Murmuring a welcome to the forty or so birds in the loft, Cal stepped inside, to be met with a scene of high agitation. All but a few of the pigeons were flying back and forth in their cages, near to hysteria. Had the rats been in, Cal wondered? He cast around for any damage, but there was no visible sign of what had fuelled this furore.

He'd never seen them so excited. For fully half a minute he stood in bewilderment, watching their display, the din of their wings making, his head reel, before deciding to step into the largest of the cages and claim the prize birds from the melee before they did themselves damage.

He unlatched the cage, and had opened it no more than two or three inches when one of last year's champions, a normally sedate cock known, as were they all, by his number - 33 - flew at the gap. Shocked by the speed of the bird's approach, Cal let the door go, and in the seconds between his fingers slipping from the latch and his retrieval of it, 33 was out.

‘Damn you!' Cal shouted, cursing himself as much as the bird, for he'd left the door of the loft itself ajar, and apparently careless of what harm he might do himself in his bid - 33 was making for the sky.

In the few moments it took Cal to latch the cage again, the bird was through the door and away. Cal went in stumbling pursuit, but by the time he got back into the open air 33 was already fluttering up above the garden. At roof height he flew around in three ever larger circles, as if orienting himself. Then he seemed to fix his objective and took off in a North-Easterly direction.

A rapping drew Cal's attention, and he looked down to see his father standing at the window, mouthing something to him. There was more animation on Brendan's harried fact than Cal had seen in months; the escape of the bird seemed to have temporarily roused him from his despondency. Moments later he was at the back door, asking what had happened. Cal had no time for explanation.