Ben Soul

by Richard George

shriveled scrotum.

  Vanna pronounced the same sentence on each: “Off with his head!” she shouted, like the Queen of Hearts in Alice in Wonderland. From nowhere Amazon guards appeared to drag the hapless men to the chopping block.

  Last of all, Dickon came before Vanna for judgment. He refused to bow or beg. He simply stood, armored in his own self-confidence. Vanna woke, struggling for breath, because she could not devise a sentence that would break him. Fury radiated from her in a black aura.

  The aura washed over the little mouse hiding in the wall. She trembled in her nest of dryer lint and sofa cushion stuffing, and went into labor. Desperately she prayed to all the rodent gods she knew for a safe birth. Sadly, she delivered a stillborn litter of mottled and scarred mouselings. Grief overcame her, and she wet the cushion stuffing with her tears. Vanna glanced at her clock, rolled over, and fell into a dreamless sleep, a bitter smile twisting her lips.

  Kitten on a String (from the Book of Bygone Days)

  Vanna’s dream woke her remembrances. When she was a small girl she had a kitten, one Mama Cat's last litter. It was, like its mother, a gray cat with white stripes and mottling. It had a particularly loud mew for so tiny a being. She ignored the kitten’s littermates. None of them fascinated her the way this kitten did.

  Vanna knew the kitten could not leave its mother for another few days. She stroked it again, and put it back to Mama Cat’s belly to nurse. She sat, hunkered on her haunches, and watched the kitten suck greedily. Its eyes were not yet open. Only when Vanna’s mother’s voice, stern with a note of command, called her in to eat, did Vanna leave the cat.

  A pout marred the infantile prettiness of her face as she got to her feet, brushing straw from her pinafore. She scraped her shoes against the iron blade at the door of the barn, turning them to inspect the edges of the soles for lingering mud or manure. One could not track such substances into the house; the rules strictly forbade it. A frown creased her childish brow under the tangled mass of black sausage curls on her head. In the sun blond highlights played along the strands. The young girl walked quickly toward the house. Just as her mother was making ready to call again, the young girl came into view.

  Yuna Dee, the girl’s mother, was prematurely gray. Her hair had once been spun gold, but since her daughter’s birth, her second child, she had gone gray and lines etched weariness into her delicate features. Not yet had she come to the years where her nose would touch her chin, and her chin rest on her sagging chest, but age before her time wore on her already. Her shoulders sloped forward, and her neck was growing bent. Even now, it hurt her to look up at the sky.

  Vanna came into the kitchen. Since it was lunchtime, the family would eat its large meal now, here, around the kitchen table. A roast beef, already sliced, filled one plate. Mashed potatoes filled a familiar blue bowl. Gravy puddled in the gravy boat. Fine black cracks ran through its white glaze. Too long warming in the oven one holiday dinner had sent it from the holiday china cabinet to this kitchen meal banishment. A huge salad of mixed green plants and such vegetable accompaniments as cucumber, celery, and radishes rounded out the meal.

  On instruction, Vanna washed her hands. She was primly disgusted at the mess of soapy dirt her brother, Dan, had left in the washbasin. She tried to rinse it down the drain, spilling water on the floor as she tried to spread it around the basin to rinse the dirt away.

  A sharp “Vanna!” from her mother hurried her to the table. She hastily dried her hands on the damp towel, also marred with the traces of Dan’s dirty fingers. She slipped into her chair just as Father folded his hands and closed his eyes. He intoned a grace, and then opened his eyes, took meat, potatoes, gravy, and salad in turn onto his plate, and passed each dish to his wife, Yuna. She in turn served herself, Dan, and then Vanna, some of each food. Vanna had no great liking for salad, but in the Dee family, no one disputed Mother’s allotment of food. Mother thought salads good for girls, so Vanna got a large portion. She bravely ate it all first, so as not to have the taste lingering on her tongue.

  Conversation at the Dee dinner table could not commence until all had eaten everything except dessert (canned peaches today, another item Vanna disliked). Conversation became mandatory over dessert. Father Perry Dee asked questions, and the family answered them. First Dan had to tell how he had progressed with whitewashing the goat pen. Then Mother Yuna had to report on how she had progressed with blanching and freezing the surplus beans.

  Vanna, as a five-year-old, had only to describe picking up her toys and tidying her room. Ordinarily Father’s inquisition stopped with such matters. Today another question troubled his mind.

