Pierre was prepared by the time he heard Blanche's soft paw steps.
"Will you tell me now?" she asked.
"I have promised. First, let me explain why I am called a gargoyle. Once, long ago, lived a fire dragon named Gargouille who lived in the countryside near Paris. He did no more than a dragon will, carrying off the occasional sheep or calf. Dragons get hungry, you know, but the humans called him a terrorist. The Bishop of Rouen, St. Romaine, burned Gargouille. His head and throat were so accustomed to high temperatures that instead of turning to ash, they turned to stone. To show the people they were in no more danger, St. Romaine attached the dragon's head to the church. That began a very bad practice, from my point of view."
"I can see that," Blanche said. "Were you, too, once a flesh-and-blood creature?"
Pierre sighed. "I remember blood coursing through me as I flew over the treetops of my forest home. It was far south of here, near great mountains. For many years I lived there, safe and happy. Then I was tempted with the promise of an elevated position and brought to this cathedral, where I was attached to this perch."
"You weren't burned?" Blanche asked.
"It wasn't necessary. The tendency to turn into stone affects individuals within many species. Those with that affliction are taught to avoid dressed stone from childhood. The transformation doesn't occur with uncarved stone. I could land on a rock, but no gargoyle dares perch on a stone house or any structure where the stone has been altered by human hands.
Blanche slowly backed away. "Does that mean I could turn to stone?"
"I pray not, dear cat, but be careful about touching the walls."
Her eyes darted around. "Then every one of these gargoyles was captured?"
"The ones who serve as water spouts, yes. Those who lack that feature are named grotesques, and humans carved them, breathing into them what little life they possess."
*
Blanche came every evening and told him about her day: catching mice, drinking milk and enjoying the attention of the nuns. "It's a better life than I ever thought I'd have. I was born in an alley, and my mother and litter mates were killed."
Dragon's heart, which had been as stony as the rest of him, began to pulse faintly with sympathy. "That is tragic," he said.
"It was surely tragic for them, and for that I'm very sorry," Blanche said. "For me, the story had a happy ending, though. A priest was walking by the alley and heard me crying. He picked me up-even though I was quite dirty-and brought me here. I was weak and sick, and the nuns nursed me until I was strong enough to come outside. They have been very kind, and they say I'm a tenderness in their lives."
Pierre's throat turned soft as his heart, and his eyes stung. That was exactly what Blanche was: a tenderness.
*
She awakened his own tenderness. He stopped resenting the freedom enjoyed by the swallows and swifts and learned to enjoy their swooping flight and the beauty of their dark gracefulness against the magenta sky. Pierre became more tolerant of the jabbering of the other gargoyles and grotesques. It was only their way of expressing whatever aliveness they possessed.
He began to feel lighter, and sometimes he dreamed of flight. His stone wings itched with the desire to feel air massage their feathers, and his cold heart began to warm with longing. When he woke up, his wings ached as if they'd flapped for many hours. He welcomed the pain. He was coming alive.
*
Night after night, the small cat visited the gargoyle and told him about darting through the garden, catching mice, drinking cream, and being stroked by the nuns. She was a fine storyteller, and through her descriptions, Pierre could imagine the sensation of springy grass beneath one's paws, the feather-soft flight of butterflies, the smoothness of living hands touching her fur.
One day Blanche said, "You are sad, but why? Your work is important. The nuns say that you gargoyles are here to protect those inside the cathedral from evil."
"No one ever told me that."
"And they also say that sometimes gargoyles become free at night to fly around a village or town, protecting the vulnerable and the innocent."
"I've heard that rumor, but I've found no evidence of it. If I could fly, I would gladly protect those in need."
*
A few nights later Blanche came into the courtyard, looking troubled. "What's wrong?" Pierre asked.
"I have heard stories of cats being murdered. If you could fly, you might drive away the murderers."
The gargoyle tried to lift a wing, but it stuck stubbornly to his side.
