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“There was no Eva Mae?” I must've sounded disappointed, because Autry turned toward me at last. His face remained stern, but a flicker of regret softened his eyes.

“Who knows, Ledge?” he said on a sigh. “I mean, who knows
really
? For all I know, Bullthorn Johnson was one of Eva Mae's long-lost brothers. But neither of them ever lived here—even if this land
has
been in our family for years.”

“So Sarah Jane's not, like, my
cousin
or anything, is she?” I asked, sweat beading on my forehead.

Autry stopped short of laughing. “No, Sarah Jane's not your cousin, Ledger. And her mother wasn't mine.”

I wiped the sweat from my brow, relieved.

“As for the Beachams,” he continued. “I suppose they could've been kin once, way back when. But no, these days the Beachams are just another savvy family, like the Danzingers or the Kwans or the Paynes. There're a lot of us, Ledge. Sometimes we know each other, sometimes we don't. But this ranch has always been a safe place, even for those who aren't kin.” Autry shot a hard look at the foreclosure notice before adding: “At least, it
was
.”

I wanted to tell Uncle Autry how sorry I was for making everything go south. But he wasn't done talking, so I stayed quiet.

“I met Summer and Cam here when we were kids. June to August, your great-uncle Ferris ran this place as a lodge and had it filled with old ramshackle cabins.”

“Great-uncle Ferris. Really?”

“That man could turn snot into icicles in ninety-degree weather!” Autry couldn't help smiling at the memory. “Your grandpa may have fixed this place up and made it bigger, but Ferris owned it. Whenever we'd visit, us kids would head for Sundance whenever we could get away with it . . . same as someone else I know.” He cleared his throat, flashing me a look that was half reprimand, half sheepish confession.

“That's how Summer and I first met Noble,” he continued, fixing his eyes back on the foreclosure sign. “Noble was actually a good guy when we were kids. A little odd maybe, but who was I to judge? I was still learning how to keep caterpillars out of my pockets and no-see-ums out of my underpants. Noble caught on quick to the fact that we were different. Summer's savvy was astonishing. She could turn anything into—”

“A tree?” I cut in. Autry looked at me, surprised.

“Figured that out, did you?” Then on a sigh, he added, “Me with the bugs . . . Summer with the trees . . . Noble's always had a talent for collecting unusual things. Even when it came to friends.”

Picturing my uncle as a kid, squished flat under glass, I shivered.

“Back when Noble married Summer, his collections were pretty tame,” Autry went on as though he'd read my mind. “Rocks, stamps, coins. But he really did love her. And Summer loved him too.”

I made a face.

“Everything changed after Summer got sick, Ledge,
really
sick. She made a decision Noble couldn't understand, hoping that in some way she wouldn't have to leave him and Sarah Jane. Noble got so angry then—angry at her for being sick—angry at her for—”

“For turning
herself
into a tree?” I knew it was true, even as I asked it. The big white birch tree that held the old house on the hill in Sundance inside its branches . . . that tree
was
Summer Beacham.

If Autry was surprised that I'd figured this out on my own, he didn't show it.

“I supported her decision,” he went on. “What else could I do? Summer was dying. Noble wanted her to wait, to keep fighting. But Summer knew that if she waited any longer, she'd lack the strength to make the change. She didn't even know if she could do it. Summer could change just about anything into a tree . . . a tin can, a stone, even her brother Cam's lucky baseball glove. You know that big cottonwood down by the river?” Autry watched my eyes go wide, then chuckled wistfully. “But change herself?” He shook his head, smiling even as his eyes grew moist. Several moments passed before he went on.

“I was there until Summer's last leaf shivered and unfurled, breathing in the sun. Then Noble kicked me off his property, and that was that. He made it plain that he didn't want Sarah Jane to have anything to do with me, my girls, the ranch, savvy folk, savvy
anything
, and that I'd do well to remember it, since I'd signed over a deed to him for my land when he loaned me the money to put up the conservatory. We'd been friends when I signed the paper. It just seemed like a formality. But as soon as Summer made her last boughs, I took one look at Noble and understood that borrowing from him had been a mistake—one which, someday, might come back to bite me.”

