It was his color that got him in trouble. Or, maybe it was his color that
saved him. Either way, the warm tones of his body were beautiful and his
eyes-dark, glistening with a force of their own-missed nothing.
His belly, hard now from running through the woods and scrambling up deer
trails in the mountains, ruled him. If he could make it to the grass field
before dawn, he would find the cottontail or maybe a pheasant for which these
Lebanon County game lands were known. It had been too long since his last meal.
It had been days, and the relentless November chill stiffened his heart. He
pressed on.
It hadn't always been this way. Growing up, he had never lacked for
attention, never felt a hunger screaming loud enough to echo off the clouds or
loneliness clinging to his soul. Back then, it never occurred to him that all of
his instincts might sharpen like the claws of a falcon and he could survive
without knowing what might happen next. How could he know his life was about to
shift in a way even the most seasoned visionary couldn't predict?
Reaching the clearing, one of many small meadows on the mountain, he
hesitated. It looked the same, bordered on one side with stumps and branches left
to rot by savage loggers in their butchery. It looked the same as much of the
mountain now: bleak and wounded. A red fox, oblivious to him in the gray dawn,
was searching a carpet of moss for fallen acorns, a delicacy of the chipmunks
that she knew would soon awake. Forgiving his presence in the way of kindred
spirits living by their wits, the fox understood that he meant her no harm. Not
now; not today.
At the piercing scream of a hawk, the fox looked up, considered her
prospects and scampered away. Squirrels, high in the trees, held their breath,
praying their frosty colors would make them invisible. A rabbit had broken from the
tall grass and was sprinting for safety. The hawk lifted into the air,
circled and dropped. From the edge of the field a mass of muscle and power lunged
from its hiding place, cleared a fallen branch with the grace of a deer and
raced forward.
**********
Mark Whittier parked his truck in the lot off Speedwell Forge Road,
grabbed his lunch bag, the latest issue of SportsAnimated and set out for a hike.
It was a flannel shirt, jeans and LL Bean kind of day. Striding easily, a
man comfortable in his skin, he was going to enjoy his hike in the woods.
Bright sun, playing through the remaining leaves on almost-naked branches of
towering oak and lower sycamore, dappled his hair with light, changing it from
brown to russet to gold and back to brown with every step. His five-eleven frame,
trim from an outdoor lifestyle, allowed him to ascend the rugged path with
little trouble.
Time to himself on the Snowmobile Trail was a pleasure he looked forward
to, especially in the early morning hours. The rustle of leaves as a squirrel
chittered away, the burst of a startled deer, the eerie call of a wild turkey
were like the intimacies of a woman getting out of bed, making coffee and
gathering her clothes for the new day. She moved freely, as if no one were
watching; and he let every sound wash over him, savoring the natural conversation of
the mountain whispering, "Sweet lover. You make my day begin."
At times like this, he often thought about an Indian yogi master he had
known, a great teacher promising the secret of all eternity.
"Tell me," the swami once asked: "What is it you seek?"
"The truth," Mark answered. "Just the truth."
"Truth is like a beautiful stone," the teacher in his white linen robes
explained, holding an emerald up to a nearby window and pointing to its many
facets. "Truth is different things to different people." He turned the gem in his
hand until they found themselves standing within an aura of refracted prism
light.
It had been a long time since Mark had thought of the swami and his
guidance in the endless search for answers to life's mysteries.
Why today?
Avoiding deep, ugly scars inflicted on the ground by heavy-duty logging
equipment and bulldozers, Mark wondered where the cheerful horse riders he used
to see on the trail had gone. Leather saddles polished to a deep luster and
their faces bright, he could still hear jokes and laughter as they trotted their
horses up and down the slopes, training for races at Delaware Park or Penn
National. Powerful Thoroughbreds, Arabians, Standardbreds and Quarterhorses.
These trails had made many a champion for the small stables nearby. But the
good-natured laughter of riders filled the air no more.
Where had they gone? They had gone away; vanished. They had disappeared
like clouds evaporating in the morning sun.
