The Apprentice

by Jana Barkley

  “Sam?”

  She whirled back around and threw out the first excuse that came to her. “I’ll go get my glove—in case I need it.” Walking the short distance back through the herb garden to the tailgate of her SUV gave her a minute to compose herself. She didn’t dare check back to see his response.

  She grabbed her glove, paused, and then turned, expecting to see him waiting at the entrance to the mews. He was gone. His absence from the yard and the moment felt like a chasm within her.

  Waiting on: The act of a falcon circling above the falconer while waiting for game to be flushed

  Chapter Nineteen

  Sam trudged back to the mews and stepped inside the open door to find him waiting for her. They were in the hallway between two separate chambers. When the front door was closed, it acted as a safety chamber. If one of the chamber doors opened and the bird escaped, it was held in the safety chamber until the falconer could get in and secure it.

  “Close the door,” he said, just for that purpose. She heard Remo squawk in his hoarse, Harris hawk way, but Hank ignored him. “Hey, Remo,” she said as she passed by the barred window, catching a glimpse of the inquisitive Harris swaying back and forth on his swinging perch. At the end of the safety chamber, she saw a table with a scale and logbook on top and a small refrigerator stowed underneath it.

  Hank picked up a glove hanging from a peg on the wall above the worktable and grabbed a leather hood. He opened the door to the left and walked in. The falcon was tethered to a shelf perch in the middle of the chamber’s far wall.

  So this was Gally. All of her fears and jumbled emotions were forgotten at the first sight of his dark-colored head. As Hank approached with his glove, the little tiercel bobbed his head and clucked, making Sam smile. She’d had no idea peregrines sounded like that.

  Once Gally stepped up on the glove, Hank turned toward Sam so she could see what he was doing. He had hung the falcon’s leather hood on his ear, so his non-bird hand could be free, but now he picked it up and held it up to Gally’s face. Showing no qualms about taking the hood, the bird pushed his face into it. Hank took the braces in his teeth and free hand, and with a gentle pull, secured the hood behind the falcon’s head.

  He motioned with his head. “Come closer.” As she stepped in, he reached for her gloved hand. His grip was gentle as he guided it up to where his own glove was holding the falcon.

  “When you pick up a hooded falcon, he can’t see you. You’re going to put your glove behind his legs and touch them to get him to step back up onto your glove. But first, take your free hand and lift up his tail feathers.”

  She didn’t get it.

  “Don’t try to figure it out. You’ll see what I mean. Just do as I say.” It wasn’t an admonition, rather a soft-spoken reiteration of his instruction, as if she were a frightened animal. When she saw how the falcon’s tail rested against Hank’s glove, she understood. She had to lift those tail feathers away from his glove so there was room to put her glove behind the falcon’s legs.

  The falcon’s tail feathers were smooth and rigid, not soft and pliable as Chance’s. This bird’s plumage was made for high-speed flying, attacking, and diving at speeds of over two hundred miles per hour. She didn’t have time to deal with any nervousness about handling this magnificent creature. As soon as she lifted his tail feathers and touched the back of his legs with her glove, she had a peregrine falcon perched on her fist. Hank handed her his leash without preamble and turned to move out of the chamber to the worktable. It was unnerving to realize she was being trusted with the responsibility of holding the precious bird. She began to tie his leash to her glove, but Hank stopped her.

  “Just bring him here, Sam.” She was fumbling with the knot, but he took the leash from her. “With a falcon, you don’t need to fuss so much. Wrap the leash around your fingers three or four times and close your glove. We’re inside, so he’s not going anywhere.”

  Hank took the falcon from her to weigh him. “How’s Chance’s weight?”

  “Good.”

  “Do you think he could wait about forty minutes?” Hank spoke while weighing the falcon, his back to her.

  “Sure. What did you have in mind?”

