| Black Mountain Lady |
Jay
Dyck
Dyck
Diary of a Goatherder 13 February 1980
Today I built a bed and moved it into my shack. It is made of plywood, two by fours,
and four by fours. On it is my futon mattress. It is solid and comfortable, and now I have
an extra twenty-five square feet of storage in my shack.
Jerry and Maude Donaldson came by with their son, Sandy. We showed them the
kids, and they were delighted.
That night, in my shack, I read for a long time. By and by, say ten-thirty or eleven, I
slept. But suddenly at midnight I was awake. I lay still for a moment. Then from the goat
pen just outside I heard snorting and stamping of hooves. I started to get up, and then I
heard one of the kids cry in a most alarming way, and I felt what I can only describe as a
vibration, a violent wave. I leaped from my bed, grabbed my flashlight and dashed outside.
I ran the few steps to the pen and snapped on the light.
There was a mountain lion in the pen! Caught in the beam of light he crouched and
turned, looking for a way out.
I had neglected to pick up my gun on the way out, the first time I had left the shack at
night without it since the last lion attack.
I yelled a deep howl that burst from my guts in simple rage. I fancy it was more of a
roar.
I dashed back into the shack and snatched up my gun belt which lay on the floor by
my bed, buckled into a loop. Throwing it over my shoulder I ran back outside, drawing the
.357 Magnum as I did.
By the time I got out there again Judy was tangling with him. But he was over on my
side of the fence by the sound, and before I could get the light on him he was over the next
fence into the pasture. Judy was in his jaws, and her screams faded rapidly down the hill
in great bounds.
I stood naked on the mountainside at midnight in February with nothing but a gun
belt over my shoulder, a pistol in one hand and a flashlight in the other. I hadn't fired a
shot.
Luke had jumped the fence, and one of the kids had gone through it. Gently I set the
kid back into the pen. My light showed that another of the kids lay disemboweled in the
center of the pen.
I was taking hold of Luke when I heard running footsteps, and seconds later Bob
came running down from the trailer. Probably less than a minute had elapsed, but it was
over. A baby doe was dead, and so, we presumed, was Judy.
After a while we went to the trailer and ate some pancakes. Then we went back to bed.
Today I built a bed and moved it into my shack. It is made of plywood, two by fours,
and four by fours. On it is my futon mattress. It is solid and comfortable, and now I have
an extra twenty-five square feet of storage in my shack.
Jerry and Maude Donaldson came by with their son, Sandy. We showed them the
kids, and they were delighted.
That night, in my shack, I read for a long time. By and by, say ten-thirty or eleven, I
slept. But suddenly at midnight I was awake. I lay still for a moment. Then from the goat
pen just outside I heard snorting and stamping of hooves. I started to get up, and then I
heard one of the kids cry in a most alarming way, and I felt what I can only describe as a
vibration, a violent wave. I leaped from my bed, grabbed my flashlight and dashed outside.
I ran the few steps to the pen and snapped on the light.
There was a mountain lion in the pen! Caught in the beam of light he crouched and
turned, looking for a way out.
I had neglected to pick up my gun on the way out, the first time I had left the shack at
night without it since the last lion attack.
I yelled a deep howl that burst from my guts in simple rage. I fancy it was more of a
roar.
I dashed back into the shack and snatched up my gun belt which lay on the floor by
my bed, buckled into a loop. Throwing it over my shoulder I ran back outside, drawing the
.357 Magnum as I did.
By the time I got out there again Judy was tangling with him. But he was over on my
side of the fence by the sound, and before I could get the light on him he was over the next
fence into the pasture. Judy was in his jaws, and her screams faded rapidly down the hill
in great bounds.
I stood naked on the mountainside at midnight in February with nothing but a gun
belt over my shoulder, a pistol in one hand and a flashlight in the other. I hadn't fired a
shot.
Luke had jumped the fence, and one of the kids had gone through it. Gently I set the
kid back into the pen. My light showed that another of the kids lay disemboweled in the
center of the pen.
