by Lily Wilspur
She sat there, staring into the dead fire. There was nothing to do. She could get out her knitting, or her mending, but for some reason she couldn’t budge from her chair. Knitting and mending were contented activities. They showed that a woman was comfortable and satisfied with her surroundings. They weren’t appropriate for a catastrophe like this.
She sat through the day, and at every hour, she told herself Elliot couldn’t be far away. He would straighten out Laird, and then she could straighten out the rest of her life. Not long to wait now.
Another hour or two passed, and she told herself the same thing. Morning turned to afternoon, and still she sat. Her throat ached from thirst, and her stomach gnawed from hunger. Then, from beyond the protection of the door, she heard the strained moaning of the cows. They weren’t just uncomfortable anymore. They sounded like they were dying.
What if Elliot came back and his milk cows were dead? He would never forgive her. A milk cow was a treasure not to be squandered. How long had he worked, how much had he paid, to get them? She had to get out to the barn, even if only to try to milk without Laird’s help.
She looked out the window to find out where Laird was, but she didn’t see him anywhere in the yard. Maybe he was gone. Maybe he’d run off, leaving her hiding in the house. She picked up her milking buckets and shot the bolt of the door.
Chapter 12
Cautiously, silently, she slid the door back and peeped out. Still no sign of Laird. She opened the door and stepped out onto the doorstep. He wasn’t anywhere in the yard. She started toward the barn.
She got halfway across the yard before he exploded out from behind the trees. Ellen jumped in fright, and for a moment, couldn’t make up her mind whether to run for the house or the barn. He almost ran her down before she got back behind the door and slammed it shut.
She watched him from the window. He stalked back and forth in the yard, snarling and slathering at her. The saliva foamed from his lips, and his eyes stared at her with wild menacing hatred. He really had gone mad. Ellen had heard about loyal pets going mad and attacking their owners. Now the same thing had happened to Laird.
The cows cried and called from the barn, begging anyone to come and relieve them. Ellen couldn’t wait any longer. She went to the door and took down the rifle from the hooks above the door frame.
She didn’t dare open the door again, so she went to the window. Laird stood in his usual place by the barnyard fence. He didn’t snarl until she brought the rifle up. He must have known what it was and what she planned to do, because he growled louder and more dangerously than ever. She moved her hand to the trigger, and he charged at the window with his teeth bared.
Ellen’s first shot flew wide and Laird didn’t stop running. Ellen threw down the lever on the underside of the gun and fired again. Her hands shook so badly and she whimpered softly under her breath from terror, so only by a miracle did her second shot hit Laird in the side of the chest.
He staggered once, and Ellen’s heart soared. But the next minute, he was on his feet again and coming fast. Ellen worked the lever one last time. If she missed him again or failed to stop him, he would be through the window and on top of her.
But she didn’t have time to aim properly. She brought the rifle up to her shoulder and fired she knew not where, nor did she care anymore whether she hit him. Her mind disconnected from her actions. She only knew she had to do something to save her own life.
Her third shot hit him in the center of his chest. Even then, he didn’t stop. He landed on the windowsill, his fangs gnashing and snapping just inches from her face. Ellen fell back into the room, lost her footing, and pitched over backwards onto her tailbone. The rifle flew out of her hands and clattered across the floor.
She bounced up off the floor, ready for Laird’s next assault. She crawled as fast as she could to the rifle and pointed it toward the window. But she didn’t need it. Laird never got past the windowsill before he slid back out and crumpled onto the ground outside.
Ellen sat on the floor with the barrel of the rifle pointed at the window. She dared not move in case he got up again. She never considered that he might not come. She listened with every fiber of her being for the slightest sound outside. If she heard Laird moaning, or scratching, or panting, she might be able to tell where he was and which direction he was going.
But she didn’t hear anything. She didn’t hear anything from the barn, either. Were the cows dead? Were they lying on the floor, thrashing in unbearable pain and dying slow, torturous deaths? Should she go and see?
She had no conception how long she sat there. Her only thought was keeping her gun pointed at the window in case Laird came after her again. She didn’t hear Elliot hail her from outside, nor did she hear him rattle the latch on the door trying to get in.
He walked over to the window and peered in. He was her sitting on the floor with her legs stretched out in front of her, her fists clenched around the gun and her eyes staring up at the window but seeing nothing. He called to her once but she didn’t answer.
“Ellen!” he barked, louder this time. “Ellen!”
His shadow darkening the window brought her out of her trance. She took another few minutes, staring and whining in terror, to fully recognize him. “Elliot! You’re home!”
