Goose Chase

by Patrice Kindl

  The tower was much taller than any of the surrounding trees. I felt as if I were looking down from the crow's nest on top of the mast of a ship out at sea. Far, far below was a foaming, tossing green ocean of leaves. And that was all. O, off on the eastern horizon lay some great white objects, but I couldn't tell whether they were clouds or mountains, and in truth it made no odds either way as they were much too far off to signify.

  Ah, 'twas a fine, ferly thing, being all alone in that high lonely place! My life in the tower was so full of other people. Even when they were not chattering or boasting or laughing or quarreling, they were yet there all the time, breathing, thinking, watching. Standing here high over their heads, with naught but blue sky above and green leaves below, I got a queer, hollow feeling inside, as though I were filled right up to the very topmost tip of my head with air and sunlight and silence. A sensation both sad and solitary, and yet it did please me greatly.

  Still, from a practical point of view the view was rather depressing. There was no sign of a road or a city or even my little village, which I knew was only a few leagues off. If I were to escape the tower it would mean simply wandering off haphazardly into a wilderness.

  Then I heard the rush of wings. Something big and white was coming at me through the air, fast. That Cook, I thought foolishly, flapping up here with her winged headgear. She's come to fling me off the tower onto the rocks below so that she need never curtsy to a Goose Girl Queen.

  But no, 'twas not a Cook, 'twas a Goose. Twas one of my Geese. In truth, 'twas Alberta. She circled the tower once and then landed.

  "Alberta!" I flung my arms around her and squeezed her for all I was worth. "You are not dead! You are not gobbled up by wolves!"

  She bit me.

  I slapped her back and she honked despairingly.

  "By my vertu, Alberta, that hurt. I was merely welcoming you. You might act a bit gladder to see me."

  She paid no attention but lifted her head up to look past me at the sky.

  "Don't think you're going to fly off again and leave me," I began, becoming thoroughly enraged, "because you're not."

  "Honk, honk, honnnk!"

  The air around me was filled with great white wings like sails, churning up winds that lifted the skirts of my gown and almost blew away my gold and ruby crown.

  "You're here! You're all here!"

  Eleven white Geese circled the tower

  "Ernestina, Lydia-the-Loud, Penelope!" Each goose landed as I called her name and began to preen herself irritably with her bill. "Selena, Simple Sophia, Beatrice-the-Brave, and Dorothea!" Overcome with excitement, I shouted out the last four, "Eugenia, Cassandra Big Foot, Ursula, and my own Little Echo!"

  Little Echo landed with a resounding thump (she was never very graceful, Little Echo), and all twelve Geese swiveled their long necks to stare at me. They hissed in unison as though trying to shush me and fixed me with twenty-four accusing little black eyes.

  "O, don't be so silly," I said, tossing my head so that my crown slid down over one ear. "They couldn't hear me up here if I shot off a cannon." I leaned over the low parapet cautiously. "Look at them, rattling away like so many windmills."

  To my amusement, they behaved as though they understood me. The twelve bustled over to peer down at the tiny people far below. As though by magic the worries and tensions of many months lifted off my shoulders and I began to laugh. 'Twas as good as a feast to see and hear them about me again, and they looked so ridiculous, craning their necks anxiously over the parapet in a perfect line! Indeed, 'twas all I could do not to tumble off the tower with laughing. The tower seemed less lonely and my situation less desperate, now that my Geese had returned to me.

  As though at a signal, they suddenly rose up into the air. I shrieked in anger and disappointment and cried, "No! Halt! To me! Come back to me, my Geese!" but they paid me no heed.

  They circled the tower, once, twice, ever lower with each circuit. To my alarm, I saw riders on horseback enter the clearing. The King and the Prince were drawing near, each hung about with every conceivable weapon that might slay a Goose.

  "No," I breathed, "No!" My Geese were flying straight into the crowd of servants at the foot of the tower.

