Page 70 of The Lonely Road

He sighs like a man accepting help he doesn’t want to accept. “Yeah. You’re looking for the Hendricks parcel records—anything from 1934 forward. They’ll be in a folder marked H or possibly Hen or possibly not marked at all.” He waves a hand upward. “The ledgers on the left side of the attic are organized. Everything else is a situation.”

No shit!

“Understood.”

“Take the flashlight off the hook by the stairs.” He’s already turning back to Feig. “And don’t touch the Christmas cards. Those are also organized.”

Of course they are!

I take the flashlight.

I go up.

The attic is accessed by a wooden staircase that protests every step with the conviction of what it’s been doing for a long time. The space above is low-ceilinged and dusty and contains approximately fifty years of water court filings, ditch company correspondence, delivery logs, and what appears to be a complete collection of every issue of the Colorado Water Newsletter from 1967 to 1994.

It smells like old paper and a previous century.

I first find what I need to for Feig, which takes a good thirty minutes and a whole lot of luck. And then, because I’ve done my research and I know that Cottonwood provides water to most ranches in Wildflower Canyon, I look for another file: S for Silverbell Ranch or W for Whitman.

I find it in the third stack I go through, which is either luck or the instinct that fifteen years of finding things in places they shouldn’t be has given me. A manila folder, unlabeled, tucked between a 1978 water court filing and what appears to be a Christmas card from someone named Earl.

Inside are delivery logs from 2019 and 2020. Jeb’s handwriting is cramped and mostly legible. Water orders and headgate times, property by property, down the north valley corridor.

And there, in the 2020 log, a notation in the margin. Jeb’s hand again.

Tom Reyes—N. pasture via Whitman upper gate—neighbor arrangement—Deke sick—no share transfer.

Three words that will hold up in a motion. No share transfer. Jeb documented it the way he documents everything—as fact, without editorializing, because water is water and facts are facts and you write down what happened regardless of whether anyone will ever need to know.

I photograph the page with my phone. Both pages. The cover sheet of the log has Jeb’s name and the year. The notation.

Then I put the folder back exactly where I found it and go downstairs, feeling like a thief.

I hand over the historical flow data for the rodeo land to Jeb. They continue to talk as they were while I stand in the doorway, look at the annotated maps on the corkboard, and feel the weight of my phone in my pocket.

The Tom Reyes notation is not the killing blow. It’s confirmation of what I already knew—the informal water transfer during the years Deke Whitman was sick.

Change of use.

Arguable abandonment of the north pasture. It’s ammunition, if not a guaranteed verdict.

I decide, standing in Jeb Cottonwood’s equipment shed looking at fifty years of water history, that this is what I give Jessup if I give him anything, and only if he agrees to keep Trafton out of the picture.

I tell myself this is a strategy.

I know it’s something else—it’s how I feel about Taya, even if I don’t want to accept it.

I call Jessup from the truck while Feig is inside saying goodbye, which will take another ten minutes because Feig’s goodbyes are structural and endless with a lot of, “oh, and” extensions.

He answers on the second ring.

“Mason.”

“I’ve found something on the Whitman case.”

“Tell me.”

“There’s documented evidence of informal water use on an adjacent parcel after the husband died. No formal share transfer. Potential change-of-use argument for your Texas team.”