3 I Start Over

Chapter 3 IN WHICH I Start Over I turn the pages to find a blank page in my journal for today's events. "June 17 "It's just a year since Alice moved in and stayed. "And it's somewhere around three o'clock in the afternoon according to my sundial." I doodle with my pencil for a moment, then go on. "Frightful was consficated today by the—" I stop. Putting my arms on the desk and my head on my arms, I see my falcon going down the mountain on the conservation officer's fist. Presently, I hear the leather hinges on the door of the root cellar squeak as Alice goes in. She doesn't seem to have noticed that Frightful is gone or she

would be calling me. I am grateful. I just want to be by myself. As I listen to Alice's footsteps pass my tree and fade along the path to her tree house, Leon Longbridge comes vividly back to mind. I hear his voice, see his blue eye and brown eye, and suddenly I think of something. Why didn't he show me his badge or some identification? I should think a person confiscating an endangered species would certainly have to show a person his authority to take the bird. Maybe he's not even a conservation officer. "I'm going to Delhi and ask the sheriff," I say, hoping he isn't and that I can get her back. I make preparations for the trip by filling my belt pouch with nuts and smoked venison. I never leave my mountaintop without food. Anything can happen to delay me—a twisted ankle, a storm, a trout waiting to be caught. As I close the root cellar door, I find a piece of paper tucked in one of the leather hinges I made from my brother Jake's old belt. It's a note from Alice. She's always leaving me messages, usually not on paper but in the mud, written in pine

needles, or scratched on a leaf. Once she floated a birch-bark note downstream to me while I was fishing. "I'm thinking waterfalls," this one reads. That's Alice—tantalizing—"thinking waterfalls." I'm sure she is. Ever since she set foot in the Catskills, she has talked about, and gone out of her way to find, cascades, cataracts, waterfalls, rills, riffles and niagaras. For whatever reason she's thinking about waterfalls now, I'm glad she is. She's preoccupied and I don't have to tell her about Frightful yet. I'll tell her in a note. That won't be as difficult as saying it to her face. I won't have to see the sorrow in her eyes or be witness to what she might do. I return to my desk and tear a sheet out of my journal. "Dear Alice," I begin. "It is easier for me to write this than tell it to you. Frightful has been confiscated by the conservation officer. She's an endangered species, and the laws concerning her are rigid. I'm going to Delhi to see

if there is anything I can do to get her back. I don't think there is, but it will make me feel better. "Keep the charcoal going under the fish on the smoking rack. Turn them once more. They ought to be done by late afternoon. Wrap them in maple leaves and store them in the grape vine basket in the root cellar. Hastily, Sam." I leave the note on the path to her tree house, check the door on the sluice that carries the water to the waterwheel to make sure it's tightly closed, and depart. The course I run is straight down the mountain to the county road, where I leave the cool shelter of the woods and trot over the hot asphalt to town. The traffic increases as I near the bridge over Delhi Creek, so I slow down. The heat and stench of exhaust from the cars is almost unbearable and I want to turn back. I don't. I have to know. Walking here on the streets, I feel conspicuous in my mountain clothes, but I guess I'm not. The summer visitors in Delhi are dressed in old pants and T-shirts, too. I look no stranger than any of

them in my moccasins and the jeans my brother Jake gave me when he left. Once I was laughed at when I wore my deerskin clothes to town, but in these clothes no one even notices me. And I wouldn't care if they did. I want to find Leon Longbridge. I round a corner and pause. The library is to the left, the Delaware county courthouse and sheriffs office are to the right. I strike out for the sheriff's office. Inside a woman is working at a typewriter. Above the door to another room is a sign reading COUNTY SHERIFF'S OFFICE, and under it is a card saying Conservation Officer on duty today. I'll soon know the truth. "Madam?" My voice squeaks and I clear my throat. "Madam." "Excuse me a minute," she answers and types on. Presently, the typing stops. The woman takes off her glasses and smiles. "I was wondering, madam," I begin, then hesitate as I try to word this just right. "I was wondering, is Mr.—Do you have a conservation officer by the name of Leon Longbridge?"

"Leon Longbridge?" She is scratching a mosquito bite on her neck, and my heart skips a beat, for she looks as if she has never heard of him. "Oh, yes," she says. "Leon Longbridge is the environmental conservation officer. He just happens to be here today. He has a big territory to cover, so he's usually in the field. You're lucky." "Can he confiscate an endangered species if somebody has one?" "Yes, indeed, he can. He can even make arrests. Do you want to see him?" I swallow hard in disappointment. "No, thank you." I walk slowly out the door. Back on the sidewalk, I move fast, weaving in and out of the strolling people, barely noticing them. I am thinking over and over and over again: There is nothing I can do to get Frightful back. She is gone. She is gone. Sam, I say to myself as I start across the bridge, you must stop these thoughts and start thinking about what to do now that you have no falcon.