  “Gally needs to fly. Why don’t you put Chance in the weathering pen so he can stretch his wings until we’re ready for him?” He was referring to the cyclone-fenced pen with a roof, which she’d noticed next to the far side of the mew. She stepped out to obey and saw the sky was turning grey. The usual coastal breeze that could turn to a stiff wind was calm this morning. She hoped it would stay that way so she could fly Chance.

  Chance jumped to her glove, eager to be out of his box. His golden eyes drank in the strange surroundings as she walked him to the pen. Once she’d tied him to the perch in the center, she stepped out, closed the gate, and went to rejoin Hank.

  The sweet distraction of seeing Gally fly saved her from the terrible introspection that had made her miserable all morning. She felt ready to tackle the world again.

  Hank had donned his hunting vest and now approached her with the hooded falcon on his glove. For a moment, his blue eyes searched her face, but by now she was up for it, and threw him a mischievous grin. He didn’t react, simply turned and motioned with his head for her to join him as he struck off down a dirt trail leading toward the ocean.

  She fell into step behind him. “At the mini-meet, Mike and some of the others told me Gally was part of the Peregrine Fund?”

  A small smile played at the corners of his mouth as he glanced behind and nodded. As the trail began to widen, she stepped up to his side to talk.

  “That must make him pretty old?”

  Hank scanned the approaching landing, which opened out onto a large, flat plateau. The plain below extended for at least half a mile before it came to an abrupt stop above the beach and ocean beyond.

  He stopped when they reached the middle of the plain and turned to her.

  “He’s twenty-six years old.” Hank waited for her reaction. “Pretty old for a falcon,” he said with the same small, unreadable smile. “I’ve had him for twenty four of those years, the other two being the time he was in the Peregrine Fund breeding project when they were working to bring peregrine falcon populations back.”

  “It was a long time ago,” he said, shaking his head and looking at her through squinty, evaluating eyes. “Back in the late 60s, a falconer who taught biology at Cornell made the connection between the pesticide DDT and the thin egg shells.”

  Hank began to remove Gally’s gear. Long fingers on hands rough from outdoor use had no problem manipulating the small gear with the fine motor skills of a younger man.

  “There were no falconry licenses back then and nobody knew how to try breeding falcons in captivity—hell,”—he laughed harshly—“until the mid-70s most raptors were still considered vermin and shot.”

  Sam looked outraged.

  “That’s the way it was. And when that teacher at Cornell and his fellow falconry buddies approached U.S. Fish and Wildlife about breeding their peregrines because the birds didn’t have the toxic levels of DDT in their systems, they were sent packing. The only falcons in captivity the Feds were aware of way back then were in zoos and too wild to tame down and consider breeding. Because they weren’t regulating what birds falconers could fly back then, USFWS treated all the peregrines used for falconry as if they didn’t exist.”

  Hank ran a loving finger up under Gally’s breast feathers and smiled. There was no doubt in Sam’s heart Hank loved this bird, that he was part of Hank like no other. She tried to see Hank as he might have been over twenty years ago with his young passage peregrine, feeding it, training it, and cutting it loose to fly when all of this was still so new in the United States; when there were still great, wide open spaces to fly a falconry bird and hunt and have no fear you would return to find your fields gone to development. She felt a nearly overwhelming desire to be back in the vast upland desert they’d hunted before, to feel the great
expanse of undisturbed land and slip back to a time she had missed. She would never know falconry like Hank and others like him had known it, and that was a sad revelation, even if she could live forever. A dangerous yearning lured her to this man. She wanted to be the one he turned to, trusted, and shared his stories with. Even more distressing was the growing understanding her passion and hunger for this ancient sport was becoming irrevocably entwined in all of her dealings with him.

  “The good news is the breeding project worked. The peregrine was removed from the endangered species list 11 years ago, and every wild peregrine falcon alive in North America today carries the genes of those original falconry birds,” he said as he continued to undo Gally’s gear.

  Sam thought about Chance. “It would be hard to give up your bird, even if it was for a good cause like saving the species,” she said.

