Cinderella in Overalls - By Carol Grace Page 0,11
the farm, not her. If he came at all. She knotted a ribbon at the end of the braid. The hairstyle was part of her new identity. Along with the skirts and shawls. But no shawl today. It was too hot.
As she walked down the path toward the potato fields, she wondered if she should mention Josh’s visit to Jacinda or anyone else. If she told them he was a banker who might lend them money, then she was setting them up for disappointment, but if she didn’t tell them, they’d think he was coming to see her. She decided not to worry about it. He might not come at all. But there was something in the air today, a hushed, expectant feeling that something was going to happen. At the edge of the field she bent over to examine the seedlings she had planted a few weeks ago.
“Come on,” she coaxed, brushing the dirt off a leaf. “Let’s see some progress here. Higher. Reach up and touch the sky.’’ She raised her voice to include the entire field, then stood on tiptoe and spread her arms to demonstrate the technique to the budding potato plants.
Hearing footsteps, she whirled around like a dancer with arms outstretched. There he was in faded jeans and a plaid shirt rolled above the elbows. She dropped her arms and watched him approach, knowing he’d seen her pirouetting among the plants, hoping he hadn’t heard her talking to them.
In seconds he was at her side, grinning at her. “Don’t let me interrupt. You were saying?’’
She blushed. “It’s a well-known method, talking to plants. They need encouragement just like people.”
He folded his arms across his chest. “Does it work?”
“If you’re sincere.” She studied him, looking for some sign of sincerity on his part. Did he really want to see the farm? He’d caught her talking to the plants, which put her on the defensive. Now she had to show him how seriously she took her job.
“These are the experimental potatoes I was telling you about.” She paused. “The day I came to your office to ask for the loan.”
“Oh, yes. The ones that take up less space and produce a higher yield in a shorter time.”
She nodded. He did remember. He bent over to rub some soil between his fingers. She knelt down next to him and sunk her hands into the loose, rich earth.
“Look at this. Isn’t it beautiful? I wish I could take credit for these potatoes, but anything will grow here. Put a twig in the earth, and the next week you’ve got a rosebush. Throw an apple core out the window, and the next year there’s a tree. What we wouldn’t give for two feet of this stuff in California.”
His knees next to hers in the dirt, he turned to face her. “So that’s where Tranquility is.”
“It’s in the Central Valley,” she explained. “You won’t find it on a map of the world.” She stood and walked slowly, looking for aphids between rows of plants.
“Is that why you left—to find better soil?” he asked.
“Yes. We had a drought back home for the past three years. And I’d learned a lot I wanted to try out. But we lost our farm. There was nothing to stay for.”
“No one to stay for, either?”
“No one,” she said firmly. “Do you always interview your loan applicants so thoroughly?” she asked with her hands on her hips.
“It always helps to know their background.” He walked on ahead between rows of plants, then stood with his feet wide apart in the rich black earth and looked up at the cloudless blue sky. Sun shone on his strong features. She studied the shape of his nose, his firm jaw and his mouth, remembering that he’d almost kissed her once on the Fourth of July.
“And you,” she said, “what made you want to be a banker?”
He paused only a second. “Money and security. Both of which were in short supply when I was growing up. My father was a jack-of-all-trades, and he failed at most of them. He was always looking for something. Unfortunately he never found it. I knew there had to be a better way to support a family.”
A family? Catherine’s mind reeled. She had never considered the possibility that Josh had a family to support. But, in fact, many families stayed home rather than adjust to the altitude and the language. She walked toward him slowly, her eyes on the plants.
“How is your family?” she asked. What