I was taking hold of Luke when I heard running footsteps, and seconds later Bob
came running down from the trailer. Probably less than a minute had elapsed, but it was
over. A baby doe was dead, and so, we presumed, was Judy.
After a while we went to the trailer and ate some pancakes. Then we went back to bed.
| Chapter Twenty-nine WITHOUT BOAST OR CLAIM |
Ma had expressed open contempt for the location of the old, adobe ranch house. "Stupid Mexicans, always
building their houses down in valleys, down by creeks," she muttered a million times. Little Victor tagged
along, and as with every other square inch of Diana's range, the two had poked through the ruins more than
once, finding little. It had been a ruin long before the Gallagher clan had come to the area. The newer ranch
house was farther upstream, still in the valley, and not inhabited by Mexicans either. Victor and Ma knew it
only as a place to be avoided, a source of pickup trucks, cowboys and trespass trouble.
"Freeze to death in the winter, and get eaten alive by mosquitoes all summer," she would gripe. In the
spring and the fall there were indeed times that Diana and Victor had camped in this or that valley. But she
was right; he knew that. He and his ma had no house themselves. The current weather was a vital part of the
calculation about where to bed down.
In rainy weather, the entire region was a network of threats. Quicksand pits came to life, gone today, here
tomorrow little wrinkles in the landscape whose danger depended on the hydrostatics of the moment, the rain
and the flow.
Besides that there was mudslides, mud itself, flooding, and even rockslides, where there was rock.
Sometimes the rocks came to the surface, were revealed, stripped of their cover, and then of their moorings on
the hillside where they had been hidden for a million years, and allowed to tumble into whatever stream bed,
road, field, farm, campsite or home was set up in its way, all in one storm.
Up in their perch on a hill, Victor and Ma may have felt the full lash of the wind, but in their tent they
could sleep without wonder about some rowdy, young, midnight river being born up the canyon from them.
Sometimes, after a storm, they would find in this valley, or that canyon, the tell-tale bits of grass and debris
clinging to the twigs of bushes and trees, speaking frankly of the level of the water the night before. For
however long a time, the water here had been six inches deep, Victor could see, and wonder to himself. Or two
feet. Or ten feet.
On clear mornings in the winter, when the two, perhaps hunting, would descend to the valley, it was like
walking into a pool of ice. Often the frost would glisten across entire pastures, fields of barley or alfalfa. Only
once in a while was there ever frost on the ridge.
"She's right about the mosquitoes, too," muttered Vikor to himself. There were never 'skeeters on the
ridge.
It seemed that Peňasquitos Valley was now a park. Vikor's feelings were mixed about that. He was glad to
reflect, as he continued to walk along the dirt road that was the trail, that this loveliness would survive, that
the industrial park would not continue to grow in that direction, nor would the march of homes fill the place
with a maze of streets and shopping centers and lights and law and order.
At the same time he felt remorse for what he sensed was a loss of the privacy that he and Ma had enjoyed,
which was itself different from that which the ranch family and hands had enjoyed.
Back then, it was seldom or never that any of the latter had even a glimpse of Diana and her wiry
offspring. To stay hidden was easy. The boy and his ma were so familiar with the hills and canyons of their
whole range that either could with considerable accuracy sense the locations of the various threats.
"Heinz is plowing for lima beans over east o' the straw barn," Ma could say.
"We best drift down the ridge for now," little Victor might rejoin. "Knebel's plowin' in Carmel Valley right
by the frog pond."
Or, "Them two guys from Peňasquitos be still clearin' brush over in the south canyon today," could work
into Diana's musing over Victor's suggestion that they go to the waterfall to bathe.
After leaving the waterfall, Vikor went up the trail to the north, which quickly put him on the ridge. He
noticed immediately that all of the other ridge tops in sight were covered with houses. The one on which he
stood, however, was still as he remembered it, with the long, meandering dirt road that ran for miles along its
twisty crest, the occasional small eucalyptus copse, and the vernal pools of water with the taste of the sky itself.
