One morning, Don Emilio stormed into the barn where Mateo was working. “Enough of this foolishness! You’ve dug up half my east field like a gopher. If you’re looking for sympathy, boy, you’ve come to the wrong—”

Mateo turned. His hands were calloused, his face smeared with clay, but his eyes were calm. “Come with me, Don Emilio.”

“Impossible. The geologist from the city said there was nothing.”

Don Emilio was the most stubborn man in the village of Santa Clara. He had built his agricultural empire from a single sack of corn, and he trusted only two things: the soil beneath his feet and the bank balance in his ledger. He did not trust Mateo, the quiet, soft-spoken artist his daughter Lucia had married.

Don Emilio squinted. “What about it?”

That autumn, the harvest was modest but miraculous. The bank extended the loan. The cattle recovered. And Don Emilio did something he had never done in sixty years: he asked for forgiveness.