Chapter 19: The Empty Centers

Arthur Lindqvist called at eight twelve Thursday morning to complain that the Ashwood Foundation had no respect for cartography. Su put him on speaker. "Good morning to you too." Across their shared desk, Hollis lowered his coffee. "Is disrespecting maps a crime now?" "It should be," Lindqvist said. "They have offended scale, chronology, and several innocent colors." His voice had the dry rasp of a man who spent his days arguing with dead surveyors. Close to sixty, Lindqvist ran Title and Abstract from two rooms above a Harbor Street locksmith. His clerk, Mara Keene, was at the county archive pulling older plats. "You found something," Su said. "Eleven somethings." Paper shifted near his phone. "They don't buy the center. They buy around it. Alleys, access parcels, subsurface rights. Different holding companies, different years, Ashwood at the top." "What sits in the middle?" Hollis asked. "Something they don't own." An email…