  “Most of the falconers who donated their birds to the project gave them up for good in return for progeny. The breeders usually stayed, and the falconers were happy to get brand-new baby peregrines to start over with.” He shook his head as if still mystified by the memory. “They seemed stunned when I said I wanted him back. After a couple of years, the breeding was going well and they had plenty of birds.” He grinned. “I took a lot of flak for that one.”

  “Why?”

  He shrugged, a little self-conscious. “A lot of falconers—most falconers, I guess—try to fly as many birds as they can. That’s how you get good. No two birds will ever be the same, even if they are the same species.” He shrugged again. “I guess that’s where I’m different. I’ve flown a lot of birds, too, over my vast career.” He threw her a smirk at the age reference. “But some birds demand a commitment. For life. At least that’s how I feel.” He glanced at her again and then returned his focus to Gally. She was moved by this vulnerable revelation. Was he testing her, searching her feelings on this, and wondering if she, too, would judge him?

  “I would have wanted him back.”

  He paused as he threaded the long cord hanging from his glove through a grommet on one anklet and then pulled Gally’s last jess out. When the falcon took off, Hank would open his fingers and the cord would slip out in a smooth release, freeing the falcon.

  Hank was quiet and turned into the wind. With a gentle tug he struck the hood, freeing the falcon’s head. Gally’s eyes, his whole energy, and his body took in the horizon, starting from one end of the coast to the other. His body exploded in a rouse, making his feathers shake and fluff and then slick down hard to his aerodynamic frame. Sam felt his pent-up energy ready to explode: he was a missile about to launch. The falcon muted and took a tentative up-and-down step with both feet. Then, with a decisive down thrust of his wings, he pumped skyward into the wind and started to circle.

  Hank walked forward into the breeze, and Sam joined him. He was not watching the falcon, though he had a pair of binoculars around his neck. Sam craned her neck back and found the falcon circling around them but gaining more height with each pass. Occasional gusts of wind made her check Hank’s expression to see if he was concerned about his bird being blown away, but he just stood and watched. Contrary to Sam’s fears, the tiercel seemed to thrive on the gusts and used them to lift even higher.

  When the falcon had reached eight hundred to a thousand feet, by Sam’s novice estimation, she turned to Hank. He continued to stand with no apparent concern. She looked up again, and now Gally was so small he was a tiny black speck in a sea of grey sky. She shook her head and caught Hank grinning at her.

  “I’m not hunting him, today,” he said. “We’ll just let him play in the wind and get his exercise.” Hank took up the binoculars and scanned the sky.

  “I don’t know how you do this,” Sam said. “If I couldn’t see my bird, I’d have a heart attack.”

  “That’s because you’ve only flown a hawk.”

  It wasn’t a put down. He was teasing her. Sam laughed. It was good see him relaxed enough to joke with her.

  “Can you see him?”

  “Still worried? Here.” He took the binoculars from around his neck and handed them to her.

  Sam searched the sky. Nothing. Nowhere. “Where was he when you last saw him?” She was working hard to find the falcon when Hank tapped her shoulder.

  “Put those down and look over toward the point.” He indicated the farthest end of the landing jutting out toward the ocean. Reaching into his hawking vest, Hank pulled out a frayed leather skirt attached to a rope with a wooden handle. She smiled. Of course, the lure.

  “Stay put,” he said, and walked ten feet away from her. Hank began to swing the lure and whistled. Sam scanned the skies where he’d told her to watch. At first, there was nothing, and then a small black shape began to emerge, coming at them faster than any animal she had ever seen. As Hank continued to swing the lure, the falcon altered his position and rushed between her and Hank with blinding speed. As the tiercel flew in, Hank thrust the lure out in a quick shot away from him, and then yanked it back in time to keep the falcon from grabbing it. He spun around to face the opposite direction, getting ready for the falcon’s next pass, which was more focused at this lower pitch.

  “It’s a game,” Hank yelled. He was grinning from ear to ear. “This bird loves trying to catch the lure. If he tags it, he wins, and I give it to him.”