“Of course, I’m home,” he snapped. “I told you I would be.”
“I thought you were never coming!” she whimpered.
“What the devil is going on here?” he demanded. “My dog’s dead on the ground out here. What are you doing with that gun?”
Ellen managed to focus on his face. Then she broke down in suffocating sobs. She couldn’t draw her breath in fast enough to keep her sobs going, and she gagged on her own tears. “I tried!” she wailed. “I tried everything, Elliot. I didn’t know what to do. I would have sat here ‘til kingdom come, waiting for you. But I didn’t know what to do!” She let out a long, wretched wail that stopped her from forming any more words.
Elliot stared at her, not understanding. “Open the door, Ellen. Let me in.”
She didn’t move. “I tried, Elliot. I really tried. But he wouldn’t let me out of the house. I tried to keep the fire going, and I tried to milk the cows. I tried to get to the wood pile, and I tried to get to the barn. I heard the cows crying out there, and I tried to get to them. But he wouldn’t let me.”
“Let me in, Ellen,” Elliot repeated, but she still didn’t respond. He studied her in her despair, and then he swung his leg over the windowsill and climbed into the house.
The first thing he did was take the rifle out of her hands. When he pried her rock-hard fingers off the trigger guard, she collapsed into loud moans of grief. Her mouth hung open and she clenched her hands together just as hard as she clasped the rifle a minute before.
Elliot squatted next to her on the floor and took hold of her by the shoulders. He wanted to shake her, but when he felt the convulsions quaking through her, he held himself back and let her cry herself out.
In the end, she settled into persistent weeping. “I’m sorry, Elliot. I’m so sorry. I couldn’t help it. I’m sorry I killed your dog. I didn’t mean to. I didn’t want to. He would have killed me. He tried, and he was foaming at the mouth, staring, slobbering, and snapping his teeth. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”
Elliot let her babble. After a while, she started to make more sense. “Now, tell me what happened.”
“I was just sitting there, not doing anything,” Ellen told him. “I was just sitting there. I didn’t do anything.”
“Where were you sitting?” he asked.
“Out there.” She pointed toward the wall of the house. “By the wood pile. I was sitting there, not doing anything.”
“And where was Laird?” Elliot asked.
“He was sitting over there.” She pointed across the yard. “He wasn’t doing anything. Then he just…I don’t know. He just snapped. He jumped at me and started growling and biting and slobbering all over the place.”
“What did you do?” he asked.
“He pinned me against the wall,” Ellen told him. “I tried to call to him, but he didn’t hear me. I finally ran for the house and shut the door.”
“Are you sure?” Elliot asked.
“He tore my dress. Look.” Ellen turned around and showed him the shredded skirt at the back of her dress.
Elliot frowned. “Then what happened?”
“It was getting dark,” she told him. “I didn’t dare go back outside to milk the cows, so I ate supper and went to bed. Look at the state of this place.” She glanced around the room. “I couldn’t get water to clean up with. When I woke up, I thought he might be okay, but he wasn’t. I tried to get to the wood pile, but he rushed me again and chased me back inside.”
Elliot scowled around at the filthy room.
“I’m sorry, Elliot,” Ellen sobbed. “I let the fire go out. I know you told me not to, but I couldn’t get any wood, and you had the matches with you.”
“Never mind about that,” Elliot grumbled.
“I heard the cows calling from the barn,” she explained. “They sounded like they were in distress, so I tried to get out there to milk them. I looked out the window, and I didn’t see Laird, so I tried to get to the barn. I almost got there, but he jumped out and attacked me. He bit me in the leg, and I ran back inside.”
Elliot’s eyes flew open. “Laird bit you?”
“Yes. Look.” Ellen showed him the gash in the bottom of her leg. “That was when I got the idea he had gone mad. I looked out the window, and he was pacing back and forth across the yard, foaming at the mouth. So I got the rifle down. He saw me with it, and he jumped toward the window.”
Elliot stared at the window. “He must have known you were trying to kill him.”
“I’m so sorry, Elliot,” Ellen cried. “I didn’t know what else to do. I would have died, locked in here, if he hadn’t killed me first. You said wolves could break into a house to get food, and he could break in here, too. And the cows! I tried to milk them. I didn’t want them to die. I tried to milk them, but I couldn’t.”
She would have babbled on indefinitely, but he stood up. “Stay here.” He stormed out of the house, taking the rifle with him.
