Jenna picked the plate again and resumed rinsing it.“Huh,” she said, which was, for Jenna, approximately the equivalent of a standing ovation.
The school bus arrived at the Foster Ranch at three-thirty.
Bonnie had texted Bray earlier to ask if it was okay for Cassidy and Noah to come to the ranch after school to see the new calves.He’d checked with Sully and Jenna and texted back that they should ride the bus to the ranch with Bobby.
Bonnie had responded,Noah has a million new questions for you.Fair warning.
Gray grinned and texted back,Can’t wait.
Oddly enough, that was the truth.He got a kick out of Noah’s boundless curiosity and out-of-the-box scientific thinking.Properly channeled and encouraged, he could see Noah becoming a talented researcher in whatever field of study he chose.
Gray was in the barn helping Sully do a quick stall cleaning, working around the cows and calves, when he heard the distinctive sound of Noah Watson moving at top speed.The boy burst into the barn, causing the normally placid cows over by the hay to jerk their heads up in unison.His backpack bounced off his shoulder, and he had his notebook out before he fully skidded to a stop in front of the first stall’s open door.
Noah asked without even a hello, “If a pine tree were crossed with a maple, would the needles turn—” Noah stopped dead, the question unfinished.
Gray looked up sharply at the boy.
Noah was frowning.“Gray, why is the calf that color?”
“Because her daddy is a Charolais bull and is this cream color.The trait is dominant over the black of their Angus mothers.”
“Shouldn’t the calf be gray?Black plus white equals gray.”
“Maybe in paint mixing,” Gray replied, grinning.“But genetics don’t work that way.The dominant gene usually wins out, and the calf is one color or the other.There are some breeds of cattle whose color genes are approximately equal in expression and when you mix two of those, you can get a mixed color calf that reflects the coloring of both parents.But neither Charolais nor Angus are that way.”
Noah's face cycled through astonishment, scientific recalibration, and something approaching religious awe.He wrote something in the notebook with the urgency of a man transcribing a revelatory vision.
Cassidy came through the barn door at a measured pace.She looked at the calf.Looked at Gray.Opened her observation notebook and wrote something down.She would make a killer private investigator.Or maybe a spy.
Bonnie came through the door last.She had come from the office to meet the kids here, and she was still in work clothes, her hair held back from her face by a pair of pretty comb-thingies.She stopped in a sunbeam coming in one of the barn’s skylights, and it turned her hair the color of warm honey.
“Hi,” she said to gathering at large.
“Hi,” said everyone who wasn't a calf.
She crossed to where he was standing and looked over the wheelbarrow in the stall entrance at the baby Charolais standing beside its mama.The calf was three hours old and already the size of a small sofa.
“Oh my goodness,” she said softly.
“This cow has a polar bear cub!”Noah announced from down the aisle where he was peering into another one of the stalls.
Dillon, who was spreading fresh straw behind Gray, made a sound like a laugh suppressed with great effort.
Gray pushed the wheelbarrow out of the stall and Dillon closed the half door.Gray strolled down the alleyway to where Noah was peering at the alleged polar bear, and said, “That’s a heifer calf.Do you know what that is?”
“It’s a girl cow,” Noah replied.
“Correct,” he responded.“She was born this morning by C-section, which means Dr.Dillon had to cut open the mama’s tummy and take the calf out.Your polar bear cub weighs one hundred and twenty-two pounds.”
Noah stared back and forth between Gray and the calf.“That's bigger than me.”
Gray glanced sidelong at Bonnie, who was trying and failing to suppress a smile.
“CASSIDY, COME LOOK AT THIS ONE!”Noah hollered.
“Noah, Buddy?”Gray said.“Can you use your indoor voice?There are a bunch of newborn calves that startle easily in this barn, and a bunch of first-time mama cows who are still pretty nervous about the whole motherhood thing.”
Noah nodded, wide-eyed while Bonnie muttered under her breath, “Amen, Sisters.Motherhood’s rough.”
