Chapter 18: Fire Hazard
When Officer Burnham announced that the pavilion had to be cleared by five o’clock, the words moved through the wedding party like a cold front.
“Five,” he said, pointing toward the chairs and tables. “Everything out. If it’s still here, I start writing citations and taking names.”
Rowan stared at him. “Under what ordinance?”
“I’m not here to debate local law with you.”
“I’m not debating. I’m asking which law you’re enforcing.”
Burnham glanced at Candace. “There’s a public-safety complaint. We need the area cleared while we handle it.”
“Then handle the complaint,” Rowan said. “You’re looking at a reservation approved by the town.”
Casey stood behind Burnham with the notebook open. He had seen the Parks notice. His first instinct had been to check the online calendar, which required no special access. He tried to say so.
“Sir, the Parks calendar may still be available. I can verify the—”
“It’s Saturday,” Burnham interrupted. “Nobody is at Parks. Put the phone away and manage the crowd.”
The younger officer closed his mouth. He had only been with the department for two days. He told himself the delay was temporary, that once the call was cleared he could ask his questions and make the report accurate. That was how hesitation became complicity: not through one grand decision, but through a string of small promises to act later.
Candace heard the deadline and brightened. Five o’clock. It was conveniently the exact time Bethany had been waiting for the honor guard, although Candace did not know that. She heard only a uniformed man making the boundary she had imagined into something apparently official.
“You heard him,” she told her viewers. “The pavilion is ours again at five.”
She walked toward the flowers. Mrs. Ingram had arranged cedar branches around glass holders with battery candles, a cautious substitute for the real flames she liked. Candace picked up a branch and waved it toward Burnham.
“Officer, this is a fire hazard. Dry greenery and candles all over the place.”
Mrs. Ingram came forward. “Those are fresh cut. I picked them up at six this morning. The candles are electric.”
Candace dropped the branch. “Then they’ll burn more slowly.”
She swept a handful of flowers off the table. A glass holder rolled across the wood and bounced onto the sand without breaking. The younger guests flinched. Alma stepped forward, one hand pressed against her chest.
“Stop touching our things,” she said.
“I’m clearing a hazard,” Candace replied.
Rowan turned to Burnham. “Officer, she’s destroying property in front of you.”
Burnham answered without looking at the fallen flowers. “She’s trying to keep the area safe. You were told to pack up.”
The sentence changed the atmosphere more than the scattered flowers. It told the wedding guests that their property could be handled, damaged, and removed without objection as long as the person doing it had the right relationship with the uniform.
Pastor Quimby rose slowly from her chair. She had seen the earlier insults, the torn reservation, the handcuffs on Quentin. Now she walked toward Candace, her purple hat bobbing with each step.
“You’ve had your fun with the flowers,” she said. “You will not stand over my nephew with a camera.”
Candace turned. “Go sit on your bus.”
“I’ll sit where I like. I’ve paid taxes in this county for forty years.”
“Then you paid for those handcuffs. Enjoy them.”
Pastor Quimby looked at Quentin. He sat with his shoulders held still, carefully protecting his pride from the crowd’s attention. The pastor could see the boy who had carried her grocery bags home one winter when she hurt her ankle, the teenager who wired the new lights at the church, the man who had volunteered to be responsible for six ceremonial sabers because he wanted his sister’s wedding to go well.