This was the time to be here, he thought: when you could see and smell and
hear what others almost never could. He wondered if loggers could notice the
way a leaf fell more slowly through air thickened by humidity, or if they knew
that by touching a rock, they could almost tell the time of day. But people
rarely noticed such things.
**********
Not looking right, not looking left, the dog ran. He ran like there never
was, never had been, never could be anything more important than what he saw
right then, right there, in front of him. The bird had found its prey. If he
could beat the hawk to the prize . . . the power of his ancestors welling up
inside him taking over as they had so often before during this exile from all that
he once knew, this exile he never wanted, soon he would feast.
It was the savage law of the mountain. It was the dance of survival. Life
was born only to be taken away, and he would risk anything, even the swords of
a hawk whetted on flesh and bone-slashing his chest, ripping his neck, his
face-as the crazed bird struggled to escape. Shredding the air with war cries,
they battled. Smashing into rocks, grinding into the dirt, bursting the grass
in a tangle of flapping wings and hatred, the hawk punished his attacker. How
dare this intruder challenge him! How dare he!
Blinded by his own blood, desperate, insulted by the unearthly pitch of
vile, avian curses, he found the crazed bird's sinewy wing. Gripping it like he
would never let go, shaking the bird as if to rattle the senses out of him, he
fought on as the hawk slapped and stabbed this new enemy with weapons that
had never failed him before.
Their cries of agony echoed through the mountain. They fought like this
until the creatures of the trees and the shadows cringed. Had the mountain
finally had enough? Was she screaming out to some force greater than they knew, a
force sensed on some deep, almost forgotten level?
The mountain wailed. The mountain shuddered. As the claws of a dying hawk
relinquished its prey, a rabbit would live to tell its grandchildren and ran
for cover.
**********
Mark froze. How did he know; how could he be so sure it was the hawk, the
one keeping watch? The one protecting its domain, staring at the world from
its shaggy throne high in an oak tree that had defied all comers for a hundred
years. He stepped up his pace.
What was happening? What dreadful fate had the hawk suddenly encountered?
What do any of us know about what's ahead, he wondered. What does a wild
creature know of its destiny from one day, one minute, to the next? We are all wild
creatures, he decided, running now—running like a man who doesn't know if
he's running away from life or running towards it. Why was he so shaken? Why was
his skin prickling? Why was the hawk so important to him?
He didn't know. He couldn't explain it. How could anyone explain to
citified friends or a crew of loggers that a hawk was something more than what it
appeared to be? This wasn't a mass of cells with no meaning. It was wisdom; it
was keen eyes through which the spirits of all who had gone before and those
yet to enter these realms could see. It was confidence so strong that tree after
tree crashing to the ground could not ruffle even one feather.
"Look at us!" the loggers seemed to holler. "We're big! We're strong! We
can tear the world apart!"
But, the great hawk, seasoned by many winters, had not been frightened.
Studying them as if aware of each man's soul, looking through them to what lay
beyond, the winged keeper of the forest remained aloof. Dreadful as it was, he
seemed to say, this would pass. But, not all things could be overcome, as the
hawk's primal shriek of disbelief-stabbing the hearts of all who could think,
imagine or feel-now testified.
Rushing to where he had so often seen the hawk circling on early mornings
such as this, Mark sensed an eerie, slow-motion stickiness in the air. It was
a dream, he hoped. Please say it's a dream, a frustrating nightmare. You can't
run. You can't breathe. You can't scream. Where were the chickadees and
cardinals, always dashing from branch to branch, scolding all who pass by for
offenses only they could imagine? Where were the squirrels, missing nothing in
their daily gossip? Where are they? Where were they when the king was battling
for his life? Running to save their own, came the answer he already knew as a
glimpse of tawny red-brown caught his eye. A startled deer?
Crouching down, Mark studied clues of the drama to which no one had been
invited, clues illuminating the truth for those who searched or wanted to
understand.
Touching a delicate, bloodied feather clinging desperately to a blade of
tall, brittle grass, he asked himself, What had gone wrong for this hunter, so
sure, so brilliant? Surely the monarch of the skies could select his prey more
carefully than this. Going after a deer? Not likely that the hawk would be so
crazed.
