The Animal-Lover's Book of Beastly Murder (6 page)

“
Ssss-st!
Damn you!” the man said in a whisper. He stamped his foot, not very hard, to make the cat go away.

Ming did not move at all. Ming heard the soft rattle of the white necklace which belonged to his mistress. The man put it into his pocket, then moved to Ming’s right, out of the door that went into the big living room. Ming now heard the clink of a bottle against glass, heard liquid being poured. Ming went through the same door and turned left towards the kitchen.

Here he meowed, and was greeted by Elaine and Concha. Concha had her radio turned on to music.

“Fish?—Pork. He likes pork,” Elaine said, speaking the odd form of words which she used with Concha.

Ming, without much difficulty, conveyed his preference for pork, and got it. He fell to with a good appetite. Concha was exclaiming “Ah-eee-ee!” as his mistress spoke with her, spoke at length. Then Concha bent to stroke him, and Ming put up with it, still looking down at his plate, until she left off and he could finish his meal. Then Elaine left the kitchen. Concha gave him some of the tinned milk, which he loved, in his now empty saucer, and Ming lapped this up. Then he rubbed himself against her bare leg by way of thanks, and went out of the kitchen, made his way cautiously into the living room en route to the bedroom. But now Elaine and the man were out on the terrace. Ming had just entered the bedroom, when he heard Elaine call:

“Ming? Where are you?”

Ming went to the terrace door and stopped, and sat on the threshold.

Elaine was sitting sideways at the end of the table, and the candlelight was bright on her long fair hair, on the white of her trousers. She slapped her thigh, and Ming jumped on to her lap.

The man said something in a low tone, something not nice.

Elaine replied something in the same tone. But she laughed a little.

Then the telephone rang.

Elaine put Ming down, and went into the living room towards the telephone.

The man finished what was in his glass, muttered something at Ming, then set the glass on the table. He got up and tried to circle Ming, or to get him towards the edge of the terrace, Ming realized, and Ming also realized that the man was drunk—therefore moving slowly and a little clumsily. The terrace had a parapet about as high as the man’s hips, but it was broken by grills in three places, grills with bars wide enough for Ming to pass through, though Ming never did, merely looked through the grills sometimes. It was plain to Ming that the man wanted to drive him through one of the grills, or grab him and toss him over the terrace parapet. There was nothing easier for Ming than to elude him. Then the man picked up a chair and swung it suddenly, catching Ming on the hip. That had been quick, and it hurt. Ming took the nearest exit, which was down the outside steps that led to the garden.

The man started down the steps after him. Without reflecting, Ming dashed back up the few steps he had come, keeping close to the wall which was in shadow. The man hadn’t seen him, Ming knew. Ming leapt to the terrace parapet, sat down and licked a paw once to recover and collect himself. His heart beat fast as if he were in the middle of a fight. And hatred ran in his veins. Hatred burned his eyes as he crouched and listened to the man uncertainly climbing the steps below him. The man came into view.

Ming tensed himself for a jump, then jumped as hard as he could, landing with all four feet on the man’s right arm near the shoulder. Ming clung to the cloth of the man’s white jacket, but they were both falling. The man groaned. Ming hung on. Branches crackled. Ming could not tell up from down. Ming jumped off the man, became aware of direction and of the earth too late, and landed on his side. Almost at the same time, he heard the thud of the man hitting the ground, then of his body rolling a little way, then there was silence. Ming had to breathe fast with his mouth open until his chest stopped hurting. From the direction of the man, he could smell drink, cigar, and the sharp odor that meant fear. But the man was not moving.

Ming could now see quite well. There was even a bit of moonlight. Ming headed for the steps again, had to go a long way through the bush, over stones and sand, to where the steps began. Then he glided up and arrived once more upon the terrace.

Elaine was just coming on to the terrace.

“Teddie?” she called. Then she went back into the bedroom where she turned on a lamp. She went into the kitchen. Ming followed her. Concha had left the light on, but Concha was now in her own room, where the radio played.

Elaine opened the front door.

The man’s car was still in the driveway, Ming saw. Now Ming’s hip had begun to hurt, or now he had begun to notice it. It caused him to limp a little. Elaine noticed this, touched his back, and asked him what was the matter. Ming only purred.

“Teddie?—Where are you?” Elaine called.

She took a torch and shone it down into the garden, down among the great trunks of the avocado trees, among the orchids and the lavender and pink blossoms of the bougainvilleas. Ming, safe beside her on the terrace parapet, followed the beam of the torch with his eyes and purred with content. The man was not below here, but below and to the right. Elaine went to the terrace steps and carefully, because there was no rail here, only broad steps, pointed the beam of the light downward. Ming did not bother looking. He sat on the terrace where the steps began.

“Teddie!” she said. “
Teddie
!” Then she ran down the steps.

