That doesn’t mean I was kind. I’d like to say it did. I wasn’t kind. I was practical, and a little cold, and very tired, and I made a calculation in a kitchen at one in the morning with rhubarb on my hands. If it had gone another way, if Arlen had shut his door, if Gene had laughed, I’d have called the sheriff the next day and not lost a night’s sleep.
What I learned is that people will surprise you, if you give them a way to be better than they are. Most of them won’t take it. But a few will, and those few are the ones who keep a country running.
Tom knew that. He’d known it all his life. It’s why he buried a cash box in a field, and a letter beside it, and a line in a notebook that said check the west corner. He didn’t trust himself to say it out loud. So he left it in the one place I’d be sure to walk.
