Part 13 (1/2)
”And day-old c.o.c.kerels are Harriet's favourite-aren't they, darling?” Barnaby stroked the bird's back with his ungloved hand.
Meredith watched his fingers, fascinated, surprised at herself. ”She's awfully hungry.”
”Yes, virtually always. Especially if you fly them every day, which I try to with this one. There's no workout like it. For her, I mean.” Barnaby reached into his bag again, and for a split second Meredith was afraid he was going to perform some terrible trick-a twisted magician pulling a dead rabbit from his top hat. Instead, he revealed a tiny leather hood with a ta.s.sel on top. With his free hand he pulled the hood over the bird's head so that her eyes were covered.
”Hoodwinked,” said Barnaby, and he stepped out of the pen with the bird perched on his glove. Attached to her ankle was a short braided leather leash, which he wrapped around his arm. ”Tricks her into thinking it's nighttime. That's where the term comes from, you know.”
As Portia circled their legs, huffing with antic.i.p.ation, Barnaby let them through the gate behind the barn and into the open country, or what he called ”the quarry.” Walking and brandis.h.i.+ng the peregrine on his arm as if he were some sort of ancient woodsman, he seemed more at ease than Meredith had seen him yet. She worried aloud that Mish (who was napping) might wake up and not know where they were, but Barnaby insisted they carry on. Mauve pouches were gathering above the horizon, making the sky seem unnaturally close to dark. Meredith looked at her watch and was surprised to note that it was only four o'clock in the afternoon.
As they walked the moor, climbing over the uneven k.n.o.bs of soft gray gra.s.s, a landslide of trivia poured from Barnaby, and Meredith found herself wondering whether on a day-to-day basis he had much company-of the human variety at least.
”Peregrines like Harriet are the second-fastest birds of prey in the world,” he said, ”the fastest being the gyrfalcon-Latin name Falco rusticolus-which are terribly expensive and nearly impossible to breed. I saw one once while visiting my cousin in New Mexico. Amazing creatures. But Harriet here is one of the fastest birds in Britain. With the right wind conditions, I reckon, she can get up to one hundred and fifty kilos an hour.”
”There, there, lovely,” Barnaby soothed, running two fingers down her tail feathers, before continuing. ”Peregrines are commonly known as the king-or in Harriet's case, queen-of all raptors. Which, of course, is another name for birds of prey-as well as being a basketball team in Toronto, or so I've noted on the Internet. At any rate, the problem for most British falconers is that in order to fly a peregrine properly, you need true open country. And to that extent, I've been blessed.”
They climbed up the slope to the edge of a cliff. A gentle incline of rubble and wild gra.s.s sloped down before them, opening onto a vast expanse of countryside. Only a few unkempt cedar hedgerows and crumbling fieldstones delineated one meadow from the next. It was like an oil painting you might find at a small-town art fair.
Near the horizon was a small stone cottage that Meredith would not even have noticed if not for its smoking chimney, which cast an interrogative yellow swirl in the sky above it. She wondered what portion of this tiny island Barnaby's family actually owned. One percent? (Something told her it would be rude to ask.) The amount of uninhabited countryside before her seemed impossible, particularly after the frenetic crush of London. For an agoraphobic moment she envied Harriet, who perched calmly on Barnaby's gloved thumb, safe in the dark shelter of her hood.
Without warning, Barnaby pulled off the bird's headgear. The bird flapped her wings twice and pushed off her master's glove, bearing down with her claws to gain momentum and then springing up. In a blink Harriet was airborne. The higher she rose, the less energy she appeared to use, resting on air currents that carried her up and up as though on a rising tide.
”Will she come back?”
”Of course. She's well trained.”
”Who trained her?”
”I did, of course. It's an awful lot of work, but rather rewarding in the end. I have the time after all.”
”So that's mainly what you do with your days?”
”Training the birds? No. I also feed them and breed them, which is like another job in itself. Well, not a job exactly. To tell you the truth I've never really had one of those, so I wouldn't know.”
”Never?” Meredith asked. ”That's amazing.”
”Really?” Barnaby looked pleased, and then frowned. ”Is that a good thing or a bad thing?”
Meredith shrugged. ”Neither really. It's just unusual.”
He stooped down slightly and kissed her on the mouth. His lips were thin, but dry and soft. He touched her waist and increased the pressure of his kiss. As their faces drew apart, she could feel Barnaby tilting his head up slightly to keep an eye on Harriet.
”We'd better tramp down the hill a bit, if you don't mind. She's moving east.”
Once they got off the path, the terrain was harder going. He took her hand again as they climbed down the hill, guiding her over every fallen log and hole.
