“Good.”
The older farmer muttered:
“Why is that good?”
“Because I don't want anybody getting excited before we know.”
The farm girl crossed her arms.
“You people say that a lot.”
The historian smiled.
“Occupational survival.”
He stood.
“In the 1930s through the 1950s, some orchardists maintained collections of named varieties.”
“Commercial varieties.”
“Local selections.”
“Seedlings.”
“Experimental grafts.”
“Sometimes hundreds.”
“This region had several.”
“Most disappeared.”
The girl looked toward the rows.
“You think this was one?”
“I think it may have been more than a normal production orchard.”
The specialist immediately added:
“May.”
“Yes.”
The historian nodded.
“May.”
They walked deeper.
By midday, the group had mapped seventy-eight trees.
Forty-six living.
Nine questionable.
The rest dead.
Then they found the stone wall.
It ran perpendicular to the rows beneath vines.
Behind it sat a shallow depression.
The older farmer recognized it first.
“Cold storage foundation.”
The historian crouched.
“Could be.”
Nearby, rusted iron bands.
Broken glass.
A piece of ceramic insulator.
The farm girl looked around.
“What was here?”
“Packing shed maybe.”
“Storage.”
“Nursery.”
The historian's excitement had become harder to hide.
Then the goats began bawling from the temporary pen.
The nineteen-year-old looked back.
The horticulture specialist pointed.
“Those animals are why you found this.”
“Yes.”
“They're also why you need fencing immediately.”
“I know.”
“No, I mean immediately.”
The specialist touched a young sucker.
“Goats can ring-bark a tree fast.”
The girl's expression tightened.
“How much fencing?”
“Depends how much you clear.”
“How much can I clear?”
“Slowly.”
The specialist explained.
Old trees suddenly exposed to full sun could suffer sunscald.
Heavy vine removal might break limbs.
Pruning too aggressively could shock them.
Roots could be damaged by machinery.
The farm girl listened.
Then looked at fifty acres of green.
“How long?”
“Years.”
The word landed harder than expected.
She had been imagining a season.
Maybe two.
Years.
The older farmer watched her.
Later, after the university group left, he found her sitting on a fence post.
“Disappointed?”
“No.”
“Yes.”
She glared.
He sat on another post.
“You thought you'd pull vines and start selling apples next fall.”
“Maybe.”
He smiled.
“That's called being nineteen.”
“You paid thirty thousand for a tractor with a bad transmission.”
“That was called being forty-seven.”
She laughed despite herself.
The older farmer looked toward the orchard.
“You know what you've really bought?”
“Don't say weeds.”
“Work.”
She sighed.
“Yes.”
“A lot of work.”
“Yes.”
“Possibly useless work.”
She looked at him.
He continued.
“Trees may not produce.”
“Fruit may taste terrible.”
“Diseases.”
“Market might not care.”
“Could spend five years finding out nobody wants any of it.”
She stared toward the kudzu.
“Are you trying to help?”
“Yes.”
“How?”