The Harbor Clerk Found The Page He Left Out

I took both papers to a lawyer named Dana Reed the next morning. Her office was above a tax preparer, with wet boots lined against the stairs.

She read without speaking. I had spent the drive planning what to say, but when she finished, she asked something simple.

“Who has the original of this new schedule?”

“I don't know.”

“Then we won't call it forged in our first letter. We'll say you dispute it and demand the original.”

“The signature is copied.”

“It looks copied. We need to show how we know.”

I paid her a $2,400 retainer from my own savings. That left $3,860 in the account I used for winter fuel and house repairs.

“I need to get people their gear,” I said.

“We'll ask for supervised access and preservation of records. Also an order against moving the disputed property. Don't cut the lock.”

“It's my door.”

“And I want the judge looking at his conduct, not a photograph of you holding bolt cutters.”

That made enough sense to be annoying.

Outside, I called Tessa. She asked me to come in after eleven, when the fuel delivery paperwork would be finished.

She had a thin folder waiting.

“Your partner gave us that contribution schedule this morning,” she said. “He asked to replace you on the berth license.”

My stomach tightened.

“Did you?”

“No. I marked the request disputed. We don't settle private title claims at this counter.”

She turned the folder toward me.

“I remembered his first visit. He wanted the business name on the berth. Your husband said something about keeping the permission separate.”

“That was four years ago.”

“Five. It was the week the office heater failed.”

Behind a renewal form, she found a copy of our original permission agreement. Attached to it was the inventory Beckett had now stopped mentioning.

My name and his were on the page. So were our initials beside the exclusions.

Hull, chamber, and berth rights excluded. Use by permission only.

There was another page I had forgotten: a short cover letter Beckett himself had sent the harbor.

The partnership requests no ownership interest in the vessel or its installed testing chamber.

“Can I have a copy?”

“You can have a certified copy of what we hold.”

She filled out the record request with me, collected the $18 copying fee, and stamped the pages. The sound was small and final.

“You remembered all that?” I asked.

“I remembered where to look.”

She put the originals back in their folder before taking another call. I waited while she explained a billing correction to someone who kept talking over her. She never raised her voice. When the call ended, the right amount was on the right account. I carried my copies out with both hands.

On the way back to Dana's office, I stopped above the floats. Rain had become wet snow, then rain again. A raven picked at a dropped glove near the parking lot.

Down on the Mercy Bell, Beckett was talking with a customer. He pointed at the door as if he had built it.

He saw me and raised his hand.

I didn't wave back. I called Dana and read her the cover letter.

By three, she had filed our request for temporary relief and sent copies to Beckett. The papers asked for access, no destruction of records, and no sale or removal of the hull or chamber while ownership was decided. They didn't ask the court to hand me every partnership tool.

At four, Beckett called.

“A lawyer? Really?”

“You sent me a property schedule.”

“You signed a lot of things. Maybe you forgot.”

“Bring the original.”

“You think a harbor clerk can save your business?”

“I think you should bring the original.”

He let out a short laugh.

“I'm offering you $8,000 to walk away. That's generous for somebody who can't handle customers.”

“Put the offer through Dana.”

“It expires tonight.”

“Then tell her tonight.”

After he hung up, I sat with my hands flat on the table. I hadn't shouted. That didn't mean I wasn't afraid.

There were customers counting days, a business account I couldn't explain, and a man with keys to everything I needed to inspect. Paper could prove a thing. It couldn't stand in a doorway by itself.

Dana called just before closing. The court had set a hearing for Friday morning by video. Beckett had received notice. We would have one day to gather sworn statements.

I called Owen first. He agreed to describe the receipts and the suits still in their bags.

Then another call came from a diver named Mara Pike.

“Beckett says he'll finish all our tests tomorrow,” she said. “He's bringing somebody down to run your chamber.”

“Who?”

“He wouldn't give me a name. He just told us to arrive at eight.”