问答题One day in the dead of winter, I looked out my back window and saw a chicken. It was jet-black with a crimson wattle, and it seemed unaware that it was in New York City. In classic barnyard fashion, it was scratching, pecking and clucking.I shrugged off the apparition. Birds come and go. Usually they’re pigeons, not chickens, but like other birds, this one had wings and it would probably use them. Or so I thought.The protagonist of this Story is known simply as the chicken. How it came to a small backyard here, remains a matter of conjecture. The chicken made its first appearance next door, at the home of a multitude of cabdrivers from Bangladesh. My wife, Nancy, and I figured they had bought the chicken and were fattening it for a feast. That hypothesis fell into doubt when the chicken hopped the fence and began pacing the perimeter of our yard with a proprietary air.Eating it was out of the question. As a restaurant critic and an animal lover, I subscribe to a policy of complete hypocrisy. Serve fish or fowl to me, but don’t ask me to watch the killing. Once I meet it, I don’t want to eat it.Nancy and I next theorized that the chicken had escaped from a live-poultry market about four blocks away and was on the run. Our hearts went out to the brave little refugee. We had to save it.