O Clever Wolf Am I
By Enita Meadows
Published by Enita Meadows at Smashwords
Copyright 2012 Enita Meadows
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O Clever Wolf Am I
Enita Meadows
Long ago, there was a wolf, a wolf whose story begins on a gray and rainy day. It’s on these rainy days that hunting is the hardest, as the water washes away all tracks, all scents, all signs that there remains any prey in the world. It was on these days that the pack hunted, as the rain also kept prey disoriented.
So trusted was this wolf in question; trusted to find the prey, trusted to lead the way, trusted as a pack leader should be.
But old wolf he was, with brindled face and graying eyes, and when that dying nose of his no longer caught the traces of prey on the misty air as other wolf noses did, no longer was he so trusted and so welcomed within his pack. That old wolf, on that rainy day when his nose no longer worked and his eyes could not find the faint tracks in the earth, was driven away with snapping teeth at his heels.
And so there he was, that great, that fallen, that old lone wolf, sitting at the far edge of a forest that no longer belonged to him with an overcast sky starting to churn up above.
“There will be such wind and rain,” he whined in the animal language.
Lone wolf licked at a scabbing wound at his shoulder before rising to his paws again and shaking out his clumping wet fur. He lifted his nose to the breeze as tiny shafts of sunlight filtered through the thin leaves up ahead, and suddenly there was something more than rainwater on the wind. He pinned his ears back and inhaled in tiny breaths, finding a scent so strong even a failing nose could detect.
It was sweet, much like honey, and warm, much like a fresh kill. He stayed to the shadows, skulking closer and closer through the undergrowth towards the taunting mix of smells. Up ahead he could see a human path, a bare scar in the forest where none could live and nothing could grow. He paused hesitantly, amber eyes gazing carefully through mid-morning light. His ears twitched with the sound of human footsteps, and he darted forward to hide himself among the bushes at the side of the human path.
Lone wolf watched through the leaves as around the corner a little red speck appeared, and he narrowed golden eyes suspiciously. He dropped his tail and lowered himself to the ground, watching as the little red speck drew closer and closer until the smells it carried with it drew a deeper hunger to his stomach and a ravenous dripping to his jowls. Slowly the red speck skipped into sight until the lone wolf could see the short yellow hair, youthful green eyes, and swinging brown covered basket that wafted with the smells of human food.
Salivation dripped from the corners of his mouth, the taste of cooked meat and steaming rolls drifting over the breeze. Even for an old and broken wolf, it would be easy to scare the basket right out of her hands.
He crept forward as she drew nearer, shifting his weight between his haunches and letting the leaves rustle around him. The girl in the red hood stopped and stared at the bush where he lay, and then he leapt out, paws skidding to a halt only a body’s length in front of her.
“Red-hooded child, give me the basket,” he snarled, shackles raised and head lowered. The girl, standing with wide eyes and trembling fingers, and not understanding the language of the animals, whipped around and away from the human path, and bolted through the woods with basket still in hand.
Lone wolf barked viscously and leaped into pursuit, the hunger gnawing at the pit of his stomach. He bayed as he ran, huffing and puffing through the trees and undergrowth. The forest again began to clear out, and another human path carried them towards an old abandoned farm. The old wolf snapped at the girl’s heels, determined to knock her to the ground and make off with the meats and breads she carried with her, but right has he made the final leap, she disappeared into the old tattered farmhouse and slammed the door behind her. Lone wolf hit the door with paws first, claws tearing at the wood as he landed at the doorstep with nothing but a heaving chest as a prize. He howled and bayed outside the old farmhouse, scratching at the door and sniffing at the crack below and listening carefully for human voices.
“Dear little riding hood, why have your barged through my door so suddenly?” the lone wolf could hear an older human say over the sounds of the storm approaching. He couldn’t understand the words, but he listened carefully to judge how many were inside the breaking old building.
“My mother told me to deliver this basket of food to my grandmother. She lives on a farm not far from here, but there was a wolf that chased me from the path!”
Lone wolf waited through the conversation quietly, sniffing at the space beneath the door and pacing back and forth impatiently. The wolf heard a snorting and snuffling coming from the side of the building, and trotted over the dry grass towards an old brown fence at the side of the farmhouse. It smelled of dirt and hay, and as the wolf checked the perimeter with the wind blowing light-colored spirals in his fur, he found that one plank had fallen out, and peered in through the tiny space.
