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Emily watched Leonardo like a hawk. He was taking far too much interest in John’s business affairs and Henry’s farm accounts for her liking.

Adelaide asked if she could speak to Emily in private, in the barn.

“I don’t want to speak out of turn,” she said. “But I took a quick look at Leonardo’s truck while he was out with Henry earlier. There’s nothing wrong with it. It’s working perfectly well.”

Emily wasn’t entirely surprised. “Is that so?”

“Why would he pretend it wasn’t working? Why would he want to stick around when folk are calling him a fraud? I don’t like lies and deception, Emily. Makes me mistrust the man.”

Adelaide’s words settled on Emily, leaving her horribly conscious of her own lies and deception.

And while she had her suspicions about Leo’s motives for delaying his departure, she couldn’t reveal them to Adelaide without also revealing the truth about him.

“I’ll talk to him,” she said. “Thank you for telling me.”

As she returned to the house, something caught her eye as she passed the window. Leo was inside, standing beside Henry’s desk.

She ducked down, keeping out of sight as she watched him open the desk drawer and pull out some of Henry’s papers.

He leafed through them quickly, keeping half an eye on the door.

What was he up to? She was about to march inside and ask him what on earth he was doing when Dorothy appeared from the pantry, Toto at her heels.

“Mr.Stregone!” she gasped. “Those are Uncle Henry’s things!”

Leo startled at the sound of her voice. “Oh! Buongiorno, Dorothy. You give me the fright!” He pushed the papers roughly back into the drawer and forced a smile. “Shall we try some more tricks?”

Dorothy frowned. “We’re not allowed to pry into Uncle Henry’s private papers. He told me so.”

“I…I look for something for him.” Leo kept his hands behind his back. “But I cannot find it.”

Emily looked on. Part of her wanted to run inside. Part of her wanted to see how this played out, hoping that Leonardo would reveal himself to Dorothy for who he really was.

As Leonardo turned to look again through the drawer, Toto barked and made a lunge for his ankles. Leonardo jumped to get away, dropping something from his hands as he did. It fell to the floor with a clatter.

Dorothy ran forward. “Mommy’s ring!” She picked up the ring and looked at Leonardo, eyes wide as she realized what had happened. “It is very wicked to steal, Mr.Stregone! I’ll tell Uncle Henry.” She crossed her arms defiantly.

“I wasn’t stealing! I was just looking. It is a beautiful emerald. Let me see it again?”

Dorothy snatched her hand back as he reached for it. “Why, you’re nothing but a coward, and a thief! Stealing from people who have been so kind to you.”

Emily’s heart swelled with love for the child. She was so proud to see Dorothy stand up to him, and yet she hated to see her let down, hated that he had shown his true colors, hated that she had to learn the tough lesson that sometimes what you believe to be true is just an illusion.

Emily had seen and heard quite enough. She marched inside and pulled the child protectively into her side.

“I’ll talk to Mr.Stregone now, Dorothy.” She held out her hand. Dorothy placed the emerald ring in her palm. “Why don’t you go and help Adelaide brush the horses. I won’t be long.”

Dorothy took another look at Leonardo, scowled at him, and called for Toto to follow her.

Emily waited until she’d gone. “So this was your intention all along. You’re not here for Dorothy at all, are you.

You’re here for nothing more than opportunistic greed.

You’ve used your time here, stalling and prevaricating, to snoop around and talk to Henry and see what we—what Dorothy—might have that could be of value to you. ”

For a moment she thought Leonardo was going to defend himself and claim otherwise, but he simply slumped into the chair and put his head in his hands, defeated. This once seemingly powerful man was reduced to nothing but a crumpled pile of tattered old clothes.

“There is no inheritance,” Emily continued, sensing that she had the upper hand.

“John went to his death financially ruined. There is nothing of financial value left for the child. All that she has now is whatever Henry and I can offer her.” As she spoke, a knot of emotion squeezed her heart in a moment of realization.

Their means were few and humble, but Dorothy didn’t need material things.

What she needed was love, and people she could depend on.

