City Beasts

by Mark Kurlansky

  But once your apartment got that smell, people could smell old age on you, and you were dismissed and there was nothing to do but wait for the end. When you die in New York you are simply freeing up valuable real estate and so everyone looked forward to your demise.

  Then he heard a door open in the hallway. It was his neighbor across the tiled hall—the only other apartment on the first floor. He would not risk another encounter with her. He dropped the leash and shuffled to the stuffed corduroy chair and sat down in the dark room, where he could face an original Rauschenberg, his sigh vibrating his lips with a sound like an old engine shutting down. A tenacious sense of self-preservation told him to wait for the neighbor to leave the block.

  Freser, whose heart was set on a journey, amused himself by holding the raven in his teeth and shaking it while growling. Did Arthur care anymore? Just let him have it for a toy. When he bought it, it was thought to be worth something, though he paid only $70 at an auction. Supposedly it was used to promote Alfred Hitchcock’s movie The Birds.

  Arthur used it for years as a prop for his Edgar Allan Poe reading. He would sit in this same chair with the raven perched behind him and all the lights turned off. He held a flashlight and shined its beam upward so that only his face—shadows where the highlight should be—and the beady-eyed bird could be seen. The hushed atmosphere seemed spooky as he recited the stanzas, and his son listened, spellbound until the very last.

  And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting

  On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;

  And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon’s that is dreaming,

  And the lamp-light o’er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;

  And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor

  Shall be lifted—nevermore!

  By the time Arthur got to the last word, his voice was a harsh whisper—“nevermore.”

  The son felt that sweet sense of fear and sometimes irrationally commented that their bird also “never flitted,” though he wasn’t sure what that meant. But he pretended to know. The fun was in pretending.

  Then one time when David was fourteen and in a whiny, unpleasant mood, Arthur took the flashlight and raven and prepared to start his performance and David said, “Oh, Dad, that’s so corny.”

  The funny thing was that Arthur found the word “corny” to be corny. Nobody said that anymore, did they?

  But now, as Arthur thought about it, it was not that moment standing in front of the refrigerator with a confused expression, it was that earlier moment when his son cut him down with an obsolete word that was the beginning of the end of his life. Soon David was off to school never to return, Arthur and Anna’s life’s work gone. Other parents talked about how their kids would come back with their dirty laundry, but David, it seemed, had learned how to do the laundry himself—a dread of every parent, no doubt.

  * * *

  There is a stench here, thinks the coyote. The streets, the cats, the rats, the dogs, the food barrels, it all has that same stink. It is the smell of stand-ups. The coyote had always known that smell. It is the smell of trouble. This might be the biggest stand-up pack in the world. The coyote was beginning to understand that he was wrong about stand-ups. They were not at all like coyotes, individuals who lived by their wits. They were like wolves, working in highly organized packs, obeying the laws of the pack, operating together. Even if they weren’t as smart as he had thought, they were even more dangerous.

  But he had learned something else. Where there are stand-ups, there is food, endless supplies of it. First there were the barrels where the stand-ups tried to hide their food in paper and plastic and metal. And near the barrels there were always rats. Rats were everywhere he went. Whenever he felt a little hungry he could eat a rat. The birds were slow and easy to catch also, especially the gray oily ones. And there were squirrels and not enough trees for them to hide in. And lots and lots of cats. And dogs. The dogs were meatier than the cats, but they often came attached to a stand-up. If you caught them by surprise, the stand-up would often let go and you could run off with the dog. But one time the stand-up held on so tightly that the coyote had to let go and run off. It was a big meaty one, too. But he had to be careful of stand-ups and not draw too much attention or he would have the entire pack coming after him.

  He probably shouldn’t howl. But he couldn’t help himself. At the end of days like these he had to rear back on his haunches and let loose with a few notes at least. What a place. The coyote didn’t ever want to leave.

  * * *

  Nevermore. Nevermore. What did the raven mean by that? What did Poe mean? Arthur used to think about this frequently after reciting the poem, but he hadn’t thought of it in years. A strange thing, memory. What had he been looking for in the refrigerator?

  When you live in a New York apartment, everything changes the instant you go outside. There is a momentary shock just as quickly forgotten. First there are the smells. For Arthur and most New Yorkers it was a single composite smell that they thought of as New York. To Freser and other dogs, and now a coyote, New York had an endless variety of distinct scents to track down. No wonder Freser so looked forward to his walk. The smell that New Yorkers called “New York” was a blend of sour milk, rotting vegetable, creosote, cigarettes, a harsh molasses burn, and gasoline. Other smells were added, depending on what was going on at the part of the block where you happened to be standing—the heady vapor of diesel heating oil, a simmering paella, a stale puddle, espresso, or the white smoke of burning oil from an older car whose rings were worn.

  The same was true of the noise. It was a roar created by tires on hard top or clanking over heavy metal plates, horns, sirens, the ball bearings on the casters of carts and dollies pushed down the sidewalk, the growl or purr of engines, the insistent clip-clop of determined women wearing crafted shoes like tiny hooves of delicate horses, the screams and giggles of children, airplanes whining in the sky and the rapid thumping of helicopters, the machine-gun slamming of jackhammers, people shouting, dogs barking—for humans, all fused into a single urban roar, but for dogs and coyotes, a long list of sounds to be investigated and evaluated.

