by Will Hobbs
“What’s going on in that bird’s brain isn’t vaguely human. That’s one of my pet peeves—people assigning human personality characteristics to wild animals.”
After a long, silent moment the biologist suddenly changed his tone, apparently working on his head, as he’d put it. “Hey, let’s eat some breakfast, and then I can show ’em to you up close. They’re due for some more bird feed.”
Bird feed, Rick mused. This must be where the dead calves come in.
Over cereal Lon said, “The Humvee went out during the middle of the night.”
“Guess I slept through it. They must’ve retrieved their stash of pottery, right? That must’ve been what you radioed about last night. Do you think they got busted when they got back to Hanksville?”
“I hope so, but I doubt it. I left a message for a ranger I know at the park. I asked if somebody from the park could initiate a casual stop. I figure chances are fair to good that those guys would have left a glimpse of pottery showing somewhere in that Humvee.”
“Couldn’t the Park Service get a search warrant?”
“I just told them I had a hunch—not enough to get a warrant.”
He didn’t tell them about me, Rick realized.
“Probably I shouldn’t have done what I did,” Lon continued. “If Carlile and Gunderson suspect that somebody’s on to them, they might get so cautious they’ll never get caught. I was thinking this was the perfect opportunity to catch them by surprise. I just wish I could’ve reached the Maze ranger personally, instead of relaying a message through someone else.”
“Don’t you have a cell phone?”
“They don’t work out here. Anyway, I’m just happy those two are gone. I need to get back to work.”
Lon went to the commissary tent and emerged a minute later with a frozen calf over his shoulder. “Where do you get those things?” Rick asked.
“They’re stillborn dairy cattle donated from a farm in Arizona. Hey, you drive.”
“Drive? Drive where?”
“Up the dugway, for starters—the switchbacks up to the plateau.”
“You’re kidding.”
“If I remember correctly, that’s what you were in the process of doing yesterday morning. You might be helpful around here if you could drive.” Lon laid the carcass gently down in the bed of the pickup.
The man was serious. “Show me how,” Rick said. “I mean, show me the gears, which one I should really be in. I warn you, though, you’re putting your life in shaky hands.”
“Life’s an adventure. Don’t kill me, though.”
Shortly past the bend where Lon had stopped him the morning before, the dugway got rough, and steepened. Rick concentrated with all his might as he lurched slowly through potholes and up and over little ledges. He was holding his breath; the consequences of failure were unthinkable. Halfway up, he was about to glance out of the driver’s window over the side. “Don’t look down,” Lon warned him. “That’s the trick at first. Your vision will swim and your stomach will go into free fall.”
“Gotcha.” The truck was creeping up the grade in the lowest of the low-range four-wheel-drive gears. “I could walk up here faster than this,” Rick commented.
“Naturally, but our dead friend in the back can’t. Unless you wanted to carry him. Hey, you’re starting to relax—that’s good. It’s not as scary as it looks. It’s just the exposure that makes it feel that way.”
Finally they crested the top of the grade onto the plateau. He’d done it. “How much did we just climb?”
“Eight hundred feet.”
Across the flats Lon pointed him onto a dirt track that wound through thickets of pinyon and juniper. After a few minutes they reached a terrace of solid rock. “Park here. We’ll leave the bird feed to thaw out for the time being. Grab the binoculars; I’ll get the scope. Walk as quiet as you can across this slickrock.”
“It doesn’t look slick.”
“Means smooth. All these smooth sandstone surfaces in this country are called slickrock.”
They sneaked among the bushy trees until they came to a plywood blind that had been erected beside a single juniper. Lon tiptoed the last twenty feet through the chalky red dirt with Rick in his footsteps. When Rick brought his eye to one of the holes in the blind he saw three birds out on the slickrock that sloped down toward the edge of the cliffs. One was standing on a carcass and pulling off stringy pieces of meat, while the other two stood off to the side and watched.
