The Book of the Dun Cow (14 page)

Master of the Universe,
why
did he always have to be in the way of everybody?

The muttering Turkey took a bite of hair from the top of his head—and then, suddenly, he was eyeball to eyeball with the Dog. He stopped and gave Mundo Cani a piercing stare directly into his left eye. Mundo Cani looked back and wept.

“Oh!” cried the magnificent Ocellata without moving an inch. “Are you here? I di-di-didn't notice you!” he shouted.

“On account of I am not worth the notice,” said Mundo Cani Dog.

“But by goo-good manners,” shouted Ocellata, “I, for one, know that someone should say excuse me.” The Turkey then pealed: “EXCUSE ME!” at the top of his lungs.

“You're excused,” said Mundo Cani.

But the Dog spoke to Ocellata's rear because the satisfied Turkey was already waddling away. It had been a most admirable pout. Pebbles rattled in his crop as he waddled.

Then Mundo Cani couldn't help himself. The word came out of him altogether on its own: “Maroooooned!” he wailed piteously.

Several hundred animals in his area stopped work, looked, and then wondered at the hairless stripe up his back. And Chauntecleer, who had been overseeing the creation of the animal camp, walked over.

“It's shaping up, Mundo Cani Mutt,” he said cheerfully. “There's a place for everyone, a job, and every family is settling in. And the food is coming and the stink is going and I'm right pleased—”

He stopped. He glared at the Dog. Mundo Cani was weeping without an end.

“What's this?” the Rooster hissed.

Mundo Cani shook his head.

“Why, you're a pump! You're a running pump! Who flushes you every time I look around?”

“Ah, pump,” the Dog managed to say; and then he delivered himself over to heavings of the breast and sobs.

Chauntecleer glanced quickly around. Two Turkeys were waddling over to begin new pouts. The Rooster flew at them and aimed them elsewhere in the yard. He returned to the Dog.

He put his beak to Mundo Cani's nose.

“Weep yesterday!” he hissed. “Weep next year. Weep with your fat head beneath the river. But don't weep here and don't weep now!”

“Ow-oooooo!” Mundo Cani's chest convulsed. It had finally happened. The dam had broken loose inside of him; sorrow burst out everywhere; and nothing in this world could plug it.

“Of all the—” Chauntecleer choked. And then he jammed his wing down Mundo Cani's throat.

“Dog, do you have any idea what's going to happen tomorrow? A war! A violent, bloody, murderous war! Serpents are going to fling themselves against our wall. They're going to reach into this place to kill what lives here. And this poor squad of animals is going to have to fight. Do you think they'll fight tomorrow if someone panics them today? They need great hearts. But you! You'll bleed dry every heart in the yard! I don't want it, Mundo Cani. Do you hear me? I don't want to hear drip out of you. Is that clear? Let them eat today. Let them sleep tonight. And then tomorrow we may have something to say to the enemy.”

Chauntecleer looked closely at Mundo Cani. He held his gaze steady for a long time. Then, when he spoke again, his voice was less thorny, more level, and much more kind.

“Mundo Cani Dog. You saw, and I saw, and no one else saw, what is to come. You saw the damnable vipers, the slick candy shapes. You saw them nip Thuringer unto his death. And did you hear the name given to the deep root of this evil? His name is Wyrm.”

The Dog closed his eyes. He struggled mightily against his sorrow. His mouth was dry. Feathers make a mouth dry.

“We alone have seen this thing,” the Rooster said. He tested the Dog: Slowly he began to withdraw his wing. “Mundo Cani, I need you. You know what nobody else knows. You witnessed the death and you did not run away, but you became salvation for a flock of fools. You have a great heart, Soul of Mine; and I need you. Who else can run like the wind? Who else possesses such a talent? One day, years and years ago, God tossed a blessing to that nose, and that nose was big enough to catch it.”

When the wing was pulled all the way out of Mundo Cani's mouth, many long sighs followed after. Little feathers puffed out with the sighs and curled through the air. But no weeping came out. All of the sobs had gone home into the Dog's breaking heart.

“Good, good, good, Mundo Cani,” Chauntecleer encouraged him. “Good, Soul of Mine. Hush. Be at peace.”

He stood up, wiping his wings together like towels. And then he saw the Dog's back.

“Who bit you?” he demanded.

Mundo Cani turned his head away.

“Do serpents bite? Who bit you!”

Mundo Cani looked back to the Rooster and shook his head. He did this because he could not talk, yet. He also did it because it really didn't matter who had bitten him, serpents or otherwise.

Chauntecleer was about to lay his head back and crow for the Weasels, now his police force. But before he could, Mundo Cani placed a paw on the Rooster's back and beseeched him with his eyes. The Rooster reconsidered, stood still, and waited.

