“Good,” Aldine said, the wind and her heart so loud she could barely hear her own voice. A rush of wind sent a tremble and moan through the barn. She could feel the pressure of her other boot through her knit stockings, the uneven wood of the sawhorse beneath her hands and legs. She tried not to look at him. The things she’d been hoping to ask this man—what Clare would do next by way of schooling, whether Neva was more than routinely sick, whether the other children, too, would catch it, and, the one big question, whether there had been any news regarding her unpaid wages—all fell silent within her.
Mr. Price cleaned the boot with a rag dipped in rubbing alcohol, took pains brushing the glue onto the sole and heel, then pressed the two back together. He set the boot on the bench and slid a small sledgehammer into the boot for weight. He pressed down on the hammer, which gathered his body into something more condensed and muscular.
Through clenched teeth he said, “I think you might be worried about your salary.”
Something in her went out to him, thinking of her when things were so bad for his own self.
“A bit, surely,” she said.
Mr. Price grimaced and shook his head but looked at her only momentarily. “I’m sorry. Do you need money for anything? I mean, in particular?”
“No,” Aldine lied. She needed postage stamps and something for the dryness of her skin and every kind of underthing, but she wasn’t going to mention that. He’d turned aside, was tightening the lid on the glue, and she glanced again at the book lying open there. She wished she could paint. It was the kind of soft illumination and exalted image someone should paint.
“You don’t have to stay,” Mr. Price said. He did not look at her. He was arranging things in the cupboard. “Working without pay—it’s not fair to you, and you’re under no obligation.”
“But who would teach them?” She closed her eyes, listened to the wind, thought of the book there.
“I suppose they’d find someone,” Ansel said gruffly. He didn’t know why he said “they.” Probably he’d not be a part of the school board after this. He thought the music and poetry Aldine brought to the class were wonderful, perfect, exactly what these children needed, but Josephson complained without end that Emmeline was receiving poor preparation for high school. Ansel moved slightly so that he stood now in front of the book, which was almost as foolish as bringing the damned book out in the first place. When he glanced at the girl, she seemed to be opening her eyes and he wondered why she might have had them closed, and for how long. She said, “But we’ve worked so hard on the Winter Entertainment.” Her eyes rose to his. “I couldna’ go now.”
Ansel lifted the boot a little and studied it. “Probably should have tacked it first. The glue might not be enough.” He searched some boxes, found particular tacks that suited him, and knocked them in with quick, efficient taps of a hammer. “It needs to dry for twenty minutes,” he said. “Do you want to wait here?”
Did he want her to? Should she, if he did? Or was he merely being kind, thinking about the discomfort of walking through the cold wind in the clarty chicken yard with only one boot? She mumbled about needing to study up for the geography lesson she was teaching tomorrow, make sure she knew the capital of South Dakota.
“Pierre,” he said.
“What?” she asked.
“It’s Pierre, South Dakota.”
Embarrassed, she nodded, and withdrew the book from her bag. “You see my need.”
As she stared at her book, Ansel walked over to the tractor and began fiddling with the carburetor. A problem with the air valve was what he thought, because it almost always came down to the dust. He damped a cloth with kerosene and began clearing the dirt and sludge. He toggled the choke, wondered about taking it down to the vapor control. He dared not look at the girl. He kept thinking of her but he dared not look. Time passed, the wind moaned and slapped and tugged, and once or twice Aldine’s book crinkled under her fingers as she turned a page. Once, amidst the whuffing and creaking, he thought he heard a sound from the stalls, something other than the normal whisking of rodents. He peered into the darkness, but nothing stirred, and when he glanced over at Artemis, always alert to out-of-the-way sounds, the dog continued to sleep. And then before he could stop himself, he was looking at the girl, sitting on the stool in the firelight, with her thin legs extended. It seemed to him a scene from another century, a time when the convergence of warmth and reading and a lovely young girl and an old dog might suggest the simplest, purest pleasure that a planet had to offer. She did not look up and he let his eyes settle on her as he had never before, until at last she shifted just slightly and shot through him an alarm almost electrical, and he went straight back to work. He tapped free dust from the vapor control, cleaned it, and had nearly completed the reassembly when he saw her stand finally and walk over to the boot.
“It looks dry,” she said.
Mr. Price wiped his hands with a rag and stood up, and as he approached did not look at her but kept his eyes narrowly on the boot. He had written the note. She was sure of it. The arrow that had pointed to Clare had all at once changed course. It was aimed now at him. Mr. Price. Which changed its nature entirely, made it more than a boyish notion.
“Do you think it would be better if I went to board somewhere else?” she asked suddenly. Not that she knew who’d take her. Not the Josephsons. Not the Wrights. Perhaps funny old Mrs. Odekirk, who kissed her on the cheek at church and kept asking if Aldine was enjoying her time here. People said Mrs. Odekirk had another house in Emporia that she rented to a doctor, which was why she was so well off. “I could ask Mrs. Odekirk.”
“No,” Ansel said, with more force than he expected. But he knew why the vehemence. He had done nothing wrong, and he would do nothing wrong. She needn’t run away.
Aldine lowered her eyes and raised them in a long slow blink. She leaned against the sawhorse and poked her foot down hard into the boot, which seemed too small now that her foot had thawed. She struggled with it for a moment and then he said, “Let me help.”
She meant to say no, but before she could say anything at all, he was kneeling down in front of her and she was looking down at his thick shoulders, his long narrowing back, his wavy head of hair. She had been lonely and homesick for a long time, and something in his tone when he said no was echoing inside her. That he should want her there—that anyone should want her—flooded her with strange thoughts, and he seemed, as he knelt there, to be as full of longing as she was. The boot slipped over her heel, and Mr. Price began to tighten the laces, slowly and firmly. She felt herself trembling and willed herself to stop. She wouldn’t come near him again—she couldn’t, not after this.
“How’s that?” he asked lightly, but when he looked up at her, he failed to make himself look away from her mouth and eyes. It was like permitting himself a drink of water after days of thirst. He didn’t move, but kept his hand on the top of her foot.