Rick could tell immediately that the two waiting their turn were condors. They were very large black birds, easily three feet tall, with long and leathery tapering gray-skinned heads. Their bills were white and convincingly designed for tearing flesh. Like thick stalks, their necks emerged from a spiked ruff of feathers that looked ornamental, like a collar.
When they pulled in their necks, as one of them was doing now, the head rested against the ruff and it appeared that the bird had no neck at all, only a head and shoulders.
The bird on the carcass—it had to be an eagle—was sleek, streamlined, and regal. Its head was covered with golden blond feathers. Watching the smaller bird feed, the condors seemed unsure of themselves. Their circular metal tags attached barely back from the leading edge of each wing identified the birds as M1 and M3.
“Golden eagle on the carcass,” Lon whispered. “Two female condors waiting. Odd-numbered condors are females.”
M1 was edging closer to the carcass, a little short on the virtue Lon had said was the strong suit of condors. Encouraged, perhaps thinking there was strength in numbers, M3 walked a little closer too. They slouched as they walked, Rick noticed, but that seemed fitting for vultures.
The golden eagle reacted by hissing, then leaping at them with talons outstretched, like a kick boxer. With their immense wings beating in reverse, the condors stepped back just in time. After retreating a little farther, they hissed. The eagle, ripping off another piece of meat, stared at them fiercely.
“Mr. Nice Guy,” Rick whispered.
A pair of jet-black ravens landed close by, then hopped and walked to the edge of an invisible circle that the eagle’s presence seemed to have drawn around the carcass. After a minute the ravens darted in from different directions. One tried to distract the eagle while the second attempted to rip free some meat. The eagle was too fast for them.
“Are eagles always this ferocious?”
“Depends on the eagle. Usually they tolerate the ravens pretty well.”
“Do eagles ever let the condors on the carcass with them?”
“Usually the condors have to wait their turn. These guys seem to know that by instinct. I’m proud of ’em. Their parents never taught ’em that.”
Suddenly the eagle flew off. The condors fed for half an hour, then lumbered along the slickrock flapping their wings and made short flights along the edge of the cliff. “Let’s plant the new carcass,” Lon said.
They placed the new carcass farther to the north, where a pair of junipers served as a natural blind.
“We can watch awhile,” the biologist said.
After fifteen minutes a raven showed up. The first thing it did was tear out the calf’s eyes. In an hour’s time there were six ravens. “They’ve already opened it up,” Lon said. “This is good. Ravens find carcass, condors see ravens, condors find food.”
Rick was tiring of the wait. He didn’t have a fraction of the patience the biologist had.
Suddenly Lon was pointing. “Look high,” he whispered.
A condor was soaring high above the rim.
“Gotta be M4,” Lon said. He raised his binoculars. “Definitely is. Come on down, M4, come on down!”
Rick located the bird through the spotting scope. He could see every feather. The condor was holding his position against the wind, broad wings perfectly flat, tail ruddering slightly as it angled its head to look below like a pilot looking out of the cockpit window. “I see what you mean about the magnificent flying machine. That’s a spectacular b
ird.”
“Yes, sir, that he is. Come on down, M4. You gotta be hungry. He hasn’t eaten since I released him.”
“He’ll die if he doesn’t eat soon?”
“It’s not that drastic. A condor can go ten or twelve days.”
“How do you know for sure he hasn’t eaten? There must have been times you weren’t watching.”
Lon put his finger to his throat. “They got a pouch in their esophagus that we call the crop in the bird biz…. Holds food until they’re ready to digest it, or afterward if they’re feeding their young. The crop pooches out when it’s full.”
M4 was turning a circle. Rick lost him in the scope and watched without it. Suddenly there were three more large birds in the air above the rim. “Not eagles, I hope.”
“All condors. Look, M4’s coming down.”
Within a few minutes they were watching four condors at once feeding on the calf. “This is a first!” Lon said, beside himself. “And no eagles in sight. Eat your fill, guys. Car-ry-on.”
“I got it. Carry-on, carrion…”
“You pounce on a pun like a coyote on a field mouse.”
