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Everyone’s spirits were lifted by news of the telegram from Adelaide and the prospect of the rainmaker coming to help them. Finally, they had a shred of hope to cling to where there’d almost been none. Folk scrounged up whatever money they could, ready to pay the man when he arrived.

The following day, when all the chores were done and she had a few moments alone, Emily fetched the shoebox of Annie’s things from the cyclone cellar.

The birthday letters Annie had written for Dorothy were still inside, and the sixteenth-birthday letter the attorney had given to Emily.

They hummed and twitched like living things, alive with Annie’s words to her daughter, but they were not Emily’s letters to read.

The letter she’d written for Dorothy’s eighth birthday, just weeks after she’d brought her to Kansas, was the only one Emily knew the contents of.

She’d added it to the box, for Dorothy to open on her sixteenth birthday with the others.

She’d kept the sentiments short and simple.

There was, after all, no cause for celebration that year, but Emily hoped there would be happier things to write about in the years to come.

She pushed the letters and circus paraphernalia aside and picked up the hourglass. There was still something mesmerizing about watching the sand slip through the pinch in the glass. Minutes became years as she allowed her thoughts to look backward.

Finally, with a deep breath, she lifted the silver shoes from the box. What power they held over her still. Such visceral memories.

She held them behind her back and went to find Dorothy. She’d been waiting for the right moment to give the shoes to her, and this felt like as good a time as any.

“Dorothy, there’s something that belonged to your mother that I thought you might like. Close your eyes and hold out your hands.”

Dorothy squeezed her eyes shut, but it was Annie who Emily saw in front of her, arms stretched out in eager anticipation on a cold Christmas morning. No peeking!

“No peeking, Dorothy!”

Emily rested the toes of the shoes on Dorothy’s upturned palms, just as she’d done with Annie. Open your eyes!

“Open your eyes, Dorothy.”

“Mommy’s dancing shoes!” Dorothy immediately put on one shoe, then the other, her feet easily slipping inside without unfastening the buckles. The shoes sparkled as she tottered around the room. She wobbled on the heels.

Emily placed a hand to her chest. It was Annie, prancing around in the shoes on Christmas morning.

“How do they feel?” she asked. “They’re a bit big now, but you’ll grow into them.”

Dorothy wobbled again. She sat down and started to take the shoes off.

“Don’t you like them?” Emily asked.

“They remind me of Mommy. I miss her.”

Emily’s stomach sank. It was too soon. Too much. “Oh, Dorothy, dear. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean…”

“Well, now. Have you ever seen such a fancy pair of shoes?” Henry appeared through the screen door. “Wherever did you get them, Dorothy? I wish I had a pair of magic silver shoes.”

“Magic?” Dorothy’s ears pricked up.

Henry winked at Emily. He must have been listening to their conversation. He pretended to look bored and disinterested. “Yes, but who cares about magic shoes anyway.”

Dorothy slipped her feet back into the shoes. “What makes them magic?”

At this, Henry stalled. He glanced at Emily.

She looked at the shoes, at Dorothy, and she saw Annie, so clearly, in the boarding house room on Kildare Street, flapping her hands and swiveling her feet in a terrible Charleston dance.

“You look like you’re having a seizure, Annie!

You’re doing it all wrong! Try it this way.

Click your heels together, then step to the front with one foot.

Click your heels, step behind with the other foot, click your heels, step in front, click, step behind. ” Suddenly, Emily knew what to do.

“Why, didn’t you know, Dorothy? All silver shoes are magic.

If you’re ever in a pickle and you have a pair of silver shoes, you just tap the heels together and make a wish.

” Emily clicked the heels of her own shoes together three times.

“Just like that, although there’s no magic in my shoes.

Why don’t you give yours a try. Make a wish. ”

Dorothy looked a little uncertain, but curiosity got the better of her. She closed her eyes, scrunched up her nose in deep concentration, and clicked the heels of the silver shoes together three times.

Emily looked at Henry.

He smiled and nodded.

They were a good team. They barely spent more than a few hours apart every day, but in that moment, Emily realized she missed him terribly.

