A few days later, Rook stopped beside a mature tree just after a long rain. He lowered his nose, breathed against the damp soil, and stood still. Nora knelt to see whether a nut was buried there. She pushed back a mat of leaves with two fingers and felt a small, uneven lump just beneath the surface.
The thing that came free was brown and rounded in places, ridged in others, and rougher than a pecan shell. Soil clung to its surface. It felt firm but not hard, and it carried a faint earthy scent that was distinct from the wet leaves around it. Nora turned it in her palm, unable to identify it.
She showed it to Wade the next afternoon. He studied it on the truck tailgate, then looked at the photograph Tess had taken before Nora cleaned it. He was quiet long enough that Nora expected a confident answer.
"I know pecans," Wade said finally. "I don't know this."
"A fungus?"
"Could be. There are plenty of things underground that aren't the kind you want to eat. Let me send you to someone who actually studies them."
He gave her the contact information for Dr. Mira Shah, a plant pathologist whose work included soil organisms associated with orchard crops. Nora took three clear photographs and sent a careful note explaining where the specimen had been found, beneath a mature pecan tree on previously neglected ground in Hawthorne County. She did not mention money. She was curious, but not yet imaginative enough to see an underground fungus as anything more than another clue.
Mira replied sooner than Nora expected. Her message was brief and unambiguous. Do not eat it. Do not offer it for sale. Do not disturb the root zone further until the material can be examined. Photographs alone cannot establish a safe identification.
Nora read the email at the kitchen table while Tess sorted the day's receipts. She put the paper bag holding the specimen beside their small bowl of pecans. The nuts represented a crop they understood but could not yet make profitable. The unknown lump represented something they did not understand at all.
"She says we shouldn't touch the soil around it," Nora told Tess.
"Then we don't."
"She thinks it might be interesting."
"Interesting isn't edible."
Nora smiled at the dry answer. "When did you get so careful?"
"Somewhere between the sagging fence and the invoice from the irrigation plumber."
The next morning, Nora returned to the tree alone. The ground was still damp, and the small hole she had made was barely visible beneath fresh leaves. Rook came with her and began sniffing near the same root area. He stopped several feet from the earlier find and moved his nose across the soil in short, deliberate arcs.
Nora stood over him with the hand rake she used to gather loose sticks from the barnyard. She remembered Mira's message. Then she looked at the nearly empty farm account in her mind, at the money the orchard had already consumed, and at the possibility that something valuable might be hiding beneath the roots.