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Show 64 air would hint for an instant of the morning thaw, but then it would errupt, blast the New Hampshire lakeside universe with ice. Hanging the second ball, Leah felt the sudden wind seem to rip open, her cheek, tear her flesh to the bone, and she screamed, no anaesthetic to the cruel surgery- "No . . . No ... I'm sorry," she spoke gently to the birds. "I'm sorry . . . don't . . . comeback. . . don't fly away . . . this is good." And Leah put her hand to her face to see, whether, in fact, the wind had drawn blood. "Come back . . . come back. This is what you need," Leah called to her friends. Then the rain came. The temperature was dropping, more than a degree a minute, and the rain came, and Leah still had two more balls of pudding to tie to the oak branches. Her fingers grew raw. The birds were shuttling and looping and sounding panicked - in the yard, in and about the limbs, anywhere with a deceptive semblence of shelter. Leah tied the fourth feedball, pulled the knot tight; she was drenched. The loden coat that she had put on swelled every fibre of its material with the pelting downpour. It felt twice its weight. Leah migh as well have been in the lake. Leah felt that way. But the birds were thin, unsheltered; they were helpless. And Leah had to get the last ball up there for them. She was their friend. Hunt was off, riding drafts of . . . what? . . . Creation? Nostalgia? But she was their friend. Leah was the friend of these luckless birds. And she had pledged nourishment. And she would deliver it. The torrents fell like ice. Her fingers lost all specific feeling. There was only an unplaced, undetermined ache. Leah dropped the food. She picked it up. She couldn't feel it in her hand, and she dropped it again. Wind with rain slashed and reslashed her face. "One more - don't leave," |