Chapter Twenty-Seven
All any of us want, bird and birder, is the freedom to find our own skies, our own magic.
Birds Through a Sherry Glass , H.A. Quirm
Hundreds of people lined both sides of South Carriage Drive. They were waving bird-shaped flags and bird-painted balloons, and they chanted in exuberant unison, “Caladrius! Caladrius! Go! Go! Go!” Banners had been strung between trees, proclaiming such things as get high er education with ornithology ! and birds are brilliant ! A pair of clowns in plumed hats danced along the rows of people, handing out boiled lollies and university enrollment forms.
Upon noticing Beth and Devon, the crowd went wild. (Which is to say, they cheered and clapped in a slightly louder fashion, considering this was Victorian Britain, where “going wild” would seem like “disinterest” to tourists from more emotionally healthy excitable countries.)
“Um,” Devon said.
“Gosh,” Beth said.
“Caladrius! Caladrius! Go! Go! Go!” the crowd replied.
And to the left of them, a small child said in the kind of sweet, lisping voice that somehow managed to be heard clearly above any amount of general uproar, “Mummy, the bird people are holding hands. Does this mean they got married?”
“Aahhhh!” gasped the crowd in delight.
“Uh,” Beth and Devon said in unison, glancing at each other. Then looking back, they saw Schreib paused at the gates, struggling to catch his breath. He winked at them, flicking his pistol in a go on, hurry up gesture.
“Uh,” they said again, utterly bemused. But in the absence of any other option, they continued along the path. The crowd cheered and tossed paper confetti at them. Beth was appalled, bewildered, and overwhelmed, but Devon’s grip on her hand kept her steady. The strength of his presence, encompassed by boots and long coat, set with hardened muscles, offered sanctuary for her jittery nerves. Even so, she wanted to stop and find a quiet place beneath a tree where she could bring out her journal, write a risk-benefit analysis of placing the caladrius in the Albert Aviary, and maybe have a cup of tea. But there was no time. She would just have to trust the wind, adore the wind.
As they progressed, the two rows of people merged behind them, and before long they found themselves leading the crowd past the Albert Memorial, upon whose steps a brass band stood, playing Rossini’s “William Tell Overture” with a verve that obliterated whatever shreds remained of Beth’s composure. Some thirty yards beyond, surrounded by a colorful garden, stood the Albert Aviary. Its great glass dome bore a delicate, finely scrolled copper exoskeleton that created a diamond-paned effect; roses framed the arched, gold-painted doorway; and as sunlight flashed here and there, producing fragments of rainbows, the structure seemed altogether like a fairy-tale castle against the faultless blue summer sky.
But Devon stopped before they reached it, and Beth edged close to his side, tightening her grip on the birdcage’s handle—for standing near the entrance of the aviary were two men in dark suits and bowler hats, their identical mustaches twitching with what might have been delight, or possibly itchiness considering the noon heat.
“Lovebirds Meet Their Destiny!” exclaimed one in rousing tones.
“Higher Education Wins the Day!” declared the other.
As the crowd behind them fell silent with breathless anticipation, Beth and Devon turned to each other, dazed.
“Do you understand what’s happening?” Beth asked in a whisper.
“I think we’ve been played,” Devon whispered in reply. “Those are the men who’ve trailed us since Paris.”
“The agents of PRESS?”
“Oh!” Devon’s countenance lit with sudden understanding. “Press agents. I can’t believe I didn’t get that before.”
The dark-suited men were watching them as warily as if they were explosive thornbacked owls. Nearby in a tidy line stood the IOS executive committee, obviously as disconcerted by the crowd as Beth herself felt. And behind them, Laz Brady and another young man in Oxford blue held up a banner reading reach for the skies with an ornithology degree .
Comprehension struck Beth so forcefully, she gasped. “This has all been a recruitment drive!”
“I think you’re right,” Devon agreed.
“But that’s insane!”
He shrugged. “Ornithology.” Reaching out with his free hand, he gently tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear.
“Awww,” the crowd cooed adoringly.
At that moment, the dark-suited men approached, briefcases in hand like weapons. “Good day, Professors,” one said with a polite nod. “I am Mr. Flogg, and this is my associate, Mr. Fettick. Congratulations!”
“Um,” Beth said. “Thank you?”
“You have been “ A Beacon of Inspiration” to thousands of bird lovers across Britain and abroad,” Mr. Flogg continued. “Because of your acts of courage and derring-do, not to mention your romantic exploits, inquiries and enrollments to the ornithology departments of all universities have more than tripled this week! At least twelve new applicants! The International Ornithological Society is ecstatic and would like to offer you both an excellent employment package, including tenure, at any institution you desire.”
