Carthage wakes slowly around its courthouse square, the light coming up red through the pines before the first pickup rolls down Shelbyville Street. Apex Lawn Service puts the mowers into that early cool, when the St. Augustine is still holding dew and the cut comes off clean. Mowing, edging, trimming along the walks and drives, and every clipping blown back off the concrete before the crew moves on. By the time the heat settles over Panola County, the yards are finished and the walks are bare. It is ordinary work, kept up week by week, in a town that notices.