Skyward (30 page)

After they sat down on the standard, government-issue chairs, she folded her hands on a manila file on her desk and looked at him earnestly.

“I have to be honest, this is a complex case,” she began. “At first glance, I thought Brady Simmons was just another poor, toughened kid with no respect for authority, no care for his future, just biding his time until he can get out. I see a lot of those boys and there’s not much I can do to help them. Then I saw the police report about that incident with the eagle. After I got past my flush of fury, I read on that he’s been doing community service at your place. Seemed to me a just sentence.” She opened the file and riffled through the pages. “The Coastal Carolina Center for Birds of Prey, right?”

Harris crossed his legs and nodded. “That’s right.”

“How long has he been working there?”

“Since mid-January. He came twice a week. Now he comes three times a week.”

“And why is that?”

“That third day is on his own time. He’s a volunteer.”

She closed the file and pursed her lips. “I see. Is that customary?”

“Brady’s the first case of his kind we’ve ever had. Other than a few staff members, most everyone who works at the center is a volunteer.”

“How would you describe Brady’s work at the center?”

“Good. More than good. He’s reliable and hardworking. And let me tell you, he’s had some of the worst jobs. Jobs most kids his age wouldn’t do. He had a chip on his shoulder when he first started. I’ll admit that. But he’s come a long way. I’d go so far as to say he’s part of our core team. I’m proud of the boy.” He dropped his foot and leaned forward. “What’s this all about, anyway?”

“That’s what I’m trying to figure out. Brady’s been in a scuffle with a couple of boys. Boys that up till then had been his close friends. The school’s put him on probation. But honestly? Early reports were that he started the fight. Brady would have been expelled from school except that the other boys involved refused to implicate him. And—” She smoothed her hand over the manila file in thought.

“Brady has been making remarkable progress in the past few months. He’s brought his grades up to passing and better. He took the SAT prep course, and he’s even been in to talk to the college counselor about applications and scholarships. Did you know about that?”

Harris shook his head. “No, but it doesn’t surprise me.”

“But now, a week before exams, he seems to have crash-landed. He’s been skipping classes, not handing in homework and now this. I’d like to find out why before it’s too late. You’ve obviously been a good influence on the boy and I’m wondering if you can help.”

Harris looked at his hands, quickly reaching conclusions of his own. At least now he knew why Brady had shown up with a black eye and split lip. And he had a pretty good idea why Brady had started the fight. If his suspicions were true, he couldn’t blame him one whit for knocking some sense into those boys. There’d been too many cases of his birds being shot. And he could not prosecute due to the uneasy peace between the resentful locals and the conservationists, who were seen as taking away land and hunting rights. In any case, he couldn’t discuss his suspicions. That was Brady’s private business.

He told Miss Dreskin instead about the influence of Lijah and Clarice Gaillard on Brady, giving them full credit for any growth the boy might have experienced. He concluded with the departure of Clarice from the center and the shooting of the rooster.

“I don’t think it was the loss of any one of these alone that set him off,” he said. “But maybe both of them hitting at the same time shook his resolve. I don’t gather he gets much support at home.”

“His mother tries, but she has four other children to worry about plus a job. That’s a lot to juggle. His father never returns my calls.”

Harris knew about absentee fathers and felt a sudden sympathy for the boy. “I’m not family and I only see him three times a week. What do you think I can do?”

She sighed, clearly uncomfortable with her lack of answers. “Brady has exams next week. Then he’s out for the year. This is a critical moment in his life. I’d hate for him to fail now, when he’s so close to turning things around for himself. If there’s anything you can think of…”

He stood then and reached over the cluttered desk to shake her hand. “I’ll do what I can.”

When Brady arrived at the center the next morning, Harris handed him his falconer’s glove and told him to fetch PEFA 14, the young peregrine falcon. Brady’s eyes widened with surprise, but he did as he was instructed without comment. Harris hoped a flying lesson would instruct more than the bird on the art of flying.

He chose PEFA 14 not only because the falcon needed the exercise but also because, in an odd way, he seemed the most like Brady. Young, full of promise, but a bit “batey”—too quick to jump from the perch or fist. And Harris hadn’t been blind to Brady’s preference for the talented, cocky falcon.

