Dragonfield (22 page)

He looked behind once to see his footprints in the rain-soft earth. They marched in an orderly line behind him. He could not see hers at all.

“Do you believe, little Addie?” Her voice seemed to come from a long way off, farther even than the hills.

“Believe in what?”

“In God. Do you believe that he directs all our movements?”

“I sing in the church choir,” he said, hoping it was the proof she wanted.

“That will do for now,” she said.

There was a fierceness in her voice that made him turn in the muddy furrow and look at her. She towered above him, all white and gold and glowing. The moon haloed her head, and behind her, close to her shoulders, he saw something like wings, feathery and waving. He was suddenly desperately afraid.

“What are you?” he whispered.

“What do you think I am?” she asked, and her face looked carved in stone, so white her skin and black the features.

“Are you … the angel of death?” he asked and then looked down before she answered. He could not bear to watch her talk.

“For you, I am an angel of life,” she said. “Did I not save you?”

“What kind of angel are you?” he whispered, falling to his knees before her.

She lifted him up and cradled him in her arms. She sang him a lullaby in a language he did not know. “I told you in the beginning who I am,” she murmured to the sleeping boy. “I am Pistias Sophia, angel of wisdom and faith. The one who put the serpent into the garden little Adolf. But I was only following orders.”

Her wings unfurled behind her. She pumped them once, twice, and then the great wind they commanded lifted her into the air. She flew without a sound to the Hitler house and left the boy sleeping, feverless, in his bed.

In 1799, in France, a wild boy

Was seen running,

Running like a beast

On all fours,

Running like a beast

Through gullies and streams,

Running like a beast

And free.

He could not talk,

He could not think

Beyond instinct,

He could not reason

Beyond his last meal,

Or count to ten,

But he was free.

He bayed at the sky,

He ate roots, He howled at the moon,

He ate acorns,

He snuffled and snorted

And did not use a fork,

He wore nothing but his tangled hair

And he was free.

But late at night

When he was packless

And without a mate

Or a mother to kiss him,

Without the comfort

Of language or art,

He was trapped forever

In his animal heart.

N
URSE LAMB STOOD IN
front of the big white house with the black shutters. She shivered. She was a brand-new nurse and this was her very first job.

From inside the house came loud and angry growls. Nurse Lamb looked at the name carved over the door: HAPPY DENS. But it didn’t sound like a happy place, she thought, as she listened to the howls from inside.

Shuddering, she knocked on the door.

The only answer was another howl.

Lifting the latch, Nurse Lamb went in.

No sooner had she stepped across the doorstep than a bowl sped by her head. It splattered against the wall. Nurse Lamb ducked, but she was too late. Her fresh white uniform was spotted and dotted with whatever had been in the bowl.

“Mush!”
shouted an old wolf, shaking his cane at her. “Great howls and thorny paws. I can’t stand another day of it. The end of life is nothing but a big bowl of mush.”

Nurse Lamb gave a frightened little bleat and turned to go back out the door, but a great big wolf with two black ears and one black paw barred her way. “Mush for breakfast, mush for dinner, and more mush in between,” he growled. “That’s all they serve us here at Happy Dens, Home for Aging Wolves.”

The wolf with the cane added: “When we were young and full of teeth it was never like this.” He howled.

Nurse Lamb gave another bleat and ran into the next room. To her surprise it was a kitchen. A large, comfortable-looking pig wearing a white hat was leaning over the stove and stirring an enormous pot. Since the wolves had not followed her in, Nurse Lamb sat down on a kitchen stool and began to cry.

The cook put her spoon down, wiped her trotters with a stained towel, and patted Nurse Lamb on the head, right behind the ears.

“There, there, lambkin,” said the cook. “Don’t start a new job in tears. We say that in the barnyard all the time.”

Nurse Lamb looked up and snuffled. “I … I don’t think I’m right for this place. I feel as if I have been thrown to the wolves.”

The cook nodded wisely. “And, in a manner of speaking, you have been. But these poor old dears are all bark and no bite. Toothless, don’t you know. All they can manage is mush.”