Ming still did not follow her. He heard her draw in her breath. Then she cried:

“
Concha
!”

Elaine ran back up the steps.

Concha had come out of her room. Elaine spoke to Concha. Then Concha became excited. Elaine went to the telephone, and spoke for a short while, then she and Concha went down the steps together. Ming settled himself with his paws tucked under him on the terrace, which was still faintly warm from the day’s sun. A car arrived. Elaine came up the steps, and went and opened the front door. Ming kept out of the way on the terrace, in a shadowy corner, as three or four strange men came out on the terrace and tramped down the steps. There was a great deal of talk below, noises of feet, breaking of bushes, and then the smell of all of them mounted the steps, the smell of tobacco, sweat, and the familiar smell of blood. The man’s blood. Ming was pleased, as he was pleased when he killed a bird and created this smell of blood under his own teeth. This was big prey. Ming, unnoticed by any of the others, stood up to his full height as the group passed with the corpse, and inhaled the aroma of his victory with a lifted nose.

Then suddenly the house was empty. Everyone had gone, even Concha. Ming drank a little water from his bowl in the kitchen, then went to his mistress’s bed, curled against the slope of the pillows, and fell fast asleep. He was awakened by the
rr-rr-r
of an unfamiliar car. Then the front door opened, and he recognized the step of Elaine and then Concha. Ming stayed where he was. Elaine and Concha talked softly for a few minutes. Then Elaine came into the bedroom. The lamp was still on. Ming watched her slowly open the box on her dressing table, and into it she let fall the white necklace that made a little clatter. Then she closed the box. She began to unbutton her shirt, but before she had finished, she flung herself on the bed and stroked Ming’s head, lifted his left paw and pressed it gently so that the claws came forth.

“Oh, Ming—Ming,” she said.

Ming recognized the tones of love.

In the Dead of
Truffle Season

S
amson, a large white pig in the prime of life, lived on a rambling old farm in the Lot region, not far from the grand old town of Cahors. Among the fifteen or so other pigs on the farm was Samson’s mother Georgia (so named because of a song the farmer Emile had heard once on the television) but not Samson’s grandmother, who had been hauled away, kicking and squealing, about a year ago, and not Samson’s father, who lived many kilometers away and arrived on a pick-up car a few times a year for brief visits. There were also countless piglets, some from Samson’s mother, some not, through whom Samson disdainfully waded, if they were between him and a feed trough. Samson never bothered shoving even the adult pigs, in fact, because he was so big himself, he had merely to advance and his way was clear.

His white coat, somewhat thin and bristly on his sides, grew fine and silky on the back of his neck. Emile often squeezed Samson’s neck with his rough fingers when boasting about Samson to another farmer, then he would kick Samson gently in his larded ribs. Usually Samson’s back and sides bore a grey crust of sun-dried mud, because he loved to roll in the mud of the unpaved farmyard court and in the thicker mud of the pig pen by the barn. Cool mud was pleasant in the southern summer, when the sun came boiling down for weeks on end, making the pig pen and the courtyard steam. Samson had seen two summers.

The greatest season of the year for Samson was the dead of winter, when he came into his own as truffle-hunter. Emile and often his friend René, another farmer who sometimes took a pig, sometimes a dog with him, would stroll out with Samson on a rope lead of a Sunday morning, and walk for nearly two kilometers to where some oak trees grew in a small forest.

“
Vas-y
!” Emile would say as they entered the forest’s edge, speaking however in the dialect of the region.

Samson, perhaps a bit fatigued or annoyed by the long promenade, would take his time, even if he did happen to smell truffles at once at the base of a tree. An old belt of Emile’s served as his collar, very little of its end hanging, so big was Samson’s neck, and Samson could easily tug Emile in any direction he chose.

Emile would laugh in anticipation, and say something cheery to René, or to himself if he were alone, then pull from a pocket of his jacket the bottle of Armagnac he took along to keep the cold out.

The main reason Samson took his time about disclosing any truffles was that he never got to eat any. He did get a morsel of cheese as a reward, if he indicated a truffle spot, but cheese was not truffles, and Samson vaguely resented this.

“Huh-
wan-nk
!” said Samson, meaning absolutely nothing by it, wasting time as he sniffed at the foot of a tree which was not an appropriate tree in the first place.

Emile knew this, and gave Samson a kick, then blew on his free hand: his woolen gloves were full of holes, and it was a damned freezing day. He threw down his Gauloise, and pulled the collar of his turtleneck sweater up over his mouth and nose.

Then Samson’s nostrils filled with the delicate, rare aroma of black truffles, and he paused, snorting. The hairs on his back rose a little with excitement. His feet of their own accord stomped, braced themselves, and his flat nose began to root at the ground. He drooled.

