‘Oh, I’m sure,’ said Peter. ‘But meanwhile we’ve been taking pledges from industry. So far today we’ve chalked up nearly three million dollars, and we’re sure we’ll get more.’
‘Well, I’m amazed,’ said Ed. ‘And pleased, too. I thought politicians were all foot-dragging and red tape.’
‘Not Shearson Jones,’ Peter told him. ‘And I want to assure you of something else, too. As soon as the first donations to the Blight Crisis Appeal have cleared the bank, they’ll be paid straight out. No waiting, and no arguments. All you’ll have to do is satisfy the appeal board that your farm meets the legal requirements for compensation – which I’m quite sure that yours does – and you’ll be eligible for your share of the three million.’
‘I’m gratified to hear it,’ said Ed.
‘I’m gratified you’re gratified,’ Peter told him. ‘You see, Senator Jones believes that we’ll be able to collect a lot more money for the appeal if we have a figurehead – one person who represents the whole plight of every unfortunate farmer. Somebody who can talk on television about what’s happened in Kansas, and how difficult life can be on a wheat farm. Somebody who represents the best in American farming. A young man, struggling against the weather, and fluctuating prices, just to keep up the traditions that made this country what it is today.’
‘Are you reading that from a script or making that up as you go along?’ asked Ed.
‘Come on, Ed, don’t be cynical,’ said Peter. ‘You know what I’m talking about.’
‘Well, I guess so. And I also guess that you want me to be your figurehead.’
‘Why not? This extra compensation was your idea to start with. Why not take it the whole way, and identify yourself publicly with what you believe?’
Ed ran his hand through his hair. ‘Let me think about it, will you? I’ve got your number.’
‘I’ll let you do more than think about it,’ said Peter. ‘Shearson Jones has arranged for his personal representative to fly to Wichita tomorrrow to meet you. She’s going to talk to Dr Benson first, to find out what he’s discovered, in case he might have turned up anything helpful. Then she can come out to South Burlington and talk to you.’
‘She?’ asked Ed.
‘Mrs Della McIntosh,’ Peter explained. ‘Right up until Monday, she was Washington correspondent for the Kansas City Herald-Examiner. But when she saw how strongly Shearson felt about the blight, and what he was going to do for the wheat farmers, she quit her job on the spot and offered to help. Shearson Jones has that kind of effect on people.’
‘I see,’ said Ed, uncertainly. ‘All right – I’ll expect her.’
‘Shearson himself will be down at Fall River by Sunday. I guess he’ll want to meet you. Meanwhile – good luck with the crop.’
‘The crop?’ asked Ed. ‘There isn’t any crop left.’
‘Well, I know,’ said Peter, slightly flustered. ‘What I meant was, good luck with the insurance, and the compensation, and whatever you need good luck with. I’ll talk to you later.’
Ed put the radio-telephone down, and stood thoughtfully beside the helicopter for a few moments. Willard said, ‘Who was that? Is anything wrong?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Ed. ‘I’ve had experience of loan sharks, arid phoney accountants, and speculators. But I’m out of my depth when it comes to politicians. They talk a whole lot of bullshit – or at least you think it’s bullshit. It’s only when you think about it for a long time afterwards that you realise the calculated importance of every single damned rubbishy word they spoke.’
‘Shearson Jones?’
‘His sycophantic sidekick. But at least he had some reasonable news. Shearson’s set up a special compensation fund, and it looks like we may be able to save South Burlington.’
Willard couldn’t help grinning. ‘Well, that’s something to celebrate. You want to come back to my place and sink a couple of beers?’
Ed looked around the black, rot-flattened crops. The sun had almost gone now, and the silence over the wide plains of Kansas was enormous. Ed remembered walking out into the fields when he was a boy, on a dark and windless night, and believing that he was the only person left in the whole world. People from Kansas know what you mean when you describe that feeling; only a city-dweller will go ‘huh?’
Ed said, ‘Yes. I think we ought to celebrate.’
‘Is your mother still staying with you?’ asked Willard, as they climbed back into the helicopter.
‘Just for a couple of days. She thought she ought to take over the house now that Season’s gone.’
‘She’s a strong woman, your mother.’
Ed clipped up his lap-belt. ‘We’re all strong, here on South Burlington. But it didn’t protect us from this, did it?’
‘We’ll get through it. You wait and see.’
Dyson Kane started up the motor. The helicopter warmed up for a while, and then tipped up into the air. They flew at low level across the ocean of stained wheat, until they circled at last around the small tree-bordered house where Willard lived. Dyson put the helicopter down beside Willard’s Ford pick-up and switched off. They climbed out into the darkness, and ducked under the whistling rotors.
Willard was a widower. His wife Nanette had worked in the kitchens at South Burlington Farm when Ed was a boy; but at the age of forty-five she had contracted cancer of the face, and died. Willard had kept his house pretty much the same through the years that followed, and if anyone had walked into it without realising Nanette had been gone since 1961, they would have thought that she was about to come singing down the stairs at any minute. Willard wasn’t morbid about her, just very gentle with her memory. Beside the oak sofa, on a small table, her knitting still lay where she had left it the day she died. It wasn’t sacrosanct. Willard didn’t mind if anybody picked it up and looked at it. But it was something she had been doing on the day he left her, and that’s why he kept it there.
Ed and Dyson sat down in the living-room while Willard went into the kitchen to find the beer. Dyson called out to Willard, ‘Mind if I switch on the television? Maybe we’ll catch the news.’
‘Sure,’ said Willard, from the kitchen, popping the tops on cans of Coors. Dyson leaned forward in his armchair and pressed the switch on the big old walnut-veneer set. The picture flickered sideways for a while, and then they saw Magilla Gorilla grinning out of his pet-store window.
‘News is after this,’ said Willard, coming back in with the beer. ‘Does anybody like pretzels?’
‘I’m only the world’s greatest pretzel-addict,’ said Dyson. ‘I took three cures at St Joseph’s Hospital before they finally gave up and let me eat as many as I wanted.’ Ed glanced around the room. It was four or five months since he’d been in here, but it hadn’t changed. The cheap ornaments still stood on the mantelpiece over the fire, and on the walls hung the framed portrait of Nanette, and the painting of Mount Sunflower, the highest peak in Kansas, at sunrise. There was also an aerial photograph of South Burlington Farm, in colour, with the ballpen inscription, ‘To Willard. With thanks for everything you’ve ever done here. Ursula Hardesty.’
Ed sipped his beer. He agreed with his mother, in a way. It was better that his father hadn’t seen South Burlington reduced to this rotten waste of collapsing crops. He wished only that his father had left him with enough capital not to have to go begging to people like Shearson Jones. He didn’t doubt for a moment that Shearson Jones would one day expect an equal favour in return.