The Kiskadee of Death

by Jan Dunlap

  “This is one of my favorite trails here at Quinta Mazatlan,” Mark told us, walking backward to face us, his voice hushed as we followed the trail away from the main driveway. “We have thirty native species of trees…”

  He stopped mid-sentence and tilted his head in a listening pose.

  I heard the call then, too, and looked over Mark’s left shoulder towards a cluster of tall scrappy bushes. A fast flitting noise accompanied a tiny yellow-gray bird with two white wing bars as it darted from branch to branch.

  “Look at those spectacles,” Mark whispered to us, his own neck moving back and forth as he tracked the bird hopping from limb to limb. “It’s a White-eyed Vireo. They’re generally hard to find, let alone being able to get a good look at, since they move so fast.”

  All six of us peered into the shrubbery as the tiny bird continued to forage for insects.

  “This is the vireo’s wintering grounds,” Mark informed us. “Both the male and female sing, and if we’re lucky, maybe we’ll hear them. The birds are fairly secretive, so generally birders hear them more often than see them.”

  He turned around and led us along the pathway that wound through the forest, stopping occasionally to point out Golden-fronted Woodpeckers, Yellow-bellied Sapsuckers, Inca Doves, and White-winged Doves perched in trees. At one spot on our walk, a small flock of house sparrows were making so much noise in the bushes lining the path that I had to raise my voice to ask our guide a question about the property.

  “With all the native plants and trees here,” I commented, “I’m guessing you must teach some landscaping for wildlife classes here at the Center. Do you get a lot of people interested in that?”

  Mustang Mark nodded enthusiastically. “It’s part of our mission. We call it our ‘Backyard Habitat Steward’ program, and its goal is to help people restore their backyards into natural habitat. We have so many beautiful birds and butterflies in this region that it’s fairly simple to attract them into your own yard with native plants. Visitors come from all over the world to see our wildlife, but people who live here can enjoy it every day if they know what to put in their own yards.”

  “That’s true everywhere,” I told him. “If you plant the native trees and flowers, you’ll get the wildlife that goes with it. All it takes is a little education about natural environments.”

  “Over there,” Luce said, touching my arm to catch my attention. “An Orange-crowned Warbler, about fifteen feet up in that tree.”

  I followed her pointing finger and caught sight of the warbler. As I looked, a Rufous Hummingbird flew by right in front of me.

  “Good eye,” Mark complimented Luce as we moved on. “You know your birds. You said you were from Minnesota, right?”

  I wondered if he was beginning to connect us with the MOBsters working on last night’s float in Buzz’s garage. I recalled that Schooner had distracted the boy with his enthusiastic greeting, thereby interrupting the mounting tension between Buzz and his nephew. Taking charge of the inebriated boy, Schooner had pulled him into the house and away from his uncle, at which point I could almost hear a collective sigh of relief from the assembled float workers. I knew I was appreciative of Schooner’s fast thinking because it had meant I hadn’t had to step up to the plate and resort to my own crisis management experience of breaking up fights.

  Granted, most of my experience was with fights that took place in high school hallways or cafeterias, but I figured the basic elements were the same.

  Although, Lord knows, there would have been plenty of limes and lemons in Buzz’s garage for ammunition.

  “We’re just in town for the week,” I heard Luce tell Mark. “We’re trying to visit all the World Birding Centers, but I don’t know if we’ll be able to fit them all in. There’s just too much to see.”

  “Did you get out to Estero Llano Grande State Park yet?” the young woman from Boston asked. “It’s amazing.”

  Mark agreed. “It’s got the largest wetlands of any of the Centers. And I’ve found some excellent trails in the woodlands that a lot of people miss. It’s almost like you’ve got the whole place to yourself… and the birds. Very secluded. I highly recommend it.”

  Interesting.

  Mark knew the trails of Estero Llano.

