The Falcon Thief by Joshua Hammer

Author:Joshua Hammer
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Published: 2020-02-11T00:00:00+00:00

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The morning of June 11 dawned cold and clear in Kuujjuaq. The pilot guided the fully loaded helicopter west out of the Inuit village, leaving all traces of a human presence behind. They flew for half an hour over pale green and russet hills dotted with patches of ice and snow, and rivers choked with ice floes. Mullin, in the backseat, followed the route on a NATO topographical map that he had procured in London, and pointed excitedly to a pod of white beluga whales frolicking in an icy river. At last they arrived at a palisade that plunged at a near-ninety-degree angle to a body of water labeled Basalt Lake. The helicopter soared over sheets of ice, small breaks providing glimpses of the crystalline blue water underneath.

Lendrum, in the front, peered out the window, searching the sky. After several passes over the lake, the pilot set the chopper down on firm ground high above the water and the three men climbed out of the craft. The tundra abounded with lichens, tussock sedge, Arctic poppies, dwarf heath shrubs, scrub birch, and willows. It was the most unspoiled corner of the world that Mullin had ever seen. Then, suddenly came a screech through the silence. A pair of peregrines soared overhead, emitting high-pitched warning cries. An aerie was nearby.

“They’re beautiful,” Lendrum said. Mullin had his video camera out again. “Look at this male.”

Even at a distance of several hundred feet, Lendrum could discern the difference in size between the two birds. Female peregrine falcons are about one-third larger than their mates, a phenomenon known as “reversed-size sexual dimorphism” and unique to owls, eagles, hawks, and falcons. Some evolutionary scientists theorize that because male raptors engage in territorial duels in midair, natural selection favors the smallest, lightest, and most agile of them. Others have posited that females need to be stronger because they are responsible for guarding the nest and protecting the eggs against predators, while males can remain focused on hunting prey.

“That is a fucking noise,” the pilot said in the video, laughing. “See Lendrum fucking smiling now.”

“It’s fucking nice,” Lendrum replied.

Then he picked out a speck of white on the horizon and knew—instantly, from half a mile away—that it was the raptor he had come to the end of the earth for: the elusive gyrfalcon, the bird of kings. Above the lake, the trio watched, enthralled, as the bird approached its aerie. “Here it comes on the right,” the pilot could be heard exclaiming on the video. “She’s coming in, coming in, staying on the ridgeline,” he narrated like a sports announcer. “Here she comes, over the ridge now, traversing.” The gyrfalcon settled on a ledge. “Beautiful,” the pilot said, continuing to observe the gyrfalcon. “We’re on.”

It was a white gyr—meaning that if its breeding partner was also white, the chances were excellent that the chicks would be that color as well. Still, you could never be sure: a scientific study in the Koryak Mountains of far eastern Siberia had turned up a nest in which a pair of white gyrfalcons had produced gray chicks.

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