The Second Book of the Dun Cow: Lamentations

by Walter Wangerin Jr.

  “Nor,” the Singer modulates his melody until it is a silken thread. “Nor is it too much to say that I love you.”

  He lies! Who can love a flaw in the handiwork of God? Least covers her face in the feathers of one blunt wing. Even in her disbelief she yearns to believe.

  “Come and love me in return. It isn’t loveliness I love. I love the heart deep within its plain brown dress.”

  Least murmurs, “Who are you?”

  “Come and I will ask nothing—except a kiss. What is a kiss? The pressure of your marvelous bill. Give it away, and you have lost nothing. Give it to me, and the touch alone will make my beloved lovely.”

  Spinster Bird. Drab and dull, poor spinster Bird, she releases herself to the song. She spreads her blunt wings and floats into the hole.

  “Ahhhh,” the Singer sings, “she comes.”

  Least descends to the stones that lie at the bottom of the defile, then enters a cleft from which the ardent heat arises. Least is beyond decisions. She is beyond thought. It is her soul that answers. Below the stones a tunnel opens. Least flies the tunnel, unafraid of the darkness that surrounds her now.

  The Singer sings a history of suffered injustices, of bitter and undeserved assaults, all of them borne courageously, sings of personal exile—and hasn’t she known exile too? She has. Least nearly bursts with pity and with solace for the one who woos her.

  The song lays down the trail before her. She plumbs the depths until the voice of the Singer is immediately before her and she can feel a presence as huge as a mountain underground. Least seems to be standing inside a cathedral hallway.

  The voice changes into many voices, a demanding hiss of a thousand voices. No, this isn’t lovely any more. It is not love.

  “And now,” the urgent chorus commands “the kiss!”

  The Plain Brown Bird is, in fact, inside the Serpent’s empty eye socket

  A loud, drum-booming rhythm lifts her, carries her to the thin bone at the back of the socket.

  “The Kiss!”

  Least is no longer in control. She lost autonomy when her heart insisted Follow.

  “Sum Wyrm sub terra,” the Serpent sighs. “Kiss me and set me free.”

  A great force swells behind her. It drives her like a spear through the thin bone at the back of Wyrm’s eye socket, drives her until her sharp bill plunges into the mud of his brain. Corruption and gore explode backward, sending the Plain Brown Bird out of the socket like a feather on a fountain. A hard gush of blood carries her up the long tunnel and all the way to the stones at the bottom of the earth-crack. And the blood, it sighs, “Thy kissing hath killed me. All is well.”

  Least’s feathers are soaked. Her throat burns. She coughs, wretches, then vomits and vomits. Her bones shiver. She wishes she were dead.

  When she tries to speak, the plain brown Bird discovers that she has lost her voice.

  One more calamity awaits her. In the weeks to come two Coyotes will begin to make a den on a shelf below the lip of the earth-crack. What will be left in Least to meet this new challenge? However will she be able to save them from the hell below?

  [Nine] In Which the Mr. and Mrs. Pertinax Cobbs Appear

  Chauntecleer had chosen a residence more elegant than the Animals could ever have imagined. Instead of a ceiling, the interior space of the Hemlock soared up to the apex of a king’s high tower.

  Outside and inside and sashaying round and round their grand spaces, the Hens elevated their beaks to the angles of hauteur. Oh, how they gussied about like ladies of a royal pedigree, and each chose for herself a roosting branch as accomodating as the beds of princesses.

  As far as the Mice were concerned, the great hall granted them a skedaddling land as wide as all outdoors. Then, when skedaddling gave way to the need for sizzle-snoring sleep, the good earth mothered them in a fine, small pocket for a nest.

  The Family Swarm of Honey Bees left the old hives and fashioned new ones in the crotches of the Hemlock’s sturdy limbs.

  The Black Ants then engineered ground tunnels and bins wherein to store the winter’s provisions.

  Sheep lay themselves down outside the rim of the mighty Hemlock.

  Somewhere in the tree’s interior a Squirrel had built his nest of twigs and leaves. He skittered down the trunk to watch this new action below, then skittered up the trunk to frown in gloomy mediations. He thought he’d run unseen. In fact, the Weasel had heard the Squirrel’s nails scratching bark, which got his back up. He told Chauntecleer that there was a bandit above them. Chauntecleer flew through the limbs of the Hemlock until he found the nest.