  Late the previous night it seemed that all the dogs in the neighborhood had joined in on a howl. Even Freser contributed with his high-pitched and unimpressive voice—something he never did.

  Freser was happy, waddling merrily, sniffing everywhere, researching the prospect of something to eat. Occasionally he would stop to inhale a scent. If Arthur stopped, he would nuzzle his ankle. Freser had reduced life to the search for food. He almost never found any, but Arthur would occasionally slip him little cubes of orange cheddar cheese so that Freser could maintain the illusion that life’s promises are fulfilled. Maintaining that illusion is the secret of happiness. And so Freser was a very happy dog. Freser’s joy was infectious so that Arthur felt that he, too, got a great deal for a small amount of cheese.

  Arthur happened to notice that they were on the corner of Perry and Washington. He didn’t think anything of this in particular, but then there was dryness in the throat, a sense of panic. Arthur had lived in Greenwich Village for almost forty-five years. July 1 would make forty-four years, Arthur recalled. And yet he still found the streets confusing, the way they darted off on angles so that parallel streets crossed. But where was his street?

  Now he could feel the panic in his chest. But then he got it. Barrow Street. Where was Barrow Street? Barrow and what? If he could just get back to Barrow Street, he was certain he could find his way home.

  This had happened to him before and it would be all right as long as Anna didn’t find out. He had a GPS on his cellphone. He only had to put in his location, which he could get from street signs and his destination, and it would get him home. Barrow and . . . what?

  His task was further complicated by the fact that he had forgotte
n his glasses and could not read the small screen. But he could get by. Then the screen went black. His battery was out.

  Freser had felt his panic and now he was panicking, too—whimpering, pulling on the leash. He wanted to go home. But how to find the way home? Then it occurred to Arthur that Freser could find his way home. He was so fat and unathletic, surely he was getting tired. He was tugging on the leash, which he rarely did. All Arthur had to do was let him lead the way.

  In a soundless bouncing trot, the coyote was following, head down, fluffy tail dragging, ears at half-mast, trying to look unassuming and unthreatening, which was his style. His sharp yellow devil eyes, like the scope on a sniper’s rifle, were fixed on the red-and-white dog pulling a stand-up. This was perfect, the coyote thought—the scared little dog and the stand-up who wasn’t paying attention. How did stand-ups survive? They had no sense of danger. The frightened dog would be an easy snatch. The coyote put his head down and his haunches high, ready to pounce.

  * * *

  At the Emergency Services Unit, B. K. Mullan was assembling information in his computer. B.K. had become a master at this, completely modernizing the unit. Everyone called him B.K., and no one knew what it stood for. There were a lot of jokes about it standing for Beast Killer. B.K. did not find this funny, because his job was to capture animals alive.

  There was that one time with the python, but B.K. admitted that he didn’t understand snakes. And the ocelot had barely survived, but that was just because he didn’t realize how much smaller than mountain lions they were. He was not making that mistake again. He was supposed to be looking for a wolf, but it was more likely a coyote, and that could be one hundred pounds smaller.

  There were an increasing number of reports of missing pets—even more than usual. There were calls about a “weird-looking dog.” Several callers said they saw a coyote. Even more said they had seen a wolf. They received more than two hundred calls about dogs howling at night. One woman said she had been walking her retriever on Central Park West when a wolf jumped out of a bush and grabbed him and dragged him away. A man reported seeing a wolf eating birds and squirrels in Riverside Park.

  Then there was the mauled pit bull. At first B.K. had thought it was a call about a pit bull mauling. They got calls all the time about pit bulls attacking other dogs or people. But this was different. The pit bull was the victim. He went to see it. This dog, with tooth punctures on his face and shoulder, was clearly not attacked by a wolf. He would not have survived a wolf, but also the angle of attack was different. A man described the animal leaping above the grass to pounce on squirrels and mice, a typical coyote move. This was a coyote.

  After several days of entering information into his computer he had his conclusion: it was a coyote who had entered Manhattan from the West Bronx across the Henry Hudson Bridge. It had moved down the West Side and would currently . . . currently be . . . near the dog run off the West Side Highway at about Houston Street. He checked his equipment and got in his van.

  * * *

  Anna saw Arthur and Freser and was about to walk up to them when Arthur did a sudden and strange thing. He darted to the side of a brownstone stoop and stared out.

  What was he looking at?

  It was that new girl who moved in across the hall.

