“Okay, okay.”
He stepped away from the hole, trying to quiet his imagination.
Maybe that thing is the entrance to the wolf’s den?
Maybe it has nothing to do with us at all.
She directed him to begin searching the edge of the clearing for anything noteworthy.
Green turned and walked toward the woods.
After the second spiderweb to the face, he picked up a branch and waved it like a conductor’s wand while he walked, wondering how many spiders were tough enough to survive the frosty fall nights. He scrutinized the ground, finding fewer and fewer pieces of trash as he moved outward from the clearing.
Something crimson caught his eye and he stopped next to the body of a red bird, one wing splayed like fanned playing cards. Green shouted to Valentina.
“Dead bird over here.”
She was searching the opposite side of the clearing.
“Yes. I have found two dead nuthatches already. Bag it.”
He knelt. The bird lay with one wing extended. The other was plastered to its side. Its eye was a perfect black jewel next to the carrot-orange beak. There was no blood, no visible damage. It seemed perfectly intact. He thought of the pink gumline of the dead woman in the van at Kinkaid Cabins.
“This one’s a cardinal, I think.”
“Keep looking. Call them out if you see more.”
He turned a sample bag inside out and used it like a plastic mitt to grab the cardinal. He’d seen plenty of dog owners in the park use the same technique. The little corpse was cold and stiff. A layer of dead leaves came with the bird into the bag. He put the bag in his jacket pocket. It felt impolite to treat a death in such an unceremonious way, but he didn’t know how to respect a dead bird in a plastic bag.
Green walked on and found another corpse immediately.
“Uh, gray bird. Looks like a small, skinny pigeon.”
“Mourning dove. Bag it.”
The dove joined the cardinal in his bulging pocket. The two bags crinkled as he stood and continued the search.
They moved on, circling the clearing and calling out their finds.
“Gray squirrel.”
“Two more cardinals.”
“European starling.”
“Blue jay.”
“Northern flicker. No, two northern flickers.”
“Uh, a little gray-and-white guy with a black head?”
“Chickadee.”
They continued for a half hour, finding just over a dozen corpses before rendezvousing in the clearing. Valentina stowed the bagged remains in her backpack. Except for the bits of twig and leaves clinging to them, all of the corpses seemed to be in pristine condition, avian displays in a natural history museum. Green ran fingers through his hair and tried to swallow away the knot in his throat.
They’re just birds.
The thought wasn’t convincing. A pattern was emerging in his new line of work, a pattern etched in death. Death, he knew, was natural. But if this was nature’s true face, it little resembled the character of nature from his daydreams.
