of time when you were older but in fact it was quite the opposite, Rebecca found. It raced away from her in a way she found ever harder to keep pace with, even without the lurking stopwatch of cancer. But if it devoured the hours at a disorientating rate, the web was a goldmine of information. There were pages and pages about the barn owl.
Tyto alba was its Latin name â the white owl, confusingly, in spite of its largely golden-brown plumage, and in spite of the existence, too, of the snowy owl, or Bubo scandiacus . In flight at dawn or dusk, though, she supposed her owl was so pallid as almost to appear white. âEtherealâ was the word that came to Rebeccaâs mind. In some Inuit dialects, she discovered, the word for barn owl was the same as the word for ghost.
The hollow oak could certainly be its nesting place. They seemed to adopt not only man-made sites but holes and crevices in rocks and trees â anywhere with a flattish ledge, concealed from view, on which to raise their young. But wasnât the websites outlining the habitat and breeding patterns of the owl which drew Rebecca to read on, but those which told of its mythology. The Lenape peoples of the Delaware and Hudson rivers believed that if they dreamed of a barn owl it would become their guardian and protector of their soul, while to the south-western Pima tribe the pale bird in flight at dusk was the newly released spirit of the departed. Death was known as âcrossing the owl riverâ; the feather of a barn owl would help the soul of the dying to pass across. Its crepuscular hunting habits and reputedly keen night vision imbued the owl for many with the power of intuition, the power of inner sight. It became the totem of prophets and clairvoyants, a messenger between the hidden world of death and shadow and the world of light. The one who hears what is not spoken and sees what is unseen. The keeper of secrets, the watcher of souls.
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Rebecca stared into the owlâs unreadable black eyes and the owl stared back. Softly, she moved closer, keeping hold of the birdâs gaze, careful not to put it to fright but at the same time visited by a strange sense of seeking permission. Another step and she was near enough to look into the hollow bolus of the tree, and there it was, the nest site: a protruding ledge above the level of her eyeline, its rim encrusted with droppings and snowflaked with down. Lower down, in the base of the V where it narrowed to a point some two or three feet above the forest floor, she was surprised to see that grass and ground elder had taken root and were growing there in the partial sunlight, taking their sustenance from the accumulation of debris, of dead leaves and earth and every state between. And no doubt, too, from the fabric of the oak itself, as it rotted from within, the outside returning to fresh spring leaf while the inside sickened and fell to dust. Like cancer, like cancer, like cancer . Except that it wasnât the same at all; the treeâs putrefaction was fecund, a source of new life. A part of the natural cycle of things.
Still mindful of the silent watcher above, she edged closer once again, until she could stretch out her hands and feel the cool moisture of the vegetation in the base of the hollow. She ran her fingers in among it, parting the grass, disturbing more down and droppings as well as here and there a larger feather. Peering down between the separated stems, she felt a sudden chill as she caught a gleam of white more bleached than the feathers, and colder and sharper, too: the brittle white of tiny bones. They lay scattered in a deep layer among the roots of the grass, the remnants of a hundred owl suppers, picked clean or undigested â the mass grave of a hundred small animals and birds.
Rebecca shuddered but did not step back. Some macabre fascination made her want to sink her hands in the tumble of broken skeletons, as if to measure the tally of lost lives.
Tyto alba was its Latin name â the white owl, confusingly, in spite of its largely golden-brown plumage, and in spite of the existence, too, of the snowy owl, or Bubo scandiacus . In flight at dawn or dusk, though, she supposed her owl was so pallid as almost to appear white. âEtherealâ was the word that came to Rebeccaâs mind. In some Inuit dialects, she discovered, the word for barn owl was the same as the word for ghost.
The hollow oak could certainly be its nesting place. They seemed to adopt not only man-made sites but holes and crevices in rocks and trees â anywhere with a flattish ledge, concealed from view, on which to raise their young. But wasnât the websites outlining the habitat and breeding patterns of the owl which drew Rebecca to read on, but those which told of its mythology. The Lenape peoples of the Delaware and Hudson rivers believed that if they dreamed of a barn owl it would become their guardian and protector of their soul, while to the south-western Pima tribe the pale bird in flight at dusk was the newly released spirit of the departed. Death was known as âcrossing the owl riverâ; the feather of a barn owl would help the soul of the dying to pass across. Its crepuscular hunting habits and reputedly keen night vision imbued the owl for many with the power of intuition, the power of inner sight. It became the totem of prophets and clairvoyants, a messenger between the hidden world of death and shadow and the world of light. The one who hears what is not spoken and sees what is unseen. The keeper of secrets, the watcher of souls.
Â
Rebecca stared into the owlâs unreadable black eyes and the owl stared back. Softly, she moved closer, keeping hold of the birdâs gaze, careful not to put it to fright but at the same time visited by a strange sense of seeking permission. Another step and she was near enough to look into the hollow bolus of the tree, and there it was, the nest site: a protruding ledge above the level of her eyeline, its rim encrusted with droppings and snowflaked with down. Lower down, in the base of the V where it narrowed to a point some two or three feet above the forest floor, she was surprised to see that grass and ground elder had taken root and were growing there in the partial sunlight, taking their sustenance from the accumulation of debris, of dead leaves and earth and every state between. And no doubt, too, from the fabric of the oak itself, as it rotted from within, the outside returning to fresh spring leaf while the inside sickened and fell to dust. Like cancer, like cancer, like cancer . Except that it wasnât the same at all; the treeâs putrefaction was fecund, a source of new life. A part of the natural cycle of things.
Still mindful of the silent watcher above, she edged closer once again, until she could stretch out her hands and feel the cool moisture of the vegetation in the base of the hollow. She ran her fingers in among it, parting the grass, disturbing more down and droppings as well as here and there a larger feather. Peering down between the separated stems, she felt a sudden chill as she caught a gleam of white more bleached than the feathers, and colder and sharper, too: the brittle white of tiny bones. They lay scattered in a deep layer among the roots of the grass, the remnants of a hundred owl suppers, picked clean or undigested â the mass grave of a hundred small animals and birds.
Rebecca shuddered but did not step back. Some macabre fascination made her want to sink her hands in the tumble of broken skeletons, as if to measure the tally of lost lives.
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