“But no one told me this was an old
wolves
home,” complained Nurse Lamb. “They just said ‘How would you like to work at Happy Dens?’ And it sounded like the nicest place in the world to work.”

“And so it is. And so it is,” said the cook. “It just takes getting used to.”

Nurse Lamb wiped her nose and looked around. “But how could someone like
you
work here. I mean …” She dropped her voice to a whisper. “I heard all about it at school. The three little pigs and all. Did you know them?”

The cook sniffed. “And a bad lot they were, too. As we say in the barnyard, ‘There’s more than one side to every sty.’”

“But I was told that the big bad wolf tried to eat the three little pigs. And he huffed and he puffed and …” Nurse Lamb looked confused.

Cook just smiled and began to stir the pot again, lifting up a spoonful to taste.

“And then there was that poor little child in the woods with the red riding hood,” said Nurse Lamb. “Bringing the basket of goodies to her sick grandmother.”

Cook shook her head and added pepper to the pot. “In the barnyard we say, ‘Don’t take slop from a kid in a cloak.’” She ladled out a bowlful of mush.

Nurse Lamb stood up. She walked up to the cook and put her hooves on her hips. “But what about that boy Peter? The one who caught the wolf by the tail after he ate the duck. And the hunters came and—”

“Bad press,” said a voice from the doorway. It was the wolf with the two black ears. “Much of what you know about wolves is bad press.”

Nurse Lamb turned and looked at him. “I don’t even know what bad press means,” she said.

“It means that only one side of the story has been told. There is another way of telling those very same tales. From the wolf’s point of view.” He grinned at her. “My name is Wolfgang and if you will bring a bowl of that thoroughly awful stuff to the table”—he pointed to the pot—“I will tell you my side of a familiar tale.”

Sheepishly, Nurse Lamb picked up the bowl and followed the wolf into the living room. She put the bowl on the table in front of Wolfgang and sat down. There were half a dozen wolves sitting there.

Nurse Lamb smiled at them timidly.

They smiled back. The cook was right. Only Wolfgang had any teeth.

Once upon a time (began the black-eared wolf) there was a thoroughly nice young wolf. He had two black ears and one black paw. He was a poet and a dreamer.

This thoroughly nice wolf loved to lay about in the woods staring at the lacy curlings of fiddlehead ferns and smelling the wild roses.

He was a vegetarian—except for lizards and an occasional snake, which don’t count. He loved carrot cake and was partial to peanut-butter pie.

One day as he lay by the side of a babbling brook, writing a poem that began

Twinkle, twinkle, lambkin’s eye,

How I wish you were close by …

he heard the sound of a child weeping. He knew it was a human child because only they cry with that snuffling gasp. So the thoroughly nice wolf leaped to his feet and ran over, his hind end waggling, eager to help.

The child looked up from her crying. She was quite young and dressed in a long red riding hood, a lacy dress, white stockings, and black patent-leather Mary Jane shoes. Hardly what you would call your usual hiking-in-the-woods outfit.

“Oh, hello, wolfie,” she said. In those days, of course, humans often talked to wolves. “I am quite lost.”

The thoroughly nice wolf sat down by her side and held her hand. “There, there,” he said. “Tell me where you live.”

The child grabbed her hand back. “If I knew that, you silly growler, I wouldn’t be lost, would I?”

The thoroughly nice wolf bit back his own sharp answer and asked her in rhyme:

Where are you going

My pretty young maid?

Answer me this

And I’ll make you a trade.

The path through the forest

Is dark and it’s long,

So I will go with you

And sing you a song.

The little girl was charmed. “I’m going to my grandmother’s house,” she said. “With this.” She held up a basket that was covered with a red-checked cloth. The wolf could smell carrot cake. He grinned.

“Oh, poet, what big teeth you have,” said the child.

“The better to eat carrot cake with,” said the thoroughly nice wolf.

“My granny hates carrot cake,” said the child. “In fact, she hates anything but mush.”

“What bad taste,” said the wolf. “I made up a poem about that one:

If I found someone

Who liked to eat mush

I’d sit them in front of it.

Then give a …”

“Push!”
shouted the child.

