“Double, then.”
That made her look at him.
Marcus had laughed when she bought Thorn’s Folly for back taxes.
Now, less than twenty-four hours after the stone opened, he was offering twice her money for the same useless ground.
Elspeth leaned one shoulder against the new frame.
“No.”
His pleasant expression vanished.
“Don’t be foolish twice.”
“You seemed to enjoy it the first time.”
He walked away angry.
That afternoon the old neighbor woman returned with another loaf of bread.
She stood over the open well for a long time.
“I wondered if it was still here,” she said.
Elspeth turned sharply.
“You knew?”
“Not where.
Not exactly.”
The woman sat on a flat rock while The General investigated her skirt pockets for food.
She pushed his nose away.
“When I was little, old people talked about a spring well somewhere on this ground.
Before my time, this wasn’t all brush.
There were grazing paths through here.
Then nobody kept them open, storms moved soil, thorn came in, and the place swallowed itself.”
“Why didn’t anyone tell me?”
The woman gave her a dry look.
“Most people in Redemption don’t listen to old women unless we’re telling them supper is ready.”
Finn laughed.
Elspeth didn’t.
She was thinking about Marcus.
“Did the Thornes know?”
The woman shrugged.
“Marcus grew up here.
He heard what everyone heard.
Whether he believed it is another matter.”
That answer was less dramatic than a conspiracy and more useful than one.
Marcus had not necessarily hidden the well from Elspeth.
He had simply mocked a piece of land he considered worthless until someone else uncovered the possibility that it wasn’t.
His sudden interest made sense now.
So did his pale face.
The next problem was whether the well could actually supply enough water to matter.
One bucket proved almost nothing.
Elspeth knew better than to build dreams on a single lucky pull.
For three days she and Finn drew water at measured intervals.
They filled barrels.
They watered the goats.
Elspeth marked the water level along the rope and checked it again after hours of use.
The well recovered.
Slowly, steadily, invisibly.
Cold water kept returning.
She began clearing a small patch below the hill.
The goats had already stripped away the worst brush.
Finn helped drag branches into piles.
Elspeth worked the soil with a borrowed hoe until blisters formed beneath her older blisters.
She planted only a little at first.
Enough to test the ground.
The first green shoots looked absurdly fragile against sixty acres of hostile country.
