A white city car turned onto the gravel drive, and Uncle Dales face went gray, because the inspector was coming about Harold Ness, the dead master plumber whose license Dale had been pulling permits under for seven years.
For five years Dale used me as free labor and told me I would never pass without his license behind me. This time the truth came from a master plumber, because Mr. Andersen needed a copy of my apprentice card and looked at the numbers.
What Mr. Andersen found was that my uncle had been pulling city permits under a license number two digits off from mine, a number that belonged to a master plumber named Harold Ness who died in 2017, which meant Dale had been running an unlicensed operation under a dead mans credentials for seven years while I did the actual work.
The stack of permit copies in my spare bag proved it. Mr. Andersen pulled the city database, matched the dead mans number to Dales permits, and knew the inspector had to be told.
Dale dumped every tool I owned into the septic tank he was pumping and told me to go fishing for it. He did not know the inspector was already coming. His face went gray when the city car turned in, before I said the name.
Tyler asked who Harold Ness was. Dale did not answer.
I drove off with my spare tools, and the next morning I passed my journeyman exam, because Dale could drown a tool bag but not five years of the work I did with it.
I am a licensed journeyman plumber now, hired on with Mr. Andersen. Dales permits under a dead mans license are with the city and the state, on paper, where you will never pass without me does not help him.
The customers whose homes Dale worked on under Harold Nesss name are being looked after, which matters more to me than what happens to Dale.
Why is he pulling permits under a dead mans license, Mr. Andersen asked. Seven years of them, it turned out. And Dales face went gray before the inspectors car finished pulling in, because the one number he thought no one would check told on him.