  “I saw,” he said, “signs of mice in the granary. That’s Mama Cat’s patrol. I suppose the old fool has popped kittens again, somewhere.” Vanna held her breath. “It’s time, I think,” Father went on, “to allow a litter to live.” Vanna let out her breath. “We need more cats around to keep the mice down.” Dan and Mother nodded.

  “She’s in the barn,” Vanna suddenly volunteered. Father turned a hard black eye on her. He looked at her for a long moment.

  “You could have told me earlier.”

  “I forgot, sir.” Vanna felt tears at the back of her eyes. She knew it was folly to release them in front of Father. Tears only doubled whatever punishment Father measured out.

  “Show me,” he said, pushing back his chair and standing up. Vanna looked at the last spoonful of canned peach in her bowl. She raised her eyes to her father. “Forget the peach,” he said. “Mother will compost it so it doesn’t go to waste.” Vanna looked at her mother. She nodded her permission. Vanna got up also. She put her tiny hand in her father’s big, calloused hand. Anger and resentment flared in her as she let her father take control. Her Aunt Mella Dee had told her several times about the evil control men held over women, and suggested women should always subvert that control wherever possible. Vanna had absorbed the lesson’s sense of oppression without quite understanding what it meant.

  She showed her father the kittens, and their mother. Mama Cat swiped at him when he poked a finger into the litter to count the kittens. Mama Cat had lost too many litters to Perry Dee’s burlap bag.

  “Not this time, Mama Cat,” Perry said. “Let’s leave them be, Vanna. Let them grow strong and hungry, to kill the mice.” Vanna looked longingly at the gray and white kitten. Miracle of miracles, it opened its eyes. The right was green and the left was blue. The kitten sparked a connection with the little girl. This cat was no mere mouser to be. Vanna knew with five-year-old certainty that this kitten was more important than any of the others.

  With her father’s indulgent agreement, Vanna got in the habit of reserving small tidbits for Mama Cat and her kittens. Vanna had argued, and Perry agreed, that the felines would prosper with a better diet, and thus be stronger to catch more mice.

  Every time she took a paper napkin full of scraps for the cats, she singled out the gray and white kitten for special attention. So it came to pass that this kitten, which Vanna called Dora, became far tamer than the average barn cat.

  That was Dora’s undoing. Barn cats learn early to distrust farm boys. Farm boys grow up to be farmers who drown unwanted kittens. Vanna’s brother, Dan, had a guest over to play, one Maxie Mumm. Maxie’s sister, Minnie, was scheduled to play that same Sunday afternoon with Vanna, but she had contracted a childhood illnesses, and was kept home. Maxie had auburn hair, and eyes that appeared either green or blue, depending on the ambient light. Maxie and Minnie were the unwanted offspring of a nameless vagabond cherry picker and an itinerant sex therapist, Chrysantha Mumm.

  Maxie was no crueler than the average boy of his age and time, which is to say, he had all the makings of a monster, or a good soldier, but was not vicious enough to become a loan officer without special training. He was a year and a half older than Dan Dee, and commonly led in their games. Maxie detested cats, ever since one had severely scra
tched him when he was an infant.

  It was near the time Vanna brought scraps to the cats, and Dora, ever greedy, was near the barn door, pacing and mewling. Dan and Maxie found the half-grown kitten. Dan’s description of the cat as one that was “always hanging around” inspired Maxie to sink to his worst. He scooped Dora up and held the feline tight.

  “Get a string,” Maxie said. Dan, as always, overawed by Maxie’s air of command, found a length of baling twine and handed it to the older boy. Maxie proceeded to make a noose, and circle the cat’s neck with it. Then he took the other end, still clutching the protesting cat, and flung it over a protruding piece of machinery. He drew the loose end toward him, and let go of the cat. It swung in space, choking, spitting and mewling. Vanna found her cat just in time to rescue the choking creature from death. She ran at Maxie, forcing him to drop the string. Dora tumbled to the ground, coughing and spiting.

  Vanna picked the kitten up and soothed the poor creature, stroking it until it became calm, and could breathe regularly. Then she put it down on the straw-strewn floor and fed it some of the scraps she had brought. She was on all fours talking to Dora when Maxie sneaked up behind her.

  Maxie liked