“How about a reel on that fiddle of yours,” Henry said. “Dancing shoes need music.”

He often encouraged Emily to play the fiddle. She’d lost interest in it lately, finding that she had no energy to play and that the dust affected the sound when she did.

“Just a little burst of something,” he urged.

Emily recalled the promise she’d made to her mother in the days before she’d died, as if she’d sensed her death approaching.

“Talk about Ireland sometimes, will you, Emmie? Sing the old songs. Play the tin whistle and the bodhrán and the fiddle, and when I’m dead and buried, keep telling the myths and legends and sing the ballads and reels.

Will you promise me that?” She missed her mother so much.

Her death had been sudden and unexpected, yet peaceful: a silent departure while she’d slept, without fuss or fanfare, as was always her way, never one for prolonged goodbyes or gushing sentiment.

Her broken heart had simply stopped beating.

Emily took up the fiddle and played the music of her childhood and her homeland, in honor of her mammy and daddy. Dorothy liked the jigs and reels, the faster songs that she could dance to. She watched Emily closely as she played.

“How does it make all the different sounds?”

“Would you like to try?” Emily passed her the instrument.

Dorothy made a few awful scratching noises, her brow furrowed in concentration, and then in frustration. “How do you make it sound nice?”

Emily smiled to herself as she remembered being frustrated that her father could make it sound so lovely while she could only make it sound like cats fighting.

“I could show you how to play a note or two, if you’d like,” he’d said.

She hadn’t cared so much about playing the fiddle but loved the time it gave her with him, just the two of them.

Playing a note or two, and then a chord, and then a chorus and verse and eventually a full song was the outcome, but the real gift had been spending that precious time together.

“I could teach you, if you’d like,” she said now.

Dorothy’s eyes lit up. “Would you? Really?”

Henry caught Emily’s eye from across the room.

She was a patient teacher and Dorothy was a fast learner. She soon had the bow playing individual notes, and then an almost harmonious chord.

“I’m playing, Auntie Em! Listen, Uncle Henry. I’m playing the fiddle!”

Emily listened to the few faltering notes and the enthusiastic praise from Henry, and for all that the fields lay bare and so much of their lives was lacking and empty, her heart was full.

—

That evening, Emily reached for Henry’s hand as he sat in the rocking chair beside her.

He looked up from a book he was reading about wind erosion. “What did I forget now?”

Emily smiled at him. “Nothing, Henry. Nothing at all.” She kissed his cheek.

“It’s me who has been forgetful.” She glanced toward Dorothy’s little bed behind the curtain.

The child was fast asleep, Toto curled up at her feet.

“Come on,” Emily whispered as she pulled Henry to his feet. “Come with me.”

She led him to the creek. In the cool ribbon-thin strands of the last remaining water, they found each other, searching and remembering, forgetting about everyone and everything else other than the touch of their bodies against the other’s.

She gave herself fully to the sensations and movements of her body, responding to the thrill of Henry’s touch as she clawed at the earth with her fingertips and drew him closer.

She had never felt stronger or more beautiful, the riverbed at her back, years of dust and hard work buried deep in the cracks and wrinkles on her skin as they moved together in an exchange of affirmation and affection and love.

Afterward, she lay in Henry’s arms and felt a surge of power within her, as if charged with the electricity that crackled in the air before a duster.

She was more than dust and dirt. She had a purpose.

A future to believe in. She closed her eyes and absorbed the simplicity of the moment, letting go of all that had come before, or what might lie ahead.

All that mattered was that she was with Henry, the love of her life: immense prairie skies soaring above, the earth reaching far below.

For a precious fleeting moment, she was happy to be where she was. To be who she was.

“We should go back,” she whispered.

But what she wouldn’t have given to stay.

Back at the house, she picked up the fiddle again, singing as Gaeilge, as the familiar melody summoned memories and she felt her parents and Annie beside her, filling her heart with love.

Dorothy was awake when Emily went to tuck in her covers.

“My wish came true, Auntie Em!”

“It did?”