Autry turned in his seat to face me.

“Did you know, Ledge, that in all the years I've been surrounded by spiders, bugs, and insects, I've never been bit once? Not once! I guess I thought my luck would hold.”

“Rocket said wounded animals can be dangerous,” I murmured, still digesting Autry's story. “Wounded people too.”

“And losing someone you love can tear your heart to pieces,” Autry added. “I know.”

“But you didn't turn rotten when your wife died,” I replied.

“Everyone puts themselves back together differently after things fall apart, Ledge,” said Autry. “You of all people should know that.” He laughed then, but his short burst of humor died quick and, staring again at the foreclosure sign, his smile decomposed. “You stepped right into it, coming here.”

“I-I'm sorry, Uncle Autry.” The words sounded lame, but Autry accepted them with a dip of his chin.

“So, you think Sarah Jane takes after her mom, Ledge?” Autry glanced at me out of the corner of his eye as he finally restarted the truck. “You think she's got a savvy?”

I nodded.

“Do you know what it is?”

I felt inside my pocket for Sarah Jane's notebook. “Yeah, I think so.”

“I think I might too.” Autry chewed at the inside of his cheek as he drove us up the gravel road. “I'll tell you something else I've not told anyone, Ledge. Just before Sarah Jane turned thirteen, Noble came to talk to me.”

“He did? What for?”

“He wanted to know if there was any way to
stop
someone from coming into a savvy.”

“What did you say?”

“I told him it would be like trying to keep someone from growing up.” Autry frowned. “It wasn't what he wanted to hear. I think he was convinced that if Sarah Jane weren't exposed to us or the ranch or anyone different, she'd manage to get through her birthday without any fuss. Then he wouldn't need to worry about losing another person he loved.

“That's when foreclosure signs began going up,” Autry continued. “Anyone too odd was swiftly threatened or removed—even though Noble himself is one of the oddest ducks around.” Autry gave a snort, parking the truck in the thin, twisted shade at the base of the windmill. “And when Sarah Jane started selling her papers . . .”

“She wrote all those crazy stories about the people in town!” I exclaimed. “Then Mr. Cabot read them and believed them and . . . and . . .” I slammed my palm against my forehead. “SJ was trying to get his attention. But she just made everything worse.”

“Who knew Sarah Jane's savvy has been staring everyone in the face this whole time?” Autry chewed his cheek again. “That girl doesn't even know how powerful her talents are. Or how much damage she can do.”

I shifted uncomfortably in my seat, wiggling as something scratched my back beneath the waistband of my shorts.

Autry's deed.

It was the first time since the sheriff nabbed me and SJ that I'd thought of the document SJ had found in the CAD Co. file room.

“Sarah Jane found this,” I said, pulling the paper from my waistband and handing it to my uncle. “She wanted to help fix things.”

Autry took the document from me and stared at it.

“Is this why you and Sarah Jane broke into Noble's building, Ledge?” he asked, holding the paper between us, his voice rising again. “What did the two of you think you were going to do with this?”

“Rip it up?” I offered. “Destroy it so that Mr. Cabot can't take away the ranch?”

Autry bit back his words three times before he spoke again. When he did, his voice was taut, but controlled—just like his savvy. I didn't see a single wasp or spider anywhere.

“I know you kids thought you were helping, Ledger. But breaking into other people's buildings and destroying legal documents isn't the way to do it.” His tone remained hard as he continued. “I hate to break it to you, Ledge, but ripping things up won't
fix
anything. I signed this paper and agreed to Noble's terms. The consequences are mine.”

I hung my head. I'd been stupid to think I could patch up my uncle's problems, dumb to believe SJ's letter. Though, now I knew I couldn't NOT believe anything Sarah Jane wrote. Her savvy wouldn't let me.

A
S SOON AS I COULD, I went looking for Grandpa, finally able to give him Grandma Dollop's jar. I found him sitting in his overstuffed chair by the river, shaded by the giant cottonwood that had once been Cam Beacham's lucky glove.