“Why, you’re a poet, too,” said the wolf.

“I’m really more of a storyteller,” said the child, blushing prettily. “But I do love carrot cake.”

“All poets do,” said the wolf. “So you must be a poet as well.”

“Well, my granny is no poet. Every week when I bring the carrot cake over, she dumps it into her mush and mushes it all up together and then makes me eat it with her. She says that I have to learn that life ends with a bowl of mush.”

“Great howls!” said the wolf shuddering. “What a terribly wicked thing to say and do.”

“I guess so,” said the child.

“Then we must save this wonderful carrot cake from your grandmother,” the wolf said, scratching his head below his ears.

The child clapped her hands. “I know,” she said. “Let’s pretend.”

“Pretend?” asked the wolf.

“Let’s pretend that you are Granny and I am bringing the cake to
you.
Here, you wear my red riding hood and we’ll pretend it’s Granny’s nightcap and nightgown.”

The wolf took her little cape and slung it over his head. He grinned again. He was a poet and he loved pretending.

The child skipped up to him and knocked upon an imaginary door.

The wolf opened it. “Come in. Come in.”

“Oh, no,” said the child. “My grandmother never gets out of bed.”

“Never?” asked the wolf.

“Never,” said the child.

“All right,” said the thoroughly nice wolf, shaking his head. He lay down on the cool green grass, clasped his paws over his stomach, and made a very loud pretend snore.

The child walked over to his feet and knocked again.

“Who is it?” called out the wolf in a high, weak, scratchy voice.

“It is your granddaughter, Little Red Riding Hood,” the child said, giggling.

“Come in, come in. Just lift the latch. I’m in bed with aches and pains and a bad case of the rheumaticks,” said the wolf in the high, funny voice.

The child walked in through the pretend door.

“I have brought you a basket of goodies,” said the child, putting the basket by the wolf’s side. She placed her hands on her hips. “But you know, Grandmother, you look very different today.”

“How so?” asked the wolf, opening both his yellow eyes wide.

“Well, Grandmother, what big eyes you have,” said the child.

The wolf closed his eyes and opened them again quickly. “The better to see you with, my dear,” he said.

“Oh, you silly wolf. She never calls me
dear.
She calls me
Sweetface.
Or
Punkins.
Or her
Airy Fairy Dee.”

“How awful,” said the wolf.”

“I know,” said the child. “But that’s what she calls me.

“Well, I can’t,” said the wolf, turning over on his side. “I’m a poet, after all, and no self-respecting poet could possibly use those words. If I have to call you that, there’s no more pretending.”

“I guess you can call me dear,” said the child in a very small voice. “But I didn’t know that poets were so particular.”

“About
words
we are,” said the wolf.

“And you have an awfully big nose,” said the child.

The wolf put his paw over his nose. “Now that is uncalled-for,” he said. “My nose isn’t all that big—for a wolf.”

“It’s part of the game,” said the child.

“Oh, yes, the game. I had forgotten. The better to smell the basket of goodies, my dear,” said the wolf.

“And Grandmother, what big teeth you have.”

The thoroughly nice wolf sat up. “The better to eat carrot cake with,” he said.

At that, the game was over. They shared the carrot cake evenly and licked their fingers, which was not very polite but certainly the best thing to do on a picnic in the woods. And the wolf sang an ode to carrot cake which he made up on the spot:

Carrot cake, o carrot cake

The best thing a baker ever could make.

Mushy or munchy

Gushy or crunchy

Eat it by a woodland lake.

“We are really by a stream,” said the child.

“That is what is known as poetic license,” said the wolf. “Calling a stream a lake.”

“Maybe you can use your license to drive me home.”

The wolf nodded. “I will if you tell me your name. I know it’s not
really
Little Red Riding Hood.”

The child stood up and brushed crumbs off her dress. “It’s Elisabet Grimm,” she said.

“Of the Grimm family on Forest Lane?” asked the wolf.

“Of course,” she answered.

“Everyone knows where that is. I’ll take you home right now,” said the wolf. He stretched himself from tip to tail. “But what will you tell your mother about her cake?” He took her by the hand.