There it was.
Financing.
Della looked toward the old notebook sitting on a side table.
Her father hated unnecessary debt.
He believed debt itself was not evil.
Debt that removed choice was.
Richard slid the contract forward.
“Read it.”
“I will.”
“Have counsel review it.”
“I will.”
“You could pay every debt.”
Della looked at him.
“You researched that.”
“It’s responsible due diligence.”
“How much do I owe?”
Richard hesitated.
“Roughly two hundred twenty thousand remaining across land and operations.”
Her mother’s expression hardened.
Della smiled without warmth.
“Very responsible.”
Richard did not apologize.
“You’d be financially secure.”
Della looked around the kitchen.
Same cabinets since 1997.
Scratch in the table from when she dropped a cast-iron skillet at fourteen.
Her father’s coffee mug still hanging beside the sink.
Financial security sounded good.
Very good.
No bank calls.
No equipment panic.
No choosing between pump repair and seed deposits.
One-point-eight million.
She could breathe.
She asked:
“Can I continue using it here?”
“Yes.”
“Can neighboring farms copy it?”
“Not without licensing.”
There.
Della closed the folder.
“No.”
Richard stared.
“You haven’t read the contract.”
“I read enough.”
“You should think carefully.”
“I have.”
“This is emotional.”
Della smiled.
“People keep saying that when I make decisions they dislike.”
“I mean no insult.”
“I know.”
She pushed the folder back.
“My father wanted this cheap.”
“You cannot know what he would want commercially.”
Della looked toward the notebooks.
“Yes, I can.”
That night she opened every one.
Sixteen notebooks.
Twenty-three years.
Most had nothing to do with fish.
Calving records from years before cattle were sold.
Tractor repairs.
Weather.
Cotton varieties.
Family notes.
One page contained Della’s height at age twelve for no obvious reason.
Another recorded the day she first drove a tractor alone.
“Dell drove straight enough. Terrified the mailbox.”
She laughed.
Then she found what she needed.
Notebook fourteen.
Inside the back cover.
Thomas had written:
If this ever works, do not let someone put a gate around it.
Farmers already pay too many people for permission to keep farming.
Keep the design simple.
Let people improve it.
Charge for labor if you build one.
Charge for parts.
Make a living.
But don’t charge someone for the right to understand it.
Della sat at the kitchen table for a long time.
Then cried again.
Her father had been dead nearly a year.
Yet there he was.
Arguing with corporations from a notebook.
The next morning, Della called Naomi.
“I want to publish.”
“What?”
“The system.”
Naomi paused.
“Are you sure?”
“No.”
“Good.”
Della smiled.
“I want proper trials first.”
“Yes.”
“Multiple farms.”
“Yes.”
“Different soils.”
“Yes.”
“Different crops maybe.”
“Yes.”
“Containment standards.”
“Absolutely.”
“Environmental safeguards.”