Chapter 4
“You don’t have to do that,” Mason said.
“I know.”
She kept sweeping.
Later, he discovered the breakfast dishes washed and the kitchen floor scrubbed.
By the third day, she had carried water to the chickens, sorted the pantry, and begun mending a stack of torn work shirts.
Mason tried repeatedly to explain that she didn’t have to earn her shelter.
Clara always answered the same way.
“I know.”
But her actions told a different story.
She worked as though stopping might give him an excuse to send her away.
Finally, Mason found her struggling with a heavy sack of grain.
He took the sack from her.
“Clara, look at me.”
She went very still.
“I brought you here because you needed somewhere safe. Not because I needed another hired hand.”
“I can work.”
“I can see that.”
“Then let me.”
Mason set the sack down.
“Do you want to work, or are you afraid of what happens if you don’t?”
Her face went pale.
He immediately softened his voice.
“You can help around here. I’d appreciate it. But you don’t need to be afraid of sitting down.”
She looked toward the barn.
“Some people don’t like seeing someone idle.”
“I’m not some people.”
“That’s what they all say at first.”
The words struck harder than any accusation.
Mason wanted to ask who had taught her that lesson.
Instead, he said, “Then judge me by what I do.”
Clara looked at him for several seconds before turning away.
But that afternoon, she sat on the porch for nearly twenty minutes without finding herself another chore.
Mason considered it progress.
Over the following weeks, small changes appeared.
A second coffee cup began waiting on the breakfast table.
Fresh bread filled the kitchen with a smell Mason hadn’t realized he missed.
Curtains that had remained closed for years opened to admit the morning sunlight.
Clara repaired the loose latch on the pantry door and planted beans beside the garden fence.
She never asked permission to bring warmth into the house.
She simply did it.
One afternoon, Mason entered the kitchen and stopped.
Wildflowers stood in a blue ceramic pitcher on the windowsill.
Evelyn’s pitcher.
His wife had filled it with flowers every spring. After her death, he had placed it inside a cupboard because seeing it empty hurt more than he could explain.
Clara noticed his expression.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I should have asked.”