It was a small and dirty yard, with loose bundles of hay stacked along the walls of the house. There was a smaller fence within, a low and deep brown wood designed to keep some kind of animal in or out, and close to the fence where his nose poked in was a large muddy area which formed a sty.
There was a door falling apart at the back of the house, and the old wolf could see the little red hood through a dirty window. His mouth dripped with hunger. The easy meal was slowly becoming a challenge.
He looked at the muddy earth at his feet and knew he couldn’t dig under the fence. The old wolf sniffed through the space and listened to the low snuffling sound, and his nose strained until he knew what animal was held within the space between two fences.
“Oh little pig, little pig, let me come in.”
A broad white face appeared at the missing space in the fence, a face nearly bald as a man’s and likewise just as flat. The pig’s body was dappled with black splotches, and its face was dirty with slop.
“No, no, wolf. I dare not let you in.”
The wolf’s lip twitched in a snarl. He could feel the storm getting closer, and if he stuck around for too long, there was nothing but death in his future. But likewise, he would need food to survive. He looked up at the treetops swaying harder and harder in the wind, and then smiled grimly.
“If you will not let me in, I will simply blow the house down.”
The pig returned to its feast without fear, and the wolf made his way around the fence, digging at different spots along the wooden posts. The wind began to pick up, and the wolf returned to the space in the fence and began to huff.
“What are you doing?” called the pig.
“I told you I will come in,” said the old wolf. “I’ll huff and I’ll puff and I’ll blow the house down.”
The wolf braced himself at the wind howling at his back, and the fence began to rattle. The pig squealed as the weakened fence crashed to the ground, and the wolf bounded over the toppled wood and through the yard.
The wolf knocked the already broken door off its hinges and flew through the house, baying and snarling in search of food. There the girl with yellow hair and the red hood stood with an old man, and the smell of the basket filled his nostrils again. He barked and leapt at the girl, but the two made it out the door again and locked it behind them.
“Wolf!” cried the old man, fetching his rifle from a tattered shed and beginning to run in stride with the red-hooded girl, and the old lone wolf cocked his head, wondering what the word meant.
He set both paws on the windowsill to gaze out as the two began to run down the human path towards the next farmhouse.
“There goes dinner,” the wolf sighed, dropping again to his paws and slinking towards the back of the house. “But there’s still my little pig friend. O clever wolf am I.”
The wolf returned to the yard and dragged the little pig into the shelter of the house, watching the wind blow straw and hay all around the yard.
“It’s a straw house, now,” the old wolf said as he ate, already wondering where to find his next meal.
He slept in the comfort of the house until he woke hungry, and then he slipped out into the wind and rain and started towards the second house. The second house was more sturdy, with stronger doors and a larger frame, but the wolf was determined to find his next meal.
Already the wolf had learned that the front door was not the way to get into the house, and so he slipped around to the back, where he found another fence, another sty, another pig.
“Little pig, little pig, let me come in,” he called through a tiny hole in one of the wooden planks.
“Dear wolf, by the hair on my chin, I dare not,” replied another squeaky voice.
“If you do not, I will simply blow the house down.”
The pig, again not believing him, began to ignore him, and again the wolf began to dig at the posts which held the fence erect. The wind began to shake the fence but did not topple it, and the wolf impatiently leapt at the fence with the wind at his back and knocked it forcefully to the ground.
He bounded through a yard littered with old timber and sticks, and there he pulled the little pig out from under the fence and ate him as he had done to the last.
When he was finished with his meal, the wolf turned towards the house and pawed at the door, but found it too sturdy to break away from the wall. He walked the outer wall of the house until he found a low window, and he backed away from the wall to ready himself. The old wolf rolled stiff haunches and leapt through the window, glass shattering all around him as he skidded to a halt inside the house. There the little red riding hood stood with an old man and a young woman, and upon sight of the wolf, all three ran for the door and slammed it hard behind them, the old man’s gun exploding at the floor around the old lone wolf as they went.
“Wolf!” the young woman yelled as the old man had once before, and the old wolf cocked his head just the same.
Quickly the wolf returned to the yard, and ran straight for the next farmhouse, where the three human folk were heading towards on the human path.