Yet he wondered. If only it were possible. Each day he tried to move his wings, and sometimes he convinced himself that he'd lifted them, if only a centimeter or two, but still he remained stuck on the ledge.
By the time the day called Easter arrived, he was in a state of seething anger. He watched the throngs of people entering the great cathedral. The sound of high-heeled shoes ringing against the ancient cobblestones and the deep tolling of the bells echoed in the darkness of the gargoyle's imprisoned being.
Long after, when the last swift had ceased to dart through the lavender sky, he wondered where Blanche was. Anxiety stirred in the center of his stone chest. He thought he heard a faint cry. Without thinking, he began to struggle, but the heartless stone refused to release him.
"She's in trouble. I have to get to her. Blanche!"
She staggered into the courtyard, panting, blood pouring from a wound in her side. Three boys followed her, their shoes clattering against the cobblestones. They had rocks in their hands. The gargoyle's rage boiled over, and he felt his attachment to the stone of the ledge weaken. He flapped his wings with fury; sinews and muscles strained. He burst free of his prison.
"Blanche!" he shrieked. He stooped and clawed the face of one boy, while his wings flapped in the faces of the others. Screaming, they fled the courtyard. He flew after them a short distance to make sure they didn't change their minds. Then he landed by the cat.
"Can you rise? What can I do to help?"
"You can do nothing, my dear friend. Something inside me is broken. I am dying. I can hardly see your face. How strange and sad that this is the first time we've ever been so close."
Pierre's throat closed. "It is more strange and sad that your mortal injury resulted in my freedom, that the blood leaving your body caused my own to surge. How strongly my heart beats, but I fear it is breaking."
A shudder rippled her bloody fur. "And mine. How sorry I am to leave you."
Sorrow flooded Pierre. How lonely his nights would be without Blanche. Perhaps there was an answer.
"Would you choose to live forever instead?"
"But you hate it."
"It was boring and lonely until you came along."
Blanche hesitated. "The nuns speak of a place called Heaven where humans go after they die, but I don't know if it's for cats. I would rather be with you."
Pierre held the cat in his arms, flapped his wings, and landed on his pedestal. He began to slowly turn back into stone and felt the cat's body do the same.
"The view is very fine, here," Blanche said sleepily, "much as I have imagined Heaven. Will I be here forever?"
"For all eternity. But at night, we shall fly."
*
And so they do, circling the white dome of Sacre Coeur, cruising over the huge park called Bois de Boulogne, and flying above the Luxembourg Gardens. Whenever they find the innocent and vulnerable being attacked, they swoop down to scare off the attackers.
At dawn they return to Notre Dame. If you were to go there, on the southwest side you might see a gargoyle with large ears and a dragon's head. In his paws rests a small cat of stone.
The Language of Stones
In a time not long ago and a place not far away lived a young man who wanted to be famous. He didn't long for wealth or the notoriety of fame. Rather, he wanted to be remembered for having made a unique contribution to human wisdom, for having opened a door that had been locked, for shining a light
where there had been only darkness.
Had he been born into an earlier time, he might have set forth on an expedition to discover new lands. Had he been of a scientific bent, he might have searched for a cure for some fatal disease. If he had been an artist, he would have broken every rule in a quest to create the ultimate masterpiece. He was none of these, though, and it seemed to him that every discovery had already been made, for any path he considered was well trodden with the footprints of earlier pilgrims.
He muddled along in a state of unhappiness and indecisiveness until an uncle left him a large legacy. After pondering how best to change his life, he said, "I will go into the world and see if it has any undiscovered corners." He quit his job, left his home, and sold all that he possessed. Limiting himself to a few changes of clothing, stout walking boots, a knapsack and sleeping bag, he set forth on a journey into the unknown, his only map the urgent need to find a way of life with purpose.