Afterward Lon wanted him to drive back down the grade to camp. “Get some more practice.”
This time Rick couldn’t help looking down, and he was terrified. “Easy does it,” Lon kept saying. “You’re concentrating too hard. Enjoy yourself. Everything’s fine. That gear’s so strong you’ll never need to use the brake.”
Out Rick’s window, it was hundreds and hundreds of feet down. His vision swam, he felt sick. “If you say so.”
“Talk to me.”
“You’re kidding.”
“I’m serious. You’ll squeeze that steering wheel to death.”
“Okay…. Will the condors ever be able to find dead cows on their own…without them appearing as if by magic?”
“Sure they will! Canyonlands National Park is surrounded by cattle country for hundreds and hundreds of miles—almost all of it public land with grazing by per mit. The ranchers lose two percent of their cattle every year to natural causes. Cattle even graze the meadows on the mountain ranges you see on the horizon. Those mountains will be within easy reach for these condors.”
“I don’t think I’ll look at the horizon.”
“Keep your eye on the road, such as it is. In addition to cattle, these condors will find deer, elk, bighorn sheep, jackrabbits, ground squirrels…. Everything that lives dies, and it all needs to get cleaned up. The Southwest is going to be Condor Country again!”
“That sounds like great material for a TV ad. Condors might get so popular there’ll be a new cigarette brand named after them.”
Lon chuckled, and gestured grandly. “I can picture it: a guy on horseback, a condor in flight against a classic canyonlands background. The slogan: COME TO CONDOR COUNTRY. A vulture logo would be perfect for cigarettes. No warning from the surgeon general necessary on a pack of condors!”
“Light up a Condor! Or try our new menthol Condors—for that refreshing taste of the Ice Age!” To Rick’s immense relief, they were almost down off the grade.
Lon was still chuckling as they pulled into camp. “Con-dors…you too can become carrion!”
Rick turned off the ignition. His T-shirt was drenched with sweat.
10
Rick was having the flying dream again. The Maze was spread out below him, the entire labyrinth of twisting canyons. From the air it didn’t look intimidating at all. In fact, it made a pattern, it made sense. He was learning the secrets of all the hidden, intricate canyons, one after the next. Every single dead end was revealed for what it was.
Off to his right a dark shape was coming to join him: another flier. It was a bird, a very large dark bird.
One of the condors, he realized. It looked primitive, prehistoric, almost like a pterodactyl. Wing tip to wing tip, they left the Maze behind and flew out over the open ocean. His fingers were almost touching the condor’s outspread flight feathers. His eye met the eye of the condor. The bird’s eye was red.
Someone was trying to call him down by singing, strangely enough. He couldn’t make out the words, but he knew he couldn’t land on the water. Panicky, he looked all around, beginning to doubt that he could fly. The condor was gone and land was nowhere in sight.
The voice, however, was still there. Someone was singing in a deep, booming, reassuring voice.
“Buffalo gals, won’t you come out tonight,
Come out tonight, come out tonight…”
The song kept cutting through. Rick struggled to consciousness, toward that voice like a life buoy. He remembered that baritone. It went with the man with the beard. It was Lon.
“Buffalo gals, won’t you come out tonight,
Come out tonight, come out tonight,
Buffalo gals, won’t you come out tonight,
And dance by the light of the moon.”
Dawn was breaking. “What’s going on?” Rick groaned.
“Wake-up call for my driver!”
“You’re kidding.”
“Pull on your clothes! I got the truck packed!”
Packed for what? Rick thought. He reached for his jeans and some of the underwear Lon had allocated him.
Lon sang another round of “Buffalo Gals” while Rick was pulling on his socks and his shoes. He reached for his flannel shirt and stumbled outside. The first light was illuminating the red cliffs above camp. “Where we going?” Rick managed.
“You’re still asleep. I’ll do the driving on the way up. Here, put this on.”
Lon handed him an oversize glove. Rick yawned. “What’s this for?”