  Anna had never spoken with her, and for a long time Arthur hadn’t, either. But he was curious about her, curious about her fabulous shoes. She left her shoes outside her door just across the hall from Arthur’s door. This told Arthur that whoever had moved in, she was not a New Yorker. She was not worried about someone stealing her shoes. And they were probably expensive shoes. They were gold, or purple or chartreuse, with matching jewels. Some had spiral straps that wrapped up the leg. All of them had very long heels, sometimes thick and sometimes so thin it was hard to believe anyone could balance on them. In his occasional more honest moments Arthur had to admit to himself—he never discussed it with anyone else—that there was something vaguely erotic about the idea of some woman leaving clothing that she wore at night, exotic intimate clothing, he thought, in front of his door. Every morning one pair was left out from whatever she had been doing the night before. Arthur wanted to steal one of the shoes—just one—to teach her a lesson, he told himself, though he knew that wasn’t the truth. He wanted to steal a shoe just to have it. He did not know why. Was it to have a part of an incredible nightlife she was experiencing with her shoes? Why did she leave them out, anyway? In time, it was a morning ritual. He would walk Freser and, opening his door, he would wonder what shoes she had left. Freser was interested, too, and once grabbed one in his mouth. Arthur had to kneel down and take it away. Then he panicked, imagining that she would open the door at just that moment with him squatted down, holding one of her shoes. He quickly tossed it to the ground.

  He never saw her but naturally imagined her to be tall and shapely, with sleepy eyes and cascading curls of satin-sheened brunette curls.

  Then one morning there she was. He knew that would ruin it. She was a thin, not particularly shapely, short, tough-looking young woman with her hair unnaturally black and streaked with purple. But he had to admit that there was something sensual about her even if it was only the tragedy of self-mutilation. She wore a short skirt and a sleeveless halter and was in the process of putting on thick-heeled copper-colored shoes. A green, red, and blue floral design was tattooed on her shoulder and flowed down her sinewy arm. Her flat, pale stomach and back had a partially exposed tattooed Asian scene involving elephants and tigers and forest leaves. The colors were vivid against her white skin, but he couldn’t quite make out the drawing with so much of it covered above and below. There was a vine or a snake that started at her ankle and rose to under her skirt. To where? Was her entire body covered in tattoos? He strained to see if he could confirm the design under her clothes.

  “What are you looking at?” said an angry voice. One eyebrow was encased in so many rings it looked like a furry caterpillar emerging from a metal tunnel. Her eyes were strikingly light blue, perhaps striking only because so much black makeup encircled them that she had the stare of a frightened raccoon. There was something silver and bulletlike piercing a nostril and two silver arrows stuck out of her cheek. Her shoes were probably not that expensive, after all.

  “Well?”

  Arthur realized that he had spent an inappropriate length of time staring at her body and he felt embarrassed.

  “Are you stalking me?”

  “What?”

  “Are you some kind of stalker? What do you want?”

  “No. I live here.”

  “So why are you stalking me?”

  “I live here. I could just as well say you were stalking me.”

  “What! Me stalking you!”

  Arthur was surprised by the angry reaction, but then he realized that this was not a good thing to say to a woman. “No, I just was . . .”

  “Listen. I carry a can of mace in my purse and my cellphone is set on nine-one-one. I can call the cops. It’s illegal to stalk.”

  “I wasn’t stalking. I just . . .”

  “Stalk. Gawk. It’s all illegal, you fucking pervert.”

  Arthur wondered what her idea of perverted was. Then he realized that he had been attracted to her because he thought she was a pervert—a person who did wild unacceptable physical acts into the night. With her shoes on or off? He didn’t know why he thought that. Probably some unfair judgment. But he did know that men never won these things. She would go to the police and nothing he said would matter. He would be the sick old man. It was the “old” part that bothered him, that would bother Anna. It was perfectly okay to be a young pervert.

  He and Freser walked past her to go outside. He would avoid her.

  Now here she was and he did not want to appear to be looking at her, but he realized that he could follow her and find his way home. How did he know she was going home? She turned rig
ht on Charles Street and then left on Christopher. This felt like the right way.

  What does he want with her? Anna wondered.

  Freser was pulling on the leash, not wanting to follow her, acting agitated, making it harder for Arthur to follow undiscovered. Why did he have to act like that now? He was probably just reacting to Arthur’s agitation.

  The coyote found it was easy to follow undiscovered. Coyotes knew how to do this, and he trotted at a distance, thinking, This will be so easy. Next time they stop.

  Arthur crossed Bedford Street and then realized she was out of sight. He had lost her. Where did he live? Why couldn’t he remember? He looked at the two- and three-story brick houses. Where did she turn to get back to Barrow Street? He must know this. He was holding his head in his hands and the coyote was about to make his snatch when they both heard a voice behind him. “Stalker!”

  She had ducked down Bedford Street to fool him. “You are behind me,” said Arthur. “You’d have to be the stalker. I was just going home.”

  “You are going the wrong way. You were looking for me.”

  Arthur realized that Bedford Street must be the right way. “I’m just going home,” Arthur said.

  “I’m not putting up with this. I’ll call the fucking cops.”

  Anna could not hear them, but she understood now. At first she felt sick. They were having a lovers’ quarrel right there. She didn’t want to believe it, but all the signs had been there for months. Arthur had been very distracted. His mind was somewhere else. Was it with someone else? She didn’t want to think that, but it seemed that way. And now she had the truth. After a moment of anger, she started to smile. She had misread everything. Arthur was not so old, so worn and tired as she imagined. And that meant that she wasn’t, either. She should confront him about this at some point and act extremely angry. But not now. Make him endure his angry lover.