Henry Cole

A Nest for Celeste

A Story About Art, Inspiration, and the Meaning of Home

Contents

One The Basket Maker

Two Illianna and Trixie

Three Mr. Audubon

Four A Sudden Departure

Five A Narrow Escape

Six A New Nest

Seven Rescue by Dash

Eight Joseph

Nine A Friend

Ten Feet in the Gravy

Eleven A Portrait

Twelve Pigeons

Thirteen The River

Fourteen A Close One

Fifteen The Ivory-Billed

Sixteen Cornelius

Seventeen Outside

Eighteen The Storm

Nineteen Aftermath

Twenty Lafayette

Twenty-One The Gondola

Twenty-Two Lafayette Returns

Twenty-Three Flight

Twenty-Four A Homecoming, and Inspiration

Twenty-Five Cornelius Says Adieu

Twenty-Six The Attic

Twenty-Seven A Friend Returns

Twenty-Eight Lafayette Strikes a Pose

Twenty-Nine Freedom

Thirty A Discovery

Thirty-One Housecleaning

Thirty-Two A Homecoming of Sorts

Thirty-Three An Unwanted Housemate

Thirty-Four Trixie Takes Off…

Thirty-Five …Like a Rock Tossed Into a Muddy Pond

Thirty-Six Back from New Orleans

Thirty-Seven Departure

Afterword

About the Author

Credits

Copyright

About the Publisher

Below the crackled and faded painting of a horse,

beneath the heavy sideboard,

under the worn carpet

and dusty floorboards of the dining room

sat Celeste, hunched over her worktable.

CHAPTER ONE

The Basket Maker

She was weaving a basket from blades of dried grasses. Above her head was a shelf full of the baskets she had made, some with dried wildflowers or colored threads woven into them. Several had long shoulder straps, which made the baskets perfect for carrying bits of food or scraps of cloth. All of the baskets were skillfully made, with perfect knots and minuscule braids and weaving so tight the baskets could hold several thimblefuls of water or honey.

Celeste’s newest basket was going to be of a design she hadn’t tried before, with a side pocket and a fold-over flap to keep things from spilling out. Her nook was dim, but Celeste was used to it. From her pile of dried grasses she pulled another long blade and, using her teeth and nimble fingers, began twisting and weaving.

“Over, under, around, through, left over right…” said Celeste to herself as the grasses sang. The blades smelled sweetly of sunshine, of summertime.

As she wove them together she pondered over where the grasses may have grown. She had nearly forgotten what a sunny day was like. She spent her time under the floorboards, or upstairs in the dining room, furtively darting about in the shadows, searching for bits of food, plucking strands of horsehair from the dining-room chairs’ seat cushions, or searching for bits of grass that had been tracked into the house on the shoes of humans. And always at night.

And lately Celeste had been finding something else on her expeditions upstairs: feathers. This was something new; she had never seen any before. Some were as small as her ear; others, long and pointy. Some were soft brown, others vivid green, still others brilliant blue and white. More often than not, after a venture to the dining room or crossing the hallway, she would return with a feather.

Finally, her paws a bit numb, Celeste tied off the last knot and sat back to examine the completed basket. “Goes quickly, once you have a rhythm going,” she mused.

Her nose twitched, and she brushed dust from her whiskers.

She heard the deep gong of the dining-room clock resonate through the floorboards above her head.

Then she heard a rustling sound, and she glanced nervously down into the darkness of the tunnel between the musty floor joists.

Two gray rats emerged from the shadows and crowded into Celeste’s nook.

No, it wasn’t living in the darkness under the floorboards that Celeste minded. But these two, they were a different story.

CHAPTER TWO

Illianna and Trixie

The first rat, Illianna, had small, narrow-set eyes like a pair of black pepper-corns and a tongue like a lancet.

“Honestly, Celeste, another of your precious baskets?” she hissed. “Don’t you have anything better to do than this silly pastime?” She brushed the remaining grasses off the table, then slumped in a chair.

The other rat, Trixie, began pilfering Celeste’s food stores, searching through her baskets, helping herself. Celeste felt defenseless against the two marauders, who frequently bullied their way into her nook, ransacking and filching.

“Hmm…bread crust…more bread crusts…” Trixie said, her raspy voice wheezing between bites. “This bread is moldy! Where’re the good bits, missy?”

“Um…what good bits, Trixie?”

“‘What good bits, Trixie?’” In an instant the rat whirled around and nipped Celeste on the back. Celeste squealed. The pain was sudden and intense.

“You know what good bits!” Trixie screeched. “The really tasty bits…the bacon scraps and the sausage bits and the biscuit pieces…. You’ve hidden them from us, haven’t you?”

“N-n-no, honestly,” Celeste stammered.

“Try looking in her bed.” Illianna squinted at her.

Trixie yanked the oily scrap of rag off Celeste’s bed.

“Nothing!” she hollered. “There’s nothing here! Well, then, you’d better get to it, missy. Take one of those baskets to the dining room and bring