by Beth Vrabel
“A real newspaper, huh?” A woman whose long, gray hair was tied at the base of her neck stepped out from behind the cubicle wall. She crossed her arms when she saw Gordon and me. “I don’t trust journalists from reputable newspapers, let alone kiddy reports.”
“The Cub Report is not a kiddy report,” I snapped.
The professor held out a long, slim hand. “I’d like to see a copy, then.”
My face flushed. “We’re working on our first issue,” I
muttered.
The professor rolled her eyes. “Do you have an
appointment?”
“No,” I said, “but I just want to ask a few quick questions.”
“No appointment, no questions,” she said. “As the only research ornithologist in this university, my time is limited.”
“It’s about birds in Bear Creek!” I blurted, even though a journalist should always be collected. “I think they’re upset.”
The ornithologist professor sighed. “I don’t have time for this.” She walked back to her cubicle. “Animals are not people. They don’t get upset. Professors, however, do, especially when their precious time is squandered. Goodbye.”
“But—” I started. The professor didn’t glance back.
“That was so rude,” Gordon whispered.
“It’s typical,” I said after a moment, straightening up. “You won’t be so surprised after a few issues. People think it’s okay to be rude to journalists even though we’re just doing our job.”
We were back in the hall when the door to the office opened. I whipped around, hope making me smile like Min. But it wasn’t the professor. A young Asian man stood in front of us, floppy hair swooping to the side across his head. He wore a T-shirt with the name of the university on it and a badge around his neck. I noticed a small bird sticker on the badge.
“Hey,” he said. “I’m sorry about the professor. She gets stressed during migration season.” He held out his hand to shake. As I shook it, he said, “I’m Patrick Tran, and I handle some of the ornithology research projects here.”
I pulled the notebook out of my back pocket. “Can you go on the record, Mr. Tran?”
He shrugged. “I guess so.”
Quickly, I told him about what had happened at the park. As I spoke, his mouth twitched. “Classic,” he said.
“Classic?” I repeated. That was a reporter trick Mom had taught me. Instead of full questions, the best way to get a source to divulge more was with a little nudge.
Mr. Tran crossed his arms. “Do you have a murder in
the park?”
“Yes!” I said as Gordon gasped, “No!”
Mr. Tran laughed. “Just checking to see how detailed your research was,” he said to me. “Do you want to tell him or should I?”
I grinned. “A murder is what you call a group of crows. You know, instead of a flock.”
“Oh,” Gordon said, stretching out the word. “Then there definitely was a murder at the park.” He pulled up the picture of the crow with the long strip of rubber in its mouth and handed the camera to Mr. Tran, who thumbed through the photos, his smile stretching even more as he went through
the frames.
“More and more research shows the ability of birds—particularly crows and ravens—to reason and feel. In fact, many researchers believe crows have the intelligence of a seven-year-old child. So as smart as you, really,” Mr. Tran said.
I glared at him. “I sincerely doubt that.” Brushing my hair off my forehead, I added, “Besides, I’m eleven.”
“Right,” Mr. Tran said, and he wiped his hand over his mouth like he was smearing away his smile. “I got into this field because of crows. My family rescued a young one that had been hit by a car. We nursed it back to health. It remembered us for years, swooping down whenever we were
outside. The coolest part was that it taught its children to do the same.”
Mr. Tran glanced behind him at the closed door. “Lots of researchers caution that we shouldn’t romanticize subjects. It’s tempting to people to try and think of animals in human terms, but that can be dangerous for their health.”
“How would that be dangerous?” Gordon asked.
Mr. Tran shrugged. “Well, it’s sort of the flip side of demonizing certain animals. Look at the big, bad wolf and how that played a role in the real animal’s depopulation across the world,” he said. “When we start morphing animals into human terms, we risk losing objectivity.”
Objectivity was vital to journalism. As soon as a reporter became personally invested in a story she was working on, being truthful and fair in coverage was at risk. It’d be like reporting on a politician’s actions despite already announcing that the politician was a bad person. That would cause bias, or favoritism, which doesn’t belong in the news.