Meredith felt she could get used to this man, with his soft skin and old-fas.h.i.+oned manners. She looked at the back of the hand that held hers. Strong, full of blood. She felt her spine unfurling at its base.
Yes, she could get used to him. Not as a boyfriend, of course-but to his characteristics, genetically speaking.
”So you follow the bird-and then what?” The spitting rain had started to soak through Meredith's tweed coat (why had she not bought something waterproof instead?). Her knees ached. They had been out for over an hour.
”Eventually she spies something she wants for tea.”
”Then she dive-bombs it.”
”In a manner of speaking, yes. When she sees something tasty-looking in the gra.s.s-sometimes a rabbit, or a snake, or maybe a grouse-she swoops down and grabs it with her talons. If the prey isn't killed instantly by the speed of the stoop-that's what it's called when she, what did you call it?-when she 'dive-bombs' it-she has a special tooth on her beak called a tomial tooth, which she uses to break the neck of her quarry.”
”Do you let her keep it?”
”G.o.d, no. What would be the point of training her to kill her own food? The point is for her to hunt down food for us and then we feed her, thus ensuring her dependence. They aren't stupid, these birds, and they're not particularly social animals either. Birds don't get attached the way dogs do.” He glanced down at Portia, who flicked her tail from side to side and gazed back at him with dumbstruck love. ”The thing is, it's not possible ever to entirely tame a raptor. You can only convince them, through training, that you are the best and most efficient food source around. Even then you're only appealing to their survival instinct.” Barnaby shaded his eyes from the glare, watching Harriet wing her way toward the crest of the hill and curve back again like a self-propelled boomerang.
”The main point is, no matter how devoted you are, a bird of prey will never love you back. She'll work for you, certainly. But there has to be something in it for her.” Barnaby reached into his hip satchel and pulled out a furry swatch that looked to Meredith like a shred of fur coat. ”Once she's caught something, then we chase her down and make the trade with this.”
”What is that?”
”It's called a dummy-bunny. You wrap some raw beef inside when you call in the bird, and then take the quarry from her.”
Meredith didn't think that sounded fair at all.
In the sky, Harriet began a leisurely loop back toward the slope they had just descended.
”That's odd.”
”What?” Meredith wiped the damp from her eyes.
”She seems to be circling back to the field we just came from, which is unusual.”
”Maybe she just wants to go home and have a hot bath before dinner,” Meredith hinted, but Barnaby and Portia were already halfway up the hill, following the bird, which had flown out of sight. Meredith mucked along, cursing herself for not bringing rubber boots. Not that she owned any.
Harriet was still out of sight when they heard the scream.
”What the devil...” Barnaby gasped.
By the time they reached the crest of the hill, the shrieks had stopped and there was Mish, standing in the middle of the moor dressed in a long oilskin coat and knee-high leather riding boots, holding her head and moaning. Meredith, who had thought she was too exhausted to go on, broke into a sprint and ran ahead of Barnaby. When she got close enough, she threw her arms around her friend.
”Are you okay?” she asked, prying Mish's hands away from her face and checking her eyes.
”I'm fine,” Mish said in a manner that suggested she was anything but. ”This insane bird appeared out of nowhere and stole my hat. I was just coming out to find you guys and I was wearing my new beaver hat I got at the January sale at Holt's in Montreal-Aaah!” She began flapping her hands around her head and whirling around. ”Is it back? It's back?”
Meredith looked up but saw nothing but sky. By this time Barnaby had made it beside them. Portia greeted Mish with a push of her snout, but her efforts, or maybe something about the proximity of fur, only amplified Mish's hysteria. Meredith pulled the dog out of the way by her collar and tried to calm down her friend while explaining the situation to Barnaby.
”Extraordinary behaviour for a falcon,” he said, pulling at his hair. ”Certain larger owls-particularly the great horned and the snowy-have been known to be aggressive to the point of attacking humans, but not-”
”Oh, will you shut the f.u.c.k up?” said Mish.
Meredith winced and continued to soothe her friend by stroking her back. She gave Barnaby a look as if to say, Don't take it personally, but he didn't see it. His head was thrown back, eyes searching the sky. Without looking down, he pulled from his pouch a fan of black feathers attached to a string, and whistled twice. Tossing the fan in the air, he swung it around, where it caught the breeze and sailed for a few moments like a small kite. Seeing the wings, Mish dove facedown into a patch of longer gra.s.s, covered her head with her hands and began screaming all over again.
”What the h.e.l.l are you doing?” Meredith demanded. ”Can't you see she's terrified?”
”Oh G.o.d, of course. Terribly sorry.” Barnaby reeled in the feathers. ”Magpie wings-to lure her back.” He slipped them back into his bag, looking like a chastised dog.