Emile was already tugging at the pig. He looped the rope a few times around a tree some distance away, then attacked the spot cautiously with the fork he had been carrying.

“Ah! A-hah!” There they were, a cluster of crinkly black fungus as wide as his hand. Emile put the truffles gently into the cloth knapsack that was swung over his shoulder. Such truffles were worth a hundred and thirty new francs the
livre
in Cahors on the big market days, which were every other Saturday, and Emile got just a trifle less where he usually sold them, at a Cahors delicacy shop which in turn sold the truffles to a pâté manufacturer called Compagnie de la Reine d’Aquitaine. Emile could have got a bit more by selling direct to La Reine d’Aquitaine, but their plant was the other side of Cahors, making the trip more expensive because of the cost of petrol. Cahors, where Emile went every fortnight to buy animal feed and perhaps a tool replacement, was only ten kilometers from his home.

Emile found with his fingers a bit of gruyère in his knapsack, and approached Samson with it. He tossed it on the ground in front of Samson, remembering Samson’s teeth.

“
Us-ssh
!” Samson inhaled the cheese like a vacuum cleaner. He was ready for the next tree. The smell of truffles in the knapsack inspired him.

They found two more good spots that morning, before Emile decided to call it a day. They were hardly a kilometer from the Café de la Chasse, on the edge of Emile’s home town Cassouac, and the bar-café was on the way home. Emile stomped his feet a few times as he walked, and tugged at Samson impatiently.

“Hey, fatso! Samson!—Get a move on! Of course you’re not in a hurry with all that lard on you!” Emile kicked Samson on a back leg.

Samson pretended indifference, but condescended to trot for a few steps before he lapsed into his oddly dainty, I’ll-take-my-time gait. Why should he hurry, why should he do everything to suit Emile? Also Samson knew where they were heading, knew he’d have a long wait outside in the cold while Emile drank and talked with his friends. There was the café in view now, with a few dogs tied up outside it. Samson’s blood began to course a little faster. He could hold his own with a dog, and enjoyed doing so. Dogs thought they were so clever, so superior, but one lunge from Samson and they flinched and drew back as far as their leads permitted.

“Bonjour, Pierre! . . . Ha-ha-ha!” Emile had encountered the first of his cronies outside the café.

Pierre was tying up his dog, and had made some risible remark about Emile’s
chien de race
.

“Never mind, I’ve got nearly a
livre
of truffles today!” Emile countered, exaggerating.

The barks of more dogs sounded as Emile and Pierre went into the small café. Dogs were allowed in, but some dogs who might snarl at the others were always tied outside.

One dog nipped playfully at Samson’s tail, and Samson turned and charged in a leisurely way, not going far enough to make his rope taut, but the dog rolled over in his effort to escape. All three dogs barked, and to Samson it sounded derogatory—towards him. Samson regarded the dogs with a sullen and calm antipathy. Only his pinkish little eyes were quick, taking in all the dogs, daring them or any one of them to advance. The dogs smiled uneasily. At last Samson collapsed by leaning back and letting his legs fold under him. He was in the sun and comfortable enough despite the cold air. But he was hungry again, therefore a bit annoyed.

Emile had found René in the café, drinking pastis at the bar. Emile meant to linger until there was just time to walk home and not annoy his wife Ursule, who liked Sunday dinner to start not later than a quarter past noon.

René wore high rubber boots. He’d been cleaning a drain of his cowbarn, he said. He talked about the truffle-hunting contest that was to take place in two weeks. Emile had not heard of it.

“Look!” said René, pointing to a printed notice at the right of the door. La Compagnie de la Reine d’Aquitaine offered a first prize of a cuckoo clock plus a hundred francs, a second prize of a transistor radio (one couldn’t tell the size from the picture), a third prize of fifty francs to the finders of the most truffles on Sunday, January 27. Judges’ decisions to be final. Local newspaper and television coverage was promised, and the town of Cassouac was to be the judges’ base.

“I’m giving Lunache a rest this Sunday, maybe next too,” René said. “That way she’ll have time to work up a truffle appetite.”

Lunache was René’s best truffling pig, a black and white female. Emile smiled a little slyly at his friend, as if to say, “You know very well Samson’s better than Lunache!” Emile said, “That should be amusing. Let’s hope it’s not raining.”

“Or snowing! Another pastis? I invite you.” René put some money on the counter.

Emile glanced at the clock on the wall and accepted.

When he went out ten minutes later, he saw that Samson had chased the three tied-up dogs to the extremity of their leads, and was pretending to strain at his rope—a sturdy rope, but Samson might have been able to break it with a good tug. Emile felt rather proud of Samson.

“This monster! He needs a muzzle!” said a youngish man in muddy riding boots, a man Emile didn’t recognize. He was patting one of the dogs in a reassuring way.