  Heads lifted. I saw startled white faces turned up toward my Geese. Ernestina was in the lead and aimed, I now realized, straight at the clothesline where the week's laundry fluttered and snapped in the breeze. She gripped a corner of a fine fat featherbed in her bill and kept going. Alberta, right behind her, snatched up another corner of the featherbed. Lydia-the-Loud and Penelope took the remaining two corners and the four of them whipped it right off the line. Behind them, four more Geese scooped up another featherbed and the last four yet a third.

  What in ten kingdoms did they think they were doing? Of what possible use is a featherbed to a Goose?

  Up they flew again, proudly bearing their booty to the top of the tower, to me. Ernestina's group sailed down to the tower roof and laid a featherbed out flat before me like a carpet. The others continued to circle over my head with their stolen bedding, watching me, waiting.

  The four Geese on the tower stared at me very hard.

  "What? What do you want?" I asked, beginning to feel a bit oppressed by their collective stares.

  The four glanced at one another and then, as one Goose, advanced upon me, staring all the while with their button-bright, round black eyes.

  "Hi there!" I yelped. "Stop that. Bad girls!"

  The Geese in the air now landed on the rooftop. They dropped their linens and likewise advanced on me.

  "Stop that at once!" I commanded, standing my ground.

  All twelve Geese began to hiss like a cauldronful of vipers; their eyes were pinched down and mean.

  "What is the matter with you?" I demanded.

  Dorothea (I think 'twas Dorothea, but since she approached from the rear I was never sure) bit me very hard indeed on the posterior. Clapping a hand to the injured portion of my anatomy, I staggered forward a few paces onto the featherbed.

  "You are very, very bad birds," I shrieked in outrage. "How dare—"

  The Geese scattered. At least, most of them did. Alberta, Ernestine, Penelope, and Lydia-the-Loud returned to their former positions at the corners of the featherbed and rose up into the air, their wings beating, the corners of the featherbed gripped in their bills. I was tipped unceremoniously off my feet and landed with a thump on my poor damaged behind.

  "Ow! You shall suffer for this, you rotten—"

  Something huge and white blotted out the sky. It was another featherbed, dropped over me by Selena, Simple Sophia, Beatrice-the-Brave, and Ursula. Then, ploof! Down came the third featherbed on top of that.

  "Ptah, ptah, ptah!" My mouth was filled with featherbed and I could not even begin to express my fury. I struggled helplessly as the featherbed lurched and swayed under me, then flattened and tightened.

  I clawed the suffocating folds of linen off my head and roared, "You cannot intimidate ME, I can tell you that, you—"

  We were no longer on the tower, but aloft, flying on steady wing beats through the air. Six Geese flew to the left of me, six Geese to the right, and each Goose held a bit of fine featherbed fast tight in her bill.

  I was being rescued from the tower. And rescued, furthermore, without my having to so much as lift a finger. In short, any further criticism on my part would be a gross discourtesy and entirely uncalled for.

  I closed my lips on threats and lamentations and said no more.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  In Flight

  GOOSEY, GOOSEY GANDER,

  WHITHER DO YOU WANDER?

  —NURSERY RHYME

  An arrow flew past my nose. The sunlight caught and gilded it as it crested and began its earthbound journey. I reached out my hand and took it from the air. There seemed to be all the time in the world to do this, but in truth my hand must have moved swiftly. I caught the arrow just as it pierced Little Echo's left wing. She faltered a moment and then bea
t on.

  "Little Echo!" I cried, withdrawing the arrow. "Are you injured?"

  She didn't look at me but went on flying steadily. Yet on the upbeat I could see a spreading stain of scarlet on her left shoulder, the one closest to me. Several more arrows sped past, but none found a mark.

  "Stop!" I commanded. The Geese exchanged glances, rolled their eyes heavenward, and went on, ignoring me.

  "O, very well," I said, a little embarrassed. "I suppose you cannot actually stop in the middle of the air. But Little Echo must have her wing bound."

  I cautiously inched my way over to the edge of the featherbed. Looking down as best I could through goose bodies, I saw with relief that we were out of range of any more arrows. The tower was already beginning to look small and toylike in the distance. My Geese, though larger and whiter than their wild cousins, must have been only a few generations removed from them, for they were strong flyers and bore me boldly onward. In spite of Little Echo's danger my heart lifted up and I rejoiced. I laughed aloud.