They walked across the wide, flat flying field with Brady to Harris’s right and the falcon, hooded, on his left fist. A breeze rolled across the field, swaying the grass and ruffling the feathers of the hooded falcon. It shook its tail, ringing the bell.

“This is far enough,” he said to Brady when they reached midfield.

The boy dropped the canvas bag on the ground, then stood with one foot before the other, waiting. Harris reached up and deftly removed the hood from the bird. The young falcon’s eyes were instantly alert and the ridge of his brow made him look all the more intense as he scanned his surroundings. PEFA 14 was a handsome bird, not yet grown into the blue-gray color of an adult, but with the bold, distinctive mustache markings. Watching nearby, Brady’s eyes were as hooded as the falcon’s had been, but Harris could read the signs of his excitement as readily as he could the young falcon’s.

Brady stood with his broad shoulder muscles taut beneath the birds of prey center T-shirt that he’d been so proud to receive. His hair, longer now, tousled in the wind like the falcon’s head feathers. Both Brady and PEFA 14 were on the verge of soaring, Harris thought to himself. Both of them were still tethered.

He thought back to his own jumbled-up feelings at that age. Sixteen was a tough age to be, full of wildly swinging emotions and merciless self-examination. It was an age of longing to be free to make your own decisions. To branch out on your own but without the legal support or the where-withal to act. Harris knew what he had to do to train the falcon, yet he was on shaky ground with a boy but a breath away from manhood.

He asked, “Do you want to put the bird on your fist?”

Brady straightened with surprise. “Yeah! I mean, yes, sir.”

Harris acknowledged the respect that spoke well of Brady’s intentions. “Then come on over here. Have you been practicing your falconer’s knot?”

“Yes, sir. I’ve got it down.”

“Well, let’s see it,” he said, handing him the long end of the leash.

Brady knotted one end of the leather leash to his glove with impressive dexterity, then moved his gloved fist close to the falcon. “Step up,” he said, and PEFA 14 stepped up to Brady’s fist without hesitation.

“He’s yours now,” Harris told him.

Brady held the bird at a good distance and angle. The falcon sat comfortably on his fist and roused his feathers, a compliment to the boy.

Harris nodded his approval and stepped aside, giving the falconer his rightful space.

“Flying’s a funny thing,” he said to Brady, sure now of the boy’s attention. “Almost all birds can do it. But a raptor doesn’t just fly. It glides, hovers and soars. And raptors are fast. Falcons, like the one on your fist, are the fastest of all. They’ve been clocked in at dive speeds of up to one hundred and fifty miles per hour. He’ll target his prey from an astonishing height, then ball up his feet, tuck in his feathers and dive, knocking out his prey when he hits it. Hard.”

He looked pointedly at Brady’s black eye, letting him know in that glance that he knew about Brady’s fight at the school.

Brady colored, catching the inference.

Nothing more needed to be said on the matter. “I reckon they fly around forty to fifty miles per hour in level flight. Not that that’s anything to sniff at.” He looked at the falcon with admiration that could be heard in his voice. “Few creatures can compare to the perfection of a peregrine falcon in the wind.”

Harris pointed to Brady’s wrist. “Watch your fist.”

Brady had been so caught up in what Harris was saying that he’d let his wrist turn in, causing the bird to foot awkwardly.

“You’ve got to always be aware when a bird’s in your care,” he said sharply.

“Yes, sir.” He quickly corrected it.

Harris looked at the boy and, in his earnest expression, read his heart. He’d worried that Brady would be insolent or churlish in training. Many young boys didn’t like being corrected or told what to do, especially not boys who’d been raised with a hard hand and harsher words, as Brady had been. This young man had heart, just as that young falcon on his wrist did. Harris could see that now. They’d both do what ever was asked of them, as long as it was asked with respect.

“There was a time when only lords and kings could fly peregrine falcons,” he told Brady. “Having one was a sign of status. A privilege. And a great responsibility, not only to the bird, but also to oneself. When you fly your bird, Brady, you fly with him. All the time and effort you work together forges a bond that is as profound as any you will ever know. When your bird succeeds, you’ll be bursting with pride. And when he fails, as he sometimes will, you must accept it and bear it privately. No moping or outward displays of emotion. The falcon will come to depend on your consistent strength and wisdom. If you cannot commit to this, cannot commit to endure the ups and downs with the bearing of a king, then you should hand me back the falcon now and not attempt to fly the birds.” He paused, then said with conviction, “But if you can, then this falcon is your responsibility to train.”