  Gally spun around in the air and passed again and again, each pass bringing his talons closer to the lure. Each dive and miss bounced him up in the air like a yo-yo, where he would stall and turn to dive again. It was a natural ballet between falconer and falcon that could never have been choreographed. But it was Hank’s face that moved her. He was young again and uninhibited. Forbidden thoughts of his life with Tasha and of how she could have preferred someone else to him teased Sam with what she wanted to know: what it would be like to be loved by such a passionate man. Oh Sam, let it go. But the thought had surfaced, and she had to admit if her life were different, if she were not struggling to survive, she would have given Tasha a run for her money. Accepting these feelings, which had been stirring in her for a week, brought a calm she didn’t expect. There was no shame attached to this, because it was impossible to pursue. Sam allowed herself the pleasure of watching him, of wanting him, even though she knew it could never go any further than this secret, silent feeling within her. He could never know about this, as he could never know about her illness until it was too late.

  Hank let Gally snag the lure with his talons on the last pass and drag it to the ground. The wind had blown his shock of blond hair in his eyes, and he flung it back with a shake of his head. He looked up at her with a big grin, and Sam smiled back. Something in his eyes held hers, and this time she did not force herself to break the connection.

  The spell broke, and Gally jumped up to Hank’s glove, expecting his food reward.

  “Amazing,” was all she could say as she walked up to them.

  “Think you’d ever want to fly one of these?”

  “I…don’t know,” she said, with mock apprehension. “Maybe if I had a good teacher....”

  He laughed aloud, and the sound of his voice charmed her. “Well, then, Ms. Apprentice, come over here so I can teach you how to hood a falcon.”

  “Me—hood him?” Sam knew better than to question him further and did as she was told.

  Gally had finished eating and was picking his talons clean of meat.

  “As soon as he rouses, hold up your glove so he can step up to you.”

  Sam questioned him with a look.

  “He’s not hooded; he can see you. He’ll step up like a hawk if you give him your glove.”

  The falcon, satisfied his meal was complete, roused hard. Hank took hold of her gloved hand, sending unexpected thrills of pleasure up her arm. Oblivious to his effect on her, he held her glove up to Gally and let go.

  Gally was a pro, and he stepped to Sam’s glove without hesitation. It was when Hank stepped back after handing Sam the leash he looked up and around in question. Then, turnin
g his dark-hooded head back, he stared long and hard at Sam. She wrapped the leash around her fingers and clenched the loops in her glove, making certain he could not get away.

  “Don’t stare at him,” Hank said. “A stare is a challenge, and falcons resent it. He’s checking you out, but he’s okay. You can watch him from the side to see what he’s doing.”

  Sam focused on the ocean instead of the falcon. She could feel the intense energy of the bird’s gaze. Then it shifted, and he adjusted his perch on her glove and went back to cleaning his talons. All was well.

  Hank walked around to her right side and took her bare hand in his. It was a jolt to her system, but she maintained her outward calm in spite of the heat rushing to her face. He placed Gally’s hood in her palm and showed her how to hold it by the topknot.

  “You’re going to present the hood to him first, let him know what you’re doing. If all goes well, he should push his face in.” Sam nodded, remembering how she had watched him do it before.

  She held the hood up to Gally with a tentative hand, taking care to look at him from the corner of her eye.

  “Up a little higher,” said Hank. “Good, now bring it toward him.”

  Gally hesitated, and then Sam felt the pressure of his head push into the hood.

  “There are two long braces and two short ones at the back of the hood,” he said. “Pulling the short ones opens the hood; pulling the long ones closes it. Put one long brace in your free hand and take the other in your teeth.”

  Sam felt awkward but did as she was instructed.

  His voice was gentle and encouraging. “Don’t be afraid; go ahead.”

  The braces slipped smoothly as she pulled them apart between her teeth and hand, closing the back of the hood. It was done. Sam heaved an audible sigh, and Hank patted her on the back.