“Because I’m standing here.”
Clara stared.
“Your goats are thin because the county is in drought.”
“They’re medically stable.”
“You are feeding hay.”
“You’re providing minerals.”
“You introduced produce conservatively.”
“You’re monitoring.”
“This is adaptive feeding, not neglect.”
Clara exhaled.
Hannah added:
“But somebody wants pressure on you.”
“I know.”
That evening Dwight returned.
Alone.
No contract folder.
He parked beside the driveway and walked toward the barn.
Clara met him before he reached the gate.
“You need something?”
“I heard you found an old cistern.”
So much for secrecy.
“Fast county.”
Dwight smiled.
“Water is everybody’s business this summer.”
“Mine is still mine.”
“Depends.”
The word chilled her.
“On?”
“Water law.”
Clara folded her arms.
“You suddenly an attorney?”
“No.”
“But old stock-water structures can create complicated rights.”
“How would you know mine is old?”
Dwight realized the mistake.
Small.
But there.
Clara saw.
He smiled again.
“Everything on Whitmore Ridge is old.”
“Not the cap someone glued onto the spring line.”
His face did not move.
That frightened her more.
“What cap?”
“You tell me.”
“Clara.”
“1998.”
Now his eyes changed.
She continued.
“My mother wrote your name.”
Silence.
The goats moved behind her.
A watermelon rind dropped against the trough.
Dwight looked toward the barn.
Then back.
“Your mother wrote lots of things.”
“So you remember?”
“I remember Miriam.”
“Did you ask to buy Section 12?”
He smiled.
“Twenty-eight years ago?”
“Yes.”
“I might have.”
“Why?”
“Land.”
“That useless corner?”
The phrase came directly from Miriam’s notebook.
Dwight’s expression tightened.
“Your mother and I had disagreements.”
“What kind?”
“Business.”
“You were twenty-four.”
“My father handled the business.”
“But she wrote your name.”
Dwight stepped closer.
Not threatening.
Just enough to make the air change.
“Be careful building stories from dead people’s notebooks.”
Clara stared.
“Why?”
“Because dead people can’t clarify.”
“No.”
She smiled without warmth.
“They also can’t change what they wrote.”
Dwight’s jaw hardened.
Then he looked toward the ranch.
“I’ll give you three hundred twenty thousand.”
Clara blinked.
“What?”
“For the property.”