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Show 8 Garrett still has his questions. The rain has lasted all day. It is the wettest spring in forty years according to Old McPherson, Garrett's ancient landlord who owns half of Portage County. McPherson doesn't so much farm his land as mine it, getting exponentially richer each year from his corn and beans and from his tenants. Each month he comes around in person to see Garrett, to check on the buildings, collect the rent, shoot the country breeze. Each month he leans in the doorway, chews on an Ohio Blue Tip match, trembles and bitches. And this month he has more than the weather and the rent on his mind. "That Arab has got to go," he says after a minute. "I been thinking about it and I shouldn't have let you bring in somebody without me knowing who it was first. They've been talking about him all over the county and I don't want my name mixed up in it." "What is it they've been saying about him, Mr. McPherson?" Garrett has already handed over the envelope containing the two checks. "Just that I got one on my land and it's bad business. You know what they're doing with that oil money. Buying up banks and hotels everyplace, and farms. I read in the paper that they've been buying up farms in Iowa. Ohio could be next." "He doesn't have that kind of money, Mr. McPherson. He's just a poor graduate student at the University. And he's not an Arab, |