  I wondered if he’d learned them from his uncle, since Rosalie had indicated that Buzz and Birdy were well-known birders at the park. Last night, I hadn’t even considered that Mark might be into birding, but this morning, I’d learned otherwise—Mustang Mark was extremely knowledgeable and skilled as a birder. To my surprise, he was also very likeable; he laughed easily with our little group of birders and engaged everyone in conversation.

  All in all, Mark seemed like a pretty good guy. He reminded me a lot, in fact, of his uncle Buzz, who also seemed like a pretty good guy.

  Unfortunately, also like his uncle, Mark had a disease he needed to address. For everyone’s sake, I hoped that happened sooner, rather than later.

  “I heard somebody found a dead man out there yesterday,” the older fellow in our group volunteered as we returned to the main drive of the estate. “One of our Winter Texans. I think he had a heart attack.”

  “That’s right,” his companion said. “He was DOA at the hospital.”

  For a split-second, I thought oh my gosh, another body out there? Does the park have a quota system or something?

  But then I realized the two birders were referring to my own discovery of Birdy Johnson’s body, and that, like Buzz and the other MOB members last night, no one was privy to the details of the death the chief had shared with Eddie, Luce, and me. I stole a quick glance at Mustang Mark and was surprised by his reaction to the local man’s statement—I could have sworn our guide’s tan went green around the edges.

  Again, interesting.

  Based on Mark’s bad boy behavior and insults to his great-uncle last night, I would have assumed the younger man was no admirer of either Birdy Johnson or Buzz Davis, blood relation or not. Yet just now, the colorful addition to his skin tone immediately struck me as a visceral reaction, something Mark had virtually no control over. If he hadn’t seemed so focused as our guide, I might have thought he was having a morning-after bout of nausea, but aside from his bloodshot eyes, Mark seemed no worse for his overindulgence the night before.

  In fact, unless I missed my guess, the reminder from the birder that Birdy Johnson was dead hit Mark right in the gut, and my counselor instinct told me Mustang Mark was experiencing a physical reaction of intense remorse.

  He’d virtually tossed Birdy’s death into his uncle’s face during his drunken rant.

  Pulling a stunt like that would make anyone feel sick… once you realized what an insensitive jerk you’d been.

  Now, on the sober side of that scene, Mark must have been kicking himself for the way he’d acted, knowing that no amount of apologizing could ever completely undo the hurt he’d caused his uncle. If that were the case—and I hoped it was for Buzz’s sake, because it would mean that Mark wasn’t a total moron—then maybe the bad boy behavior was just that: bad behavior, and not evidence of a bad boy.

  A loud scratchy cry of kis-ka-dee called a halt to my rumination as a flash of yellow, black, white, and reddish-brown flew over my head and settled to perch in the upper branches of a tree.

  “Great Kiskadee,” Mark said, his tan back to its previous shade, his voice smooth and professional. “One of the largest members of the Tyrant Flycatcher family and a Texas specialty. That black mask he wears?”

  He pointed at the bird that continued to make its raucous call.

  “It works like the black smears athletes apply under their eyes: it reduces glare,” he explained. “That gives the kiskadee an edge for hunting insects in bright light or snatching small fish or snails. A great example of natural adaptation.”

  A light gasp escaped th
e lips of the Boston birder.

  “It’s only got one eye,” she said.

  “Great Kiskadees are aggressive,” Mark replied. “They’ll attack larger animals, like snakes or raptors, that try to raid their nests. It’s inevitable that they might sustain injuries. Protecting what’s yours is a key to survival in the natural world, but it doesn’t make it any less dangerous. Or deadly.”

  I found myself staring at Mark as he spoke.

  More precisely, I was staring at his shirt.

  His Hawaiian shirt.

  With a tropical print.

  That was clearly ripped along one side.

  I realized Mark was watching me stare at him.

  “Have we met before?” Mark asked.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Before I could answer, the older woman in our group grabbed her companion’s arm and loudly whispered.

