“I know.”
“No, you don’t. You can’t, not really.”
Was he about to tell her she should give up? Even though he’d just called her a natural? Had he identified some fundamental inadequacy in her? The whole valley seemed silent. No wind. No birdsong.
Finally he said, “So what do you say?”
Her mouth was dry. “About what?”
“You want to keep flying?”
For a moment she wasn’t sure she could answer. “If you’d just tell me what you charge, I’ll find a way of paying it.”
Trout beamed up at her, his droopy eyes scrunched almost closed by the upward curve of his long mouth. “I have good news for you. Great news. So good you won’t even believe it.” He paused dramatically.
“Believe what?”
“There’s someone who wants to pay for your lessons. You won’t have to pay a dime.”
For a moment her disorientation was complete, but just as quickly it cleared, replaced by certainty. “No,” she said.
The big fish mouth arced downward. “What do you mean no?”
“No.”
“Marian!” He reached for her shoulder, gave her a gentle shake. “This is good news. You’ve got a benefactor.”
“Who is it?”
“As a matter of fact, this person would rather stay anonymous.”
“Barclay Macqueen.”
Trout’s face locked up tight. “I don’t know that name.”
“There’s no one else it could be. No. I have to pay my own way.”
“I’m afraid that’s not possible.” Trout looked genuinely regretful.
“Isn’t my money as good as Barclay’s?” Of course it wasn’t.
“I don’t know who you mean.”
“He can’t have thought I wouldn’t guess. There’s not a whole crowd of people fighting to pay for things for me. Only one’s been offering lately.”
“Why not just enjoy the gift, then?”
She turned away. “Nice meeting you. Thanks for the lesson.”
Trout put up his hands. “All right. He said you might not accept his offer at first, but he also said you’d come around.”
Marian thought for a minute. “He owns the plane, doesn’t he?”
“Technically, Mr. Sadler does. So, I’m afraid I can’t let you pay for your own lessons. If it were my plane, I would. If I had a plane like this, I’d do a lot of things.” He seemed to be getting even smaller as he spoke, hunching into himself. Abruptly he went striding off toward the hangar, short legs working furiously.
Marian didn’t follow. She wanted to be alone with the plane. The engine was still giving off heat and the smell of oil. She bowed her head, rested one hand on the propeller as though it were the lid of a coffin. If Barclay had really wanted to be generous, he would have put his plane in her path and allowed her to pay Trout something reasonable for instruction and to become a pilot under a blissful illusion of self-sufficiency. But no, he wanted her to know she was beholden. Why, exactly, she didn’t know, but she knew enough to be wary.
“They’re not cold,” Trout said from behind her. He was holding two beer bottles from the basket she’d delivered. “But after a first flight, you need something to celebrate.”
She took one. “Thanks.”
“Pull up some grass,” he said, sitting down. She sat cross-legged beside him. The beer was warm and malty. “I remember what it was like,” he said, “wanting to be a pilot.”
The low sun glinted off the plane. “All along,” she said, “when no one would give me lessons, I was sure it was because my teacher hadn’t come yet. I thought he’d just show up one day, fly into town the way the first pilot I ever knew did. So when you said you’d take me up…” She took a morose swig.
“Why not just let things happen the way he wants? I get paid. You get to learn. He gets to be your patron. Everybody’s happy.”
“He’s not doing this out of the goodness of his heart.”
The band of reflected sunlight on the plane narrowed and disappeared. The air began to cool.
“Maybe this is like what I was saying about flying,” Trout said quietly, picking at the grass. “Maybe you have to go against your instincts. You want to pull away, but you’ll only get through if you do the opposite.”
“I should do the opposite of pulling away from Barclay?” She looked at him hard.