13 The Dawn Breaks over Me

Chapter 13 IN WHICH The Dawn Breaks over Me As we near Rensselaerville, we sit down in the shade of a white ash and plan what to do next. I will go to the falls to see how Alice is. Bando will go to the library to find out where the hacking will be held on the vast preserve. That decided, we arise and I start off. Bando holds me back. "You know, Sam," he says, "I've been thinking about this hacking business in the paper. There's something strange about it. First of all, six o'clock in the evening is a bad time of day to hack a bird. My friend, Steve, at the peregrine mew, puts the fledglings out early in the morning so they'll have all day to look around and learn the environment before they fly off". "And secondly, the news of the hacking wasn't on the front page like the pig show. It was in the paid personals. I think it was paid for because it's a message for one man, Skri, whoever he is. He was

probably told to watch the newspaper for the date and place to meet." "To hack birds?" "I don't think they're hacking birds. I think it's a cover-up for something else. But I don't know what." Bando turns to go, his black eyebrows pulled together in puzzlement. "I'll meet you at the library," he calls. "Okay," I reply, and, eager to see Alice, take off at a run down a dirt road, then cut over to Tenmile Creek, passing through a forest of yellow birch and maples. I follow the stream to the falls, a beauty that splashes down an eighty-foot staircase. The water hums, whispers, and spins white threads before pooling at the bottom. This is it, I say to myself, this has to be where Alice is. I jump down the rock staircase, pausing on ledges to look for signs of her camp, and come upon the ruins of an old mill. I poke around briefly, then go on to the bottom of the cascade. Finding no clues, I am on my way back up the falls when I see it.

"Alice's castle," I say, clambering up to a ledge where a stone wall with stones placed one on two, two on one, protects a natural cave from rain and wind. I crawl in and give out a whoop. I've found her at last. Who else would make a bed of boughs and put a rabbit-skin pillow on it? Who else would have a container made out of two huge sycamore leaves sewn together with wild grapevine thread and filled with daylily buds? My heart is beating as fast as a bird's. Alice is here, but she's also not here. She must be out foraging. I'll sit on the ledge and wait for her. Now that I've found her what do I do? When I started tracking her, I was only going to make sure she didn't get into a scrape. Since I know she's playing On the Track and we're supposed to find each other, I think I'll just hide until she conies back and say "Boo!" like she does when she finds me. Then I'll hug her. To wait out of her sight, I climb into a young hemlock with limbs that hang over the falls and sit among the dense needles. From here I can see the

creek, the gorge, and a pine plantation. From whichever direction Alice comes, I'll spot her. As I settle in, I note that the sun has crossed the meridian. A yellow-shafted flicker chisels for an insect in a tree, and a kingfisher alights on an aspen bough. Alice has still not come back. Suddenly the kingfisher screams his alarm note, and the forest becomes still. Wild eyes join mine, looking for the danger. Into the clearing below me slips a large eastern coyote. Gray as a wolf and almost as big, her movements are agile and swift. She lifts her head to inspect a scent on the wind. Her eyes are yellow fire. I can't see her too well, but I can make out a large bird in her mouth. This is the first eastern coyote I've ever seen, although Miss Turner said that this nearly extinct animal is making a comeback. Before the first settlers arrived in America, the big gray coyote of the woods lived and hunted all over the Northeast. With the cutting and burning of the forests for farming, its habitat was eliminated. Without the forest foods of ruffed grouse, turkeys, raccoons, and wood rats, the eastern coyote almost died out.

Only a few lived on in the Adirondacks and the Catskill Mountains. Then things turned around for woodland creatures. Like my mountain, the tilled land eroded and grew stones, not crops, and the farms were abandoned. The forests returned and the forest animal community returned with them, including the eastern coyote, which now ranges from Canada to the Bronx in New York City. I sit perfectly still. Miss Turner said the eastern coyote is a clever hunter. Perhaps I can learn something from her. The kingfisher keeps screaming his alarm cry but from a safe distance. The coyote ignores him, then moving so effortlessly she seems to float, she stops directly under me and drops the bird she is carrying. She teases it with her nose. I lean forward and a branch snaps. The coyote vanishes, gray into green. Bird feathers ride the little whirlwind her passage stirred. Annoyed at myself for scaring her, I settle back again and wait for Alice. The shadows grow longer. A crow flies silently into a tree across the stream and, after checking

the land and sky, drops to the ground near the coyote's prey. Cautiously it walks up to it and pecks. Suddenly there's a gray streak of coyote, a jaw snap, and the crow is dead. She is a clever hunter. That bird was a trap. Well, if that isn't neat. I'm going to do that, too. I take my sling and a stone from my pocket and move to a limb where I can swing my arm if another creature comes to the bait. I see the bird pretty well and it puzzles me. I come down lower. On its legs are jesses, swivel, and leash. Dropping to the ground, I pick up a sharp-shinned hawk. The trappings are very professional, the bird fat and in good health. I wonder if this was one of the birds to be put at hack. It can't be. It's an adult. Only juveniles are hacked. It must belong to one of the hackers. He's brought her along to fly and exercise her. I backtrack the coyote by following feathers and find that she killed her prey in a clearing not far from the falls. Feathers are scattered everywhere. I circle the area. Whoever was here left sometime today. The dirt that put out the fire is still warm. I look around for