Grant held the microphone with both hands, and it shook. “I billed twenty-seven thousand dollars for labor I did not do,” he said. The farmyard went silent. “The truth is, I have not spent a single weekend on this farm. My sister and her neighbors did all of it.” A murmur rolled across the crowd. Marcia, standing at the edge near the barn, covered her face with her hands.

He turned toward me, and his voice cracked. “Beth, I was in trouble with money, and I told myself I had earned it.” He pulled a folded paper from his jacket. “This is a check, made out to the estate, for the full amount. And this is a second one, for the eight of you, because you should have been paid.” Walt Dietrich took off his cap, and nobody clapped yet.