Delphine Fernside's Arc

Chapter 5 of 11

Della and Grampy came down the hidden path with a plan. Grampy would walk home and bring more crates and twine. Della would stay at the patch and start picking what her small basket could hold. She had another idea too, one she kept to herself. The forest was full of small helpers — mice, voles, chipmunks, the bold ones who came for spilled seed. If she sat quiet and crumbled a heel of bread on the moss, some of them might come close enough to trust her. Many small hands could move a lot of berries. She found a good spot for them right away. At the patch's edge stood a heap of fallen logs, soft with moss and tangled branches, with dark gaps wide enough for any small creature to duck inside. She crumbled her bread along the base of it and sat back on her heels to wait. Nothing came. Della watched the gaps for a long time. Then she looked up and saw why. A hawk hung in slow circles above the patch, brown wings spread, red tail fanned against the sky. It had been there since dawn, she realized. No mouse would cross open ground with that shadow sliding over the strawberries. Her plan was finished before it started. She followed the hawk's circles back to their center. At the far side of the patch stood a tall spruce, and near the top sat a wide stick nest. The hawk was not hunting. It was guarding. Della stood up slowly and walked the tree line, keeping low. Beneath the spruce, in the needles, she found what she had half expected — a fledgling, brown and speckled, hunched against a root. Its eye was bright and afraid. It had fallen and could not climb back. Della did not try to touch it. She pulled off her apron and laid it on the ground beside the bird like a ramp. Then she walked back to the patch, found the stack of empty crates Grampy had left ready, and dragged one slat-sided box to the base of the spruce. She tipped it on its side near the fledgling. She broke a low spruce branch and used it to nudge the bird, gently, into the crate. The fledgling hopped in and crouched. Della lifted the crate against her chest and carried it up the slope toward the nest as far as she could climb, then set it on a flat rock high in the branches' shade. She stepped back into the open and waved both arms at the sky. The hawk dropped. It landed on the rock beside the crate and folded its wings around the fledgling. Della walked back to the patch with her heart pounding. Above her, the circling had stopped. Already a chipmunk poked its nose from the log pile and sniffed at the bread. She knelt by the strawberries and began to pick.