Mr. Tran continued, “There’s a history of crows seemingly doing things like what’s going on in your park. I’m not saying you have a crow issue, but I can tell you that crows have been known to head-dive people to get their attention, especially if they’re too close to where the birds are roosting.” He held up one finger. Raising a second, he added, “And they’ve been recorded stealing things, such as key rings.” He unfolded a third finger. “And the windshield
wiper is another on-the-record item crows have been known to take apart.”
“Why?” I asked while busily scribbling down Mr. Tran’s response. He paused while I whipped to a fresh page.
“Well, sometimes it seems they do it just because it’s fun.” He grinned. “They seem to like to play; messing with humans must be a fun game for them. But with all of these things happening at once, I’d think there might be more to it.”
“Like what?”
The doorknob behind us began to turn. Mr. Tran’s eyes widened and he ushered us down the hall. In a lowered voice, he said, “I’d start looking into what might’ve changed in
the park.”
Gordon and I went to the college library after interviewing Mr. Tran. I quickly brought up research on crows on one of the desktop computers. Crows lived in families, sometimes generations roosting in the same tree. Mr. Tran was right about them being as intelligent as a child—I watched videos of wild crows figuring out multiple-step puzzles to get a piece of food. I also read sections of research by ornithologists about how playful crows could be, but also how angry, particularly if someone blocked them from getting food.
“Look at this,” Gordon said softly. He was sitting next to me, doing his own crow research. I leaned over to see what he had brought up.
It was a research project investigating why crows reacted the way they did when another crow died. Other crows gathered around the body of the dead crow. They cried out loudly and called to other crows to join them. “It’s like they grieve,” Gordon said.
I shook my head. “You’re doing that thing Mr. Tran told us not to do. It says here they might just be trying to learn what killed the bird so they don’t do the same thing.”
Gordon didn’t say anything for a long moment, just breathed in and out. For some reason, I couldn’t look at him. Finally, he whispered, “Or they’re recognizing someone is gone and letting themselves feel sad. I think that’s probably pretty important, too.”
I turned back to my computer.
WE GOT BACK FROM the university at three o’clock. I texted Mom, asking if it was okay if I grabbed something to eat at the diner and worked on my article. Something was nagging me, a feeling like I was missing some crucial piece to my story. I thought maybe if I sat in the diner with my notes, it’d be kind of like sitting amid the bustle of the newsroom. Maybe it’d help me figure out what I was missing. Plus, other Cubs—
Gordon and Gloria—were going to be there, too. They could maybe help me figure it out. Look at you, leaning on your friends, I heard in Dad’s voice. My eyes got crinkly at the thought.
Quickly, Mom typed back yes. Too quickly. It must not have been a good day.
“How’d it go?” Glor
ia asked after I ordered a slice of pizza. Gordon was talking with Chef Wells about some of the framed photographs he had up for sale around the diner; someone had bought a bunch of them all at once.
I shrugged. “I’m missing a few details.” Mr. Tran had seemed pretty convinced that crows could be responsible for the vandalism at the park. But if I wrote that in my article without any proof, The Cub Report would be a joke. No one would believe it, even with the photo of the wiper blade rubber in a crow’s mouth.
Chief Rodgers, sitting in the back corner of the diner, was dipping a grilled cheese sandwich into a bowl of Chef Wells’s tomato chowder. I’d wait until he was done before asking him a few more questions. Mom had said it was rude to ask sources for information when they were out to lunch.
Mr. Tran had suggested we look into what could’ve changed at the park. But I had been going to the park every day since we moved here and, just like everywhere else in Bear Creek, nothing had changed.
At least, I didn’t think so. Gloria was saying something else, but I tuned into what was going on behind me. Someone in running clothes passed Chief Rodgers’s table. “Hey, Chief, when are the park trails going to be open again?”
“When I get some leads,” said the chief, not looking up from his soup.