Here, he quickly figured out, the hand that held back the tide of urbanization was not the city park
commission, but rather the even mightier power company. This agency had devoted a swath of land to the path
of two columns, one a march of huge spruce poles with cross members that bore the mighty electron journey to
the consumer community. The newer column was a line of steel towers, higher than the poles, with bigger wires.
Between the waves of radiance surrounding these copper cables, and the pollution of air that touched the ponds'
surfaces, Vikor would not have been surprised to see mutant frogs in the area, hopping away from
metamorphosis with the happy innocence of grotesque, genetic jiggling.
Horrors be damned, the land still held a fragrant beauty that caught at the heart of the wandering
murderer. Everywhere he looked brought new memories. His own first deer kill…
building their houses down in valleys, down by creeks," she muttered a million times. Little Victor tagged
along, and as with every other square inch of Diana's range, the two had poked through the ruins more than
once, finding little. It had been a ruin long before the Gallagher clan had come to the area. The newer ranch
house was farther upstream, still in the valley, and not inhabited by Mexicans either. Victor and Ma knew it
only as a place to be avoided, a source of pickup trucks, cowboys and trespass trouble.
"Freeze to death in the winter, and get eaten alive by mosquitoes all summer," she would gripe. In the
spring and the fall there were indeed times that Diana and Victor had camped in this or that valley. But she
was right; he knew that. He and his ma had no house themselves. The current weather was a vital part of the
calculation about where to bed down.
In rainy weather, the entire region was a network of threats. Quicksand pits came to life, gone today, here
tomorrow little wrinkles in the landscape whose danger depended on the hydrostatics of the moment, the rain
and the flow.
Besides that there was mudslides, mud itself, flooding, and even rockslides, where there was rock.
Sometimes the rocks came to the surface, were revealed, stripped of their cover, and then of their moorings on
the hillside where they had been hidden for a million years, and allowed to tumble into whatever stream bed,
road, field, farm, campsite or home was set up in its way, all in one storm.
Up in their perch on a hill, Victor and Ma may have felt the full lash of the wind, but in their tent they
could sleep without wonder about some rowdy, young, midnight river being born up the canyon from them.
Sometimes, after a storm, they would find in this valley, or that canyon, the tell-tale bits of grass and debris
clinging to the twigs of bushes and trees, speaking frankly of the level of the water the night before. For
however long a time, the water here had been six inches deep, Victor could see, and wonder to himself. Or two
feet. Or ten feet.
On clear mornings in the winter, when the two, perhaps hunting, would descend to the valley, it was like
walking into a pool of ice. Often the frost would glisten across entire pastures, fields of barley or alfalfa. Only
once in a while was there ever frost on the ridge.
"She's right about the mosquitoes, too," muttered Vikor to himself. There were never 'skeeters on the
ridge.
It seemed that Peňasquitos Valley was now a park. Vikor's feelings were mixed about that. He was glad to
reflect, as he continued to walk along the dirt road that was the trail, that this loveliness would survive, that
the industrial park would not continue to grow in that direction, nor would the march of homes fill the place
with a maze of streets and shopping centers and lights and law and order.
At the same time he felt remorse for what he sensed was a loss of the privacy that he and Ma had enjoyed,
which was itself different from that which the ranch family and hands had enjoyed.
Back then, it was seldom or never that any of the latter had even a glimpse of Diana and her wiry
offspring. To stay hidden was easy. The boy and his ma were so familiar with the hills and canyons of their
whole range that either could with considerable accuracy sense the locations of the various threats.
"Heinz is plowing for lima beans over east o' the straw barn," Ma could say.
"We best drift down the ridge for now," little Victor might rejoin. "Knebel's plowin' in Carmel Valley right
by the frog pond."
Or, "Them two guys from Peňasquitos be still clearin' brush over in the south canyon today," could work
into Diana's musing over Victor's suggestion that they go to the waterfall to bathe.