In his travels he kept to quiet country roads, rarely seeing another human being, sleeping at night in the silence of the woods. Though he walked through a world of great natural beauty, he paid no attention to sun-dappled roads, morning birdsong, or the scented flesh of flowers. His senses strained beyond the visible for a sign, a direction.
One day, while sitting in a field enjoying one of the infrequent rests he allowed himself, he happened to notice the variety of stones which surrounded him: slabs of red sandstone, glittering chunks of quartz-embedded rocks, and bits of gravel. He wondered briefly about their stillness and their ability, unless shifted by earthquake, landslide, or flood, to stay in one place. He picked up some smooth pebbles and rubbed them. They lacked arms, legs, eyes, and ears. They didn't eat or reproduce. Their only purpose seemed to be to provide a foundation without which all living things would be spinning in space.
Stones, he reflected, had been around since the beginning of time. Imagine what they'd seen, and what stories they might tell if they could speak.
He jumped up. "If they could speak! That's it!" The idea exploded within him. He would teach the stones to speak.
He began at once to search for the first likely candidate. He quickly discarded the smooth stones and those blanketed with moss, sensing in them an innate stupidity. He hesitated over the specimens that glittered in the sunlight but rejected their seeming intelligence as superficial. As he wandered through the field, he found himself drawn to the more rugged stones, those whose cracks and fissures and jagged edges spoke of vast experience with the rigors of long life. He examined them all day, forgetting to eat, forgetting to rest, until at twilight he found a particularly austere stone whose surface had a crease that resembled a mouth.
The man made this stone his student. Day after day, from sunrise until long after the sun set, he sat before the stone and taught it.
He saw little point in teaching it the alphabet, since his ambitions didn't extend to educating stones to become readers. Instead, he recited simple phrases and sentences, alternating them with short speeches so that the stone might develop a feel for language.
It was now that he began to faintly regret the single-minded nature of his life and education, for he knew little poetry and few songs, and sometimes he imagined that the stone's mouth yawned with boredom when he recited the many facts he remembered. He wished that he knew even a few jokes. He would have liked to have seen the stone smile.
Before many days had passed, he realized that this would not be a quick undertaking. Far from being discouraged, he decided that a lengthy time span would only make his quest more worthy. He begrudged the hours needed to go into the nearest town for provisions and paid little attention to its inhabitants, who, amongst themselves, called him "the hermit lunatic." From time to time, one of them went out to the field he'd made his home and came back to report that the lunatic talked to himself constantly.
Months passed. Scarlet leaves replaced green, but his only acknowledgment of the changing seasons was to build a lean-to of brush and some of the stupid stones and to scrape snow away from his stone's still-silent mouth. The man had moments of doubt. He wondered whether there weren't some easier way to become famous. He wished on occasion that he'd been born a more mediocre person.
*
Several years passed, and one morning the man woke up with bones that creaked out a tune of failure.
He walked over to the stone, and barely resisted the temptation to kick it. "I wasted the best years of my life on you," he said. He laid his head on the stone's broad surface, and cried until he fell asleep.
He woke up, and thought, "I have failed." He waited for the expected pain, but there was none. "I have failed," he said aloud and felt only an unfamiliar sense of peace.
Then he heard the song of birds and felt a strange swelling in his heart. The sight of a small rabbit scampering through the field brought a curious wetness to his eyes.
The man sat in unaccustomed inactivity, his starved senses gorging on the world around him. Night came, and he still sat by the stone. Moonbeams and starbeams slid down the sky to dance around him, and his peace deepened.
"You see?"
He looked around for the speaker of those words, but there was no one in sight.
"It's me," the voice repeated, and now he recognized its deep, gravelly tones, though he'd never heard them before. Serenity and peace were forgotten; his heart quickened in anticipation of immortality.
"Stone, stone, you've finally learned to speak."
"No," said the stone in a voice as old as time. "You have finally learned to listen."
His peace shattered as a sledgehammer shatters a stone. "Do you mean that all these years I've wasted my time?"
