Since making the acquaintance of Toby, Michael had reviewed his thoughts on this subject. The fact was that Toby was exceptionally attractive. He watched him now as he bounded about near the path, running up to Michael and away again like an exuberant dog. His long limbs had still the sprawling awkwardness of youth, but there was something neat and clean in his whole demeanour which took away any suggestion of untidiness. Michael noticed the freshness of the pale blue open shirt which he was wearing; and reflected ruefully upon the filthiness of his own. He guessed that as an undergraduate the boy would be something of a dandy. Above the firm and now darker flesh of his neck the dark brown hair ended in a clear furry line, and similarly fringed his brow, carefully cut, and showing the finely rounded head. His cheeks and lips bulged ruddy with health. His eyes retained the shy searching look of a boy; he had not yet become the confident or self-assertive young man. He seemed electrical with unused energy and hope. Michael reflected how much less complex an entity he seemed at eighteen than Nick had seemed at fifteen. All the same, it must be admitted that he was charming. Michael’s mind reproduced with a vividness amounting to violence the image of the pale body of the boy naked beside the pool. How startling and in a way how utterly delightful that had been. At the time Michael had been upset to find how greatly the sudden vision had moved him. Now more gently he put the image aside. Perhaps he ought to insist on both Toby and Nick coming to live in the house; it was difficult to find a pretext for moving Toby alone. But somehow the idea of having Nick so near to him was not acceptable. He dismissed the problem for the moment and returned to his enjoyment of the evening.
A further scandal had arisen in the group ahead, to whose conversation Michael had been vaguely listening. Peter had been asking Dora whether she was going to paint any landscapes while she was at Imber: a question which she seemed to find surprising. It had evidently not occurred to her, or to Paul, Michael noted, that she might do any painting. After a few more exchanges about country life and the observation of nature it emerged that Dora had never heard the cuckoo. Peter found this almost inconceivable. “Surely, in the country, as a child?” He seemed to imagine that all children naturally lived in the country.
“I was never in the country as a child,” said Dora, laughing. “We always took our holidays at Bognor Regis. I can’t remember much about my childhood actually, but I’m sure I never heard (he cuckoo. I’ve heard cuckoo clocks, of course.”
Toby and Michael came up with them as, still disputing, they approached the grassy clearing where the traps were laid. Peter hushed them to silence. They came cautiously up to where the path opened out, and Peter went forward to survey his catch. He had laid three old-fashioned sparrow-traps, dome-shaped wire structures about three feet long and eighteen inches high, which stood upon the grass. Each trap was divided into two compartments. One end wall of the trap sloped gradually inward to a small opening fringed by projecting wires which led into the first compartment at ground level. A similar opening, wide at the near end and narrow at the far end, led a little above ground level into the second compartment, on the other side of which, in the farther wall of the trap, there was a small door to admit the trapper’s hand. It appeared at once that there were several small birds in each trap. There was a good deal of fluttering as Peter approached.
Michael had seen this operation performed many times, but it never failed to fill him with uneasy excitement. Once or twice, under Peter’s direction, he had even handled the birds; but it made him too alarmed, it too much moved him with distress and pity, to hold in his hand those exceedingly light, exceedingly soft and frail bodies, and feel the quick terrified heart-beat. The only exhilarating moment was releasing the bird. But Michael was too much afraid that one might die in his hand, as they sometimes did if one held them too tight; and Peter reluctantly let him off any further lessons.
Peter came back and motioned his companions forward.“Come and look,” he said, “only don’t come too near. There’s one splendid catch. The little goldcrest in that cage. See him, the little fellow with the red and yellow streak on his head. The rest are sparrows and tits, I’m afraid. And one nuthatch in the far one.”
The birds were inspected while Peter photographed the goldcrest through the netting.
“Why ever do they go in?” Dora wondered.
“For food,” said Peter. “I lay down a little bread and nuts as bait. Then they try to get out by flying what seems the easier way into the second compartment, and then its still harder for them to escape. Some birds will even enter an unbaited trap out of sheer curiosity.”
“Again, like human beings,” said Michael.
“I won’t bother with the tits and sparrows this time,” said Peter. He lifted up one of the cages from the ground and in a quick flurry the birds rose with the wire and darted away.“I’ll ring the nuthatch and the goldcrest. Perhaps, Michael, you wouldn’t mind photographing the goldcrest while I’m holding him.”
Michael took the camera. Peter knelt down and opened the door at the end of the cage and put his hand in. The birds in the small compartment began to flutter madly. Peter’s brown hand seemed very large beside them. Fingers spread wide he cornered the little bird. His hand gently closed, folding its wildly agitated wings to its body and drawing it out. The small gold striped head appeared between Peter’s first and second fingers. Dora gave an exclamation of alarm, excitement, and distress. Michael knew how she felt. He got the camera ready. Peter took the light metal band from his pocket, so small that a magnifying glass would be needed to read its legend. He juggled the bird carefully in his hand until one tiny scaly leg and claw appeared between his fourth and little fingers. Then with his left hand he bent the flexible band around the bird’s leg, and lifting it up to his mouth closed the band deftly with his teeth. At the sight of Peter’s strong teeth closing so near to that tiny twig of a leg, Dora could bear it no longer and turned away. Michael took two photographs. Peter rapidly tossed the bird into the air and it vanished into the wood, bearing with it forever after to all whom it might concern the information that on that particular Saturday it had been at Imber. Peter then ringed the nuthatch and released the other birds. Dora was full of wonderment and distress and Paul was laughing at her. Michael looked at Toby. His eyes were wide and his lips moist and red where he had been biting them. Michael now laughed at Toby. It was extraordinary how affecting the whole business was.
While they examined the traps at closer quarters, turning them on their backs, Peter wandered away into the wood. Under the trees the light was fading faster, and great clouds of midges drifted about the clearing. Dora was waving her parasol and complaining of being bitten in spite of the citronella. Then a moment later everyone was electrified to hear clearly and unmistakably at quite close quarters the call of a cuckoo. They straightened up and looked at each other – and then burst out laughing. Peter was called back.
“Oh dear!” cried Dora. “I thought it really was one. What a shame!”
“I’m afraid the real cuckoo is in Africa by now, wise bird,” said Peter. He showed Dora the little instrument he used to make the sound. Then he took from his pocket other toys made of wood and metal, and reproduced in turn the song of the skylark, the curlew, the willow warbler, the turtle dove, and the nightingale. Dora was enchanted. She demanded to see and to try, seizing the small objects from Peter with little cries and self-conscious feminine twittering. Michael observing her thought she epitomized everything he didn’t care for about women; but he thought this with detachment, liking her all the same, and feeling too good-tempered at present to feel distaste for anyone.