  "O my brave and clever ones!" I shouted into the wind. "We are away!"

  Then, when she was least expecting it, I threw an arm over Little Echo's back. She squawked in alarm, but I pulled her struggling, protesting body onto the cloth. The expressions of the other Geese grew a bit tense as they coped with all this tugging and jerking.

  "Now lie still, Little Echo!" I said sternly. "Are you not ashamed of yourself?"

  Mayhap she was ashamed, but if so, she hid it well. At any rate, she must have realized the futility of resistance, for at length she quieted down and lay there looking up at me apprehensively.

  "I must wash the blood off," I mused. "But how? I have no water here."

  Keeping a firm hand on Little Echo to prevent her escape, I took another peek over the edge of the featherbed. This was not easy, as one was quite likely to be smitten in the face by an uplifting Goose wing. What I did see did not look encouraging. We were flying over the King's country of Gilboa now and 'twas much more populous than my own country of Dorloo. I was looking for a solitary lake or pond at which we might land so that I might bathe Little Echo's wound. Each and every single source of water, from the largest to the smallest, seemed to have a cluster of human habitations ringing it.

  When we had flown some time without finding a safe place to land, I sat back up and thought. Where could I find water in the middle of the sky? Water, I reminded myself, comes from the sky in the shape of rain. I looked up. There were a quantity of low, puffy clouds above us, some not so very far away. I knew not what clouds might be made of, but did they contain water—why then, I meant to have some for Little Echo's shoulder.

  I leaned forward and tapped Ernestina on the back. Her eyes flicked toward me.

  "Go higher," I said loudly, gesturing in case she didn't understand me. "I wish to go up."

  I wriggled over to the other front corner of the featherbed, where Alberta labored, and repeated the request.

  "'Tis for Little Echo that I ask it," I explained, feeling a trifle foolish as I did so. I am not in the habit of explaining the whys and wherefores of my actions to a gaggle of Geese, but this was not my element. On earth I was the sovereign ruler of my household, but here in the upper air the Geese were at home and I was not. I might choose to issue commands which they might choose not to obey. And what I would do in that circumstance I knew not, to be quite candid with you.

  With powerful strokes of their wings, we began to rise. The other Geese grasped our change in direction and soon we were headed straight into a small dark cloud.

  Clouds are not what you might imagine them to be from seeing them on the ground. I used to think, ignorant girl as I was, that I should like a gown cut from a cloud. How fine and white and soft 'twould be! 1 no longer desire this. 'Twould not be decent, to speak truly. Why, a cloud does not seem to be anything but a great mass of mist or steam, and a girl dressed in a cloud gown might as well be walking about in her shift and naught else.

  However, there is water in a cloud. Upon my honor I do believe that clouds are nothing but water which for some reason has chosen to go very small and then wander aimlessly across the vault of heaven instead of raining down to earth as it ought, where it could be of some use.

  Within moments everything save the Geese had become thoroughly damp. The water rolled right off the Geese, as I had observed it to do during a rainstorm, but both I and the bedding were drenched.

  I was now glad to see that the bag containing my golden wedding gown had come along with us, as it also contained a little pair of silver scissors. I realized with regret that my Princess gown would have to be at least partially sacrificed to bind up Little Echo's injury. Tearing the featherbeds would mean losing their stuffing, and my golden gown seemed to be the wrong sort of material for making into bandages. I therefore cut my hem into several long strips.

  "What cannot be cured must be endured," I sighed. "'Twas ripped already, besides."

  I instructed my Geese to drop back down into the sunlight that we might dry off and warm up.

  Obediently, they dropped with such a lurch that my inner organs seemed like to fly right out through my lips. I did not offer any remark, however, but waited in silence until my gizzards reseated themselves. I would not have Ernestina and Alberta (ever the leaders of the flock) thinking that I had not the intestinal fortitude for this sort of travel.

