I built on it instead. I have been there for 4 months. I have built a cabin, planted a garden, and had a child there." The witness to the transfer was a resident of this territory by every standard this office applies. She looked at Dunar once briefly and then back at Aldrich. Mr.
Dunar filed his claim 3 weeks after I broke ground. He knows the settlement was active when he filed it. He is hoping this office will give him something a court would not. She paused. I am asking you not to.
Aldrich held her eyes for a moment. Then he wrote something down. The pen moved for longer than a single note required and she watched it move and did not allow herself to interpret what that meant. The hearing ran another 20 minutes, mostly procedural. Vance pushing on two remaining points.
Garrett answering both and then Aldrich said he would issue a determination within 2 weeks and did not indicate which direction it would go. He closed the session with the professional neutrality of a man who had made his decision and was not going to give it away early, which she understood and respected, even as it cost her something to accept. In the hallway outside, Vance spoke quietly to Dunar, and Dunar looked at Clara once with the expression of a man who had done his calculation and did not entirely like the result. Then they left. Garrett shook her hand.
"You did well," he said. The photographs were the right thing. Yes, she said. She looked at Amos, who was standing slightly behind her right shoulder. They were.
He looked back at her without the performance of innocence she had half expected. You could have told me about them, she said. You would have argued about whether they were necessary. They were necessary. I know, he said.
That's why I didn't tell you. She looked at him for a moment. There was no good response to that and he knew it which was evident from the very careful and very small thing that happened in his face. Buy me supper, she said, and then we're going home. The thing in his face happened again.