by Paul Gallico
Mr. Peddie sighed and shook his head sadly. “I hoped you would see,” he said, “why I will not go. I will not interfere with Lori in any way or attempt to penetrate the sphere in which she lives. She strikes me as one who has looked upon our world and our way of life and has not liked it. Her contacts are other than ours; her devotion is to the service of helpless things that are ill or hurt. She is what the French would call ‘une vraie religieuse.’ There are not many left on earth.”
MacDhui, whose patience was exhausted, said savagely, “All of whom were more than half mad, your religieuses— Well, then, I trust you will have no objection if I go and deal with this woman personally and put an end to her interfering with my business and the business of the district.”
Angus Peddie reflected, sitting on the edge of his chair, cuddling and scratching his dog, his mind awhirl with the problems set by MacDhui’s proposal. And yet he thought that he saw, or rather felt, a possible pattern and considered it his duty to warn his friend. He rose to his feet, setting the dog on the floor, clamped his hat onto the back of his head while he regarded MacDhui earnestly. “No,” he replied. “No, I have no objection whatsoever. But you know, Andrew, I should be careful if I were you. You may come into the greatest danger if you were to go!”
MacDhui exploded. “Danger! Danger? Are you mad yourself, Angus? Explain yourself, man—”
For the first time the minister looked embarrased. “I—” he began and then hesitated, leading MacDhui to say impatiently, “Well, well—”
“You must not be irritable with me when I bring in my God,” Peddie replied. “God, you see, is my business and my vocation. It is in a way as if I were to fly off the handle every time you mentioned that you were going to vaccinate for blackleg, or inoculate lambs against dysentery.”
MacDhui said nothing but waited for him to go on.
“Lori, I think is very close to God. Her life is the manner in which she worships and loves God—that is all . . .”
“And what danger would I be running, might I ask?”
The little clergyman gathered up his dog and his medicine and replied, “Of coming to love God too.” Then, tucking Fin beneath his arm, he pattered out. But no sooner had he closed the door than he popped his head back inside again. “Should you decide to risk it,” he said, “it will not do to go to Lori’s door, for she will not open to you or to anyone. But there is a bell with a rope attached to a covin-tree, a large oak that stands before her house. It is rung by humans and sometimes, I understand, even animals who have need of her. It is called the Mercy Bell.”
MacDhui glared. “I’m damned if I do. What need have I—?”
The little man’s eyes glittered curiously at this and he did not mince words this time. “If ever a man had need of mercy, it is you, Andrew MacDhui,” he said, and went out, closing the door softly behind him.
1 4
I, Bast-Ra, cat goddess of Bubastis, now called Talitha, remember the day of the coming of the Man with the Red Beard.
I saw him first as in a vision, striding through a dream of prophecy with flaming hair, for I, Sekhmet-Bast-Ra, the lady of Sept, have first, second, and third sight.
And I cried out aloud in the night of the doom-dream, “Death! Death! Death and doom await the slayers of cats! He is Duamutef, son of Horus, brother of Anubis, the jackal of death. Red is the beard of his chin, the hair of his head, and the glare of his eyes; red is the blood that drips from his talons and fangs; red is the doom that envelops his ka, for he has transgressed and I, Bast-Ra, shall set the seal upon that doom. For it is writ in the Book of the Dead that whosoever causes the death of one of us shall not go unpunished.”
And in the dream he came striding fiercely, with the sun blood red behind him, and in his hands he bore a red ax of copper and there was red stain upon the blade. He came, fearful and mighty as Sopdu and even I, Bast-Ra, was filled with fear and cried out so that I awoke.
I was at my fireside then in the cottage temple and the glow of the dying fire was as red as blood. In the next room I heard the sweet singing of Lori and the thumping of the loom as she finished her weaving. Even so she ceased her singing and called to me, “Talitha! Poor puss! Have ye had a bad dream then? Och, but ye have nowt to fear—” and she came and lifted me up, cradled and stroked me.
