Three crows flew down to the ground in front of the picnic table; their presence seemed incidental to the fact that the person at the table was eating her lunch: they did not seem to be paying her much attention. One trotted up beside another, bent its head in front of the other bird’s beak as if waiting on some words. The approached, bowed-to, bird did open and close its beak several times as if in speech but no sound was made and if anything was being conveyed it was in mime. During this time the third crow came up behind the listening one and began to nonchalantly bite its tail feathers. The tail feathers were just as nonchalantly moved out of the way. Crow number three was giving a long reach to give another nibble when a passerby – drat! – startled all three of them into flight. The person at the picnic table would have liked to have observed the rest of the story.