After leaving the waterfall, Vikor went up the trail to the north, which quickly put him on the ridge. He
noticed immediately that all of the other ridge tops in sight were covered with houses. The one on which he
stood, however, was still as he remembered it, with the long, meandering dirt road that ran for miles along its
twisty crest, the occasional small eucalyptus copse, and the vernal pools of water with the taste of the sky itself.
Here, he quickly figured out, the hand that held back the tide of urbanization was not the city park
commission, but rather the even mightier power company. This agency had devoted a swath of land to the path
of two columns, one a march of huge spruce poles with cross members that bore the mighty electron journey to
the consumer community. The newer column was a line of steel towers, higher than the poles, with bigger wires.
Between the waves of radiance surrounding these copper cables, and the pollution of air that touched the ponds'
surfaces, Vikor would not have been surprised to see mutant frogs in the area, hopping away from
metamorphosis with the happy innocence of grotesque, genetic jiggling.
Horrors be damned, the land still held a fragrant beauty that caught at the heart of the wandering
murderer. Everywhere he looked brought new memories. His own first deer kill…
| Whisker-flick death-wink My arrow cuts twilight And summer blood flows Warm and slender To cool in the night. |
| -Vikor, age fourteen |
He held his gaze on the spot where the young buck had disappeared with, he had no doubt, a broad head arrow
tearing at his life, draining him of blood and alert awareness, dragging him into weary collapse, somewhere just a
little further, in the brush, downhill, somewhere…
"We'll eat tonight!" came the merry voice of Ma. Victor looked over with pride. Ma was seated close to him in
the blind where the two had waited patiently for well over an hour before the deer came by. She returned the
pride with a smile. Her own bow, with an arrow nocked, lay across her lap as she sat cross-legged and comfortable.
Now they waited, waited for the deer to settle, to bleed, to perceive no pursuit, and so to relax the strain, to
stop the wild gallop that came like an urge when the pointed razors clipped with rude efficiency the arteries of his
lungs and heart.
Diana was not dressed in any white gown. The castoffs of civilization and her own experienced choice had her
in drab shades of green and brown. She was barefoot, and the brown of her feet and legs and shoulders and arms
that protruded from the worn smock were part of the soft blur of color that allowed her to disappear like a wild
animal into the infinite background of the chaparral.
tearing at his life, draining him of blood and alert awareness, dragging him into weary collapse, somewhere just a
little further, in the brush, downhill, somewhere…
"We'll eat tonight!" came the merry voice of Ma. Victor looked over with pride. Ma was seated close to him in
the blind where the two had waited patiently for well over an hour before the deer came by. She returned the
pride with a smile. Her own bow, with an arrow nocked, lay across her lap as she sat cross-legged and comfortable.
Now they waited, waited for the deer to settle, to bleed, to perceive no pursuit, and so to relax the strain, to
stop the wild gallop that came like an urge when the pointed razors clipped with rude efficiency the arteries of his
lungs and heart.
Diana was not dressed in any white gown. The castoffs of civilization and her own experienced choice had her
in drab shades of green and brown. She was barefoot, and the brown of her feet and legs and shoulders and arms
that protruded from the worn smock were part of the soft blur of color that allowed her to disappear like a wild
animal into the infinite background of the chaparral.
| * * * |
Johnny watched the sunrise from the top of Black Mountain. In time he descended, to become a ranch hand,
a sailor, a warrior and a friend.
Earth, water, air and fire.
On a morning in the future, a few years later, Johnny and Bob Cabler were watching the sunrise from the
same mountain top. They had spent the night, intending to sleep, but staying awake till daybreak with
conversation and shooting stars. In the inexpressible glory of the dawn, it had been Cabler who stood with legs
braced wide and arms stretched to the heavens, and who proclaimed in a booming voice, "I, Robert Charles
Cabler, claim this land as my own! Let any who would dare to oppose me come forth!"
