Black Single Dad Went Looking for Work on a Farm — He Didn't Know a Millionaire Would Make Him Rich
Chapter 11
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The lost hour came back to haunt him almost at once. By 4:30, the wind had shifted. It came down off the western ridge in long, cool gusts that flattened the grass and carried the smell of rain. The clouds that should have arrived tomorrow afternoon were already rolling over North Mountain, dark and heavy, their bellies flickering with distant lightning. The storm had moved faster than anyone had forecast.Luke looked at the sky, then at the field. More than a third of the windrows were still lying on the ground.He did not waste time cursing; he simply worked faster. He stopped walking between bales and started jogging. He stopped lifting one bale at a time and started hooking two, one in each hand, swinging them onto the wagon with a grunt that came all the way up from his stomach.At the bank barn, he fed bales onto the elevator as fast as the belt could carry them, then climbed into the loft and stacked them eight high along the western wall, exactly as Clare had asked. The twine cut through the calluses on his palms; by 5:00, his hands were bleeding. He wrapped them in strips torn from his bandana and kept going.His shoulders burned. His lower back screamed every time he bent. Hay dust caked the sweat on his neck and arms until he looked like he had been dipped in green flour. His legs began to shake on the wagon steps, but he never skipped a trip to the white oak. Every half hour, he still walked to the shade, handed Toby the water jug, and smiled like nothing in the world was wrong.Then he walked back to the field and the smile disappeared.At a quarter to five, Clare came down from the porch and met him at the bank barn. She was holding her phone, and her face was tight."That was the bank," she said. "Gordon Pierce, the vice president at Valley Farm Credit. He wants me in his office in Harrisonburg at 6:00 tonight. He says the loan committee is reviewing my file in the morning, and if I'm not there, they'll proceed without me."Luke wiped his face with his forearm. "On a Friday evening?""That's what I said." Clare looked toward the ridge, where the first gray curtains of rain were sweeping over the far pastures. "It feels like someone wants me off this property. But if I don't go, I could lose the loan. And if I lose the loan, I lose all of it." She hesitated, looking at the field, at the half-loaded wagon, at the bloody bandana wrapped around his hand."Go," Luke said. "The hay will be in when you get back."Clare studied his face for a long moment. Then she nodded. "Your pay will be waiting at the house when I get back," she said. "I promise."