He saw Brady’s shoulders straighten as his chest expanded.

Harris’s eyes gleamed and he nodded. “Very well,” he said, and turned to face the wind. “Let’s start flying.”

Later that week, Ella heard Harris calling from outside.

“Ella! Marion, come quick!”

Ella dropped what she was doing and came running from the house with Marion in hand. Her braid slapped against her back as they sprinted across the lawn toward Harris and Lijah standing at the edge of the pond. Breathless, they arrived to find the two men with wide grins on their faces.

“Look!” Harris exclaimed, pointing toward the hack tower at the opposite side of the pond. “I promised you that you’d see this.”

“What is it, Daddy?” Marion asked when he bent to swoop her in his arms.

“Look up there, honey,” he said, pointing to the tower. “See the eagle sitting up there on the ledge?”

“I see it!” Marion exclaimed, clutching him tight with excitement. “What’s he doing?”

“Getting ready to fly,” Lijah answered her. “His sister’s al ready been flying for a couple of days now. She swoops by just to needle him, she does. He cries after her. Gets right up to the edge, tottering.” He chuckled softly. “Thought the wind was going to take him a few times.”

Ella drew near to Harris and Marion and felt bonded to them as they watched the young eagle about to spread its wings.

The fledgling threw back his head and cried its thin, reedy call. He would not acquire the white head and tail or the yellow beak and feet for another four or five years. Yet already he was full-size and bore the proud stance and threatening glare of the adult.

The eagle inched to the very edge of the platform, lured by the siren call of the wind. He beat his wings again, as though to gather his courage. Harris had told Ella that an eagle’s first flight was fraught with life-and-death peril. Yet his instincts urged him onward. This primal call demanded him to leap forward and take his place in the cycle of nature: to fly, to hunt, to pounce, to conquer, to breed, to nest. If he survived, his reward was to soar with the gods.

The young eagle flapped his wings in earnest, leaning forward. Ella clutched Harris’s arm when the eagle teetered, almost losing his balance. But the wind caught him in an up-draft and he was swept up, airborne at last! Ella felt her chest expand as she watched him sail over the pond, his knife-straight ebony wings slicing the blue sky. He soared right over their heads toward the open field, then began to angle down ward. His first flight ended as he lowered to the earth in a graceless landing, tumbling clumsily to a careening stop. He stood still for a moment, comically looking about, unsure of what he was supposed to do next.

“He’ll get the hang of it,” Harris said, beaming with exhilaration.

“My heart done dropped to my shoes,” Lijah said, shaking his head.

“I have to tell you, he had me worried there for a minute,” Ella said, exhaling heavily. “I thought he was going to crash.”

“He could have,” Harris replied. “Only half of the eagle fledglings survive their first year. There’s a lot to learn that first year besides how to fly. Now he has to learn how to hunt and he only has this summer to do it. Then he’s on his own.”

“You mean he won’t go back to the hack box?”

“Oh, he’ll keep hanging around for a few more weeks, as long as we keep bringing food deliveries. Sort of like what the parents would do so they don’t starve while they’re learning. This pair will keep showing up at the box until one day—” He shrugged. “They just won’t come back.”

“We should all be like Buh Eagle,” Lijah said in his storytelling tone of voice. “When Buh Eagle’s babies get big and the nest gets crowded, the mother eagle, she flies out and gets herself a nice fish or a varmint. Then she swoops by the nest with it dangling in her feet. Real close, so they can get a good look at it. Those hungry babies cry and beg for it. But she don’t feed it to them. No, she don’t. She calls for them to come and get it. She makes those grown children work for their bittle. ’Cause if she didn’t, they’d be lazy and fat and never leave the nest. They’d never learn how to fly. All grown children got to learn how to fly and hunt and make their own nest. Yessir,” he said, nodding his head. “We should all be like Buh Eagle.”