If she spent the money and the drought came and the system worked, she would have a harvest when no one else in the valley did. If she did nothing and the drought came, she would lose the crop anyway. She would lose the money she'd saved because it wouldn't be enough to replace the harvest. She might lose the claim. She looked at those four options for a moment.
Then she said, "I'll need to go to my place and get the money. I'll be back within the hour." "I'll be here," Rafael said, which was a practical statement and not a promise. She was back in 40 minutes. What she didn't know until she came around the corner of the freight building and saw him standing near the door was that Silas Ward had arrived while she was gone.
He was the kind of man who occupied a space without announcing himself, not quiet exactly, but settled. She knew him by sight and by reputation, which were two different things in a valley this size. He had a ranch on the other side of the arroyo, ran cattle, had once run more of them before a bad stretch she'd heard only partial accounts of. His wife had gone east before Evie arrived in the valley and had died there of something nobody specified when they mentioned it, which was how you knew it was something they felt tender about. So, he was 34 and looked like someone who had stopped being surprised by difficulty without becoming indifferent to it.
He waited until she had counted out her money on the freight counter and received her receipt. "Miss Mercer." His voice carried without effort. "You know what you're spending."
"I do." She kept her eyes on the receipt making sure the amount was correct. "If this doesn't work, then I'll have learned something expensive." She looked up. He was watching her with the particular expression of a man who has a point and is deciding how hard to push it.
"I appreciate the concern," she said. "It's genuinely noted." He held her look for a moment. Then he stepped aside to let her pass.
By the time she had arranged transport for the crates, word had reached the other end of the settlement. It traveled the way news traveled in Dry Willow Valley, fast and with additions. By the time the story came back to her that evening, it had grown to include a Mexican brochure she'd never seen, a mystical spacing pattern she hadn't designed, and the strong implication that she had lost her judgment along with her winter reserve. She heard the version and found it nearly impressive in its departure from what had actually happened. Hiram Bell had already begun warming up his material.
He was outside Walton's Mercantile the next morning when she came back to the freight yard to confirm the loading time, and he had brought an audience with him. Three or four men with nothing urgent on their Wednesday morning, arranged at the approximate angle of spectators at something worth watching. "Look, there she is," he said, loud enough for everyone.