Slippery blood on his fingers, Mark considered the eternal struggle
between one ruler and the next, so deeply buried in us that no living thing on this
earth or in its heavens could escape its grip on the psyche. Have or have not,
he thought, knowing he had long ago decided to be one of the Haves. Rule or
be ruled, he thought, bracing himself.
Yet, no matter what Mark decided, no matter what he wanted to learn, to
have, to discover, part of him, part of his life—his world—was being ripped away
now.
Stop, murderer!
Catch him, somebody!
Let flittering chickadees and cardinals hide if they must. Let squirrels
chatter mindlessly until there was nothing left for them to chatter about. The
hawk . . . his hawk . . . was gone, and with it the spirit of the mountain.
What desperation would drive an animal to attack a fierce bird like this?
Cougars, bears and wolves hadn't been seen in this part of Pennsylvania for many
years. Game had been plentiful, and no animal he could think of would hunt a bird
of prey. No animal in its right mind, he thought suddenly, remembering
interviews with biology experts and wildlife officials in SportsAnimated, the only
magazine that covered it. "College Experiment Goes Jurassic" was the
headline.
Even now, it jumped out at him. The genetic experiment at a noted school
of veterinary medicine sabotaged by militant animal rights activists. An entire
breeding colony of crossbred coyotes and domesticated dogs released into the
wild—excited not only by the scent of blood, the scent of fear and weakness,
but by the very thrill and challenge of killing.
Within days, their howls could be heard fifty miles away from the
laboratory where they had been created. Stunned and anguished families found pet dogs
lying in pools of their own blood, their last cries of warning slashed from
their throats; flocks of sheep slaughtered and left to die; ducks, geese,
chickens and peacocks mangled and scattered like so many feathers in a pillow fight.
From a veterinary school hundreds of miles to the north, "coy-dogs" had been
spotted in Perry County and Hazleton. He must turn back.
He must—but how could he?
Like an arrow bearing a golden chord, the shivering, hollow cry of the
dying hawk pierced his heart. Away from coy-dogs it pulled him, away from sterile
laboratories and god-like scientists taking the fragile balance of nature
into their own hands, twisting it into what they wanted it to be. Nature wasn't
always what we wanted it to be. Nature was the king of the mountain being
yanked from its throne and crushed to the dirt. Nature was the mystery of the
killer and the raging insanity of the unpredictable.
**********
Had he been seen?
Trembling with each stride, running from the forces the bird had conjured
in its last tremors of consciousness, he ran like he couldn't get away from
the scene of their battle fast enough . . . could never find what he was looking
for . . . no longer knew what he was looking for. And hadn't for a long time.
At first, he had been afraid. The sounds at night pulsing around him,
through him, saying we are here we are here we are here . . . darkness so thick
he could fall into it . . . when will it go away? I can't see; I'm so alone.
Fitful sleep . . . waking to the glow of light over the tree tops . . . I
am back, the light assured him; I will warm you. I will stay long enough for
you to find water, long enough for you to know they will not catch you. I will
stay for a while. For a while.
It had been this way for so long that he expected nothing else. He learned
to hunt and to hide until he knew every stream, every path, every rock. As
only the hunter can know. He knew the chant of the locusts and tree frogs would
swell to deafening pitch in the darkness and be quieted by the light if he
waited . . . if only he waited long enough. He knew these things. He knew them
from an understanding born in him, waiting for him to call. He called on it
now.
What's wrong? What's wrong with me?
His legs—legs that had, until now, transported him like the wings of an
angel—were rubbery cables pulling him to the ground, refusing to obey his
command. The hawk's cry had filled the air and penetrated the earth . . . calling
upon the gods of the wind and sky. Surely they would come; surely they would
find the taker of the king and destroy him. He would face them. He would defy
them to take back the flesh that would sustain him for another day. He was king
now. He was king, even as he fell to the ground not knowing if he would ever
raise himself up again.
Cool dirt. . . .
Cool dirt against his face, his chest, his belly.