And, of course, no one did, for no one heard him except the deer in the canyon below, the larks preparing to
herald the morning in their own sweet way, the wood rats heading home to bed in their mounds of brush, the
rabbits twitching in the dew, and Johnny Stream.
Just don't get in my way, my young friend, Stream had thought to himself, as he had watched the grandiose,
teenaged, would-be warlord trumpet his proclamation.
You don't even know what you're talking about, thought Johnny, looking at Bob's silhouette, like an eagle in
the first rays of the sunrise. Scenes of the war just past flashed in his mind, the chaos and the powerless
confusion.
Johnny didn't care who claimed to own what land. He hunted always on land claimed by hawks and squirrels
both, claimed by deer, claimed by blue jays, staked out by packs of coyotes, and again by the foxes and bobcats. If
some old fellow on a distant tractor also had declared his possession of this or that patch of fields and meadows, if
some tribe of gin-soaked whoopers had a treaty that said that this or that range of wilderness was theirs, or if
some city-bound family of spiteful snobs had a deed that made some ten acre square on a mountain side the
family fief, it was all the same to Johnny.
Let them make their deeds and plough their bean fields and dance their niggardly domination. So long as a
man could pitch a tent, could wet a hook, or could squint down a sight at a fur-clad hunk of meat, so long as a
man could saddle up and move along, could come or go, could share the work for a share of the bounty, or ride
free on the lazy, wild ridges, who cared who owned the land?
That first evening, as he watched the surrounding land until it sank into inky darkness, his gaze kept
returning to the west, to the placid, little kingdom of Carmel Valley. He felt the same, at twenty-one, as would
Cabler four years later, at seventeen.
He could have trumpeted his own dominant challenge of lordship. To what end he might do such a thing, he
had no idea, and, on his own, Johnny Stream was not so flamboyant as to express himself in such exuberance. His
heart soared like a hawk, but it was a quiet hawk, a hawk that would poise in the cloistered sky till such time as
it might swoop without sound or warning, to kill without boast or claim.
a sailor, a warrior and a friend.
Earth, water, air and fire.
On a morning in the future, a few years later, Johnny and Bob Cabler were watching the sunrise from the
same mountain top. They had spent the night, intending to sleep, but staying awake till daybreak with
conversation and shooting stars. In the inexpressible glory of the dawn, it had been Cabler who stood with legs
braced wide and arms stretched to the heavens, and who proclaimed in a booming voice, "I, Robert Charles
Cabler, claim this land as my own! Let any who would dare to oppose me come forth!"
And, of course, no one did, for no one heard him except the deer in the canyon below, the larks preparing to
herald the morning in their own sweet way, the wood rats heading home to bed in their mounds of brush, the
rabbits twitching in the dew, and Johnny Stream.
Just don't get in my way, my young friend, Stream had thought to himself, as he had watched the grandiose,
teenaged, would-be warlord trumpet his proclamation.
You don't even know what you're talking about, thought Johnny, looking at Bob's silhouette, like an eagle in
the first rays of the sunrise. Scenes of the war just past flashed in his mind, the chaos and the powerless
confusion.
Johnny didn't care who claimed to own what land. He hunted always on land claimed by hawks and squirrels
both, claimed by deer, claimed by blue jays, staked out by packs of coyotes, and again by the foxes and bobcats. If
some old fellow on a distant tractor also had declared his possession of this or that patch of fields and meadows, if
some tribe of gin-soaked whoopers had a treaty that said that this or that range of wilderness was theirs, or if
some city-bound family of spiteful snobs had a deed that made some ten acre square on a mountain side the
family fief, it was all the same to Johnny.
Let them make their deeds and plough their bean fields and dance their niggardly domination. So long as a
man could pitch a tent, could wet a hook, or could squint down a sight at a fur-clad hunk of meat, so long as a
man could saddle up and move along, could come or go, could share the work for a share of the bounty, or ride
free on the lazy, wild ridges, who cared who owned the land?
