Chapter 2 The Complication
The complication was named James Breck.
She learned this from Mr. Crane on the afternoon of the first day, in the warm practicality of his office, over tea that was better than she had expected from a mountain-county lawyer and under the mild, focused gaze of a man who was choosing his words with the specific care of a person delivering information that was correct and inconvenient.
"Your uncle," Mr. Crane said, "had a neighbor.
James Breck, who ranches the adjacent property to the west. In the spring of this year, your uncle was in declining health and had concluded — with some reason, as it turned out — that he would not recover.
He made an informal arrangement with Mr. Breck, in which Mr. Breck agreed to work the Vance land through the growing season in return for the right of first purchase should the property come up for sale. "
Holly set down her tea. "Informal," she said.
"Verbal," Mr. Crane confirmed. "Your uncle was not a formal man in his personal arrangements. He was entirely formal in everything legal, which is why the will is sound and the property is unambiguously yours. But the arrangement with Mr. Breck has no legal standing."
"He worked the land all year," Holly said, "expecting to buy it."
"That is Mr. Breck's understanding, yes." Mr. Crane's tone was carefully neutral. "He has maintained the property in your uncle's absence and has done so well, which I should say in fairness. The house is sound. The barn is in good repair. The fencing has been kept up."
"And he expected to buy it at the end of the season," Holly said.
"He has expressed this expectation," Mr. Crane said, "with some directness."
Holly considered the word directness and what it likely covered. "What kind of man is he?" she said.
Mr. Crane considered this. He was the kind of man who considered things properly before answering them.
"Capable," he said. "Well-regarded. He came to the valley four years ago and has built a solid operation on his own land.
He is not a man who starts things he doesn't intend to finish.
" He paused. "He is also not a man who is pleased about the current situation. "
"Because I exist," Holly said.
"Because you exist," Mr. Crane agreed, with the wry precision of a lawyer who appreciated when his clients grasped the essential point quickly.
"He had no reason to expect a niece. Your uncle was not a man who spoke much of his family, and the will specifying you was a surprise to Mr. Breck as it was to everyone. "
Holly looked at the file on Mr. Crane's desk — the papers that constituted, legally and completely, her inheritance. One hundred and sixty acres and a house and a barn and a neighbor who had worked the land all year and expected it to be his.
"I need to see the property," she said.
"Of course," Mr. Crane said. "I can drive you out tomorrow morning, if that suits."
"It suits," she said.
"One other thing," Mr. Crane said, with the quality of someone adding information they have been deciding how to present. "Mr. Breck is aware of your arrival. I informed him by letter when you wrote to say you were coming. He is aware that you intend to see the property and then decide."
"And?" Holly said.
"He asked me to tell you that he will call at the property on the second day of December," Mr. Crane said, "to discuss the matter directly. He prefers directness."
Holly thought about a man who worked a hundred and sixty acres for a season expecting to buy them and who, on learning they were inherited by an unknown niece, had written to the lawyer asking to discuss the matter directly.
She thought: well. At least he's not pretending.
"Tell him the second suits," she said. "I also prefer directness."
* * *
She stayed at Mrs. Connelly's boarding house, which had a room available and a woman proprietor who assessed her over supper with the comprehensive attention of someone who ran a small community's primary boarding facility and considered accurate assessment of new arrivals part of the professional obligation.
"Your uncle's place," Mrs. Connelly said, passing the bread.
"Yes," Holly said.
"Harold was a good man," Mrs. Connelly said. "Private. But good. He didn't socialize much but he was always there when there was trouble. The spring of '82 when the Pearce barn burned, he was the first man over the hill with timber and his own time, and he never said a word about it after."
Holly absorbed this picture of her uncle. "You knew him well?" she said.
"Well enough," Mrs. Connelly said. "He ate here sometimes, in the early years. When he was still finding his way in the valley. Later he had his own routine and preferred it." She passed the butter. "He mentioned a niece. Not often. But he knew you were there."
Holly felt something she had not expected — a quiet grief for a man she had barely known but who had apparently known she existed, which was a different thing from being known and was still something. "He never wrote," she said.
"Some men don't," Mrs. Connelly said, with the pragmatic acceptance of a woman who had housed many different kinds of men and had formed accurate opinions about all of them. "Doesn't mean they don't keep track."
After supper, Holly went to her room and looked out the window at the December street and the mountains invisible behind the dark but present — she had learned already that you knew they were there even when you couldn't see them, which was a quality she was still working out the implications of.
She thought about James Breck, who had worked her land all year and was going to come and discuss the matter directly on the second of December.
She thought: I have never owned anything before. The apartment in Kansas City was rented. The furniture was modest and portable. Everything she owned fit in two trunks, and the smaller one was sufficient for everything she was not willing to leave behind.
One hundred and sixty acres. A house. A barn. A man who had been expecting to own it.
She thought: I came here to see the property and decide. I have not yet seen the property. I will see it tomorrow and then I will decide.
She thought: I have been managing since I was fourteen. I can manage this.
She went to sleep, and the mountains waited in the dark outside the town, and the decision waited in the morning, and everything was in exactly the state it needed to be in for the next part to begin.