent commercial storage. To a young couple on Thistle Way she spoke about a judge using his position to bully a volunteer president.
Every version contained a small recognizable truth. The golf cart did help Bev. Off-site storage would cost money. I was a judge. Those facts were the wrapping around the lie that I had somehow taken public property for myself.
By the end of the week, the neighbors were no longer merely avoiding me. They had an explanation ready for why avoidance was virtuous. The man with the garden hose turned away when I approached the mailbox. A woman I had once seen walking a golden retriever crossed the street rather than pass in front of my house. Even Dale had become quieter, although he still nodded when we met. On Friday I found a second cream-colored notice beneath the windshield wiper of my truck, which was legally parked along the public street.
It claimed another violation of Section 4.2. This time the fine was three hundred dollars, marked SECOND OFFENSE. The signature beneath it was the same sweeping blue loop I had begun to recognize at a glance. I placed the notice beside the first one and wrote down where and when I found it. Then I went back to work.