And the Winds Came

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“You don't believe me, do you, Sadie?”

I remembered the sorrowful frustration in John's voice in the late night darkness on the night we met.

He was almost raving when he arrived after the fireworks on the Fourth, his dungarees sharply creased. He'd stumbled through God-knew how many briar bushes and twisted his knee badly when he missed the road. He started at every sound from guard dog howls to locusts chirping the summer heat.

When he'd finally calmed by dawn, I made a pallet for him on the front porch, where he clutched his heavy knapsack.

We had a guest room, but brother Jesse wouldn't understand why a stranger would be inside instead of on the porch where tramps could take shelter.

“No, you're a crackpot... but harmless.” I didn't see how recording these storms would help.

I believed he was once some kind of professor, down on his luck. Still, he was willing to help with chores without pay.

He gave me a wistful smile that night. “I am harmless. These are historical... history-making storms. People's lives are being changed. It's one of the president's projects. Any evidence I find will help convince... you don't care, do you, Sadie?”

His enthusiasm made him seem much younger than his gray hair and bright blue eyes.

I was too tired from minding the farm and garden on my own to think much more than note how handsome he looked. I was just playing the waiting game this summer, hoping the harvest would let us rebuild after the storms of the last few years. I had only kept three cows alive. “I want to save our farm. Jesse should save enough from his job for almost all the taxes.”

“I heard farmers were stubborn optimists...” John's warm voice was both admiring and full of disbelief.

The wind picked up, making a gray dust-devil sweep across the barnyard. “That we are. Time to do another tour.”

With his unskilled but clever help, we got the windmill working for the herd after a week or two of tinkering. The thing had gotten stuck in the Black Sunday storm in April. At least, that happened before planting and Jesse's departure.

John was good company, not ivory tower.

The radio from Hugoton didn't have much but for some music and black storm news.

The crash of a broken tea cup happened the same time as a sob. My lungs ached before I realized I'd stopped breathing from what I heard.

I felt John's arms grip me.

“Sadie! We have a little time, there's always a chance...”

“We need the crop to save us from foreclosure. We might get thirty bushels an acre with rain!”

“Hush, Sadie.”

The storm was coming down from Canada to choke out my hope. “Sure, I might save Rex or the munchkins, but not the crop. Not enough...”

“I'll fix it, Sadie.” John's arms wrapped around me.

I just wanted to hold someone and be held. The dust storm, any dust storm would wreck what was left. More neighbors fled this season. They gave up after so many storms.

If I left our home of generations, I had nothing left. No skills that thousands of vagrants weren't already failing to find work with.

My knees got weak, and John held me up. I wanted to cry, I wanted to wail at a careless God that allowed so many good people to lose everything. As soon as I steadied, John led me to the parlor to sit on the sheet-covered furniture, stained by red dust.

I looked at the small and bright portrait my brother commissioned last winter from that WPA artist. Wearing an antique dress made from the artist's imagination, I looked out over a dreamlike Victorian garden of daisies and jonquils.

That garden of hope was being smothered when John stood in front of me with a cup of tea.

“Shouldn't I...” I had to cough to even speak. I took the cup and looked out the small north window.

The sky was still clear.

John knelt in front of me before looking away. “Don't worry. I'll take care of it. I have to go.”

“Do you need me to...”

“No...” Taking a deep breath, he leaned forward. And like in a Valentino film bussed me, leaving me draped over the horsehair.

He leaned back. “Goodbye, Sadie.”

I straightened up again. “Don't you go and do something stupid. These storms don't kill if you're careful.”

“I promise I won't be out long enough to get hurt.”

By the time I got to my feet and threw open the locked door to rescue Rex at least, I could see the darkness low on the north horizon. I ran to the staple that anchored Rex's chain. I was angry that I'd wasted time with my shilly-shallying.

Rex stayed close when we got inside but then began to sniff the room. I looked outside, worried about John.

The cloud arrived but it wasn't dust this time. It was fresh spring air, laden with promise.

And the rains came, gentle at first but then a soaking.

An hour later, John hadn't returned and the announcer said that the storm had fizzled through some miracle before listing damage further north.

I ran outside into the rain but didn't find John. The livestock were fine. I was fine.

He was gone.

For days I searched all over our farm and beyond it. I found nothing. Finally I looked in his knapsack, to try to find some clue as to who to send his things to. There were no letters and the journal of his storm stories was a blank book.

What bothered me the most was an old painting, red dust thick in the corners and paint cracked with age, of a woman in Victorian dress in a spring garden of jonquils and daisies.

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A/N: Challenges for this are word: historical, phrase: 'and the rains came,' and the elements: a broken teacup, and old painting, and a stranger. Thanks to my beta reader who has been kind enough to read this and point out stupid flubs. Any typos that remain are not intentional... Reviews or a PM to let me know what you think would be very appreciated.