The Audacity of Goats

by J. F. Riordan

  The new-fallen snow had obliterated his footprints from the weeks before, but the path he had broken was clearly discernable. There were deer and turkey paths, too, which crossed his route, and they had already seen some use today. It was not cold for a Door County spring, only in the twenties, and Ben felt hot inside his down parka. He pushed the hood off so he could feel the air, and hear what was going on around him.

  A woodpecker was busy in the tops of the trees, and a red squirrel chucked angrily from somewhere nearby—probably at Ben. He stopped and slowly turned in a circle, looking up. The woods were filled with movement. A slow wind circled overhead. Snow fell from trees, birds and squirrels chirped and pecked, and Ben listened to see if he could discern the short snorting breath of deer anywhere nearby. They had been studying Wisconsin history in school, and he had read of the tracking skills of the Potawatomi, the Ho-Chunk, and the Menominee Indians. He was trying to teach himself to pay attention to the little things in the woods as the Indians were said to have done. He wished he knew an Indian who could teach him. His father had told him that he had a friend who was Potawatomi. Maybe he would know. Ben made a mental note to ask.

  It was as he was standing still in the woods, teaching himself to observe, that Ben heard a sound he had never heard before. It was a cry of terror that chilled him to the core of his soul, and that continued, with rising panic, resonating even in the snow-deadened air. Without pausing to think, Ben turned and ran toward the sound, down the rough, snow-covered pine path, past the ravine where the creek ran, and over the short, rocky bluff, down the rocks toward the lake.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Running, Ben followed the sound to the beach. The water seemed to be ice-covered, but the weather had been fluctuating between winter and spring, and Ben knew that the appearance of solidity was potentially deadly. There were mounds of ice thrown up against the beach like sand dunes, and black pools of open water surrounded by deadly ice—either thick or thin, no one knew until he was under. Some of the pools were springs feeding into the lake; the weakest ice, and the most dangerous.

  The sound was coming from there.

  Suddenly Ben knew that voice. He knew that it was perilous to go out by himself. He also knew that if he did not, the sound would subside forever beneath the water.

  Ben knew his father’s stern principle: “You don’t sacrifice your life for an animal.” But he did not heed. He could not. This animal was afraid, and it trusted him. He owed something to that trust, and if he betrayed it, he would be diminished under Heaven.

  He opened his back pack and grabbed the rope he still carried, and scanned the beach for a slim, long log, which he found quickly. Speaking to the animal in the best combination he could manage of volume and comfort, he readied himself. He put the rope around his waist, and fastened it to a birch tree, which was the closest he could find to the water. His rope was not long, and it did not reach. Impatiently he ripped it away from himself and ran toward the water dragging his log.

  With a steady hand, he pushed the log out, in as solid a fashion as he could, and slid out on his belly along the log. The frantic animal was kicking with its feet, and Ben feared that he would be injured by the flailing limbs. To his relief, the animal recognized him and when Ben put his two arms out to grasp its front feet, it stopped struggling and allowed him to pull it toward him. With all his strength Ben grasped and pulled, until, at last, the soaking, shivering creature lay panting next to him on the ice.

  Soaking wet himself, and shaking, Ben threw his coat over the creature, and then his own sweatshirt. He spoke soothingly and gently pulled it in safety to the rocky beach. It was injured, he thought. Its rear leg.

  It was after five o’clock, and Nika was worried. His habits had been shifting over the past few months, but Ben was always home before now, so long after dark on a cold afternoon. If nothing else, his ten-year-old appetite drove him home in time for supper. She knew that the spring snow would have drawn him to his favorite trails. But what could he see at this hour? And which trails had he chosen? With an outward calm she did not feel, she stood at the kitchen window in the last light, scanning the field from which Ben usually emerged, hoping to see his red jacket popping out against the snow. There was no sign of him.

  It was too early to panic, or to ask for help, but something told her that things were not as they should be. Ben had never been late like this. Never. Something wasn’t right.

  As she scribbled a note and pulled on her down parka, their yellow lab, Sugar, eagerly rose from her place by the fire and stood by the door wagging her tail. Nika looked at the dog for a moment, hesitating, and then made her decision. “Do you want to come, Sugar? Do you want to come find Ben?” Sugar ran to the door and stood looking back at Nika and wagging her tail.

  The dog would be company, and a comfort in her anxiety.

  “Come on, then,” said Nika. She zipped her cell phone carefully into an inner pocket, and opened the door to let the dog precede her. Taking a deep breath, she closed the door on the warm kitchen and headed out toward the woods.

  Nika hadn’t gone far when Sugar began to bark excitedly. Joyously, the dog ran ahead on the darkened path in the woods. Relief flooding through her, Nika followed as fast as she could, burdened with boots and nearly a foot of snow. Coming toward her, she could see the outline of her son in the dusk.

  “Ben!” she shouted. “Ben! Are you all right?”

  “Mom!” His voice sounded tearful and frightened. They met and she clutched him in her arms. His parka was missing, he was soaking wet and shivering violently, weeping with fear and relief.

  “Come on,” said Nika quickly. “Let’s get you home right now. Sugar! Come on, we’re going home.”