That first evening, as he watched the surrounding land until it sank into inky darkness, his gaze kept
returning to the west, to the placid, little kingdom of Carmel Valley. He felt the same, at twenty-one, as would
Cabler four years later, at seventeen.
He could have trumpeted his own dominant challenge of lordship. To what end he might do such a thing, he
had no idea, and, on his own, Johnny Stream was not so flamboyant as to express himself in such exuberance. His
heart soared like a hawk, but it was a quiet hawk, a hawk that would poise in the cloistered sky till such time as
it might swoop without sound or warning, to kill without boast or claim.
| * * * |
The day broadened into afternoon, then dwindled to nighttime. Again and again the pattern was repeated, and
the years flew past.
In a valley to the north a citrus grove cooled in the shadow of a western ridge. Beyond the ranks of orange
and lemon, was the river of early evening commuters, headlights and tail lamps, the sparkling, moving jewels of
the snake.
Some of the lights moved to the south, flowed to the south, powered by Antarctic gravity, over many hills,
past many lagoons, quiet in the near dark, hushed mud-hens.
South past cattle pastures. Roads that are two dirt tracks heading out the ridge.
Eucalyptus skylines. Tumbledown barbed wire fences, coils of red rust, tangles of tetanus, rotten, weathered
wood.
Miles of long summer grass, white moonlight, trailed south. Coyotes gathered in tentative packs, preluding
the deadly forages of autumn.
Canyons full of snakes. Serpents of emptiness, slithering canyons that prowl into California neighborhoods.
Patches of chaparral. Rattlesnakes, thirteen feet long. Big around as a man's leg. Dragons moving easily at many
levels through tangles of branches that you, dear reader, would find nearly impossible to move in at all.
Here a housewife finds the door open. Last week there was a snake on the walk. The baby cries. She shuts
the door.
Is old Red-eyes in or out?
Snakes.
And sex. The old house has its moments. The old boards creak. There are no screens on the windows; birds fly
in and out. The cat's in bed with them, and they are there fucking on the bedspread. There's cool breezes,
nakedness and nibble.
In the kitchen there's beans, still warm, tortillas, a pan of oil, still warm, onions, cheese, avocados. There's a
basket of fruit.
The baby sleeps. Now. She had been crying. Now there are birds singing outside. Mama's twenty-three and still
a girl, and the snake is under the rug.
Time passes. The girl, the woman, her hair is blonde, sorta curly, not too long. She has freckles. She goes into
the kitchen. She almost steps on the snake.
Then it changed. The cat sat up from where she lay half-wrapped in clawed sheets. She was tuning into a
different kind of trip. She might have been having hallucinations, the sound of a nest of kittens crying.
She sat up and pointed her ears. She looked. Her eyes sent an arrow of murder.
Down on the floor, a tongue out and in, he was concealed too well. Across the room already, he was into the
first spare folds of the big quilt on the floor. The same quilt covered the baby. She was still sleeping. There was a
soft noise. Baby's breath? Scales on cotton? The cat heard it.
She hopped to the floor. She was black fur, cat eyes, silent. Weightless, a needle in thread.
The woman came into the room. It was a noisy distraction. But this little game went on without a flicker. This
mammal, this reptile, hot blood and cold.
The woman had a burrito in her hand. She was cheerful. The snake moved a little. Cat very intense. The
woman flopped onto the bed. The man wanted some of the burrito in her hand. She smiled and laughed.
The snake was very close to the baby. The cat still hadn't seen it, but she was very, very curious.
It grew twilight. Outside there were dusky trees. Paths went off in different directions, through long dry grass
and powdered clay. There was no road. There was no car. It was miles to town.
A dry sunflower stood with its head bent over like an old woman. It swayed in the breeze. The air current
rippled along the board and batten sides of the old house. The cat reached the quilt.
The snake moved. A fold of calico trembled so slightly, an old red print, so close to the baby's foot.
The cat took a swipe at the tremble. She sunk her claws into the head of the rattler. He coiled up like a
contracting spring, a spiral muscle in electric tension. He rattled. The baby woke up and cried.