  Little Echo's wound was not so dreadful as I had at first feared. My hand had robbed the arrow of the force to penetrate very far into the muscle, and it had missed the bone altogether.

  She lay still on my lap while I tended her. Often and often I had doctored the Geese in the past, and this one in particular was quite accustomed to my ministrations. Little Echo, for all her small size, was both a pest and a tease, fond of sneaking up on the others and stealing a choice tidbit from under their bills, or nipping them on the knees, or ducking them in the pond. She was well and truly bitten for her pains and several times had needed bandaging after some mischievous act.

  So accustomed was I to scolding her as I bound her up that now I found myself abusing her heedlessness from habit. Then I recollected that she was injured, not through some bit of nonsense in the duck pond or our own home meadow, but in the act of rescuing me from the lewd embraces of a kingly cutthroat or, in the Prince's case, an imperial ass. I bit my lip and abruptly fell silent.

  Once Little Echo was cleaned and bandaged I released her, the while keeping a wary eye on her. She was ever a wild little thing and, even though she had acted the part of a heroine today, I did not trust her.

  Now at last I was able to sit and look about me and take pleasure in the ride. What I saw, however, was little more than a great many pumping white wings. The featherbed sagged under my weight and Little Echo's and, when I was sitting erect, the wings of the Geese were at my eye level. Yet there was an intense blue dome of sky above, and after a time a crescent moon rose over the edge of the featherbed.

  The sky slowly darkened and the stars began to show, pale and lonely. I soon understood why my Geese had procured for me not only the featherbed which was my chariot, but two others. Twas cold here in the sky when once the sun was gone.

  Suddenly I thought to wonder where we were going.

  "Where," I inquired, "are we going?"

  None of the Geese responded. Even could they have spoken with a human voice, their bills were fully occupied with the featherbed.

  "Do you not grow tired?" I asked. "Would you not like to rest for a time?"

  In truth, I myself was becoming a bit bored. And hungry. Nor was I accustomed to sitting in one position for such a time. How I longed to stand up and stretch my limbs!

  "We shall have to stop somewhere for the night," I argued, as the birds flew steadily on. I knew that although wild geese sometimes fly at night during long migrations, my own domestic birds never did. And never had they flown such a distance before, let alone with the burden of Little Echo and myself.

  "I pray you," I adde
d, as my left leg suddenly cramped.

  However, my request was ignored. We sailed silently on through the velvet-black sky. I pulled the featherbeds closer about myself, shivering, and rubbed my calf ruefully. I would not ask again.

  It came into my mind that we had lost height, and I did not think that it was because we were landing, but rather because they had not the strength to keep us up so high so long. There was desperation now in their weary wing beats.

  Whither did we wander in the night sky, and why?

  I struggled to keep my eyes open. The labor of this flight was none of mine, yet I would not be carried like a helpless child, nor yet like some bundle of goods going to market. Though I could do naught to aid us in our journey, I sat up very straight and pinched my arm until the diamonds trickled down my cheeks. Little Echo, less proud, slept at my knee.

  The land below us was dark and without feature now, but the scent of earth and leaf informed me that we traveled ever closer to the treetops. Would these demented fowls persevere, steadily sinking into calamity? Would the dawn's first light discover our mangled bodies, all to-brosten in a poor, pitiable pile at the roots of some mighty oak tree?

  No sooner had these queries formed in my brain than the featherbed dropped like a rock. In certes, I would not be kept in suspense for much longer.

  "Alas!" I cried. "My doom is come upon me!"

  Thump! Thumpathumpa thump!

  Trees, tall grasses, and several large boulders hurtled by.

  "O woe! O! O! OW!"

  We had landed.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  The Cottage in the Wood

  TWO HEADS ARE BETTER THAN ONE.

  —JOHN HEYWOOD, PROVERBS

  The house in the clearing where we had landed might have been our very own, had we returned to it after ten weary years of exile. The winter winds and snows had gripped it hard and twisted it out of true. The door had fallen in and the thatched roof showed great dark gaps where the spring rains had penetrated for many a year.