Katerina's Wish by Jeannie Mobley Read Free Book Online Page B

than our own. I looked back the way I had come. I could see the lone cottonwood. Mark and Holena stood in the sunshine beside it, looking up and waving. I waved back and set off down the opposite slope.
    Mark had been right about fish in this stream. I caught one almost immediately after casting my line into the water. After catching a fish in one pool, I walked along the water to the next, and I soon learned which places were likely to have fish and which were not. I worked my way upstream for some time, until at last I had twelve trout—one each for me, my sisters, and mother, and two for each of the men. The sun’s rays were slanting from the western horizon, and I knew it was time to get home. I gathered the fish into my apron and I tied it into a bundle with the apron strings. Swinging the bundle over myshoulder, I began to walk back toward the ridge. I had been moving upstream all afternoon, and wasn’t sure how far I had come. I had planned to climb to the top of the ridge and use the view from there to find my way back home.
    The bottom of the valley was choked with willow bushes and shrubs, and I had to fight my way through them to get away from the stream. I burst out into a plowed field and almost into the farmer. A tanned, squarely built man, with thick black hair and a large mustache blinked at me in surprise, as did the two barefoot children beside him.
    â€œExcuse me,” I said, taking a quick step back. “I was fishing. I didn’t know—” I was afraid I was on his land and he’d take my catch. He only stared at me. His little girl giggled, reminding me of Aneshka.
    â€œBuenas tardes,” she said to me, but her papa shushed her.
    I recognized the language as Spanish. I had heard it at school, spoken by the children of Mexican miners. At least, the schoolteacher called them Mexican, but I knew some of them had grown up on farms in the area. Farms like the one I had apparently stumbled onto. Now that my surprise was wearing off, I saw that they were planting a field. Each carried a canvas bag of seeds and a sturdy, pointed stick to form the holes for the seeds. I felt a pang of longing—this was exactly the life my father had wanted us to have.
    Suddenly I had an idea. I swung my bundle of fish off my shoulder and opened it. “Will you trade?” I asked. “Half my fish for some seeds?”
    The man held his hands up and shrugged. “No hablo inglés, señorita,” he said.
    I took six fish from the apron and held them out. “For seeds?” I repeated, pointing at his canvas bag.
    The children and the farmer spoke for a moment in Spanish, then the man smiled at me. He took a handful of seeds from the bag and held it out, pointing between me and the seeds. I nodded and he poured corn kernels into my open hand, saying something to his son. The boy took a handful of beans and added them to the seeds I already held. I accepted them with thanks and poured them carefully into my pocket before gathering the fish and giving them to the man.
    â€œ Muchas gracias,” he said. He handed the fish to his son, who ran off with them toward the low buildings on the far edge of the field. I retied the apron bundle and hurried away. The load was considerably lighter. There would not even be a who le fish for each of us now, but I was happy with my trade. I planned to plant a garden behind our house and grow some of our food. That way, we could save some of the money that we usually spent at the company store.
    The sun had nearly set when I got back to the creek, and everyone had gone home. I found both Mark’s family and my own waiting for me at my house.
    â€œWell?” Mark asked when I arrived. “Did you bring us supper?”
    I untied my apron so they could see the six fish. With so many expectant people gathered around, the fish seemed smaller than they had before.
    â€œWe’ll have to share,” I said.
    â€œThat’s not even