Free One Magic Night by Shirley Larson

just heard.”  A cool blank look shuttered his face, and he let his hands fall away. With a mocking lift of his brow, he stepped aside.
    She stood for a moment, shocked by his retreat. She had braced herself for…what? She didn't dare to think. She gathered herself and slipped past him to fly down the stairs.  It was only after she got into the car and drove up the steep hill out of Springwater that her breathing slowed and her heart resumed its normal pace.
    Ten minutes later, she pulled off the road and into the gravel driveway that curved in front of a low, white farm house. A maple tree in the yard had turned cherry red, its umbrella of leaves shimmering like a blaze of fire. Saucers of white Queen Anne's lace dotted the yard between the house and the barn, and when she got out of the car, she could hear the hum of bees as they gathered the last of summer's nectar.
    Stan Fielding, his rounded figure clad in overalls, sauntered toward her from the back door of the house. "Finally come to collect those stalks of corn, did you?"
    She nodded and got out of the car, feeling a sense of relief at being here in this sun-splashed hill country. Stan, like her stepfather, Dean, clung to the land. He drove forty miles to work every day in the city in order to live on this eighty-acre farm tucked against the hills. He kept a small herd of milking cows, black-and-white Holsteins, and a few feeder cattle, red Herefords.  She could see them grazing in the hilly pasture above her.
    "I didn't cut it cause I wasn't sure when you'd be out to get it."  He cast a look back at the house, and she knew she had interrupted his late Sunday dinner.  "If you give me the corn knife, I can do it."
    Stan gazed off at a distant hill, squinting. "I just sharpened it. Sure you won't cut your leg off?"
    Leigh's mouth quirked. "I'm sure."
    Stan thought it over for another minute, his lips pursed, his hand rubbing his cheek.
    "I caught you in the middle of Sunday dinner, didn't I?" she prodded softly.
    He nodded. "Will you come in and have some dessert?  Tom said as how you liked pumpkin pie.”
    She smiled. "No, thanks. You'd better go on back and have your share before that teenage boy of yours eats it all. I can manage."
    He squinted, tugged at an earlobe. She had seen his son do the same thing when he was trying to puzzle out an answer in her class.
    "Okay. Just be careful, you hear?"
    She stifled a smile. "I hear."
    He walked away in the direction of the barn and returned in a few minutes carrying the long-handled knife. The blade itself was dark with use, but the cutting edge shone with a bright, lethally sharp glitter.
    "See that edge?" He tilted his head, looking at her. "Now mind what I said, Miss Carlow."
    "I'll be careful. Thanks." She started to go, then turned back. "Stan, I'll need twenty stalks."
    "Take as much as you want," he said, favoring her with a slow smile. "Cows won't miss the little bit you need. At least you asked. Some folks don't." He gave her directions to the stand of corn he wanted her to use and handed her the knife. She took it from him, trying to disguise the shock she felt as its heavy weight dragged her arm down. She clamped a firmer grip around the black tape-wrapped handle, thanked him, and turned back to her car.
    At the end of the driveway she waited for a car to pass and then pulled out on the road.
    A minute or two later, she drove onto a grassy shoulder, got out, walked to the wire fence, and swung her jeaned leg over. Her graceful stride took her across the stubble, the brittle stocks making crackling sounds under her sneakers.
    She reached the standing corn. Long fan leaves rattled together in dry protest. No longer green, the stalks were shades of beige and brown, streaked like weathered wood.  The yellow tassels whispered in the breeze. 
    Need any help bringing in the sheaves?
    The low husky words shivered through her mind. She remembered what he said, and her mind served it up to her in an unguarded