The Summer of the Falcon Read Free

day, going to sleep when the boys got up. “Musical beds,” they called it.
    Bobu had another enchanting habit: he rode the old victrola in the living room. Whenever he came into the house he would fly to the turntable and wait until someone came to wind it. Then, circling, circling, he would spin around and around, making contented owl noises, captivating everyone with his funny, swivelling head. “Wind up Bobu’s amusement park,” Aunt Helen would say when the owl flew into the house.
    As Bobu circled his head, Jim said to him, “Where ’ya been?” and the speechless bird chuttered and closed his eyes tight.
    “He looks Chinese when he sleeps,” Jim observed as he lifted his hand. The quick movement awakened the half-peeking owl and he flew to the boy.
    “Where’s Windy?” Jim asked. Swinging softly, silently out of the dawn light came a creamy-colored barn owl. Windy made seven of Bobu, for he was a much larger species. He alighted on the railing and bobbed his head.
    Four years ago the twins had found Windy at the foot of his nest tree in Rock Creek Park and had brought him home. As the funny, ugly owlet hissed and sissed, their mother had said, “You ought to call him Windy.”
    Each bird in the family—the falcons, the owls—had its own whistle to which it came like a dog when called, but Windy was the most obedient. When he heard his call he came home from tree hollows far away.
    As June greeted the owls she wondered how Zander was going to like them. In the wild, Zander would not meet an owl, for the owls fly by night, the hawks by day. June was a little fearful for her youngest of the birds. Then the owl eyes turned softly upon her and blinked. She blinked back and whispered, “Dear Bobu, you’ll like Zander. He’s little, like you.” The owl blinked again.
    By this time Charles had awakened. “Whatcha doing?” he asked. As he moved, Fingers, the raccoon, poked his head out of the barrel under his bed and scratched.
    Fingers was a wonderful pet—except that he took all the labels off tin cans, paper off walls, and slept in the sugar barrel whenever he could. Mrs. Pritchard had relegated him to the outdoors, saying, “There are limits.”
    June told Charles they were going to shoot sparrows in the barn. He decided to come along. Then Don rolled over and got up. He wasted no words. He had no need to. June’s twin brothers were so close that when one started a sentence the other finished it. The same ideas came to them at the same time. They had the same fillings in their teeth, had caught the measles the same day, also the chicken pox and mumps.
    It did not matter that most people could not tell them apart. If one was called, both came or either. They moved as one. And they called themselves “I,” never “we.” And yet, each was different.
    The twins were crackling motion. As soon as they were up, the porch was aburst with activity. Even the owls moved and bobbed. The quick movements of the brothers motivated boys and beasts and birds...all but cousin Rod. He rolled over and went back to sleep. Bobu saw the sleeper and flew to him without sound. As Rod mumbled and nuzzled deeper in the covers, Bobu ran down the mountain of blankets into the cozy hollow of the warm, dark opening under Rod’s chin. Rod grinned in his half-sleep. The owl, accustomed to the tight closeness of hollows in the wild, enjoyed cozy contact with things and people when in captivity. Rod hugged Bobu as a hollow tree would.
    June and the boys returned before breakfast with plenty of fresh food for the owls and falcons. They wrapped it carefully in waxed paper and put it in the left-hand corner of the icebox. This tolerance of fresh-killed sparrows in her domain was Elizabeth Pritchard’s contribution to falconry. She believed in children with projects and she put up with the difficulties such projects might involve.
    After breakfast, June proudly carried the basket with Zander to the lawn under the maple tree, where