“Your father taught you well.”
“He did.”
“Then you'll be just fine.”
Margaret borrowed a flatbed from a neighbor and hauled both tractors home.
The M needed a clutch and new hydraulic seals.
The Super M needed a fuel pump rebuild and an electrical overhaul.
Margaret spent three weeks in her father's workshop using his tools.
Following notes he had left in a battered repair manual on the shelf.
By the middle of April, both tractors were running.
And Margaret began the first season of the hardest challenge of her life.
Margaret’s first year was the kind of year that made most people quit.
She planted 120 acres of winter wheat that her father had already seeded before he died and put the remaining 120 acres into grain sorghum.
She did everything herself.
Plowing.
Planting.
Cultivating.
Harvesting.
She woke before sunrise and worked until she could barely see her own hands in front of her face.
The neighbors watched.
They talked.
They shook their heads.
“That Holcomb girl is going to kill herself trying to farm alone.”
“Somebody should talk some sense into her.”
“She’ll be done by fall. Guaranteed.”
Roy Dennison heard the talk.
In June, he drove out to Margaret’s farm.
He found her underneath the Super M replacing a hydraulic line.
“Margaret.”
She slid out from under the tractor.
Grease covered her face.
A wrench was still in her hand.
“What do you need, Mr. Dennison?”
“I’m not here to sell you anything.”
“I’m here as a friend of your father’s.”
Margaret looked at him.
“What do you need?”
Roy glanced around.
At the two old Farmalls.
At the workshop.
At the fields stretching toward the horizon.
“I just want to make sure you’re okay out here.”
“People are worried about you.”
Margaret wiped her hands.
“People are talking about me.”
“There’s a difference.”
Roy looked uncomfortable.
“Those old tractors aren’t going to last, Margaret.”
“They’re fifteen and ten years old.”
“Parts are going to be hard to find.”
“You’re going to have breakdowns at the worst possible times.”
“And when that happens, you’re going to lose your crop.”
“They’ll last.”
“I know how to take care of them.”
Roy shook his head.
“Your daddy thought the same thing.”
“And his tractor threw a crankshaft.”
The words landed harder than Roy realized.
Margaret felt them in her chest.
But she didn’t flinch.
“My father’s tractor had over 200,000 hours on it.”
“These have half that.”
“I’ll take my chances.”
Roy studied her.
“I hope you know what you’re doing.”
“I do.”
He left.
Margaret went back under the tractor.
But her hands were shaking.
And not because of the cold.
Harvest came in September.
The wheat produced 28 bushels an acre.
Not great.
But not bad for dry land Kansas in a dry year.
The sorghum produced decent yields too.
Margaret sold everything.
Paid her property taxes.
Set aside money for seed and fuel.
And had $4,200 left.
She put every penny in the bank.