The Stone Raft (Harvest Book) by José Saramago Page B

to the sky, someone declared, I've never seen so many birds together in my whole life, and to judge from his appearance he was old enough to have had this experience and many others, There are more than a thousand of them, he added, and he was right, at least twelve hundred and fifty birds had gathered on this occasion, They've finally caught up with us, said Joaquim Sassa, let them wear themselves out and we'll be rid of them for good. José Anaiço watched the starlings as they flew triumphantly in a great circle, he stood there transfixed, staring at them intently, Let's drive slowly, from now on we'll go slowly, Why, I don't know, it's just a premonition, for some reason these birds won't leave us alone, You could be right, so do me a favor and go slowly, and we'll see what happens.
    How they crossed the Alentejo in this blazing heat, under a sky more white than blue, amid shining stubble with the occasional holm oak on the bare land and bundles of straw waiting to be gathered, beneath the incessant chirping of the cicadas, would make a whole story in itself, perhaps even harder to tell than that other one I re-counted on an earlier occasion. It's true that for kilometer after kilometer along this road there is not a living soul to be seen, but the corn has been cut, the grain threshed, and all these tasks required men and women, but on this occasion we shall learn nothing about all this, all too true is the proverb that warns us, Don't count your chickens before they're hatched. The heat is oppressive, suffocating, but Deux Chevaux is in no hurry, is only too pleased to stop wherever there is a little shade, then José Anaiço and Joaquim Sassa get out to scan the horizon, they wait as long as they have to, finally it comes, the only cloud in the sky, these stops wouldn't be necessary if the starlings knew how to fly in a straight line, but because there are so many of them, each with its own disposition despite its attachment to the flock, dispersions and distractions are inevitable, some would prefer to rest, others to drink water or to peck at berries, and until their desires
coincide, the flock will be scattered and its itinerary upset. Along the route, in addition to the kites, solitary raptors, and members of less gregarious species, other birds of the starling family had been sighted, but they didn't join the flock, perhaps because they were not black but speckled, or perhaps because they had some other destiny in life. José Anaiço and Joaquim Sassa got into the car, Deux Chevaux resumed its journey, and so, starting and stopping, stopping and starting, they arrived at the frontier. Then Joaquim Sassa said, And now let's see if they'll allow me to pass, you follow, perhaps the starlings will help.
    Just as in those tales about fairies and enchantments, knights and damsels, or in those no less admirable Homeric epics in which, thanks to the bounty of the tree of fables or through some caprice of the gods or other superhuman beings, anything might happen, however contrary to custom or opposed to nature, it came about that Joaquim Sassa and José Anaiço had stopped at the police lookout, or frontier post in technical jargon, and God alone knows how anxious they must have felt as they presented their papers, when the next moment, like a sudden downpour of lashing rain or cyclone sweeping all before it, the flock of starlings swooped down from the heavens like a black meteor, bird bodies transformed into flashes of lightning, hissing, screeching, finally scattering in all directions when they reached the low roofs of the lookout, just like a whirlwind out of control. The terrified policemen waved their arms about, ran to take shelter, Joaquim Sassa saw his chance, got out of the car and retrieved the documents one of the policemen had dropped, there was no one to observe this infringement of customs regulations, and that was that, secret crossings had been made by many routes, but never before like this. Hitchcock