“Even if the parcel is separate, she still owes me.
Thirty days means thirty days.”
“That is true,” Ezra said.
Silas straightened, recovering some color.
“Then this spectacle changes nothing.”
Calla looked toward the second locked box.
“Open that one,” she said.
Ezra used a larger iron key.
Inside were cloth sacks filled with dark soil, six glass jars, and a report bearing the county seal.
The soil agent, Dr.
Nathan Cole, stepped forward.
He was a narrow man with wire spectacles and mud on both knees from examining the field.
“I took samples at twelve points,” he said.
“The topsoil averages more than three feet deep.
It is river-fed silt over a gravel drainage bed.
The ridge protected it from the worst floods, and the years of heavy grass restored the ground rather than exhausting it.”
Clyde crossed his arms.
“Speak plain.”
Nathan lifted one jar toward the light.
“This is the best unbroken agricultural soil I have tested in the county.
Properly cleared and planted, the parcel could yield nearly twice what the Birch upland produces.”
The farmers stopped whispering.
They knew what that meant.
Calla’s rocky fields had kept her alive, but they had never made her prosperous.
The eastern parcel was different.
Its black earth crumbled between the fingers.
Water stood close enough for irrigation but drained through gravel beneath.
The grass growing there was so thick that a man had to turn sideways to force a path through it.
Clyde stared across the field as if he could already see his own name on it.
“I’ll give you four thousand dollars for the parcel,” he said.
Several men laughed before they could stop themselves.
Clyde’s jaw tightened.
“Cash.
Today.
Enough to clear the bank note and leave something besides.”
Calla looked at Nathan.
“What did you estimate the field was worth?”
“Uncleared, with legal access restored? At least twelve thousand.
More once production is established.”
Clyde’s face reddened.
Silas pulled him aside, but their voices carried.
“Be quiet,” the banker hissed.
“You told me the whole farm would be mine for the balance of the note,” Clyde said.
The crowd fell still.
Calla turned toward them.
Silas glanced around too late.
His private arrangement had stepped into daylight.
Clyde had been waiting for Calla to default because Silas had promised him the property at a price far below its true value.
That explained the banker’s impatience, the repeated warnings, and the refusal to extend Calla’s note even after two respectable farmers offered to guarantee part of it.
Ezra closed the soil report.
“Mr.
Vane, did you negotiate the resale of mortgaged property before foreclosure proceedings had begun?”
“That is none of your concern.”
“It may concern the banking examiner.”
Silas reached into his coat and pulled out the foreclosure notice.