“Nothing?” the runner asked.
“It’s an open investigation. Not discussing the details.”
“Sure.” The runner shook his head as he walked away. “You look real hard at work there, Rodgers.”
“I’m having lunch. People can have lunch and still be working!”
Although Mom said interrupting sources was rude, Dad had always said that reporters should seize any opportunity to confront them. And Chief Rodgers had said it was a working lunch.
I nodded to myself.
“Ha!” Gloria called over her shoulder to her dad. “Second order of the special today. Pizza with peaches and arugula coming up!”
“What? Peaches? On pizza? No!” I yelped.
“You don’t have to be rude about it,” Gloria said. “I asked if you wanted to try it and you nodded.”
“I was nodding at my own thoughts,” I said. “I’d never nod for peach pizza.”
Gloria’s eyes narrowed.
“Don’t worry,” I said. “Once that column on recipes runs, people won’t accidentally order specials; they’ll do it on purpose.”
Gloria’s arms crossed. A few feet down the counter, Chef Wells chuckled.
“Boring old pepperoni it is.” Gloria rolled her eyes.
I went over to Chief Rodgers, who was reading the Bear Creek Gazette. He sighed and pushed it aside. “Hello, Nellie,” he said. “The Gazette’s closing, so I assume you’re not here in your official capacity as a so-called reporter.”
I pulled my notebook out of my back pocket, and he groaned. “I no longer freelance for the Gazette. I work for a different newspaper now.”
“Sure, sure,” said the chief, dipping his sandwich into his soup.
“Has anything happened to disturb the murder?”
“The what?”
“The murder,” I repeated. “That’s what a collection of crows is called.”
He sighed and dropped his sandwich onto his plate.
“I thought you were working on an article about the vandalism at the park?” he said. “Now you’re asking about crows?”
“Yes,” I said. “Has anything upset them lately?”
“Upset them?” Chief Rodgers threw up his hands. “What exactly do you think police do, kid? It’s not all sniffing bags of smells and checking in on birds’ feelings, I can tell you that.”
Gloria brought over my slice of pizza, muttering boring under her breath as she walked away.
“Just a few more questions.” He groaned. Reporters must be persistent, I heard in Dad’s voice.
Before I could ask another question, a plate rattled to the floor beside us. “What was that?” a diner squealed.
Chief and I both were on our feet, turning toward the action. A slice of pizza lay upside down on the diner’s black-and-white tile floor. Hank, the middle-aged man who said he had been attacked at the park, rubbed at his tongue with a napkin.
“That was the special,” Gloria said. “You ordered it.”
“I said I wanted something special. Not something disgusting! Were those peaches? On pizza?”
Chef Wells rounded the corner. “I’ll get a slice of regular. On the house, Hank.”
“There’s nothing wrong with that pizza,” Gloria said. “Have a taste for adventure, people!” But she brought a mop and bucket out from a pantry and headed toward the flipped-over slice.
“Bit of an extreme reaction,” I murmured to Chief.
“Ah, you know how it is,” Chief Rodgers said with a shrug. He pointed to his tomato soup. “You like what you like. I count on Wells back there making this chowder every Monday at lunch. Just like we get tacos on Tuesdays. If he went and threw peaches in there, I’d be pretty sour about it, too.” He dipped a piece of crust into the bowl. “We’re all creatures of habit,
I guess.”
“Creatures of habit,” I repeated under my breath. “That’s it!” Suddenly, what had been nagging at me unsnagged. I jumped to my feet, accidentally upsetting my own plate of pizza.
“Really?” Gloria snapped. “I’m not cleaning that up,
Nellie.”
“Sorry!” I said and plucked the piece off the tile. I tossed it back onto the table, ignoring Chief Rodgers’s grimace. “Birds! Creatures! Habit! Peanuts! That’s it!”
“Yeah, yeah,” Chief said and rolled his eyes. “It all makes sense now.”