  “Look, everyone! Is that a Curve-billed Thrasher over there?” she asked the rest of us.

  I hesitated only a moment longer before turning in the direction the woman was pointing. Perched on top of a lamp pole near the front drive to Quinta Mazatlan was a large, grayish-brown bird. Even though I thought I could see the downward cast of its bill, I lifted my binoculars to my eyes to make sure.

  “It’s the thrasher,” I confirmed to our group. “It’s got the long thin bill that curves downward, and the eyes are yellow-orange.”

  “He’s also got the faint spots on his chest,” Mark said, his own binos to his eyes. “He’s been here all week. You folks are getting the royal treatment, today, seeing all these birds.”

  He lowered his binoculars and checked his wristwatch. “I need to wrap this up with you since I’ve got a student group coming. Third-graders. Noisier than a flock of Great Kiskadees, let me tell you. Enjoy your day and be sure to take a look around inside the mansion.”

  With that suggestion, he turned his back on us and strode briskly away.

  “What do you think of him?” Luce asked me, tipping her head in the direction Mark had taken back towards Quinta Mazatlan’s main entrance. “I never would have imagined him as such a personable tour guide after his performance last night,” she added.

  I nodded in agreement.

  “He’s a good kid, I think,” I said. “He’s definitely a good birder, and he must have had decent references to land a volunteer position here.”

  “But?” Luce asked. She could recognize the uncertainty in my voice as easily as she had identified the Orange-crowned Warbler during our birding walk.

  “But he’s got some issues with alcohol and accepting his uncle’s help, I think. I got the impression he felt really badly about Birdy’s death when that other birder brought it up,” I said, “but he covered it well and just went right on with the tour. Who knows? Maybe Birdy’s death will make Mark realize life is short, and he needs to get his act cleaned up and make peace with his uncle.”

  I slipped my fingers in my pocket to make sure the scrap of material Maddie had fetched for me was still there. Part of me wished I had taken it out and held it next to Mark’s shirt to see if the print matched, and part of me was convinced I’d moved past suspicious to paranoid.

  I hardly knew this kid. I hadn’t even spoken with him at Buzz’s place, and I was fairly certain he’d been oblivious to my presence on the driveway, seeing as he’d been so focused on railing at his uncle. And yet I thought I’d caught a spark of special attention on Mark’s part when we told him we were from Minnesota—a spark, I considered, that may have led to his query about our having previously met.

  A query which I was able to avoid answering, by the way.

  So what in the world could Mustang Mark possibly hold against me enough to warrant a very early morning foray into a fenced yard to leave a threatening note?

  I left the shred of fabric in my pocket and took my wife’s hand.

  “We’ve got a little time before we go to meet the chief,” I said. “Let’s take Mark up on his suggestion and go check out the mansion. I want to see what a ‘mansion with a mission’ looks like.”

  Palatial, I’d say.

  With its high-beamed ceilings, tiled floors, palm-lined courtyard, Grand Hall and airy light spaces, the mansion was about a zillion degrees nicer than my own place of work, which was a broom-sized cubbyhole in an ancient brick high school. Combined with the extensive outdoor spaces and gardens, the mansion was well-equipped to host a wide variety of events, and judging from their program listing of educational events and activities, the City of McAllen was putting Quinta Mazatlan to good use as a model for native habitat preservation.

  I wandered into the gift shop alcove just inside and left of the mansion’s main entrance while Luce made a stop at the ladies’ room. I was considering buying us a matching pair of sweatshirts emblazoned with the Great Kiskadee and Green Jay when I thought I recognized a woman’s voice coming from behind the registration desk and cashier’s station across the entry area.

  I leaned back to see across the entry, but a visitor was paying for his purchase at the desk and obscured my view of the woman. A moment later, he left the desk, and I recognized Poppy Mac, her red hair flaming, tending the register. Paddy’s wife wore a Quinta Mazatlan name tag, though hers was marked with “Staff,” whereas Mark’s had been labeled “Volunteer.”

