Garrett nodded.
“Please.”
They sat at the kitchen table.
Garrett had brought a binder.
Inside were updated copies of the HOA’s founding documents.
Tabbed.
Highlighted.
Raymond noticed.
“You did homework.”
Garrett smiled.
“More than the last administration.”
Raymond poured coffee.
Garrett opened the emergency-water agreement.
“I want to understand this correctly.”
“Good start.”
Garrett laughed.
Raymond explained the drought.
His father.
The adjoining farms.
The original temporary connection.
The developer’s request.
The standby fee.
The emergency-only terms.
Garrett listened.
“So the HOA pays you annually?”
“A small amount.”
“For maintaining potential emergency availability?”
“No.”
Raymond corrected him.
“For preserving the agreement.”
“I maintain my well for my ranch.”
“If I decide the well can support emergency access during a real disruption, the connection exists.”
Garrett nodded.
“We can’t require it.”
“No.”
“We can’t tell you when to run the pump.”
“No.”
“We can’t maintain it.”
“No.”
“We can’t enter your property.”
“No.”
Garrett smiled.
“You really enjoy that word now.”
Raymond sipped coffee.
“I always did.”
Garrett became serious.
“Why did your father agree?”
Raymond looked out the kitchen window.
Toward the pump house.
“Because people needed water.”
“That simple?”
“Usually.”
Garrett thought.
“Donna believed any resource benefiting the community should be controlled by the community.”
Raymond looked at him.
“That’s how favors disappear.”
Garrett waited.
Raymond continued.
“If giving your neighbor water means your neighbor eventually owns your well, fewer people will give water.”
Garrett nodded slowly.
“That’s probably the most important thing anybody has said about this.”
Raymond shrugged.
“It’s not philosophy.”
“It’s plumbing.”
Before leaving, Garrett stood on the porch.
Looked across the pasture.
The pond.
Barn.
Cedars.
“You’ve been here thirty-one years?”
“My family fifty-three.”
“Beautiful place.”
Raymond looked out.
“Some days.”
Garrett smiled.
“I’d be proud.”
Raymond thought about the word.
“Responsibility is closer.”
“What’s the difference?”
“Pride looks backward.”
“Responsibility gets up tomorrow and fixes the next thing.”
Garrett remembered that.
A week later, Deputy Wallace stopped by.
No uniform emergency.
No complaint.
Just a patrol vehicle pulling into the drive.
Raymond was repairing fence near the western line.
Wallace leaned against the hood.
“Pressure holding?”
“Yep.”
“County civilization saved.”
“Barely.”
Wallace laughed.
He told Raymond the law-enforcement matter was closed.
No further action.
Finch’s office had decided the original call did not justify prosecution because Donna appeared to have acted from a mistaken belief rather than provable intentional deception.
Raymond nodded.
“Good.”