Someone near the door asked what I thought was wrong with it. I said the damaged exhaust might have let water into the cylinders and that the fuel system would need professional examination, too. I described wet sleeves, corrosion, and why a rebuild depended on careful measurements rather than wishful thinking. I didn't give them a guarantee, because I didn't have one.
Gary asked for three hundred. Floyd raised his paddle with a theatrical sigh. Grandma squeezed my elbow again, and I bid three hundred fifty. The numbers climbed in small jumps: three seventy-five, four hundred, four twenty-five. Each time Floyd bid, he kept his eyes on me instead of the tractor. It was becoming clear that he disliked losing to a child more than he wanted a non-running Deere.
I looked down at Grandma's hands. She had our spending limit written on the envelope in pencil, with the amount of farm money she had offered circled twice. Four hundred fifty was the last number. It was our whole gamble, mine and hers together. She met my eyes and nodded a final time.
"Four fifty," I called.
Gary repeated it. He looked toward Floyd and waited. Floyd held his paddle halfway up, studying my face, and for one terrible second I thought he was going to make me lose simply because he could. Then he lowered his arm.
"Let the kid have his scrap," he said.
The gavel struck its wooden block. Sold for four hundred fifty dollars to bidder thirty-eight. For a moment I couldn't move. I had imagined that sound so often during the last two days that hearing it for real felt less like winning and more like reaching the edge of something I couldn't see beyond.
Someone began clapping. The man with the seed-company cap was first, and then several others joined him. Grandma put an arm around my shoulders, but her face held more fear than excitement. We had bought the tractor. We had not repaired it, transported it, started it, or earned one dollar with it. The applause didn't change any of that.
At the payment desk, I laid out the two hundred sixty-three dollars from my tin while Grandma counted one hundred eighty-seven from the money she had withdrawn that morning. The woman behind the desk gave us a receipt in Grandma's name and asked when we would remove the tractor. Grandma admitted that we hadn't arranged a flatbed yet. The woman was kind, but she could only give us two days before storage fees started. It was my first reminder that winning an auction and solving a problem were very different things.
Outside, I walked slowly back toward the 4020. It stood exactly as it had before the bidding, silent and cold, untouched by the fact that its ownership had changed. I rested one hand on the fender and tried to feel proud. Mostly I felt responsible, in a new and unexpectedly heavy way.
"Noah Price?"