“Can I see?” I look at the picture on the sign. The bird’s long legs and neck remind me of a dinosaur.

“So the water is good for the cranes? And people have to leave the field alone?” I ask.

“Yes,” Mom answers.

“Now you have a rare rock AND a rare bird,” James says.

I press the spot on my chest that still aches and think about what Mom said.

The stone brought the water, and the water attracted the sandhill cranes. Now the field is a wetland and no one can disturb it. The stone found a way to protect itself without my help, the way beavers make a moat around their lodges so foxes and coyotes can’t get to them.

“I wonder if the sandhill cranes will also bring something new?”

“Yeah! Maybe a rare bug that likes to live on cranes. A crane bug!” James suggests.

James’s father is working the evening shift at the mill, so James stays for supper. By the time we finish our roast chicken, mashed potatoes, and Nana’s three-bean salad, it’s dark outside.

Nana heads to bed early, the way she always does.

“I’m like a chicken,” she tells us. “I go to bed before it’s dark under the table.”

Mom is on the couch again, and Dad brings her a cup of coffee. They sit there in the dark, without turning any lights on. It’s just me and James and Birdie left at the table. James reads Miles Morgan’s business card.

“Why don’t you memorize the phone number, Henry? What if you lost the card and needed to call him? Try to memorize it and I’ll test you.”

I study the numbers on the business card.

2-1-2-7-6-9-5-1-0-0

Birdie takes the puzzle pieces out of the dinosaur puzzle box, one by one, and sets them on the table. She looks at each piece as she takes it out of the box and puts the colored side down.

“Birdie,” James explains, “the puzzle pieces go faceup so you can see the picture, so you can see the colors. See the dinosaur on the cover.”

Just as James reaches for the puzzle box cover to show Birdie the stegosaurus, the big picture window behind us bursts with a loud bang and splinters of glass shoot out everywhere. I jump out of my chair and watch James fall to the floor with a stunned look on his face, blood in his blond hair and on his shirt, and blood all around him.

My hands shake as I kneel down next to him. Cold air blows into the room through the broken window. There’s a brick next to James’s head with a piece of paper attached to it by a rubber band.

Birdie runs to him, screaming, “JAMES IS HURT BAD, HENRY! MAMA, COME.”