She looked at her father.
“He already did this.”
Her father touched the paper.
“Part of it.”
“Why did you forget?”
“I was seventeen when they stopped using it.”
“Why stop?”
“Electric pump went in by the creek.”
The girl stared.
“So the new system replaced the old.”
“Yes.”
“And then the new system failed because the creek dried.”
Her father laughed softly.
“That appears to be what happened.”
The Farm Girl looked at the rusty pipes outside.
“Grandpa said not to throw useful iron away.”
Her father’s eyes filled.
“I remember.”
That evening, they walked to the reservoir.
The sun set red across Kansas.
The Farmer Father sat on the embankment.
His daughter beside him.
“You saved the field.”
She shook her head.
“Not yet.”
“You gave it a chance.”
“That’s different.”
“Yes.”
He looked at her.
“Do you know why I laughed when you brought home those pipes?”
She nodded.
“You thought it was stupid.”
“No.”
She looked surprised.
“I thought I couldn’t survive hoping.”
The girl did not understand completely.
He tried again.
“Every week, I thought maybe rain would come.”
He looked toward the sky.
“Then maybe prices would improve.”
“Maybe the bank would wait.”
“Maybe something would break our way.”
He picked up a stone.
“At some point hope started hurting more than expecting the worst.”
His daughter listened.
“So when you brought scrap home…”
“I thought if I believed you and it failed, I’d have to lose the farm twice.”
The girl looked at him.
“Once before it happened.”
He nodded.
“And once when it did.”
She thought.
“Did Grandpa ever think like that?”
Her father smiled.
“Your grandfather believed everything could be fixed with baling wire.”
“Could it?”
“No.”
The girl smiled.
“Most things?”
“Too many.”
They sat quietly.
Then she asked, “Are we going to lose the farm?”
Her father answered honestly.
“I don’t know.”
She nodded.
Better than pretending.
The irrigation worked.
But the drought had already taken too much.
Nearly thirty acres were too damaged to recover.
Another fifteen might produce almost nothing.
The best twenty acres improved.
Green returned slowly.
Pods developed.
The extension agent warned them not to expect miracles.
“No system can replace the six weeks they already lost.”
The Farmer Father nodded.
The Farm Girl asked, “Can we save seed?”
The agent looked toward her.
“For next year?”
“Yes.”
“Probably.”
That mattered.
But the bank deadline remained.
Two weeks.
Seven thousand eight hundred dollars.
The Farmer Father began calling grain buyers.
Projected yield still looked short.
One evening, the same Neighbor Farmer who first mocked the girl arrived alone.
He carried an envelope.
The Farmer Father met him near the barn.
“What’s this?”
“Don’t make it strange.”