  “Who,” he said, “are you?”

  “Who,” the Squirrel answered, “are you?”

  “Chauntecleer, captain and commander.”

  “Chauntecleer, land-thief and plunderer. I was here first.”

  “And you can surely stay. There’s room enough here for herds and oxen, flocks and belly-crawlers.”

  “Me, I take up a whole tree. I need room!”

  “You!” the Rooster crowed, “won’t have a butt to sit on once I chew it to pulp. What is your name?”

  A Rooster is five times the size of a Squirrel. Grudgingly this Squirrel answered, “Ratotosk the Grey Squirrel.”

  And so it was that the Society of Animals felt themselves well settled and protected.

  Nation shall not lift up swords against nation,

  Neither shall they learn war any more.

  Pertinax the Ground Squirrel had not complained when a clutch of babbling Hens began to trample and scratch the soil above his burrow; had not complained when they busified the daylight with perpetual peckings and scratchings. Neither had he complained when Sheep of a noxious stink and squadrons of Insects bleated and buzzed and broke his sleep in his nest among the roots of the World-Tree which his family had inhabited for generations and generation past.

  But now he stood erect on the mound beside his doorway, watching with dismay the bustle of immigrants, and realizing that they planned to make their homes above his own.

  So sure was he of his not-complaining that he had freely, nay, fearlessly put the question to his wife.

  Down into his passages he went, and into the bedroom where Mrs. Cobb was weaving a pallet for their long nap. “Mrs. Cobb,” he said, “you decide. Am I complaining?”

  “Why, no, Mr. Cobb.”

  “Right!” he said, and straightway raced up a passage to the heap of his residue dirt, where he sat and held his narrow body erect, having been assured that he was indeed a tolerant Ground Squirrel and a not-minding-the-new-neighbors neighbor—though he did put a rather more severe twitch to his whiskers.

  Neither had Pertinax Cobb minded the proudful presence of that golden Rooster, nor the metronomic regularity of his crowing, for he valued schedules and disciplines. Besides, the tender mercies of the Bird’s midnight Matins always sent his wife into a puppyhood of peaceful dreamings.

  What Pertinax did mind, when all at once the winter had slammed the land, was that now he could not go to sleep!

  Pertinax the Ground Squirrel had been planning on that sleep. It was the tradition of Ground Squirrels everywhere to sink into a three-months’ slumber, which was their pleasant reward for the three months of their hard labor preparing for the frigid season. Indeed: before this migrant population arrived, Pertinax had dashed abroad, stuffing harvests into his cheek’s pouches until they bulged with prosperity, and then, back in his tunnels, pouring the foodstuffs into granaries. Moreover—before this ruck-ruckering ruckus—he had concentrated on the seeds that he and Mrs. Cobb loved the most: the winged seeds from the fallen cones of the Hemlock Tree.

  “Mrs. Cobb, Mrs. Cobb!”

  It was midnight. The Ground Squirrel poked his wife awake.

  “What is it, Mr. Cobb?”

  “Did you hear that?”

  “Hear what, Mr. Cobb?”

  “Did you feel that?”

  “Feel what, M
r. Cobb?”

  “I think the earth quaked.”

  “In fact,” Mrs. Cobb answered, “I dreamed of a bumping and a sprinkling of dust.”

  “There! That’s what I’m talking about.”

  “It wasn’t a dream?”

  “I don’t want to complain.”

  “You are a wonderful not-complainer.”

  “But I can’t sleep.”

  “Mr. Cobb, I am sorry for you.”

  “You sleep.”

  “That too. I am sorry for that too.”

  “I think some somebody just chopped off a limb of the tree.”

  “My, but that is very disconcerting.”

  “A limb, Mrs. Cobb. A very big limb—of the Hemlock!”

  “I don’t doubt it. Nobody puzzles puzzles better than you, Mr. Cobb.”

  “I am at the end of my rope. If they break our tree, what then? They break our world.”

  “Well, Mr. Cobb, I believe the time has come.”

  “The time has come indeed.”