Yet I knew that a doom had commenced—perhaps Lori herself had threaded it upon her loom—and must go on to its appointed end. The day when I would encounter the Man with the Red Beard was not far off, and in spite of myself and the sweet love of my priestess, I trembled and could not take comfort. It is not easy to be a goddess and know too much.
It all began next day hard by the covin-tree.
Other times, other customs. Had you heard of the covin or coglan tree? As Wullie, who explained it to me, said, “Och, any Scot, or even Scottish cat would know that. Ye cannot be a true Scot, Talitha.” The covin-tree is the great oak or beech that stood in front of the manor house, or in the castle courtyard, where it spread its branches, offering shade from the sun or shelter from the rain. It is peaceful beneath its canopy.
Now, Wullie explained further, it is not that the Scot is inhospitable; far from it. When he kens you he is the most hospitable man on earth. But first—and danger taught him this—before he welcomes you within he must know who you are and what your business. And thus it was under the covin-tree on a bench that the laird interviewed the stranger, the traveler, and the seeker, to have a word with them as to their purpose and their antecedents, before admitting them into the house.
We had such a one growing two gallops and a jump away from the front of the cottage temple, an oak that towered twice as high as any palm I knew in my ancient home and a hundred times as thick around. The branches towered over the roof of the cottage, their leaves scraping the slate in a wind, and the topmost crown was yet again as high, and from that vantage point one could see far down the glen and into the fields of the valley below and even the smoke rising from the chimneys of the town.
The Mercy Bell, of which I have already spoken, hung from the lowest branch. To its clapper was tied a rope which fell loosely to the ground, trailing there. Sometimes the rope was tugged by a human bringing some animal in distress for my priestess to heal, for Lori was a reincarnation of Renentutet the nurse goddess. And sometimes the bell was rung by the animal itself, for Lori to come forth from her weaving and help it.
Oh, you who are so clever and full of knowledge about the ways of your world and know and understand so little of that realm of gods and goddesses that is mine will ridicule and scoff at the idea of an injured animal somewhere deep in the forest determining to seek out Lori’s help. You will not believe that it could drag itself for miles through woods and across icy burns to arrive at the covin-oak before the cottage, there to ring the Mercy Bell.
Yet in the days when I was God this would have surprised no one, for the beasts of the field and the birds of the air, the gods and the humans were as one brotherhood living with and for one another and sharing the knowledge of their magic and wisdom.
Man saw in the winged and four-footed creatures who shared the earth with him powers that were beyond him, and worshiped them. Magic and magical powers were the usual way of life. No one was surprised at anything that happened, for the gods were everywhere and dwelt in every object animate and inanimate. From what I have learned since my return, the gods no longer live and magic has gone out of style.
We were all about our business that pleasant summer’s morning when the Mercy Bell was touched, shivered twice in the clear air, and was still. The jackdaw came a-screaming, “Danger! Great danger! Beware!” and we assembled, afluff with curiosity, I, and Mac, and Wullie, and Dorcas, with Peter the Scottie and Shep the sheep dog, to see what was toward, but with care because of the jackdaw’s warning, for Jackie was a clever bird, and we came to the covin-oak warily, as Lori appeared at the cottage door, shading her eyes from the sun, and there we all saw the badger that had rung the bell.
&n
bsp; The trap was clamped about his leg, with the length of chain where the badger had snapped it still attached to it. One end of this had crossed the rope trailing to the ground from the clapper of the bell, causing it to ring. There was no magic in that part of it. The magic lay in how the badger, more dead than alive, the white of the bone showing at the shoulder and foreleg where a dog had attacked and worried it while it was trapped, had known where to come and had dragged itself perhaps more than a mile to our temple and my priestess of healing.
We cats sat down at a respectful distance, for the beast was half mad with pain from its festered wounds; there was white slaver at its mouth and its yellow teeth snapped and bit in every direction. But the dogs were beginning to yield to that hysteria which is so characteristic of them and wanted to attack and kill the badger, which might have been all for the best, since it was more than half dead anyway.
