Constable Spence leaned against the homestead door and smoked his pipe. He was young and his skin was boyishly smooth and red. His black hair was wet and carefully brushed, for he had not long since returned from the windmill pump. His belt and buttons shone in the sun.
Shading his eyes, Spence looked across the plain. The flowers were gone and the grass was parched. In the foreground, the chocolate-colored furrows of the summer fallow cut the sweep of dusty brown and gray. Farther back, the rolling plain was blue and melted into the shining horizon.
An old wagon, crusted by dry gumbo mud, stood by the straw-pile wheat bin. The wheat bin was like a large beehive, and Spence supposed it covered all the farmer’s crop. A lean plow ox drank from the broken trough at the windmill; a sod stabl
