and began his stoop.
I can hear him, Debra whispered, and the sound of his wings carried
clearly to them, rustling like a bush fire in dry grass as he dived on
the old bird.
Break left! Go! Go! Go! David found he was calling to the old eagle
as though he were flying wingman for him, and he gripped Debra's hand
until she winced. The old eagle seemed almost to hear him, for he
closed his WIngs and flicked out of the path of the strike, tumbling for
a single turn so that the attacker hissed by him with talons reaching
uselessly through air, his speed plummeting him down into the basin of
the plain.
The old bird caught and broke out of his roll with wings half-cocked,
and streaked down after the other. In one veteran stroke of skill he
had wrested the advantage.
Get him! screamed David. Get him when he turns!
Now!
The young bird was streaking towards the tree-toops and swift death, he
flared his wings to break his fall, turning desperately to avoid the
lethal stoop of his enemy. In that moment he was vulnerable and the old
eagle reached forward with his terrible spiked talons and without
slackening the searing speed of his dive he hit the other bird in the
critical moment of his turn.
The thud of the impact carried clearly to the watchers on the hill and
there was a puff of feathers like the burst of explosives, black from
the wings and white from the breast.
Locked together by the old bird's honed killing claws, they tumbled,
wing over tangled wing, feathers streaming from their straining bodies
and then drifting away like thistledown on the light breeze.
Still joined in mortal combat, they struck the top branches of one of
the leadwood trees, and fell through them to come to rest at last in a
high fork as an untidy bundle of ruffled feathers and trailing wings.
Leading Debra over the rough ground David hurried down the hill and
through the coarse stands of arrow grass to the tree.
Can you see them? Debra asked anxiously, as David focused his
binoculars on the struggling pair.
They are trapped, David told her. The old fellow has his claws buried
to the hilt in the other's back. He will never be able to free them and
they have fallen across the fork, one on either side of the tree. The
screams of rage and agony rang from the hills about them, and the female
eagle sailed anxiously above the leadwood. She added her querulous
screeching to the sound of conflict.
The young bird is dying. David studied him through the lens, watching
the carmine drops ooze from the gaping yellow beak to fall and glisten
upon the snowy breast, like a dying king's rubies.
And the old bird- Debra listened to the clamour with face upturned, her
eyes dark with c oncem.
He will never get those claws loose, they lock automatically as soon as
pressure is applied and he will not be able to lift himself. He will
die also. Can't you do something?
Debra was tugging at his arm. Can't you help him? Gently he tried to