** Tenure! ** rejoiced one part of Beth’s brain. The rest, however, was a tumult of cynicism, overwhelming stimulation, and the desire to run away to some distant moorland where the soft melody of a whispering warbler provided the only sound for miles. Over Mr. Flogg’s shoulder, the IOS committee members regarded her with solemn approval, and she smiled politely in automatic response. Then, noting that Gladstone was not among them, she breathed a little more freely.
“That’s—” she began.
“But wait!” Mr. Flogg interjected dramatically, causing her to jolt and the caladrius to emit a startled peep. “There’s more! The Royal College of Science would like to honor you both with their Medal of Distinction, which comes with a grand cash prize of ten pounds.”
“Good heavens,” Devon said sardonically, grinning at Beth. He bounced his eyebrows. “We’re rich. Ten pounds each!”
“Er, no, that’s ten pounds between the two of you,” Mr. Flogg explained, scrubbing his mustache in embarrassment.
“Wasn’t there supposed to be a five thousand pound reward that went along with Birder of the Year?” Devon asked.
The committee members shuffled uncomfortably, looking like Devon had just threatened to steal all their blackboard chalk. “Ah, yes, well, you see…” Mr. Flogg extemporized. “There are two of you, and as everyone knows—”
“There can only be one Birder of the Year,” Beth, Devon, and the committee members joined him in saying.
“Yes, precisely. Because the award cannot be given to two people, it will instead be presented to the International Ornithological Society executive committee itself.”
“Which is significantly more than two people,” Devon pointed out, but no one heard him over the committee members enthusiastically congratulating each other for this win.
“What about the caladrius?” Beth asked.
“Ah! Wonderful news on that front too,” Mr. Flogg continued. “The committee is excited to offer the caladrius an all-expenses-paid tour of the British Isles! Including a very special audience with Her Majesty the Queen’s aviary keeper !”
Beth went cold right through. “But that’s what Gladstone was going to do,” she said. “It’s why we took the bird.”
“Yes, but we are doing it in the name of science, not profit,” explained the committee secretary, Monsieur Badeau.
“Entirely different,” said the representative of Universiteit van Amsterdam.
“Gladstone has been invited to resign,” announced Oxford University’s chancellor, in a tone that left no doubt “invited” was a professional synonym for “forced to.” He looked Beth up and down comprehensively, then nodded in approval, and she intuited that there were great things in her future: not only tenure and a corner office, but a higher quality of gloves to wear when she washed the dishes in the faculty lounge. She took half a step back, clutching the birdcage so tightly her fingers hurt.
“Excuse us a moment,” Devon said to the committee, then turned away, drawing Beth with him. She felt his mood clench with the same instinct to flee that she had. But there was nowhere to go. With Messrs. Flogg and Fettick and the IOS committee behind them, and what appeared to be half of London before them, they were thoroughly trapped.
“This is dreadful!” Beth whispered. “We can’t release the caladrius inside the aviary now; it’s just like placing it inside a larger cage. But we can’t run either. The poor bird is doomed! Utterly doomed!”
Devon took a deep breath, holding her gaze steadily with his, then exhaled. When next he breathed in, Beth did the same, then they exhaled in unison. It was highly effective, although only if their goal had been to feel rather dizzy. Certainly, calm found nowhere to perch within Beth.
“You have a plan?” she asked Devon hopefully.
“No,” he said. “I’m at a complete bloody loss.”
Peep!
The caladrius’s sudden sharp cry drew their attention to the cage. A gold thread of magic was emerging from beneath it, coiling slowly as it rose through the space between them.
“Ooh.” A soft ripple of wonder went through the crowd.
The magic began to extend in sparkling ribbons, shooting off tiny pink stars. Floating toward Devon, it encircled him, then wove around Beth, binding them in enchantment.
“Ahhh!” The rippling wonder grew louder. Messrs. Flogg and Fettick stared, mouths agape. The IOS committee began taking notepads and pencils from pockets in their university robes to record the phenomenon.
Peeeep!
At the caladrius’s shrill cry, Beth’s pulse leaped. She hastily lifted the cage cover, revealing the little white bird standing tall on its perch, wings outstretched.
“The caladrius!” several people at the front of the crowd shouted.
“Where? Where?” shouted others.
“Move! I can’t see it!”
“Quick, Hilda, get out your sketch pad!”
“It looks nothing like its picture in the newspaper.”
Peep peep! An intense light burst forth from the little white bird. Everyone winced, and when they looked again the cage was melting away, gold drops falling to the earth, leaving only the handle in Beth’s grasp.
“Oh no,” she said—
And the caladrius flew up, singing, singing.