It was a main struggle, for his throat was lodged full of lumps. But when he could finally speak, Mundo Cani put his eyes down and said: “A Dog came here. A Dog brought you evil. A Dog is going away.”

At first Chauntecleer was going to laugh. But in a rush laughter was drowned in irritation, and he became instantly angry. “One lout of a Dog!” he said.

“Will my Lord look at himself?” Mundo Cani said woefully. “Here are two eyes that should have gone to sleep two years ago. Are they sleeping? Instead they spend time on a Dog of no value. Here is a voice that one night hallowed a lonely Dog when he cried outside the door. How does this voice sound today? It has worry in it. The worry makes it hard. It has sorrow in it. The sorrow makes it break. And it is as tired as the two eyes. A Dog saw these members when they were God's miracle. But a Dog brought God's curse into the Coop. Curses are maybe stronger than miracles. Such a Dog should be dead. He is going away.”

Chauntecleer was dumbfounded. “Listen,” he said, stamping the ground compulsively, “you go away and I'll follow you! I'll wart your nose. I'll break it! What damn-fool talk is this? You think
you
caused all of this? Are you the father of Wyrm? You blithering nincompoop! You utter fool!”

Mundo Cani said it softly, looking into no one's eyes: “The Master of the Universe is embarrassed that he made such a mistake as this one—”

“Cock-a-mamie!”

“—and he wants to cover it up.”

“Cock-a-balderdash!”

“It is my fault, my Lord.”

“BULL! BULL, YOU PLUG-HEADED DOG!”

Mundo Cani sighed. He shook his head and sighed again. He tried to speak, but failed miserably. He waved a paw in front of his face as if that would say what was on his mind. And then he spoke in a baby's breath, confessed: “On account of this Dog—here is evidence, my lord—on account of this Dog, a beautiful Turkey, banded and brown, died last night. Ah, this Dog did not save him. And he died.”

“That's your evidence? That! Why, you alone—”

Suddenly Chauntecleer threw himself away from Mundo Cani. He strutted up and down the camp, jerking his head and flaring his neck feathers. He was swearing. Little animals scurried out of his way. Other animals who had been taking a rest leaped up and hurried back to work. John Wesley Weasel, who was about to report a quarrel between the Ducks and the Geese, looked at the Rooster and immediately decided to report nothing at all. Chauntecleer came to the wall, then spun on his heel and raced back to the Dog—a thought in his brain.

“What has that Cow been saying to you?”

Mundo Cani said, “My Lord has a right to laugh at me.”

“Your Lord! Your Lord has a right to stuff you! What did that Cow say to you yesterday? Did she saucer your mind? Did she convince you of guilt? Is that how she explains an evil?”

“Yesterday evening there was a Turkey—”

“Yesterday, Dog, there was a Cow standing next to you in the back of the assembly. Once she sat with me, but then she said nothing at all. She talked with you. What did she say to make a miserable fool the more miserable?”

“My Lord must be right about something. When did he ever make a mistake? But Cows don't take the time to talk with this Dog. There was a Cow?”

“There was a Cow!” Chauntecleer exploded. “I thought her something good. But now I think—”

All of a sudden, Chauntecleer sat down. His wings hung loose to the ground. His neck sagged. His eyes showed an infinite exhaustion. A trembling Rooster faced a sad, sad Dog.

“Hear this, Mundo Cani Dog,” he said. His voice was like sand. He put his two wings on either side of the Dog's great nose. “If it is God's curse which a Dog brought with him into this Coop, then a Rooster needs the curse of God. Can you believe this? If it were a bushel of fleas which a Dog brought with him, then this Rooster would be happy for a bushel of fleas. A Rooster needs a Dog. A Rooster has come to love him. Stay.”

For a long, long time, while the business of the day went on round about them, Chauntecleer looked at Mundo Cani Dog, saying nothing. And then he laid his head down across the Dog's great nose. And because he was so passing weary, the Rooster fell asleep that way, and he dreamed no dreams.

So how could Mundo Cani go away then—or even move?

When Chauntecleer woke up again, it was midnight and he was in pitch-blackness. Several times the Rooster opened and closed his eyes, but he couldn't tell any difference: It was all darkness. On this night not even stray light reached the earth through the clouds; so tight, so heavy were they in heaven, that Chauntecleer felt their weight on his back, and he groaned. The whole earth, and especially this round camp on the face of it, was in a closet—muggy, still, and absolutely dark. And the closet door was shut.

Chauntecleer didn't want to move. He felt surrounded by the invisible presences of his animals; he didn't know where nor how to move. From every direction: grunts, coughings, snorts, sighs, rustlings; now and again a dream shout from across the camp sent ripples of worry everywhere; legs, claws, snouts, and jowls nudged the ground nervously; back to back the animals surely lay, and that wakefully—an impossible and dangerous maze. Volatile. Chauntecleer didn't want to move. . . .

