The picker was another matter. One drive chain had rusted. The gearbox needed attention. A tire had a cut along its sidewall. Ellis stood before the equipment, hands on his hips, and shook his head. "We can make this safe enough to test with proper guards and repairs. We cannot make it new."
"How long?"
"Longer if you rush me."
Hollis looked at the sky. A sharp edge of blue remained beneath the cloud bank, but beyond it the west looked bruised and heavy. The weather service had warned of a powerful system approaching by early morning, possibly bringing damaging wind, intense rain, and localized hail. If the storm flattened the corn, modern combines would struggle to recover the downed stalks; the old picker might be nearly useless in parts of the field. She felt time squeezing around the barn.
"Okay," she said. "Tell me what to do first."
Ellis gave her a grease gun and pointed toward the tractor. "Start by finding every fitting your father circled in red. Then tell me what you see."
They worked for two hours. Hollis moved between machinery and phone calls, tightening a clamp, speaking to the bank, fetching a work light, listening to a grain buyer explain receiving hours, and asking the neighbor about available wagons. At dusk, the neighbor arrived carrying sandwiches and a printed weather forecast. His name was Wes Calder, a lean man with kind eyes and a permanent crease across his forehead from years of squinting across fields. He had finished his own soybeans and was preparing to start corn the next day.
"I can spare a combine after dark," he said, "if the ground will carry it. But one machine won't save the whole crop."
"I know."
"I'm calling two people. Don't say no before I ask."
Hollis wanted to object. She was already calculating what hiring custom equipment would cost and which bills might have to wait if she paid drivers and fuel. Wes read her expression. "We're not negotiating in the mud," he said. "Let people tell you what they can offer. You can work out fair terms in the morning."
"I don't want charity."
"Then don't call it charity. Call it neighbors trying to keep food in the elevators and farms operating. Your father helped me through a flood when I couldn't repay him. He didn't ask for collateral."
Her throat tightened. "He never told me."