"Three years, maybe a touch longer," he said. "Started after the Delgados moved. Trish told everybody the association had bought the house from the bank and was keeping it in reserve. That way we wouldn't have to pay for a storage unit across town."
"The association bought it?"
"That's what she said. Used to be a nice little family in there. After they left, nobody stuck around long."
"There were other owners?"
He nodded. "A couple from Ohio for a while. Somebody who worked nights. Linda, I think her name was, lived there for a few months. Trish said some of them were renters, some were looking after the place for the bank. Honestly, I never asked."
"And when those people moved in, they were allowed to use their own driveway?"
Dale stared into his coffee. "I figured the association had some arrangement with them."
"Did any of them tell you they were renters?"
"No." He said it so quietly I nearly missed it. "Trish told us."
There it was. Three years of property arrangements assembled from one woman's declarations and everyone else's willingness not to verify them. Dale was not the sort of neighbor who deliberately helped steal a house. He was the sort who trusted the person holding the clipboard, especially when that person supplied a golf cart and had spent eleven years running the annual picnic. Patricia had made belief convenient, which is often all that persuasion requires.
"How many people have remotes?" I asked.
He thought. "Bev on Meadow Court. The Okafors. A couple of the families on Thistle Way. I think nine altogether, but Trish has made extras at different times."
"Nine households can open my garage."
Dale shifted his weight. "When you say it like that, it sounds bad."
"How else should I say it?"
He looked over the street at my house. "I guess there's no better way."
I told him the golf cart needed to be returned and that I would arrange for everyone to collect anything genuinely belonging to the association. He promised to deliver the cart when he had finished his errand, then hesitated as though there were one more thing he should say. Finally he asked whether I thought Trish had made a mistake. I could have given him a satisfying answer. Instead, I told him I knew only what the documents and the garage showed, and I needed to see the rest before assigning motives.
"You're a careful fellow," he said.
"I've had practice."
When I crossed the street, the blonde curtains next door moved again. I had the beginning of a record, not yet a complete explanation. I also had an unpleasant new possibility to consider: the sellers and the association had known about the garage arrangement and avoided discussing it because explaining it would have frightened a buyer. I called the real estate agent, who insisted she had been told the remaining items were temporary. She promised to contact the seller's representative. The promise produced no useful answer that week.