"Do not speak to a stone of waste. Do not speak to a stone of time."
Understanding, like a slow-falling beam of moonlight, began to fill the man, but there were no words for what he knew, only the harmony of frogs and crickets singing.
And the stone laughed.
Tarasque
This story is based on a legend that has many variations. The Tarasque was a dragon or giant sea serpent that ravaged the countryside surrounding Nerluc in the South of France. Saint Martha tamed the creature with hymns and prayer and led it back to the city, but the terrified citizens attacked and killed it. Martha preached to them and converted many to Christianity. They became sorry for killing the Tarasque and changed the town's name to Tarascon.
In my version the story begins in the Camargue, an area of salt marshes, south of Arles, on the Mediterranean.
Tarasque lay on her back on the beach and rolled gently to feel the friction of sand against her scales. Above her, clouds, white as the horses grazing in the nearby marsh, streaked through a pale blue sky.
A flock of pink flamingos clustered in shallow water, sucking it through their bills for the plankton they loved. Soon, Tarasque and her parents would glide through the waves, seeking tasty seaweed and crabs. The thought made her hungry, but the warmth of the sun as it kissed water and sand and the whisper of the salty breeze were food enough for body and spirit.
She fell asleep and dreamt of the black bulls in the marsh, their hooves pounding against the earth as they ran for the joy of movement. Joy. Comfort. Contentment. Tarasque sighed in her sleep.
Thudding sounds jarred the baby dragon out of her dream and into a nightmare. She blinked to see her parents running as quickly as their bulky bodies allowed. Steam poured from their nostrils and mouths, and emerald eyes blazed with terror. The flamingos squawked frantically and rose from the water in a fluttering pink panic.
"Tarasque! Hide in our cave. Humans come!"
She wobbled, half running, half flying, to the cave. Her mother led her to the back and covered her with seaweed.
"Don't move until we return. And not a sound." She bent down to kiss the small dragon and hurried out.
Humans. Tarasque heard them stumble through the marsh like baby animals learning how to run. Their high-pitched shrieks suggested that they were small and young
.
The shrieks were followed by a sound like the ominous whine of sea wasps when their nests were disturbed. Her father screamed, and Tarasque shivered with his pain. A heavy thud shook the earth.
Another waspish whine cut off Tarasque's mother's roar of rage, and the ground shook again. The strange animals shouted, "Hurrah! The killer dragons are dead! The Lord has rewarded our righteousness."
They began singing, their voices terrible and tuneless, to this Lord animal who liked to see dead dragons and orphans. Tarasque burrowed into the seaweed and wept, her mouth hurting with the memory of her mother's last kiss.
Much later, when moonlight silvered the sand, she crept out of the cave. Her parents' bodies lay motionless on the shore in pools of green blood. Dead. She flung herself on her mother's body and slept there until morning, when hoof beats and a soft whinnying awoke her.
"Tarasque, if I could weep I would." The leader of the horse herd stood above her. "We were at the far end of the swamp and heard nothing. And the bulls are gouging holes into the earth in their rage at failing to prevent this tragedy. Together, we might have saved your parents."
The dragon wasn't too young to know that might have provided neither food, shelter, nor love. "What will I do? I'm so small."
"You're not too small to feed yourself, at least. We'll all do our best to comfort you. Flamingos, come here."
The pink forms approached.
"You must talk to Tarasque, groom her, let her move among you, and sleep against one of your bodies at night. Though your shapes are different, you can teach her how to fly well.
"And when you grow up, Tarasque, you must find other dragons, for no animals not of your species, however caring, can replace that need."
So the years and decades passed. New horses and flamingos replaced those who died, and all befriended the lonely dragon. She was grateful for their affection, but the wound that her parents' murder had gouged into her heart would not heal. It festered, poisoned by her hatred for the humans who had killed them and the Lord who had urged them to commit murder.
Cats in Command and Other Stories Page 3