But “want” and “won't” are two different words.

“. . . run away! Now or later, it don't make no never mind. Now's the better.”

Chauntecleer's ear went sharp. Under the general restlessness of the animals and through the night he heard spoken words. Someone was holding secret conversation in hoarse bursts of whisper.

“. . . seen him? Seen this Cockatrice or his . . . ?”

“Never seen . . . ! Flank nor feather, beak nor claw . . . no knowing what kind of . . .”

“. . . Beryl! Oh, Peck,
her
I seen!”

Peck! There was a name. So these two were members of the Mad House of Otter. Chauntecleer stretched his ears to hear, but lost most of their words. Yet the tones of their conversation he caught very well, and he didn't like the sound of it.

“. . . horrid! Nothing natural, not natural-born . . . a broken neck like that! Shoulda seen, Peck; a blow so strong . . .”

“. . . the gash on Ebenezer Rat! What about that? What about that? Scrape, what're we gonna do about that?”

“Me, I'm . . . place.”

“You what? But Chauntecleer—”

“Hush up, Peck! What do you think? The camp's got ears!”

Then Peck very earnestly asked a question which Chauntecleer lost altogether, and Scrape gave him a long answer. It was obvious that a plan was hatching, growing out of the grisly fear of the two Otters, and that Peck, though he wasn't sure of its righteousness, was surely interested in the length of his own neck.

Again and again Chauntecleer heard the name Cockatrice pronounced in dread:

“. . . don't
know
, Peck! And you gonna go against that? Die, Peck? For what? A pack of softhearted . . . ?”

One by one Chauntecleer heard other voices join the whispering.

“. . . away? Tonight? . . . can't see nothing, Scrape!”

“. . . defend . . . own territory.”

“But . . . !”

“Oh, let the Rooster watch out for himself!”

“Cockatrice! Cockatrice!
Cockatrice!
”

Now even those animals who did not talk were stirring—restless, hopheaded, filled with strange imaginings, scared. A general groan began to spread from the Otters' muttering; widening circles caught ears, thumping hearts, bristling hair into them. In a moment the animals would begin to stand up, and then what? The night was dreadfully dark. The camp was dangerously crowded. And tomorrow! Every creature needed his rest tonight. More than that, every creature needed desperately every other creature at his side tomorrow—

Chauntecleer broke his silence and stood up. He fought an urge to excoriate these rotten renegades, these traitor Otters: Scrape should be skinned!

Instead, from the place where he was, he began to crow compline, the seventh holy hour of the day. Cool, smooth, restrained, a silken lariat, the Rooster gave his animals, in the darkness, a point of recognition. He covered them with the familiar. He announced his presence. Then he drew them back from the edge. He blessed them right gently, crowing nothing of the battle for tomorrow—but naming every one of them their names. Names, one after the other, with a prayer for the peace of each one: That was compline on this particular night.

Soon the restless animals on every side began to settle down again. Their own names in the Rooster's mouth had a transfiguring effect:

“Nimbus,” Chauntecleer crowed, “the Lord's peace is with you.”

And Nimbus the Deer, whose flanks had begun to shiver, who was jerking his head, ready at a crack to leap and flee, Nimbus heard his own name in the mouth of his Lord, and he came to his senses again. Dark was suddenly not so dark anymore. He lay down encouraged—for who had known that he was so well known?

“Pika,” Chauntecleer crowed next, and behold! Nimbus was himself the more encouraged to hear the name; for Hare Pika, whom he could not see, was suddenly with him, a part of his company. Name followed name. Lonely was lost in communion: The company grew as if lights were turning on. And Nimbus the Deer went to sleep.

So it went. All the animals began to believe in sleep again, and the dark camp settled down.

But as he crowed this remarkable compline, Chauntecleer the Rooster was walking slowly through the camp straight for the Mad House of Otter.

And when he came to that place, he didn't stop crowing or lose a breath for compline, but, as if it were by accident, he stepped up onto Scrape Otter's back and stood there, crowing and twisting his claws into the Otter's fur.

Scrape grunted. The Rooster gripped the tighter.

Scrape began to whine. The Rooster made a vise of his feet, then spread his wings, took three enormous flaps through the air, and dropped the Otter bang among the Weasels. Scrape had no doubts about the cause of his punishment, though not a word had been spoken to him. And when Chauntecleer had finally climbed to the top of the circular wall, he crowed, “Scrape! The blessing of the Lord is on you—even on you, Otter!”

An Otter decided to forgo his plan; and, finally, he too went to sleep.

There were thousands of names to be crowed. That was good. The night was very long, and Chauntecleer needed the names, for compline tonight should last the whole night through.