“The birds!” Sometimes when I got excited my thoughts rushed out like a faucet turned to full blast. Dad used to hold my face in his hands and tell me to breathe when I got like that. I pressed my own hands against my cheeks, forcing myself to pause. But I was too excited to sit down again.
“There was a person—Mrs. Austin—who fed them every day. The receptionist at the Gazette said Mrs. Austin is always in the park. But she hasn’t been lately. Not that day with Hank! Not that day when you put up tape and closed the park! Not in at least a week!”
Gordon, who had been hanging more framed photographs for sale around the diner, piped in. “Yeah, and she wasn’t there the day I got those shots of the birds, either.”
Chief Rodgers stood up and brushed crumbs from his lap. “Shots? You were shooting birds, son? At the public park?”
“Well, sure,” Gordon said. He glanced at me and Gloria in confusion, before lifting his camera and going through the images to those of the birds.
“Oh,” Chief said and sat down. “Camera shots.”
“Yeah, of course,” Gordon said and handed over the camera.
“Huh,” Chief Rodgers said. I peeked over his shoulder;
he had gotten to the images of the crow with the wiper blade rubber in its mouth.
“See!” I said, excitement taking over again. “Crows! They do this! They’re super smart, and they do this kind of thing. Something’s wrong and it’s not what’s at the park—it’s what isn’t. Mrs. Austin! She fed them every day; they’re acting out because they’re hungry.”
“Or because they miss her,” Gordon said.
Gloria turned and called out to her dad. “Hey, Pops. When was Mrs. Austin in here last?”
Chef Wells rubbed the back of his neck. “Been at least a week. Maybe two.” He pulled a landline phone from its holster on the wall and punched in some numbers. After a long pause, he looked back toward us. “No answer at Arlene’s.”
Chief Rodgers popped up again from his seat. He pulled the walkie-talkie strapped to his shoulder closer to his mouth and said something in police code.
“Let’s go!” I said and tucked the notebook back in my back pocket.
Chief Rodgers pointed his finger at my face. “No. I’ll debrief all the press after we check on Mrs. Austin.”
Part of me thought of fighting—journalists
are able to go to crime scenes, so long as they don’t interfere. But a bigger part knew to hang back; I didn’t know if I wanted to be among the first on the scene to discover whatever was keeping Mrs. Austin from the park. And a third part gave me happy shivers. Chief Rodgers had called me the press.
That night, someone knocked on our front door. Min, I assumed.
But when Mom opened it, she gasped so loudly I dropped my notebook and ran. It was Chief Rodgers and Gloria.
“I’m sorry to frighten you, Mrs. Murrow,” the chief said.
Mom shook her head. “I’m being silly. Not used to seeing an officer on my doorstep.”
Chief tilted his head in my direction. “Mrs. Austin is doing fine. She had the flu and was weak. She says she didn’t want to bother anyone, but she was in rough shape. She’s doing better now, and her doc says she’ll be back to herself in a few days.”
Gloria said, “I just dropped off some meals from the diner. You saved her, Nellie. If you hadn’t put those pieces together about the crows, who knows how long—”
“I was just doing my job,” I said. “Hold on a sec.”
Mom’s head swiveled among the three of us. Her eyes widened again when I came back holding my notebook. “On the record now,” I said. “When will the park reopen?”
“That’s the thing,” Chief Rodgers said.
Gloria stepped forward, swinging a little basket in her hand. “We need to test your theory.”
The next day, we met early at the park. Mrs. Austin sat on her bench next to Chief Rodgers. Min, Thom, Gloria, and I spread peanuts and bits of fruit in front of the bench.
At first the crows ignored us. Then a few squawked. Finally, a dozen or so swooped down. They hopped as they picked at the peanuts and pieces of diced-up apple. A couple flew up to perch on the bench behind Mrs. Austin. “I missed you, too,” she told them.
Gordon crouched on the grass and aimed the camera in Mrs. Austin’s direction as a crow hopped onto her shoulder. She laughed. “I didn’t think anyone cared about little ol’ me.”