Lying there . . . holding on . . . holding on to the smell of the earth,
the leaves . . . the world spinning-spinning round and round and round. . . .
What's happening!
What's happening to me!
Where did they go? How did I get here? I don't belong here—I don't belong!
Darkness . . . go away! I can't see. . . .
Alone . . . too alone to hear the unnatural snap of a twig crushed into
the dried leaves as a man approached and the new king of the mountain was alone
no more.
Skin prickling, gut twisting, Mark pushed aside low-hanging tree branches
and made his way into the dense thicket. Not a sound reached him now; not a
flicker of ebbing life or the crunch of bones. Trying to shake off the feeling
of eyes watching him-his face? his back?—he followed the evidence of a crime
scene beyond the jurisdiction of any court of human law. To the hush of bright
crimson blood dripping from the shriveled leaves of tiny saplings and poison
ivy, he read familiar footprints pressed into the sandy soil. Distinctive in
their shape, and missing a toe, he had first seen such prints on the mountain in
early spring, before the tough grass and low foliage grew thick enough to
cover them. Curiosity aroused, he searched for signs of life. A lone killer could
be very shadowy. Was there more than one? Tightening his grip on the walking
stick he always used, Mark stepped forward-and quickly pulled back!
Less than three feet away-directly in his path and dripping with
blood—there appeared to be a large, tawny animal staring directly, quietly, intently at
him. Cougar? Coyote? Not a sound came from its throat as it lay there, jaws
gripping the dead hawk, inhaling the bird's departing spirit in the innate and
desperate struggle for survival.
Slowly, calling upon every muscle, Mark held the killer's gaze and
crouched to the ground, balancing himself on his walking stick. "Easy there," he
managed to say, on guard for any sign of mistrust from what he recognized now as a
wild dog. "Whatcha got there, fella?"
At the sound of Mark's voice, the dog seemed to quiver, chattering its
teeth together almost as if to emulate human speech. Lowering its head, the dog
closed its eyes; though whether it was bowing to human attention or overcome
with weakness from the gaping slashes on its throat, chest and side, Mark
couldn't tell.
"I'm not a vet," Mark told the dog, moving closer. "And it sure looks like
you need one," he said, knowing without his help the unusual dog would die
right there, right now, in front of him.
And then he heard it: thump, thump, thump.
In the way of its kind before, since and forever, with a flicker of
movement in the grass, the dog was accepting him. Trusting him.
In what could have been his last gesture on this Earth, the dog was
wagging his long, skinny tail. This was no coy-dog, no experiment gone haywire at
the hands of people claiming to love animals while interfering with nature just
as much as scientists, themselves, had done. This was a dog. A dog down on his
luck. A dog asking for help in the only way it could.
Stripping off his shirt, revealing a well-defined chest and strong arms
still tan from summers at the shore, Mark eased forward and covered the shaking
animal. How could he stop the bleeding? He couldn't—but he knew of a stream
half-way down the hill. If he could reach it in time, the cold water of the
stream would be enough to slow down the bleeding—if he could get there . . . if
he could lift the dog . . . if the dog would allow itself to be touched. Could
he carry what he guessed was about seventy sprawling pounds all the way down
the mountain to his truck?
Hold on, boy! he thought to the dog, mentally commanding him not to quit,
not to give up, offering his own energy to the fading life force of the
gallant animal. He was gallant, this dog. In his presence, even now, clinging to the
most fragile vestige of life, Mark sensed the power within. Pushing his arms
under the dog's side, the animal's sharp yelp surprised him. Instinctively, as
if pricked by a needle, he pulled back.
"Don't do that again!" Mark whispered hoarsely, fighting to regain his
balance. "I almost dropped you."
Rolling the dog on its back now and cradling him like a newborn baby, Mark
stood. The dog wasn't as heavy as he had imagined, but already Mark's skin
was itching just from the sight of wart-like ticks and the grainy black dirt of
fleas.
Forget about it, he told himself as he began running and the fading dog's
head drooped and flopped against his waist.
A dog with fleas is still alive.
HOME