The young mother dropped the burrito and spun toward the baby. Immediately she fell off the bed onto her
knees. She screamed and reached for the baby, falling forward, stretched on the quilt. Under the cloth the snake
buzzed and slithered against her breasts.
She had the baby. "Johnny! Johnny!" she was screaming. Her voice was a pure southwest-tragedy drawl.
Johnny got her about the waist and heaved her away from cat and quilt. "It's a snake," he said. "Carol!"
Carol had the baby. Everyone was safe but the cat. She was inches from the snake, grinning her whiskers at
beady, hooded eyes. She was under the cover with him. The snake hissed horribly. Blood was on its head.
It struck at the cat. It missed. The cat was too fast.
"Johnny, do something!" The universal call to action. Don't do nothing, Johnny. Do something. Don't give the
serpent a chance to sink his fangs into poor Buffy's neck.
"Oh, Buffy," she whispered helplessly, one arm around the baby, the other fist pressed to her mouth. "Do
something!"
Buffy was enthralled with her new live toy. She batted rapidly at the darting triangular head, delighted with
the speed of her hot-blooded mammalian reflexes.
The fangs of the snake were distinct in the shadowy bedroom. They seemed to drip venom.
Carefully Johnny snatched the quilt away. The movement so thoroughly distracted Mr. Rattlesnake that
Buffy was able to pounce. She was instantly wrapped in live coils, but her teeth were sunk into the back of the
scaly neck. She clawed furiously at the sleazy noose. The rattling grew to a fierce pitch. Purple blood oozed from
between the cat's jaws, and from the long scratches.
"It's okay," said Johnny. "Buffy's got him." Indeed, the snake was in mortal distress. The coils were
weakening, patterned sides slashed to bloody ribbons. The rattle stopped; Buffy shook her head. Drops of blood,
flung in a wide arc, spattered the quilt and the wall. The snake rattled half-heartedly. Its mouth was gaping.
The baby laughed. Carol and Johnny looked at one another. They were naked. A few drops of the snake's blood
were on her shoulder and breast. One red droplet glistened near the corner of her mouth.
Outside the sun was down. Thin red streamers blended into the horizon.
The full moon rose. A coyote moon. A moon of sandstone and chaparral.
the years flew past.
In a valley to the north a citrus grove cooled in the shadow of a western ridge. Beyond the ranks of orange
and lemon, was the river of early evening commuters, headlights and tail lamps, the sparkling, moving jewels of
the snake.
Some of the lights moved to the south, flowed to the south, powered by Antarctic gravity, over many hills,
past many lagoons, quiet in the near dark, hushed mud-hens.
South past cattle pastures. Roads that are two dirt tracks heading out the ridge.
Eucalyptus skylines. Tumbledown barbed wire fences, coils of red rust, tangles of tetanus, rotten, weathered
wood.
Miles of long summer grass, white moonlight, trailed south. Coyotes gathered in tentative packs, preluding
the deadly forages of autumn.
Canyons full of snakes. Serpents of emptiness, slithering canyons that prowl into California neighborhoods.
Patches of chaparral. Rattlesnakes, thirteen feet long. Big around as a man's leg. Dragons moving easily at many
levels through tangles of branches that you, dear reader, would find nearly impossible to move in at all.
Here a housewife finds the door open. Last week there was a snake on the walk. The baby cries. She shuts
the door.
Is old Red-eyes in or out?
Snakes.
And sex. The old house has its moments. The old boards creak. There are no screens on the windows; birds fly
in and out. The cat's in bed with them, and they are there fucking on the bedspread. There's cool breezes,
nakedness and nibble.
In the kitchen there's beans, still warm, tortillas, a pan of oil, still warm, onions, cheese, avocados. There's a
basket of fruit.
The baby sleeps. Now. She had been crying. Now there are birds singing outside. Mama's twenty-three and still
a girl, and the snake is under the rug.