“Yes! I wished that I could hear Mommy’s voice again.”

Emily’s heart cracked at the earnest little voice as she reached for Dorothy’s hand. The child had such a vivid imagination that Emily was no longer surprised by anything she claimed to hear or see.

“I heard her, playing the fiddle and singing a song from Ireland,” Dorothy continued. “I closed my eyes, and she was right there, on the other side of the curtain.”

—

Toto was yapping and barking.

Emily stirred. “Toto! Stop that.” She nudged Henry. “Henry. The dog.”

Henry woke. “What on earth’s got into him.” He called to the dog, but Toto wouldn’t stop barking. “Another damn hobo, no doubt.” He sat up. “Stay there. I’ll deal with it.”

Emily’s eyes took a moment to adjust to the darkness before she saw that the door was open.

Her stomach filled with dread.

“Dorothy!” She rushed to the child’s bed.

It was empty.

“Henry! Dorothy isn’t in her bed.”

Within seconds, Henry had pulled on his boots and a flannel shirt. “I’ll go. Wait here in case she wanders back.”

“Hurry, Henry. Take Toto.”

Henry called to the dog as he hurried outside. “Where is she, Toto? Where’s Dorothy?”

Emily stood barefoot on the porch, peering into the darkness, desperately looking for any sign of Dorothy’s white nightdress. She could hear Henry calling out and Toto yapping.

A moment later, she heard Henry call out again. “I have her, Em! She’s fine.”

Emily clasped her hand to her heart. “Thank you, Lord. Thank you.”

Toto got back first, Henry just behind him. Dorothy was still asleep in his arms, oblivious to the worry she’d caused.

“Where was she?” Emily asked as she closed the door and bolted it.

“With the old mare. She was just standing there, rubbing her hands over her neck. Calm as anything.”

They settled the child back into her bed and made a great fuss of Toto.

“Good boy,” Emily said as she found a bit of bacon rind for him. “You’re a very good boy for telling us.”

Toto wagged his tail and tilted his head to one side, as if he understood that was the reason he’d been brought here. To protect the child. To help her whenever she was in danger.

“Auntie Em!”

Dorothy had awakened.

“What is it, Dorothy? Did you have a dream?”

“I dreamed that I was riding the old mare with you. We were going ever so fast. And Toto was there, too,” Dorothy said.

Emily smiled. “That sounds nice. I like riding the horses.”

Dorothy looked a little shy as she pulled Toto into her arms. “I liked riding the horse with you most of all.”

A knot of emotion tightened in Emily’s throat. “You did?”

Dorothy nodded. “Could we really ride the mare together sometime?”

“Of course, dear.” Emily leaned forward and pulled the covers up to Dorothy’s chin. Without thinking about it, she bent down and kissed her on the forehead. “Good night, Dorothy.”

“Good night, Auntie Em.”

Emily lay awake for a long time, a cyclone of emotions swirling in her heart as she turned over the events of the days and weeks and months that had come before.

So much of her life had changed, and while the road ahead was unpredictable and uncertain, she remembered to be grateful for all that she had.

She’d come here as a young woman in love, eager to embrace the thrill of excitement and adventure that a life on the prairie offered.

What she needed now was security and stability as those delicate first blooms of naivety and enthusiasm settled into firmer roots of practicality and resilience.

In the bed beside her, Henry snored. Across the room, Dorothy muttered a few words of nonsense as Toto turned a circle at the foot of her bed before they both settled and fell silent.

Outside, the wind began to dance as the remnants of a summer storm crackled in the distance.

Emily listened as the wind tugged at the windows and rattled the timbers in the roof.

It would once have kept her awake. Now she was lulled by it.

As she drifted into a deep sleep, she dreamed that she became the wind, lifting the house and carrying them all to some distant land where the rain fell in great curtains and the fields bloomed in every shade of green, and the deep distant rumbles of thunder that crept into her subconscious became the exhilarating pounding of hooves as she rode across the prairie, outrunning the storms, a little girl up front on the saddle urging her to go faster and faster, farther than she’d ever gone before.