  She wished she could still carry him, but instead she stripped off the sodden shirt, pulled off her own parka, and stuffed him into it, zipping the collar up tight and pulling the hood over his face.

  “Now run, Ben. As fast as you can go. Get into the house. I’ll be right behind you.”

  “Mom,” he said, reluctantly.

  “Do as I say. NOW.”

  He ran raggedly the mile or so toward the house, Sugar leading the way. Nika followed clumsily, but swiftly, fueled by the adrenaline of fear and anger.

  Once they were safely in the house, Nika sent Ben to soak in a hot bath, and went to her own room to change her clothes. She was shaking now, too, not from cold, but from adrenaline withdrawal. Wrapping herself in her warmest bathrobe, she went to the dining room and poured herself a sliver of brandy. She stood at the window, looking out at the moonlit fields as she held her glass. She was, she thought to herself, a lucky—no—an extremely lucky woman.

  “Skal,” she whispered to herself, and drank it all down.

  Later that night, Nika and Pali lay in bed discussing Ben’s adventure. “He says he got too near the creek bed, and slipped when he wasn’t looking down.”

  Nika’s voice was calm now, but she could not retell the story without a quiver of fear running through her.

  “We don’t have any reason to doubt him,” said Pali. “He’s a good boy, and accidents like these help to shape a young man. It will teach him that bad things can happen, and you have to be careful.” Pali had a father’s skill for remote analysis.

  Nika nodded in the darkness.

  “I was so scared, Ver.” She rarely used his given name, calling him Pali, as everyone else did, except when she was being serious.

  Her husband rolled over and put his arms around her.

  “He’s safe now, Nika. That’s all that counts.”

  But Nika lay awake all night, running through the terrifying alternative scenarios over and over in her mind.

  In his own room, Ben too was sleepless, and for his own reasons. Ben had never lied to his parents; never even felt a need to. The fairy tales he had been fed like mother’s milk from the time he was very small had taught him the code of knights, and princes, shepherd boys, and honest miller’s sons: tell the truth; do
your duty; and be kind, because you never knew who was a fairy or elf in disguise. But when his mother, her face serious and sad, asked him to tell her where he had been and why he had disobeyed her rules about going near the water, Ben looked her in the eye, and without a moment of doubt or hesitation, had lied to her face.

  He could not explain to himself why he had done it. Not exactly. Except that he felt a protective instinct he could not ignore. His conscience hurt him, and he saw, in his mind’s eye, his mother’s sad face. It wasn’t that he had told the lie that hurt so much. It was that she had believed him.

  And now that he had told it once, he was going to have to tell it again, and again, and again.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Fiona was standing in the ruins of an old barn on a hillside with vistas across great expanses of rolling hills. The roof was gone, but the stone walls were still standing, and hanging along the walls was a collection of paintings by a great artist. She knew they were his, and yet she had never seen them before, and the style was a bold departure for him. She was gazing at them when suddenly she realized that the artist was standing beside her, and they were friends. Other people she knew vaguely were there too, and Pete. They wandered then, along the hills, and the group dispersed. It was sunset. She wanted to see the paintings again, when suddenly the artist appeared, inviting her to come to see some other paintings in a different place.

  “Let’s play!” he said, and suddenly he dropped to the ground and rolled down the hill and under a bush, and was leaping like an animal through the countryside toward, Fiona knew, another barn filled with his art. She followed him, leaping and rolling as he did, and Pete did, too. She realized then that the artist had become a fox, and they followed him gaily. All at once, there was an explosion and the sky filled with light. The artist fox pointed at the horizon. She knew that the fire was his paintings, and she stood, alone and unmoved, watching the red glow along the sky. She felt no fear of loss or remorse. She knew that the paintings would be unharmed.

  Fiona awoke to the silence of the house. It was pre-dawn, and one bird sang rather tentatively. There was a cool breeze through the open window, but it was warm under the covers, and she didn’t want to move. She lay listening to the bird as others joined him and light slowly crept along the edge of the sky. There was a change beginning in the birdsong. It was a difference in tone and quality, brought on by the addition of newly-migrated voices. Though cold, the breeze was sweet. Even after a heavy snowstorm, it almost seemed like spring.

  But it was far too early for spring on the island, where April—and even May—snowstorms were not uncommon, and spring was a long season of mud and disappointment. Today was instead a small offering of hope after the fast-melting snow; an indication that winter would not last forever, and that, whatever else might change, the turn of the seasons would go on despite the shifts in human purpose.

  Feeling this, but not as a conscious thought, Fiona urged herself from bed and padded barefoot down to the kitchen for some coffee. She was in a playful mood after her dream: relaxed and optimistic, until a sudden realization struck her with the thud of emotional force. Today was the election.

  Fiona spent the day in a state of mixed agitation and resignation. She had done all she could. She had gone beyond what she had thought she could. Now it was out of her hands. It was up to the voters—her friends, neighbors, and otherwise—to determine whether she would stay on the Island, or leave, humiliated.

