Black Feathers: Dark Avian Tales: An Anthology(29)

Not the brother-in-law. Not him.

She is returning to the house when she sees his vehicle in the driveway—a brass-colored Land Rover. She knows that he is ringing the doorbell, rapping his knuckles smartly on the door. She sees him peering through a window, shading his small bright eyes. Claudie? Claudie it’s me—are you in there?

Amid dripping trees at the corner of the house the widow waits, in hiding.


She will say It is very quiet at the lake. It is lonely at the lake.

Most days.





“Stop! Stop that . . .”

Cupping her hands to her mouth, shouting at the boys throwing rocks out onto the lake at the waterfowl.

It is amazing to the widow—she is shouting.

Not for years, not in memory has she shouted. The effort is stunning, her throat feels scraped as with a rough-edged blade.

“Stop! Stop . . .”

Most of the rocks thrown by the boys fall short. Only a few of the youngest, most vulnerable birds have been struck—ducklings, goslings. The boys, who appear to be between the ages of ten and thirteen, are not wading in the water—(it’s as if they are too lazy, too negligent to hunt their prey with much energy)—but run along the lake shore hooting and yelling. The adult mallards, geese, swans have escaped toward the center of the lake, flapping their wings in distress, squawking, shrieking. The boys laugh uproariously—the birds’ terror is hilarious to them. Claudia is furious, disgusted.

“Stop! I’ll call the police . . .”

Boldly Claudia approaches the boys hoping to frighten them off. She is panting, her heart is pounding with adrenaline. She seems oblivious to the possibility that the boys might turn to throw rocks at her.

Their crude cruel faces are distorted with glee. They seem scarcely human to her. They glare at her, leer at her, trying to determine (she guesses) if she is someone who might recognize them and tell their parents; if she is someone whose authority they should respect.

“Don’t you hear me? I said stop! It’s against the law, ‘cruelty to animals’—I will report you to the sheriff’s office . . .”

The words sheriff’s office seems to make an impression on the older boys who begin to back off. Claudia hears them muttering

Go to hell lady, fuck you lady amid derisive laughter but they have turned away and are tramping back through the marsh to the road.

Six boys in all. It is disconcerting to see how unrepentant they are, and how young.

Claudia supposes the boys live nearby. Not on the lake but near.

Their laughter wafts across the marsh. She is shaken by their cruelty, and the stupidity of their cruelty. What would James have done!

On the lake the terrified birds continue their protests, craw-craw-craw. They are swimming in frantic circles. They can’t comprehend what has happened to their young, what devastation has rained down upon them. The widow is terribly upset and can’t come closer to the carnage. A number of the young birds must have been killed in the barrage of rocks. Others must have been injured. She does not want to see the living, injured creatures floating in the lake. She does not want to see their writhing little wings, she does not want to see the distress of the elder birds, this has been enough, this has been more than enough, she does not want to feel anything further, not at this time.


And yet: pursuing the boys from the air. Beating her great wings, that are powerful with muscle. Glancing up they see her bearing upon them, their faces are rapt with astonishment, shock, terror. It would seem to them (perhaps) that the creatures they had tormented had taken a single, singular shape to pursue them. It would seem to them (perhaps) that a primitive justice is being enacted. The creature that swoops upon them is not a large predator, not an eagle. But her slate-colored outspread wings are as large as the wings of an eagle. Her beak is longer than the beak of an eagle, and it is sharper. The screams of the cruel boys will not deter her—nothing will deter her.

The boys run, stumble, fall to their knees before reaching the road. They try to shield their faces with their uplifted arms. She is fierce in her assault, she attacks them with both her wings as an aroused swan would attack, beating them down, knocking them to the ground. And once they are on the ground they are helpless to escape the talon-claws that grip them tight as with her pitiless beak she stabs, stabs, stabs at heads, scalps, faces, eyes.

The boys’ cries are piteous, pleading. Blood oozes from a dozen wounds and darkens the marsh grasses beneath them.





Her dreams have become agitated, she is afraid to sleep.

Especially, she is afraid to sleep in the large bedroom at the upstairs, rear of the house overlooking the lake.

She moves to another, smaller room, a guest room overlooking the front lawn of the house. This room has pale yellow chintz walls, organdy curtains. She keeps the windows shut at night. She is determined, she will regain her soul.

She will make amends.

“Why, Claudia! Hello.”

“Claudia! What a surprise . . .”

Greetings are warm at the private girls’ school to which she returns for a visit. It has been too long, she says: four months, two weeks, six days! She has missed them all.

Unable not to see how, irresistibly, uncannily, every colleague she meets, everyone who shakes or grips her hand, embraces her, exclaims how much she has been missed, glances at the third finger of her left hand: the rings the widow (of course) continues to wear.