She Paid $55 for a Sealed Farm Barrel — 24 Days Later, Everything Changed
Chapter 8
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At 10:00, a white car pulled up, and a woman in her fifties with short gray hair and a deep blue jacket stepped out with a camera case and a clipboard. Behind her came a second car, and a tall, lean man climbed out wearing a badge from the Plant Genetic Resources office and carrying a large cold case."Junie," Dr. Okonkwo said, shaking her hand like a grown woman's. "This is Daniel Reyes, a seed preservation specialist. Your second letter landed on his desk the same week I called."Cal stopped chewing sunflower seeds for a second.Dr. Okonkwo did everything slowly and out loud. She set her camera on a tripod. She read every seal number into a small recorder. Mr. Reyes checked each one against a printed list, nodding; his face gave nothing away, but Mr. Odgaard, who stood closest, said afterward that the man's hands were not quite steady.Then she turned to the girl. "Junie, it's yours. Do I have your permission to break the seals?"Every head turned. Cal stopped chewing."Yes, ma'am."She cut the first seal with her own cutters, and bagged it, and labeled it. Wendell and Mr. Reyes loosened the bolts one by one. They lifted the heavy lid off the canister and set it down on the gravel, and the people in the folding chairs leaned forward.Inside, packed in waxed paper, were twelve thick glass tubes, hermetically sealed and set in a wooden frame. Each one filled with golden wheat kernels, dry and tight, as though they had been packed yesterday. Not a drop of moisture.Tucked inside the lid was an envelope of oilcloth, and inside it, a card folded twice. Mr. Reyes read it aloud, and his voice was not quite steady either:"National Seed Bank, winter wheat variety Holden Red. Harvested 1950, sealed and stored 1951. Held for restoration should the variety be lost."He lowered the card. "Holden Red is extinct. It was the most drought-tolerant wheat this region ever had, and it disappeared in the 1960s. We've been looking for it for thirty years.""Is that good?" Junie asked.Dr. Okonkwo almost laughed. "Honey, this wheat can survive droughts that today's varieties can't. For the small farms in this valley that are losing their crops to dry summers, it could be the difference between keeping their land and losing it. A single tube that still germinates is enough to rebuild the whole region's seed, and here we have twelve tubes."