Chapter 13
Knowing Elliot was nearby calmed Ellen, and she soon stopped crying. But she didn’t move from her place on the floor. She couldn’t induce her legs to function. Getting up would mean the danger had passed, and she still couldn’t convince herself of that.
She sat still, she didn’t know for how long. Still, she kept her ears trained on the sounds outside, but didn’t hear anything. She waited and waited. She just started to worry something might have happened to Elliot when she heard his footsteps coming back.
She stared at him with wild eyes. “What is it?”
Elliot didn’t answer. He hung up the rifle in its place above the door. When he came back over to her, he took her hand and stood her up. Then he conducted her to the table and seated her in a chair. He pulled another chair over and sat down next to her.
He enclosed her hand in both of his and patted it. “Now then. You’ve had a bad time of it. Just try to calm down a little bit, and we’ll get the fire going, and have some supper, and then we’ll go to bed. When we wake up in the morning, everything will be the way it was before I left.”
“But Laird….” she began.
He closed his eyes and shook his head. “Never mind about that. Don’t think anything else about it.”
“But the cows….” she began again.
Elliot answered her again with a simple shake of his head. “They’re just fine. They were very full, but I milked them out, and they’ll be fine. We’ll milk them again in the morning, and then they’ll be just fine. You don’t have to worry about them.”
“But they were crying so terribly!” she exclaimed. “They sounded like they were dying.”
Elliot chuckled. “They can sure put on an act when they want to. No, they’re just fine. They might have a little fall in production for a couple of days on account of not being milked, but they’ll come around with no problem. You wait and see.”
“But Laird,” Ellen repeated. “What made him go mad like that? He tried to kill me.”
Elliot sighed and peered into her eyes. “I didn’t want to tell you this, because it will just make you upset. But you won’t let it go until you know, so here goes. Laird didn’t try to kill you. He only tried to keep you in the house. He scared you to make you get into the house quickly, and he kept you scared to keep you in the house.”
“But why?” Ellen asked.
Elliot sighed again. “Darling, there are a lot of things out here in the wilderness that you don’t understand. Laird did understand them. He knew I wanted him to protect you, and he did. There are the tracks of wolves all through those trees out there. A pack of wolves surrounded the house. They would have attacked you and torn you to pieces if Laird hadn’t protected you.”
“What?” Ellen cried. “Wolves?”
“A whole pack,” Elliot repeated. “They ranged all around the house. They were probably just waiting for Laird to lower his guard for an instant before they rushed in and killed you. Laird saved your life.”
Ellen stared toward the window, and the tears started down her cheeks. “But…but….he bit me. He attacked me. He tried to kill me.” She broke down in sobs again.
Elliot slid off his chair onto his knees. “Don’t cry, darling.” He took her in his arms. “Don’t cry. You did what you had to do. You did what anyone would have done in the same situation. If I didn’t know Laird, I would have done exactly the same thing. You have the cut on your leg to prove it.”
Ellen tried to respond, but only more choking sobs came out. How could she ever explain?
Elliot petted the side of her head, and she buried her face in his neck. “Don’t cry, love. It’s all right. You did just fine. You stood up to him, and when you couldn’t do anything else, you shot him. You did good, darling. You did good.”
But how can I ever make it up to you? she thought.
But she didn’t have to say anything, because he already knew. He patted her on the back and held her while she cried. The pain in her leg, the pain in her hands from firing the gun, and the pain of thinking she’d let Elliot down descended on her in one devastating blow.
She sobbed and wailed and wept, and he held her, stroking the back of her head and down her spine, patting her and telling her it was all right now, that she’d done the right thing. But she couldn’t believe it herself. She only grieved for Laird, and for herself for not knowing him better before she had to depend on him for her life.
Outside, the sun crept low toward the horizon, and still Elliot held her, making no effort to rush her back to work. When Ellen sat up, her face remained a mask of wretched pain that would never heal. The world was a brutal, intolerable place, where things like this could happen. She never wanted to recover from this. She would mourn for the rest of her life for herself and for Elliot and for Laird and for all the things they had lost.
Elliot leaned back and examined her face. He brushed the stray hair back from her face.
“I’m sorry.” Ellen couldn’t think of anything else to say. “Your dog is dead.”
Elliot stood up and raised her to her feet. “It doesn’t matter. You’re here now.”
The End
Copyright
© 2014 by Lily Wilspur
All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be copied, reproduced in any format, by any means, electronic or otherwise, without prior consent from the copyright owner and publisher of this book.
This is a work of fiction. All characters, names, places and events are the product of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously.
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