.dropcap { color: #838078 ; float: left; font-size: 82px; line-height: 60px; padding: 5px 8px 0 0; } Excerpted from H IS FOR HAWK. Used with the permission of the publisher, Grove Press, an imprint of Grove Atlantic, Inc. Published March 2015. Copyright © 2014 by Helen Macdonald. All rights reserved. *** The conversation of death. The sentence kept coming to mind. I’d think of it at odd moments—while taking a bath, scratching my nose, leaning to grab a mug of hot tea. My subconscious was trying to tell me something and though it was shouting very loudly indeed, I didn’t hear what it was saying. Things were going wrong. Very wrong. One afternoon Mabel leapt up from her perch to my fist, lashed out with one foot and buried four talons in my bare right arm. I froze. Blood was dripping on the kitchen floor. I could do nothing. Her grip was too powerful. I had to wait until she decided to let go. The pressure was immense, but the pain, though agonising...