“Here, Grandpa,” I said, handing him the peanut butter jar and watching the old man's wrinkled face light up.

“Look what you brought me, Ledger!” Grandpa murmured as he turned the lid, listening to the canned symphony like it was the first music he'd ever heard.

“I-it didn't get broken, Grandpa. It just . . . it just got kinda lost for a while.”

Grandpa stood from his chair and hugged me with more strength than I thought he had left in him. He kissed the jar, gave the lid a little twist, then held it high, waltzing in slow, shuffling steps to the music, as if Grandma Dollop were there dancing with him. Bitsy tipped back her head and howled in doggy harmony. Birds chittered and chirped. Insects added percussion. When I saw tears traveling down paths worn deep into Grandpa's cheeks, I quickly turned away, hoping I'd somehow said and done enough.

“Ledger!” a voice I barely recognized stopped me. I looked over my shoulder but couldn't see anyone. A shadow brushed past me and, for a minute, Samson was there, having gotten up from his own chair next to Grandpa's. I could still see the river and the cottonwood tree through my cousin, but he was definitely there, one hand holding a book, the other stretched out as if he'd been about to grab my shoulder and changed his mind at the last moment.

“Take my seat for a while,” he said, his voice dusty with disuse. “There's something I need to do for Uncle Autry, and Grandpa shouldn't be alone.” Then he was gone—
poof
—just like that. Yet, somehow, I felt better for having seen him at last.

Dancing tired Grandpa quickly. His tears slowed, then stopped. But as soon as he sat back down with Grandma Dollop's jar, he started pitching all the jar lids from Fedora's helmet into the river one by one, watching them skip and splash
kerplunk!

“Grandpa!”

“It's all right, Ledger. All things pass. My Dolly-Dollop's gone and it'll soon be time for me to join her. I've been living on borrowed strength too long already.” Grandpa gazed past me as if he could still see Samson's shadow in the distance. Then he patted Samson's empty seat. “Sit down and keep an old man company.”

Bitsy hobble-bobbled at my feet, pushing her wet nose into my hand. I scratched the dog once behind the ears, then sat down. Grandpa gave me my own handful of jar lids and, together, we tossed them into the river. Soon all the lids glinted from beneath the water like wishes in a fountain.

Squishing deep into the cushions of Samson's high-backed chair, I realized how comfortable I'd grown sitting on the hard, unbreakable stumps by the fire. For weeks, I'd wanted to go home. Now I knew I was going to miss those sawed-off trunks when I went. I was going to miss a lot of things. A lot of people too.

Autry had felt obligated to call my parents when we got back from the sheriff's. Mom had totally freaked out. She freaked even more when Autry shared the news of the foreclosure at last, convinced that she and Dad needed to head for Wyoming straightaway.

I sighed and pitched the last of the jar lids into the flowing river, thinking about the long list of punishing chores I knew Autry was compiling. I guessed I'd soon be weeding the garden or scrubbing compost buckets. Or worse, feeding budworm larvae to predatory stink bugs.

“Tell me, Ledger.” Grandpa rested one hand lightly on my arm. “Tell me the story.”

“What story, Grandpa?” I looked at him, confused.

“Tell me the story of how the jar got lost, and how it found its long way back.”

“But—”

“Just tell me the story, Ledger.” Grandpa Bomba closed his eyes, settling back into the cushion of his own tall chair, the sound of the river like a great-great- and greater-than-that-grandmother whispering to us from the past. “And Ledge,” Grandpa added, letting just one eye pop back open.

“Yes, Grandpa?”

“Make the story really good.”

 

I tossed and turned all night, wondering if SJ had gotten into trouble—if she was all right. Wondering if Jonas Brown had ignored his sheriff-duty and kept our presence at the CAD Co. building secret. Wondering, too, what Mr. Cabot had thought of the brand-new ladder spiraling up to his daughter's window.

The next morning, I was bleary-eyed and tired, while my uncle Autry looked like an all-new man—or an all-new
kid
, judging by the way he was acting. He woke us up early, before dawn, thrusting an e-mail under our noses and spinning like a Frisbee between the truck, the Bug House, and his office inside the house.