  Even as she thought this, she questioned whether it were true. Supposing, for the moment, that she lost the election. Would she really allow herself to be driven from her home? Or would she stay and fight, only—she reminded herself—to meet an even more ignominious fate? Fiona thought through the specific and most likely ways that Stella could make her life a misery. It was a clear and vivid picture. She had to admit: there didn’t seem to be much hope.

  This mental turmoil began to take its toll, and late in the day, she had accomplished nothing except worry.

  She would not be alone for the night’s ordeal. Terry, his wife Anne, Mike, and his wife Ella were coming; and Elisabeth and Roger were arriving on the last ferry to offer moral support. The house was ready. She had already voted. There was no need to get to the town hall until the polls closed. Fiona still had hours of uncertainty left, and nothing to do.

  Resolutely turning her mind from her troubles, she put on her warm sheepskin jacket to cut the wind, and struck off for the fields.

  Fiona had chosen a different route from her usual one, hoping that the change would engage her mind a bit more. She walked, today, along the road, heading north through the interior of the Island. There was never much traffic to speak of, and here there were more open fields and sky to rest her soul. There was still snow piled along the sides of the roads, but it had melted on the fields, and they were a rich golden color, sharply contrasted against the blue of the sky.

  She had reached the western edge of the Martins’ place, and knowing she had their permission, she cut through toward the wooded trails she knew. She was looking down to avoid the worst of the mud when, to her surprise, she heard a voice.

  “Ms. Campbell! Ms. Campbell! Over here!”

  It was Nika and Pali’s boy, Ben. Nika had often spoken of his wanderings with a mixture of affection, pride, and worry, but Fiona had never encountered him on one of her walks before. She waved and obligingly shifted her path in his direction.

  Fiona couldn’t know that Ben saw her in this moment as the answer to his many hurried prayers. For months now, he had been longing for an adult to ask, to confide in, and now he realized, all at once, that she was the perfect person. Ms. Campbell would be sympathetic and she wouldn’t scold. He also knew instinctively that she wasn’t like the other adults he knew, even if he couldn’t exactly say why.

  He ran to meet her, and after a brief exchange of greetings they stood gazing at one another with nothing much to say.

  Ben looked up trustingly into Fiona’s eyes, and she could see in him his father’s steady warmth. Ben liked Fiona. He suddenly realized that one of the reasons she was different was that he could sense her respect for him, something few adults expressed toward a child.

  “I have a secret,” he said solemnly.

  Fiona studied his face. He was a remarkable boy, and he would probably grow up to be a perfect Island man: steady, reliable, kind, capable, and just a tiny bit mystical. She felt a twinge of envy for the life he would have, and of how much he had left of it.

  “Secrets are important things,” she said, seriously.

  “Would you come to see it?” His voice was insistent, and his eyes pleading.

  Fiona hesitated. What kind of adventure would she be committing to?

  It was getting late. The ferry would be arriving soon, and she didn’t have much time before she would be expected at the town hall. But the boy’s trust in her and his urgency made her know she had to say yes.

  She chose her words carefully. “I would. If you would like me to.”

  Without a pause, Ben began to trot off into the field. “We’d better hurry,” he called over his shoulder. “It will be dark soon.”

  And shivering a little, Fiona shoved her hands into the pockets of her sheepskin jacket and followed him, jogging a bit unsteadily on the rough ground, the boy’s figure only a shadow against the rutted yellow grass as the dusk came on.

  At the town hall, members of the community were already gathering to witness the vote counting. Most people felt they had done their duty when they voted and were content to wake up in the morning and wander over to Mann’s for the results. Those who showed up for the counting were the stalwarts and busy bodies, and possibly, thought Jake, people whose televisions weren’t working. Jake stole a glance over at Stella, who was glowering, alone in the corner.

  He shivered and whispered in Pali’s ear. “Snakes,” he said.

  “What?” asked Pali, startled. He had been lost in thought.

  “In her hair,” said
Jake. “Who was the witch who had snakes instead of hair?”

  In spite of himself, Pali laughed silently. He tilted his head toward Jake and whispered, still laughing.

  “Medusa,” he said. “She wasn’t a witch. She was a Gorgon. One look into her eyes turned men into stone.”

  “Close enough,” said Jake.

  Fiona followed Ben on a path that led along the northern edge of the island, on a rock bluff that was sometimes thirty feet and sometimes only three or four feet above the water. It was an old path, possibly even an ancient one, and occasionally there were the ruins of old log cabins, long abandoned. Fiona did not know this part of the island well. She was fairly certain that it was private land, but this was not a moment to worry about details. Ben seemed skittish, and she didn’t want to dissuade him from whatever he was embarked upon.

  There had been silence for most of their journey, with Ben leading the way, and Fiona behind. It wasn’t easy to hold a conversation this way, and Fiona was content with her own observations. She was worried about being late to the election festivities, but a part of her was relieved to be away from it all. This excursion with Ben felt like real life. The rest was just… she struggled for the right word and failed. But it was a waste of energy, whatever it was.

  “We’re almost there,” Ben called back over his shoulder, and he broke into a trot. After fifty yards, or so, he suddenly turned and disappeared off the path into a clump of brush.