But Lori ordered, “Sit. Leave him be,” and they sat. She went to the animal and stood looking down at him for a moment, while the wicked teeth snicked and snacked, and in my eye of prophecy I could already see them sink into the flesh of Lori’s hand, and as she knelt at the side of the beast, I quickly put a spell upon the badger and a blessing upon Lori.
Bending over, she freed the crushed hind leg from the trap and, gently lifting him up, cradled him in her arms and whispered something to him. And she was safe because of my spell and my blessing. From the first touch of her fingers, stroking his panting flank, the badger had become calm. His head was fallen to one side as she held him, but his eyes were rolling like a dog’s, so that all of us could see the cream of their whites as he gazed up at Lori. She rose to her feet and carried him back to the stables where she tended her sick, with most of us following soberly after.
Old Wullie expressed the relief we all felt with, “Phew! Nasty moment that! It’s a miracle Lori’s hands and arms weren’t torn to shreds.” I held my peace. I had learned my lessons. As I said before; other times, other customs. There was no use in my telling them that it was my miracle, one which, when I was an acknowledged goddess in the temple of Khufu where the Nile divided about the isle of Bubastis, I used to work all the time, keeping rivermen who worshiped me properly unharmed from the tusks of enraged hippopotami or hungry crocodiles when they upset or fell into the river.
Instead, I put my tail up in a dignified manner and accompanied her to the stone building she used as her lazaret. I sat down in the doorway and watched as she gently laid the badger on the table of the room where she kept her bandages, salves, and medicines on shelves. Under it she then spread a clean white cloth, placing a basin and a sponge beside it, and then went to the kitchen in the cottage temple to fetch a kettle of hot water.
When she returned with it she put it on the floor for a moment, placed one of her hands beneath the badger’s head and with the other stroked it gently, her eyes filled with love and pity.
From the badger issued the saddest sound I ever heard. It squeaked. There was no more growl or snarl left in it. It was partly a whimper too, but really more a squeak. Is it not strange how quickly hate and fear can be replaced by love? When something fierce and dangerous, of which you have reason to be afraid, is hurt so that it is rendered helpless and suddenly squeaks like a mouse, it breaks your heart.
I turned my head away for an instant and washed my back furiously. When I looked again, the tears were falling from Lori’s eyes as she sponged the mangled leg and the awful festered wound at the shoulder where the white bone lay bare and the flesh of the forepaw was shredded. The shoulder was broken and the paw seemed to hang attached by no more than tatters. As for the crushed hindquarter—Lori said to me, “Do you see, Talitha? This poor beastie is sorely hurt, and me not knowing what to do for him. Look what has happened. A dog attacked him while he was caught in the trap and laid the bone bare. Yet he must have fought him and driven him off. One so brave and gallant must no’ be allowed to die.”
Carefully Lori laid out fur, skin, flesh, and bones and the claws of the badger on the white cloth and bathed them tenderly. Only one eye of the brute was to be seen, but it was rolled upward toward Lori and regarded her with trust and pleading.
Then Lori looked once more upon the fearful injuries and shook her head, saying so sadly, “I do not know what to do, Talitha; oh, not at all. I do not know even where to begin and he will die unless something is done. See how beautiful he is, how beautifully formed and marked. Surely God did not send him here to me to die.”
Her hands fell to her sides for a moment in despair. But soon her head was lifted in resolve, and courage came into her eyes. She turned to me and said, “We will ask then for help, Talitha, you and I.”
Ah, had she but asked help of me, recognized and acknowledged my godhead, I should have had the power; I would have made her a miracle.
She came over to where I was and sat down upon the threshold, and for a moment caressed my head and back and rubbed me softly underneath the chin. Then she folded her hands in her lap and raised her eyes to the sky. Her lips moved silently; her eyes were filled with confidence, and a smile of trust played about her mouth as she prayed.
I prayed then, too, as I had been taught in the long ago, to Ra, my father and Hathor my mother, to great Horus and Isis and Osiris, to Ptah and Mut and Nun, and even to dread Anubis to turn his face from the lintel of our door. I called upon the oldest of the gods, Khonsu and Amen-Ra the Creator of all.
