Moments later, with an ambiguous blend of hope and doom in her voice, Jude asked, “Is he dead?”

“Oh, I don’t think so, honey,” Papa answered calmly and reassuringly, gingerly scooping up the bird and placing it in his left hand. “Just stunned, I suspect.”

He turned slowly toward us from the triangle of bushes and flashed that broad smile of his that always made me believe that the world was a good place, in spite of the painful baggage that was an integral part of it.

“She’ll be fine,” he promised nonchalantly.

He cupped his right hand over the sparrow, which still lay stock-still in his left palm. After staring intensely at his fingers for a few seconds, he raised his right hand. The tiny creature, its white spot visible to us, stirred, slowly at first, and then, like a newborn foal, stood up with wobbly determination.

“She’s coming around,” our father added. “You two wanna pet her quickly before she’s airborne again?”

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