Lon explained that they were taking the eagle with them, and Rick’s forearm was going to be its perch.
Rick was wide-awake now. “You’re kidding! You want me to hold the eagle?”
A few minutes later he was seated in the truck with the bald eagle on his left forearm. The eagle’s face was just inches from his. “What if she pecks my eye out?”
“You’d be the first.”
Lon had strapped one of the long plastic tubes from behind the tents across the top of the camper shell. Out in front of the truck cab it was supported by a T-shaped bracket attached to the front bumper. Lon was being very mysterious. Rick guessed they were going up onto the plateau to erect an antenna. “So what’s this all about?” he asked.
“I need you to drive back down. I don’t get to do this except when Josh or some of the others are here, or unless I want to do some serious walking afterward. It’s one of the disadvantages to working alone.”
As they crested the grade, Lon turned off the road to the left and parked on a big patch of slickrock only a hundred feet or so from the edge of the cliff. Rick stood by with the eagle while the biologist unloaded the long plastic tube from the truck. Then Lon pulled out a long, furled bundle of bright red, blue, and white material wrapped around long aluminum tubes.
Wrong about the antenna. “Umbrella?” Rick ventured. “Giant beach umbrella?”
Lon looked up with a quick smile. “Nope. Hang glider.”
“Really? Is it yours?”
“Sure.”
Lon was working fast, unfolding the aluminum members of the glider, attaching guy wires, sliding extremely thin metal ribs into sleeves in the wing.
Rick shivered. The day was only starting to warm up. “You’re really going to jump off this cliff?”
“Run off. I haven’t had many chances since I got here. I took Josh up a couple of weeks ago in my tandem glider. Andrea’s been up too. She works with Josh.”
“You don’t expect me to—”
“Don’t worry, this is my solo glider. You’re gonna drive the truck down to the LZ—the landing zone. Right now you can take Sky over to that bracket on the front of the truck. She’ll step off your arm.”
The eagle stepped to the bracket just as Lon had said she would. Sky looked around fiercely, opened her wings to the wind, the good one and the stub, and started flapping in pla
ce.
Lon was walking close to the edge of the cliff. Rick tried to follow but could feel himself hanging back. Lon reached into his back pocket and pulled out a length of neon-green surveying tape. He stepped forward to the very edge, knelt, and tied it to a dead branch on a stunted juniper. “Indicates wind direction,” he explained. “I need a good strong wind blowing directly at me. If it’s coming from the side—no good.”
The tape fluttered smartly in the wind. “Perfect,” Lon said. “Mornings are excellent this time of year. It only takes an hour or so for the sun to warm up this east-facing cliff. Warm air rises up the cliffs. Until October cools off some more, mornings are best. Once the sun has a chance to cook all this rock out here, it creates thermals strong enough to yank you into heaven.”
Lon pointed below. “See the road running by those buttes?”
“I see it.”
“All together, the buttes are called Standing Rocks, but each one has its own name. Closest to us is the Wall. The huge one, shaped kind of like the Sphinx, is called Lizard Rock for some reason. The Plug’s out there past it, then Chimney Rock.”
“Chimney Rock is obvious.”
“Okay, follow the road down to the huge field in between the sand dunes and the Doll House down at the end of the road.”
“I see the field. I drove all the way to that Doll House when I took off with your truck. It looked more like a bunch of giants to me.”
“The field is my primary LZ. That’s where you pick me up—you’ll see the flags. I need to land into the wind.”
“One thing I don’t understand.”
“Name it.”
“Why did we bring the eagle with us?”
“Oh. Sky’s going with me.”
“You’re kidding.”
“It’s the only way she can fly these days.”
Rick was having a hard time believing all this. First the hang glider, then the eagle…“How long have you been flying hang gliders?”
“Twenty-one years.”
“So it’s safe.”
“Depends on the pilot, depends on conditions. The way I look at it, it’s safer than driving on a freeway with drunks and homicidal maniacs.”