Emile was ready to return a spate of argument: hadn’t the dog been annoying the pig first? But it crossed his mind that the young man might be a representative of La Reine d’Aquitaine come to look the scene over. Silence and a polite nod was best, Emile thought. Was one of the dogs bleeding a little on the hind leg? Emile didn’t tarry to look more closely. He untied Samson and ambled off. After all, Emile was thinking, he’d had Samson’s lower tusks sawed off three or four months ago. The tusks had started to grow higher than his snout. His upper tusks were still with him, but they were less dangerous because they curved inward.

Samson, in a vaguer though angrier way, was also thinking about his teeth at that moment. If he hadn’t been mysteriously deprived of his rightful lower tusks long ago, he could have torn that dog up. One upward sweep of his nose under the dog’s belly, which in fact Samson had given . . . Samson’s breath steamed in the air. His four-toed feet, only the two middle toes on each foot touching the ground, bore him along as if his great bulk were light as a white balloon. Now Samson was leading like a thoroughbred dog straining at the leash.

Emile, knowing Samson was angry, gave him serious and firm tugs. Emile’s hand hurt, his arms were growing tired, and as soon as they neared the open gate of the farm’s court, Emile gladly released the rope. Samson went trotting directly towards the pig pen where the food was. Emile opened the low gate for him, followed Samson’s galloping figure, and unbuckled the belt collar while Samson guzzled potato peelings.

“
Oink!
—Oink-oink!”

“Whuff-f!”

“
Hwon-nk!
”

The other pigs and piglets fell back from Samson.

Emile went into the kitchen. His wife was just setting a big platter of cold diced beets and carrots, sliced tomatoes and onions in the center of the table. Emile gave a greeting which included Ursule, their son Henri and his wife Yvonne and their little one Jean-Paul. Henri helped a bit on the farm, though he was a full-time worker in a Cahors factory that made Formica sheets. Henri was not fond of farm work. But it was cheaper for him and his family to live here than to take an apartment or buy a house just now.

“Good truffling?” asked Henri, with a glance at the sack.

Emile was just emptying the contents of the sack into a pan of cold water in the sink. “Not bad,” said Emile.

“Eat, Emile,” said Ursule. “I’ll wash them later.”

Emile sat down and began eating. He started to tell them about the truffle-hunting contest, then decided it might be bad luck to mention it. There were still two weeks in which to mention it, if he felt like it. Emile was imagining the cuckoo clock fixed on the wall in front of him, striking about now the quarter hour past twelve. And he would say a few words on the television (if it was true that there’d be television), and he’d have his picture in the local newspaper.

The main reason Emile did not take Samson truffling the following weekend was that he did not want to diminish the amount of truffles in that particular forest. This forest was known as “the-little-forest-down-the-slope” and was owned by an old man who didn’t even live on his land any more but in a nearby town. The old man had never objected to truffle-hunting on his land, nor had the current caretakers who lived in the farmhouse nearly a kilometer away from the forest.

So Samson had a leisurely fortnight of eating and of sleeping in the scoop of hard-packed hay in the pig shed, which was a lean-to against the main barn.

On the big day, January 27, Emile shaved. Then he made his way to the Café de la Chasse in his village, the meeting point. Here were René and eight or ten other men, all of whom Emile knew and nodded a greeting to. There were also a few boys and girls of the village come to watch. They were all laughing, smoking, pretending it was a silly game, but Emile knew that inside each man with a truffle-dog or truffle-pig was a determination to win first prize, and if not first then second. Samson showed a desire to attack Georges’s dog Gaspar, and Emile had to tug at him and kick him. Just as Emile had suspected, the young man of two weeks ago, again in the riding boots, was master of ceremonies. He put on a smile, and spoke to the group from the front steps of the café.

“Gentlemen of Cassouac!” he began, then proceeded to announce the terms of the contest sponsored by La Reine d’Aquitaine, manufacturers of the best
pâté aux truffes
in all France.

“Where’s the television?” a man asked, more to raise a laugh from his chums than to get an answer.

The young man laughed too. “It’ll be here when we all come back—a special crew from Toulouse—around eleven-thirty. I know all of you want to get home soon after noon so as not to annoy your wives!”

More good-natured “Ha-ha’s!” It was a frosty day, sharpening everyone’s edge.

“Just for formality,” said the young man in riding boots, “I’ll take a look in your sacks to see that all’s correct.” He stepped down and did so, and every man showed a clean bag or sack except for apples and bits of cheese or meat which were to be rewards for their animals.

One of the onlookers made a side bet: dogs against pigs. He had managed to find a pig man.

Final
petits rouges
were downed, then they were off, straggling with dogs and pigs down the unpaved road, fanning off into favorite fields, towards cherished trees. Emile and Samson, who was full of honks and oinks this morning, made for the-little-forest-down-the-slope. He was not the only man to do so: François with his black pig was going there too.