Vera read that sentence again. It did not say she possessed a lost treasure or that every descendant would carry the same traits. It said she might have a rare surviving line and that the college would be interested in studying it. She recognized the distinction because she had been protecting it in her own notebook for months. What mattered was not the flattering possibility of rarity but the opportunity to have her observations tested by people who knew more than she did.
The second page requested additional records. Professor Whitfield wanted average egg weights, shell descriptions, a winter laying history once available, and information about the source of the breeding male. He also asked whether she would be willing to supply hatching eggs or live birds for a controlled study, subject to inspection of health and ancestry records. The letter ended with an invitation to continue the conversation, not a promise of riches. Vera folded it carefully and held it in both hands.
"Well?" Martha asked, finally abandoning the jars.
"They don't know exactly what I've got," Vera said.
"Neither do you."
"No. But they think it's worth finding out."
Martha looked pleased. "That's more than most people get when they ask an expert to take them seriously."
Vera drove home with the letter on the seat beside her, protected beneath the notebook. She stopped once near a dry creek crossing and sat there watching dust move across the road while she considered what the college might expect. Scientists would want numbers, healthy birds, and evidence that her claims survived scrutiny, and she knew that her records had to withstand the sort of questions a good farm ledger invited. A customer might believe in an egg because it tasted wonderful. A college would ask whether the same result could be repeated when the conditions changed.
That night she began preparing a reply. She copied her feeding log, separated the weights of the twelve original hens from the weights of their offspring, and explained that the next generation was too young to evaluate fully. She enclosed the information the professor requested and added a question of her own: if the birds proved suitable for a breeding study, what would the college be prepared to pay for verified stock? Vera hesitated before writing that last sentence. She did not want to appear greedy, but a farm that was expected to supply research animals deserved an honest discussion of the cost of raising them.
When she finished the letter, she took it to the barn and read it aloud to the twelve hens as though they were her board of directors. Number Three pecked at the edge of the page, Number Seven tried to climb onto her boot, and the rest continued eating with complete indifference to the possibility of academic recognition. Vera laughed so suddenly that one bird startled. She had not laughed alone in the barn for months, perhaps not since before her father's illness, and the sound felt surprising enough to make her stop.