As Emily looked at Leo, hunched and submissive, she summoned a strength from the knowledge that she and Henry could give Dorothy those things in abundance.

Leo looked up. He wiped a solitary tear from his eyes before slowly holding up his hands.

A surrender.

“You are right,” he said, shaking his head. “I think about the money and Dorothy’s inheritance. I fall on hard times, Mrs.Gale. Become desperate.”

“Desperate! Don’t tell me about desperate. You’re not desperate. You’re just a boy who is afraid to grow up. You turned your back on my sister when she needed you—when she believed in you, and loved you. She thought you loved her too, but it was just another trick, wasn’t it. Another con.”

As she spoke, she felt a sense of power rise within her.

She had no reason to fear him anymore. After all these years holding Annie and herself under his spell, he had revealed himself for who he really was: a coward who was afraid to face the realities of life.

He didn’t deserve Annie. He would, no doubt, have broken her heart in the end.

And he most certainly didn’t deserve Dorothy.

He refused to look at her. “Please, forgive me, Mrs.Gale. I am the fool. A clown.”

“And a fraudster, hiding behind your illusions and explosions,” Emily continued. “You take advantage of good people who give you their hard-earned money and believe everything you tell them.”

He finally met her gaze. “I bring hope, and wonder,” he said, a last gasp to try and redeem himself. “Is there a price too high for that?”

Emily thought of the hopeful faces that had watched his experiments: Henry and Dorothy, Laurie and Hank, Ingrid and Pieter, May and Zeb.

Even Wilhelmina West. Emily had gone along with the charade, keeping her doubts to herself.

She’d thought they needed to believe that Leo could bring the rain more than they needed the truth, but she now realized that the truth was all that mattered.

“You bring nothing but false promises,” she said. “Tricks and lies, disguised as hope.”

For a moment, he didn’t speak. He stared at the floor, his hands clasped tightly together, as if in prayer. “I only wish to remain a friend to Dorothy,” he said eventually, his voice small and quiet. “Even if I cannot be her father.”

Emily refused to pity him. This show of remorse was, no doubt, just another act. “Dorothy has plenty of friends, Mr.Stregone. What she needs is a family. Stability, and security, and a loving home. Henry and I will give her that.”

Henry was twice the man, twice the father, Leonardo Stregone could ever be. Henry would love Dorothy as if she were his own child. They would both love her with every ounce of their being. Dorothy was where she belonged. Emily understood this now, embraced it, without doubt.

She drew strength from her certainty as she released her grip on the back of the chair and stood up straight. “When will you leave?” she asked, eager to bring things to a conclusion. “I believe the truck is fixed.”

Leonardo let out a long breath, resigned to the inevitable conclusion. “I will leave tonight,” he said, picking up his hat. “While everyone sleeps.”

Emily crossed her arms and huffed out a derisory breath. “A magic man after all. The classic disappearing act.”

As Leonardo stood up, a small vial dropped to the floor and rolled toward Emily.

She stooped to pick it up and turned it over to read the label. Glycerin. Fake Tears. Of course.

Leonardo walked to the door, where he turned to face Emily, a wry smile at his lips.

“The show is over, Mrs.Gale. The curtain has fallen.” He bent into a low bow, arms spread wide before standing upright again.

“I did love your sister, and I will keep her and Dorothy in my heart. But, as P. T. Barnum once said, ‘I am a showman by profession, and all the gilding shall make nothing else of me.’?”

—

That night, Emily watched the stars and the moon, turning her gaze away from the earth that had let her down.

So often, her eyes had turned to the prairie skies, watching for signs of rain or snow, dusters and thunderheads and tornadoes.

It was the sky that held all their fates now: where their greatest hopes lay, and where the greatest dangers lurked.

One devastating dust storm or tornado was all it would take for them to be erased from the prairie, wipe them away as easily as their machines had stripped away the ancient grass.

Yet one prolonged spell of rain could turn their fortunes the other way.

In the end, it would be the unstoppable power of nature—not a man with a rainmaking machine—that would have the final say.