  So Pertinax Cobb the Ground Squirrel betook himself to the door of his personal burrow, and hopped up onto his mound, and straightened his spine in order to complain from the highest of his height, and chittered furiously. If he couldn’t sleep, no one should sleep. If they disrespected the Hemlock, they must depart the Hemlock. One Creature—it was the Rooster, by the hearing of it—went flapping off into the night.

  But no one else stirred. Snozzle-snorings from the Mice’s pocket-pouch. Sleep-clucks from the branches, and antennae-tickings from countless Instects under the ground. But not a single cackle of fear.

  No one seemed to notice the Ground Squirrel’s scoldings. Except Mrs. Cobb, who loved him.

  Pertelote was awake. She too had felt the earth tremor. And then, by the sudden coolness at her right wing, she felt the absence of Lord Chauntecleer.

  The first had wakened her. The second caused her soul a quick disquietude, because her husband had said “Wyrm” with his old bitterness, and his flight had been angry.

  A half hour later she heard someone muttering at the roots of the tree.

  “By-cause Chickies sneaked away! John knows! Didn’t his burrow bust and tumble down on him? Didn’t a Boom bury him? And he to grub him poor self out or die? And what when he come up? Wasn’t nobodies what told John Double-U, ‘Come out, come out, and run away.’ Nor nobodies what said, ‘Bye-bye.’ Nor not neither a ‘Stick-it-in-your-ear.’”

  Pertelote heard the Weasel scratch around the trunk of the tree, forth and back, seeking something.

  “John, he smells gone-ness. And the only somebody in sight is John!”

  Pertelote heard distinctly a Weasel-nose scrape against a tree root.

  “Gaw!”

  A Mouse said, “Step-papa? Is that you?”

  There came a grunt, then a shuffling, and then a bark, “Mices! Move over!”

  Three of the Brothers Mice said, “Hello, Step-papa.”

  The first Mouse spoke through a yawn: “Good night.”

  And a Weasel said, “Ack.”

  It was during that same night that Fimbul-winter with a might slam concluded all seasons except itself. If the moon was cold, earth was colder. The fog snapped and became crystals of ice. Ice whitened the ground, creating a pale light. The clouds swept in and cloaked the universe.

  [Ten] In Which the Dun Cow Makes Herself Known

  Sing, says a voice.

  And a voice says, What shall we sing?

  A voice says, Sing of heroes and their witnesses.

  The voice of a thousand congregations seethes: Arma virumque.

  Chauntecleer stands beside Russel’s grave. In dark night he had flown here. In darkness he stands, listening. The words he hears come hissing from the surface waters of Wyrmesmere. And he can see them, for they arise as a kind of ghostly light, an ignis fatuus that he can see slant, but cannot see by on.

  It was the slumping of the earth that drew him thither. He feared he’s find Russel’s sepulchar broken open and his bones dishonored. But the tomb was still intact. Then the sea has destroyed the Rooster’s relief—by speaking.

  Sing.

  What shall we sing?

  Sing encomia.

  How meet, right, and salutary it is to praise the great now gone before us.

  Fimbul-winter has forged the Liverbrook into a winding snake of ice, its mouth a paralyzed bite at the coast of Wyrmesmere. Lakes and rivers; what once were the autumnal roaring foam and the quiet pools; the rills and ponds and fountains and the mighty mountain falls—all these are fixed in dream-shapes, anvils and unbreakable spears.

  The air in this place is stinks of salt

  Sing.

  What shall we sing?

  Praise Russel the Fox. Glorify his memory. For he took Vipers in his mouth and died that others might live.

  Yes: in his soul Chauntecleer too praises the Fox. Russel did not scorn his duty. He deserved his feathered bier and the devout “Amen” of the whole community. Chauntecleer cannot gainsay the sea’s homage. But it pinions him nonetheless.

  Sing of him, the Anointed, who by vast love and a hornèd spear….

  Mundo Cani Dog! Chauntecleer resists the memory. He would leave if he were not spellbound. He covers his ears. But the words slide into his brains.

  Sing of him who blinded monarchs. Apotheosize the Hound of the most stunning humility.

  All at once, Chauntecleer is sobbing. Mundo Cani, who proved himself the paragon of warriors—he does. He deserves the greater homage.