The Rooster walked along the top of the wall, crowing—gently giving ease to the animals' sleep, but himself gravely worried over the weakness of his army. That's why he could not stop crowing. The Otters' plot had made him wary. The quick deterioration of the camp, their readiness to chuck and run, had been a revelation to him. Their fear of the enemy had become his fear of them; and for him, as well, the enemy became the more frightful. So compline was a necessary lie. It was peace spoken to the fearful. But it was also one fearful himself who crowed that peace.

It was a long, long night before the war. It was an exhausting compline.

Only once during the night did something break the rhythm of his crowing the exceptional compline. Toward morning.

It began with a laugh.

High in the invisible sky above him, Chauntecleer suddenly heard malevolent, screaming laughter—so cold, so evil, so powerful a bellowed laugh that he gasped and forgot his crow. His feathers stood on end. All the darkness around him swelled with the hateful sound, and the Rooster stood perfectly still.

“Ha! Ha! Ha!” screamed the sky laughter. It was distant: It came from just underneath the clouds. But it fell with murderous bullet force. It seemed that the mouth of the laugher was aimed directly at him. Then Chauntecleer's heart stopped.

It knew him! This laughter knew Chauntecleer, knew exactly how he was standing, knew the fear driven into his soul, knew him for a weak commander, knew him lost, dead, and buried.

“Ah, ha! Ha! Ha!” It stroked its victory there in the sky—pleased laughter; strange, insidious, watchful laughter. . . . And suddenly Chauntecleer had no idea where he was. On the wall, to be sure—but where on the wall? The side near the forest? The side—God forbid it!—near the river? He had been walking the wall for hours, heedless, crowing; and a circle is a circle. He
was
lost! And right now it was vitally important that he know his position. Damn the darkness! How could he give a bold front to the devil above him
if he didn't know where he was
?

That one knew, and he didn't. That made the Rooster naked!

So Chauntecleer spun on his heel and began to race back along the wall. Not outside the wall he ran, for what would he find there? A ditch, and then what? Forest? River? Not down into the camp. The animals would hinder him, trip him up.

On and on around the wall he ran, he rushed, headlong, hearing his own breathing and breaking his lungs for breath; hearing the hard, delighted laughter above him. Through the black night he ran, and he began to whimper: “It's here! I want to see. I want to see. I want to see. O God, where am I?”

Then, blindly, he ran straight into a soft flank. He yelped, then tumbled off the wall, down into the ditch.

The Dun Cow followed him down, and once there she breathed on him. Immediately poor Chauntecleer drove himself like a child into her neck, curled, and gave himself over to the refuge. He had absolutely no doubt who she was. And, strangely, her presence did not surprise him. Neither did he stop for his own dignity. Simply, he was thankful for the shelter, and he hid himself there, and he waited for the trembling to quit.

When the Rooster's reason had come back again, he discovered that the laughter was gone and the night silent once again—save that he heard wind in the trees of the forest. Trees! Ah, the Dun Cow had brought him down on the north side of the wall; the camp stood between him and the river, and he was relieved. And he knew where he was.

Chauntecleer lay a long while against the fine fur of her neck. He let his mind free to think of the night; and soon his mouth was free as well. He found that he was talking his thoughts aloud. The Dun Cow listened. Low and long he shed his private fears into her silence—all of them, right up to the final idiocy that he, Chauntecleer, Lord and leader, should be reduced to racing wildly in circles! Long and low he shared every piece of apprehension with the Cow who lay beside him in the ditch, and this, too, relieved him.

But then, even in this special hour, a tiny thing began to nag the Rooster: that the Dun Cow, who had filled Mundo Cani's ear yesterday with such a steady stream of talk, now was saying nothing at all to him.

“Speak to me,” he said bluntly and loudly in the night. “Have you nothing to say to me? Who are you? Why are you here? Where do you come from?” And then, a question which Chauntecleer never formed on his own, nor ever would have asked, had he thought about it first: “—Why do I love you?”

His own question so shocked him that he shrugged his shoulders as if there were light in the ditch and he could be seen, as if to say, Forget it: I didn't mean it. And he consciously shut his mouth and said no more.

So the last hour of the night passed by. Once or twice he felt—-just barely—the prick of her horns upon his back. They kept him wide awake. And in that time it seemed to Chauntecleer that the Dun Cow
did
speak to him, though he could never remember the language she used, nor the timbre of her voice; and she did not offer any answer to any one of his questions.

But what he learned from her made his spirit bold and his body ready. Three things she gave him: weapons against the enemy. And two he understood immediately. But the third remained a mystery.

Shortly the Dun Cow was gone again, and the Rooster alone in his ditch. And then, with a faint light to make shadows of every solid thing, the night was done and the dire day had begun.