Time passes. The girl, the woman, her hair is blonde, sorta curly, not too long. She has freckles. She goes into
the kitchen. She almost steps on the snake.
Then it changed. The cat sat up from where she lay half-wrapped in clawed sheets. She was tuning into a
different kind of trip. She might have been having hallucinations, the sound of a nest of kittens crying.
She sat up and pointed her ears. She looked. Her eyes sent an arrow of murder.
Down on the floor, a tongue out and in, he was concealed too well. Across the room already, he was into the
first spare folds of the big quilt on the floor. The same quilt covered the baby. She was still sleeping. There was a
soft noise. Baby's breath? Scales on cotton? The cat heard it.
She hopped to the floor. She was black fur, cat eyes, silent. Weightless, a needle in thread.
The woman came into the room. It was a noisy distraction. But this little game went on without a flicker. This
mammal, this reptile, hot blood and cold.
The woman had a burrito in her hand. She was cheerful. The snake moved a little. Cat very intense. The
woman flopped onto the bed. The man wanted some of the burrito in her hand. She smiled and laughed.
The snake was very close to the baby. The cat still hadn't seen it, but she was very, very curious.
It grew twilight. Outside there were dusky trees. Paths went off in different directions, through long dry grass
and powdered clay. There was no road. There was no car. It was miles to town.
A dry sunflower stood with its head bent over like an old woman. It swayed in the breeze. The air current
rippled along the board and batten sides of the old house. The cat reached the quilt.
The snake moved. A fold of calico trembled so slightly, an old red print, so close to the baby's foot.
The cat took a swipe at the tremble. She sunk her claws into the head of the rattler. He coiled up like a
contracting spring, a spiral muscle in electric tension. He rattled. The baby woke up and cried.
The young mother dropped the burrito and spun toward the baby. Immediately she fell off the bed onto her
knees. She screamed and reached for the baby, falling forward, stretched on the quilt. Under the cloth the snake
buzzed and slithered against her breasts.
She had the baby. "Johnny! Johnny!" she was screaming. Her voice was a pure southwest-tragedy drawl.
Johnny got her about the waist and heaved her away from cat and quilt. "It's a snake," he said. "Carol!"
Carol had the baby. Everyone was safe but the cat. She was inches from the snake, grinning her whiskers at
beady, hooded eyes. She was under the cover with him. The snake hissed horribly. Blood was on its head.
It struck at the cat. It missed. The cat was too fast.
"Johnny, do something!" The universal call to action. Don't do nothing, Johnny. Do something. Don't give the
serpent a chance to sink his fangs into poor Buffy's neck.
"Oh, Buffy," she whispered helplessly, one arm around the baby, the other fist pressed to her mouth. "Do
something!"
Buffy was enthralled with her new live toy. She batted rapidly at the darting triangular head, delighted with
the speed of her hot-blooded mammalian reflexes.
The fangs of the snake were distinct in the shadowy bedroom. They seemed to drip venom.
Carefully Johnny snatched the quilt away. The movement so thoroughly distracted Mr. Rattlesnake that
Buffy was able to pounce. She was instantly wrapped in live coils, but her teeth were sunk into the back of the
scaly neck. She clawed furiously at the sleazy noose. The rattling grew to a fierce pitch. Purple blood oozed from
between the cat's jaws, and from the long scratches.
"It's okay," said Johnny. "Buffy's got him." Indeed, the snake was in mortal distress. The coils were
weakening, patterned sides slashed to bloody ribbons. The rattle stopped; Buffy shook her head. Drops of blood,
flung in a wide arc, spattered the quilt and the wall. The snake rattled half-heartedly. Its mouth was gaping.
The baby laughed. Carol and Johnny looked at one another. They were naked. A few drops of the snake's blood
were on her shoulder and breast. One red droplet glistened near the corner of her mouth.
Outside the sun was down. Thin red streamers blended into the horizon.
The full moon rose. A coyote moon. A moon of sandstone and chaparral.
