“It’s not much of a secret.”
Claire shook her head, impatient. “My daughters don’t understand.”
“No.”
“They have no feeling for the land. Refuse to live here. They want me to leave, and sometimes I have doubts … maybe they are right.”
Minna put her hand on Claire’s. “Maybe you should offer the ranch to one daughter to take over. She runs it and gets to keep it.”
“That would create hard feelings.”
“It’s their choice. Maybe there will be only one taker. Hopefully there will be one taker.”
* * *
An hour later in her bedroom, book slumped against her chest, Claire awoke to the sound of a strangled voice. It took several minutes to shake off the impression that its source was not in her dream, which had been troubled, nor even from an overloud television, but real, and its source was Minna crying. She pictured Don come back, charged with lust, beating against the French doors. She ran into the kitchen with the only weapon in reach — her book — only to find Minna, her back to Claire, screaming into the phone.
“Mwen renmen-w, I love you … I told you — I take care of you as soon as I can. You push and push, Jean-Alexi, and I just disappear again, you hear me?”
How to account for the momentary conviction that Minna was an intruder in her house, even though she was wearing the robe Claire loaned her? Her feet were spaced apart, her shoulders hunched, as if enduring a strong wind, or preparing for a lash. That posture created a whole new idea of Minna from the one Claire thought she knew. She was speaking English quickly, mixed with a guttural, foreign-sounding language (maybe French?) whose words Claire couldn’t pick out.
“Minna?” Claire whispered, more to hear herself aloud, wake up from an apparent dream, than to be heard. Minna turned, and the face that looked back at Claire was a stranger’s — flamed eyes, tendons and bones swelled in rage against the surface of her skin. But it was the expression of fury — or perhaps the adrenaline of terror? — that took her breath away.
No dream. Claire turned away, as if she had been shown something shameful, something not meant for her eyes, as provocative as a vision of Minna and Don writhing on his couch. She groped her way back to her bedroom and lay rigid under her cover, scared, staring at the ceiling. More excited talking on the phone, something at last concluded, and the receiver was hung up. Perhaps Claire fell asleep, but after a prolonged period Minna, her Minna, kind and smoothed over, came through the door as if the other had never been. She carried a cup of herbal tea.
“Have a nightmare, doudou?”
“No,” Claire said, looking out the window, at the dresser, anywhere but at her.
“Drink,” she coaxed, and Claire reluctantly did. Minna leaned over her in bed, stroked her damp hair, plastered down by panic. “Don’t ever be frightened of me.”
Chapter 6
The late spring brought a fierce bout of tule fog through the orchard every morning. Minna and Claire walked like ghosts, barely visible one to the other. Trees slid by like apparitions, the only tangible thing the scent of the leathery white blossoms that foretold future harvest. The quiet brought a sense of invisibility.
The natural world colluded with this illusion: rabbits stood in their path, not flinching till they were almost close enough to reach out and touch them. Hummingbirds hovered close by their faces as if in search of nectar. One morning, Minna lifted her arm and pointed through the fog to an orange tree, under the branches of which a coyote lay curled sleeping as if enchanted.
They discovered a mutual admiration for silence, so on their walks there would be only the sounds of their feet against the earth, only the slight husking of their exhalations. For old times’ sake, Claire would stoop down and take a pinch of dirt, place it on her tongue, taste whether it was too sweet or too sour, worrying about the harvest, although modern chemical tests made the practice obsolete. Minna did her divining in other ways — leaving a large glass of water in the kitchen with a piece of floating bread swelled, a portent of plenty, she insisted. She had heard Claire and Octavio discussing the small yields of apricot and avocado that season, attributed to low bee pollination. Places, too, can be haunted; the spirits want to be propitiated.
“I’m not watching things closely enough,” Claire said.
“You need to be watching only your health.”
“The farm barely gets by. A bad harvest, and I’ll have Forster complaining.”
“This is Octavio’s job. If he doesn’t do it well, you should replace him.”
Claire was surprised by her presumption, not sure how to react. “Octavio’s good. And loyal. He’s been through a lot with us.”
“I don’t like to see you worried.”
“What about your worry? That phone call a few nights ago?”
“Can I tell you a secret?”
Claire nodded, not sure how much she really wanted to know.
“He’s a distant cousin I had a crush on for a while.”
“Why do you call him?”
“Why? Because I owe him money. Why? Because he’s a voice from home.”
“Maybe you should put him behind you.”
* * *
Farmers, like as not, assess an operation not by its current crop, nor its location and climate, nor even its prospect, but direct their attention straight to the real wealth of a farm: its soil. The soil, far from being ignored as dead filler, is recognized as a live, changing, vital organism on which the life of the farm depends. The amount of rainfall, of sun and shade, of decomposing plants, of soil amendments, the rate of harvesting, all contribute to its vitality. Neglect it, throw away its careful balance, and life comes to a standstill.
Claire knew these things and wondered if the knowledge transferred to the human body — what was the effect of depression, poisons, surgeries, fear, and anxiety within her own body? Minna was on a campaign of strange means to realign Claire with the natural world, and as much as she claimed not to believe in its efficacy, she appreciated the effort and grew more and more fond of her. Her naïveté made Claire overlook the quirks that were coming out. Small things, such as when one morning finding an expensive crystal glass broken in the sink. She asked Minna about it, and the girl denied knowing anything.
“But that’s absurd. It’s only you and me here.”
“Ask Paz.”
“She hasn’t been here in days.”
But these were minor flaws. Mornings Minna ground spices with a pestle. She insisted that Claire anoint herself with a combination of lime and nutmeg, which made Claire feel she was a dish about to be consumed. Afternoons Minna planted dried leaves in the ground from a velvet bag she carried, explaining that four leaves of one, boiled in tea, fixed the kidneys, five could kill you. At night, candles burned everywhere, while she chanted prayers. Claire prayed only that Minna wouldn’t end up burning the house down. Minna insisted on cooking one meal a week consisting only of white: chicken meat, white rice, white rum. For an inexplicable reason, no salt, which made it impossible to eat. When Paz scraped it out into the garbage, she made a face.
“I can cook for you. Mama and I can bring you good food.”
“It had to be white,” Claire said, realizing how ridiculous she sounded.
* * *
Later, alone, Claire teased Minna. “Do you really believe in all this? You, an educated woman?”
“They live side by side. The normal and the magic.”
Claire wagged her head, unsure.
“Picture they live inside each other. You see what you have the ability to see, no more.”