He was polite. That was the first thing I noticed. He shook my hand. He shook Dad’s hand. He called Dad “sir.”
He carried a clipboard.
“Mr. Lindqvist,” he said. “Thanks for meeting with me. I’m sorry to bother you.”
“No bother,” Dad said. “You want some coffee?”
Tyler blinked. I don’t think anyone had ever offered him coffee on an inspection.
“Uh. No, thank you, sir. I’m all right.”
“Suit yourself.”
Tyler walked the edges of the garden. He took pictures with his phone. He measured things. He wrote on his clipboard. Dad walked beside him, quiet, his hands in his overall pockets.
I followed behind them, ready to fight.
At one point, Tyler stopped at the end of the tomato rows. He just stood there for a minute, looking at them. Three hundred plants, every one of them staked and caged and tied with strips of old bedsheet. Not a single yellow leaf. Not a single weed.
