Chapter 8 - THE DRY SUMMERAt first, people said the heat was inconvenient.
Then they said it was worrying.
By the third week without rain, nobody softened the truth anymore.
Fields yellowed.
Cattle weakened.
Creek beds cracked into hard brown veins. Women lined up at dawn with buckets beside the church well, only to leave with half of what they needed. The baker began using less water in the dough and pretending nobody noticed the bread had grown heavier and meaner.
At Mercy House, Arthur’s courtyard well still held.
Not abundantly.
But enough.
Villagers began arriving before sunrise.
Arthur gave every household a ration.
Then he reduced his own.
Then he stopped bathing altogether and ordered the ornamental fountain drained.
Councilman Hargrove returned with a new smile.
“You cannot give water to everyone,” he warned. “You must protect your estate.”
Arthur said nothing.
Hargrove lowered his voice.
“Sell it.”
Arthur looked up.
“Sell what?”
“The water. Control the supply. Charge modestly. That way people will value it, and you won’t be overwhelmed.”
Arthur stared at him.
“You want me to profit from thirst?”
“I want you to think like a man of means.”
Arthur’s face hardened.
“Then perhaps it is fortunate I still remember being poor.”
Hargrove left insulted.
That night, Arthur ordered the courtyard gates left open anyway.
He drank little.
Slept less.
On the seventh day of rationing, he found the well lower than it had ever been.
Fear touched him again.
Not for himself.
For everyone standing in line outside.
He knelt beside the water and stared into its dark reflection.
“Am I failing them?” he whispered.
No voice answered.
Only silence.
Then footsteps came from behind.
Arthur turned.
A woman stood at the edge of the courtyard with a child in her arms.
She was ragged, dust-covered, and near collapse. The boy looked no older than six, his lips dry and his eyelids heavy from fever.
“We walked from Brook’s Crossing,” she said. “Their well is gone.”
Arthur rose immediately.
Mrs. Penley hurried forward with a cup, but the woman shook her head weakly and pointed to the child.
“Him first.”
Arthur took the cup himself.
He knelt and held it to the boy’s mouth.
As the child drank, one bright red drop fell from the woman’s eye.
Arthur went still.
A blood-red tear.
His heart pounded.
When he looked up again, the woman was watching him with unbearable calm.
May you like
And suddenly he understood.
The second test had arrived.
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