After a time we heard the sound of the ringing of the Mercy Bell.
I gathered myself up and with two gallops, a leap, and the bound, I flew around the side of the cottage to see who or what it was had touched the silver bell for the second time that morning.
And I stopped in my tracks, frozen with horror and filled with fear. My fur stood up on end and a dark ridge crept up my back from tail to crown. My ears flattened back against the side of my head. A low, angry growl came into my throat, to be replaced by the long hiss of hate.
A man, a stranger, stood by the bell on the other side of the covin-tree. The sight of him filled me with loathing, disgust, and fear. For a moment I crouched there staring at this monster who was having such a terrible effect upon me. He was huge; huge and terrifying in aspect. He had fox-colored hair and a fox-colored beard covering his chin and wild and rolling eyes and he stood there pulling again and again upon the rope as though he would pull the Mercy Bell out of the tree.
And then I knew. I had never seen him in this life before, but it was he of my doom-dream, he the red monster, the slayer of cats, upon whom lay the curse of Bubastis. Doom lay across his brow, and yet it was I who was filled to the marrow of my bones with fear.
He had not yet seen me when I crossed the distance from the house to the tree with one bound and the next moment I was clawing my way up the tree, nor did I stop until I was lost in the very topmost branches, so high that I could no longer see or hear what transpired below. And there I remained until the setting of the sun and the drawing in of the night.
Yes, I, Bast-Ra, a goddess, succumbed to the fear of a mortal man and fled from him. Nor was I able to say why this had happened.
1 5
Now that he was there, Mr. MacDhui was beginning to feel something of a fool. During the long march up through the glen along the narrow track from the spot where he had had to park his jeep, there had been time to reflect upon what his friend Peddie had said about the figure he might cut in court. Thus the forthcoming spectacle of himself in the midst of a woods, bullying some creature who was touched in the head and hardly responsible for her actions, did not appear to him to be very attractive either.
Nevertheless there was his sense of duty toward his profession, and if farmers took to sending their sick cattle or sheep to this half-witted woman, there would be an end to the discipline he had installed in the valley.
But by the time MacDhui had reached sight of Lori’s cottage and outbuildings and paused to reconnoiter, his anger managed to reassert itself, defensively in a sense, for he resented
the eeriness of the feeling the place gave him.
He took in the silent cottage with the blinds and curtains drawn, sleeping in the cool and gloom of the forest of oak, pine, larches, and old smooth beeches, but which yet was surrounded by an intensity of wildlife, heard rather than seen, which was startling. The house slumbered at the heart of the rustle and whir of myriads of forest creatures.
He glimpsed the cottontails of a pair of hares disappearing from the open space in front of the house; a squirrel scolded, hidden somewhere above his head. Birds went into nervous wheelings and chirpings, in flashes of color about the chimney and eaves at his intrusion, and something large went flapping off through the forest aisles on the slapping beat of powerful wings, laughing to itself.
MacDhui paused now before the giant oak, from the lowest branch of which hung the silver bell with the pull rope tied to its clapper. And he was furious with himself that he did not march forthwith and stoutly to the door of the cottage and pound upon it with his knuckles, or yank at a bell pull if there were one, in the manner of custom and civilization. But neither the house nor its surroundings invited such brazen intrusion. Quietly and effectively it had cast its spell over him so that he did nothing but stand there, uncertain and fuming, his hands thrust deep into the pockets of his jacket.
A moment later he recalled that the Reverend Angus Peddie, who believed not in witches but in an unseen, all-powerful Creator and Director of the universe, had given him directions as to how to come to grips with the woman who was the center of this little forest mystery, and thrusting his head and shoulders forward with something of his former aggressive truculence, he pulled hard upon the bell rope.
The sweetness and brightness of the shivery note of the vibrating metal startled him, as well as causing the birds to whir and flutter more loudly. A roe deer appeared at the edge of the forest and for a moment her liquid eyes stared curiously into his before she turned and galloped away. But there was no other response.