  The Rooster is staggered by the shame these words have renewed in his breast.

  And now the voice grows thunderous, crashing like rolling breakers: Sum Wyrm, ab Cane caecor!

  The Language of the powers! And Chauntecleer is struck dumb.

  The light on the sea now glows like a field white with fire.

  But then the next words flow over the Rooster’s as a father warms his children in winter. They bring consolation.

  Like woodwinds they sing, But you, O Lord of the Coop that was, and of the Tower that is: your glory has never been extinguished. What is a Dog to the grandeur that shall be yours?

  Chauntecleer cocks his head sideways. With his left eye he peers at the gaseous light. Nor does he blink, lest he miss something of the future unrolling now before him.

  Who is this that knows the work of Mundo Cani? Who is this that promises a heroism superior to the Dog’s?

  We sing of the penultimate hero. For there exists yet one heart able slay the horrors underground.

  Chauantecleer is panting. Even so quickly have these sweet predictions cleansed his soul of regret, and then filled the space with hope. Lost in his desiring, he is unaware that the warmth of the sea has been blown away by a Fimbul-freeze.

  One heart is shapen in nobility. One there is—for there is no one else on this round glob—who is worthy to be shown the navel to the netherworld.

  Chauntecleer hears what is spoken of himself. Of himself! After even Pertelote had demanded penance for his transgressions. No, the Rooster will not question the singers’ veracity. By wish and by want, he permits his own transfiguration.

  The voices are French Horns. You, Galle forte—you are the Chosen One. You alone can descend Wyrm’s caverns and arise again triumphant.

  By his left eye Chauntecleer peers as far as sight allows him over the sea of his commissioning. He strains to see his benefactor. The singing seethes, and this is what he sees: the waves combusting into a dance of ghostly light. Upon the waves is the source of their combustion: a slick of oil. And a tarry scent reaches his nostrils, blown at him on a benumbing wind. The oil spreads and thickens, forming an island against whose edges the waves begin to lap.

  It pleases Chauntecleer to be vouchsafed the birth of an island on which there is no snow, under which there is no ice. Wyrmesmere is proof against the winter.

  He and the sea! What heart cannot triumph in such a compan
y?

  A single voice now, formal in its declaration: O brave Rooster, today have I made you my son.

  The pastel light diminishes, but Chauntecleer is not troubled. The icy breeze continues. His left eyeball has grown cold in its socket, and the more cold because the rest of his body burns with wild electricity.

  The son of the sea.

  The Rooster turns back toward the north. He moves without haste, glad for the solitude in which to savor his new station in life. If he isn’t home by Lauds, well, then he isn’t home by Lauds. He will choose to arrive when he will, for he come with new purpose, and every Animal will exult in a Lord so bright with glory.

  Suddenly, at some distance ahead of him, he spies another kind of light altogether, a spitting light, a narrow spouting of blue light.

  Chauntecleer’s hackles stand up and quiver the way they do before the rip-crack! of a lightning bolt.

  He is unnerved.

  Abruptly the point from which the sparks shoot is right beside him. The sparks project from something like a long spear. The spear swings low and touches his breast, and the Rooster gasps. This is no spear. It is the single horn of the Dun Cow.

  “You are a dream!” he yells and casts his head to the side.

  The Dun Cow says, “Look at me.”

  The scent of her breath is as sweet as timothy and a motherly as cud. Her voice is the low pipe of an organ.

  “Look at me.”

  Chauntecleer, the baptized. Chauntecleer, grown bold by the sea’s adoption, crows, “No!” He is, by God, better than the Dog!

  Chauntecleer crows again, “You gave Mundo Cani more comfort than ever you gave me. No!”

  “Chauntecleer, look at me.”

  “Shut up! Go away! I know you, woman. You say you suffer with suffering Creatures. You said you wanted to bear my suffering. You made a weakling of me. But I am not suffering now!”

  The Rooster refuses to turn toward her, the witchery Cow, this wringer of souls.

  In deep, lowing tones the Dun Cow says, “You are in harm’s way, child. Lend me your fresh afflictions. Look at me.”

  After a moment the Dun Cow removes her sizzling horn from Chauntecleer. He is free to leave.