  “Bob White!” Poppy called as soon as she caught sight of me. “Welcome to Quinta Mazatlan. Did you take a bird walk this morning?”

  I walked over to the counter and set the sweatshirts on the glass surface.

  “We did,” I told her. “And our guide was Mark, Buzz Davis’s great-nephew.”

  “You want these?” Poppy pointed to the shirts.

  I nodded and she entered the information on her sales terminal, looking down through the bottom half of the glasses perched on her nose.

  “Mark is an excellent birder,” she said, tapping in the price. “Really, one of the most talented volunteers we’ve got. He’s just such a loose cannon sometimes. That comes to $65.73. Do you want to use a credit card?”

  She glanced up at me, and I handed her my card.

  “Well,” she continued, “you saw him last night at Buzz’s. Such a shame. Disgraceful, really. I was so embarrassed for both of them. I know Mark has a drinking problem, but he shouldn’t be taking it out on Buzz. Buzz is only trying to help. And especially last night, what with Birdy’s accidental death and all. Buzz and Birdy were so close, and I know that Mark knows that. I can’t imagine why he was so awful to Buzz.”

  She looked quickly around to see if anyone else was in the store, then leaned over the counter to confide in me.

  “You know what?” she asked.

  I started to say something, but I guess she’d already determined that I knew nothing, because she went right on without any prompting from me.

  “I’ve heard that there are all kinds of secret drop-off places for drug deals in the area,” she informed me, “and Mark certainly knows his way around all the parks. Of course, he’s young, too. Young people can do such stupid things, can’t they? I think Mark’s into drugs, if you want to know the truth.”

  Actually, I didn’t.

  What I really wanted was to add Texas birds to my life list, enjoy a week of warmth and sunshine with my wife in January, and find out what it was like not to have to help anyone navigate a crisis for a few days. So far, I’d managed two of the three, but that last bit—about crisis—wasn’t playing out too well in the last twenty-four hours, and I didn’t have high hopes for it to magically go away in the next few hours, either.

  But gee, you can’t always get what you want, can you?

  Especially when somebody decides to bring that crisis right to your front door.

  Or, in my case, to my guest suite’s front door.

  I watched Poppy efficiently fold the sw
eatshirts and slide them into a Quinta Mazatlan Nature Store bag. Luce joined me at the counter and said hello to Poppy.

  “How often do you have a shift working here?” my wife asked her, making polite conversation.

  Poppy printed my receipt and slipped it into the bag. She looked at Luce over the top edges of her eyeglasses.

  “I just started a month ago,” she told us. “Paddy and I bought a home here last month because we decided to settle down and live here year-round. We’re officially retired, you know, but Paddy still takes an occasional temp job. I think he gets too bored, otherwise. He really loved working in collections, if you can imagine that. I thought working here at Quinta Mazatlan would be a good way for me to meet people, too. We’ve moved around so much during our marriage, that I’ve never really had the chance to connect with neighbors, so I’m really looking forward to it.”

  She handed Luce our bag. I was ready to make a run for it to escape Poppy’s life story—I could feel it coming—but Luce smiled at the woman, and I knew what that meant.

  Poppy was going to keep talking.

  “I love the MOB,” Poppy went on, “but sometimes I just don’t want to talk about birds, you know? And now that the SpaceX project is underway, there are all kinds of new people moving into the area. Morning, Regina!” She waved at a woman who passed by in the hallway beyond the store.

  Poppy leaned her elbows on the counter and removed her glasses from her nose.

  “Really,” she told us, “it’s just so sad that Birdy won’t see the fruits of all his labor to get SpaceX up and running down here. He’s brought so much hope to the region. You know, a lot of people associated this area with drug smuggling and illegal immigration, but now, the Valley will have a whole new bright future as a spaceport. People flying in space just for fun—people like you and me! I’d be thrilled beyond words to be on that first flight, wouldn’t you? Imagine that!”