—
As the small wings flapped valiantly, carrying the bird into clean fresh not-too-horribly-polluted sunshine, Beth’s spirit lifted along with it. Fear seemed to dissolve like old thaumaturgic energy being shed in flight. Panic faded into a quiet sigh. The bird flew swiftly upward, trailing magic in long, beautiful feathers of light: all the infirmities it had absorbed since being captured and brought to England by IOS agents, all the pains it had transformed into hope. Throughout Kensington Gardens, plants whispered and stirred. The music of the brass band dwindled into one exquisite melody from a clarinet.
Love filled the air.
It was magic, but more. It was pure healing, right down to the core of life, where only truth existed. Among the crowd below, a plethora of broken words, strained silences, and simple everyday distresses melted away into peaceful resolution. People began turning to embrace each other, weeping tears of joy; making protestations of love, apologies, promises; signing university enrollment forms. Beth noticed the PRESS agents kissing each other with such passion, their bowler hats fell off. Even the IOS committee were in paroxysms of emotion: shaking one another by the hand, even going so far as to pat a shoulder or two. And within the crowd—
Smack.
“This is all your fault, Oberhufter!” boomed Hippolyta’s voice. “That bird should have been mine!”
Laughing, Beth turned back to Devon.
He was gone.
Looking around confusedly, she was bewildered to discover him on one knee before her. “Oh,” she said. The confusion tipped and spun until her thoughts became a blur. All she knew then was the rush of her pulse and the safe, heavy darkness of Devon’s eyes gazing up at her.
“Well, this is embarrassing,” he said as he took one of her hands in both of his and held it gently, loosely, so that she could slip away from him at any second, should she want. “Nothing like being forced down on one knee in front of crowd by the magic of a tiny bird.”
“Sorry,” Beth whispered.
He smiled. “No need for an apology, my angel. I don’t need magic to know I love you. And I always intended to do this, just perhaps a little more privately. With, you know, flowers and champagne, and a prettier view. Then again, I’m grateful the caladrius is giving me the courage it might have otherwise taken a while to gather.”
“ You need courage?” she asked, amazed.
His smile wavered. “More than you know.”
Indeed, his hands were trembling around hers. Beth wanted to take them, hold them against her heart, so he might know how it beat for him. She could not move, however, mesmerized as she was by the enchantment he was weaving, had been weaving this past week, with his good cheer (and his even better kisses).
“You’re allowed to say no,” he assured her. “You’re allowed to turn away and leave, never mind all the people watching right now.”
Beth glanced around, swallowing heavily as she realized the entire crowd had already forgotten about the caladrius in the face of the far more interesting spectacle Devon was making of himself. She glimpsed Rose Marin, the hijacking professor from Edinburgh, grinning brightly; and Hippolyta, wide-eyed; and the magnificent mustache of Monsieur Chevrolet…and was that the Chaucer Inn landlord and his daughter, waving to her from beside a hydrangea bush?
“But should you wish to stay,” Devon continued—then paused to brush the hair away from his eyes with uncharacteristic nervousness. Several onlookers shuffled impatiently; “get on with it, man” could be heard within the ranks of the IOS committee. “If you do stay, um, then I’d like to propose that we marriage. Er, get married. We could travel—um, wherever you want. Psychic territories of the giant moa. Eyries of American eagles. We could have fun, rescue a lot of birds, make a lot of—um. Yes. Well. There you have it. Never mind. Goodbye.”
He began to rise, but Beth hastily set a hand on his shoulder, holding him in place. Devon looked up at her with a vulnerability, and yet a love, that made her think of the first moment a bird took flight from a tree branch into the peril and promise of the sky. She smiled back at him, entirely certain, and just a little smoldering.
“It requires very little analysis,” she said, “for me to conclude that your proposal has copious merits, and that acceptance would be the most profitable response on my part; therefore, please do take remittance of it.”
His expression emptied. “What?”
Urgently seeking a translation from within the wreckage of her overwhelmed brain, she received one instead from her heart.
“Yes.”
“Yes?” Devon echoed, his own intellect apparently having disappeared somewhere up among the clouds with the caladrius.
Beth grinned. “Yes, please. I love you, Devon. I will most definitely marry you.”
Instantly, he was on his feet, grasping her head and manhandling her into a fierce kiss. Beth wrapped her arms around him, clutching his coat, not letting him go.
The crowd screamed with excitement. Banners flew out of raised hands to flap free, like vast wings, in the glimmering air. And a voice shouted out from the general melee.
“By Jove! Good catch, Elizabeth!”
Laughter broke their kiss. Still hugging, they smiled at each other before lifting their gazes skyward with the irrepressible instinct of ornithologists, seeking wings.
Far above, the caladrius circled the scene, peeping cheerfully, then flew away into mystery.
And a cool breeze began to drift in, promising fresher days to come.