“Clever wolf am I,” said the old lone wolf, dashing at a speed that might have been slow for a younger wolf, but left the three humans trailing obliviously behind on a parallel path. “Already when they arrive, I will be waiting for them. Then I will have the basket of food and the three people with it, so long as I avoid the gun of that man.”
The wolf arrived at the grandmother’s farmhouse and found it to be much sturdier and larger than the other two houses. Through a tiny hole in the back fence the wolf could see extra bricks from building the house stacked through the yard, and another sty was lined up against one side of the fence.
The wolf heard another snorting sound, and called, “Little pig, little pig, let me come in.”
“By the hair on my chin, I dare not, old wolf.”
Again the wolf called, “If you do not, I will simply blow the house down!”
The wolf began to dig at the posts holding up the fence, but it was weighted down by bricks, and the posts held true deep in the ground. No amount of digging or pushing would make the fence so much as budge.
The pig snorted in laughter, and said, “Old wolf, you will not get in. The kind old woman who lives here cares for all animals, and is protective of me as if I were her child.”
The wolf waited silently for a moment, and then a dark smile crept over his face.
“O clever wolf am I,” he said, paying no mind to the pig and trotting around the house and to the front of the house. “O clever, clever wolf am I.”
The wolf sat at the front door and held his paw before him, and he turned so that the wounds from his expulsion from the pack showed clearly. He dropped his ears and curled his tail behind him to appear as a dog, and whined like one at the door. He scratched until there was a stirring within the house, and then the door swung in to reveal a little old lady with gentle eyes.
“Dear thing,” she cried in the human language, taking pity on the wolf and patting at her leg for him to come forward.
The old wolf limped forward until the woman shut the door behind him, and then he leapt at her with tail flowing, ears erect, and teeth bared.
“Wolf!” she shrieked, and then, with a gargle as he leapt at her throat, went silent with death.
“What is ‘wolf?’” said the trickster, standing over the dead woman and remembering the word muttered before. “Am I ‘wolf?’”
The wolf smiled. “If I am ‘wolf,’ I am the cleverest of them all. O traitorous pack, do you eat as well as I, now that I am gone?”
The wolf dragged the grandmother to the yard and ate his fill of both human and pig, and when he was done he yawned lazily. His tongue rolled past his teeth and he licked his lips, and then he returned to the house and tucked himself in the warmth of the old woman’s bed.
“There is not a wolf cleverer than I,” he said, and drifted off to sleep.
The wolf woke only later to a pounding at the door, and he dug himself deeper into the sheets of the bed with a full stomach. The pounding ceased and the door creaked open, and in came the three humans who the wolf had once hunted.
“Grandmother, Grandmother, please lock your doors!” the young girl with the red cloak said urgently, not knowing that it was the wolf who hid in her grandmother’s bed. The wolf stayed silent, and suddenly he heard the clicking of a human gun. “There is a wolf about, and I fear he may still be around.”
The wolf shook with fear, as he knew the danger of human guns, and knew the sound by heart.
“Grandmother, why do you cover your head?” the girl said, although the wolf could not understand her, and pulled back the blankets to reveal the beast hiding there.
“Wolf!” the husky voice of the hunter shouted, and the gun exploded in his hands.
The old lone wolf felt a sharp pain in his hip, and he yelped like a pup as another shot blew a notch in one pointed ear. The wolf sprang from the bed and dashed out of the house through the opened front door with a bleeding hip and paws slowed from a full stomach. The man ran after the wolf some ways, driving him deeper and deeper into the territory of Man, but even weakened, the wolf escaped with what was left of his life.
At a hilly spot at the edge of a forest, the wolf stopped to pant and lick at his wounds. He lay himself down and rested his head on his paws, staring ruefully down into the rest of the human village. The farmlands stretched on for miles, but all the clever wolf could see was his lazy and foolish mistakes.
“Wolf!” he heard, and as if called to attention, his ears pricked up and he lifted his head to look in the direction of the only human word he knew. Down at the edges of the human village, not far from where the defeated old wolf lay, a human boy with golden hair called out the wolf’s name. “Wolf! Wolf!”
The old wolf cocked his head. The boy was not looking at the old lone wolf laying atop the hill, and surely could not even see him from where he stood with a herd of grazing sheep. Down in the village below, the wolf could see few heads turn towards the sound, and then away as if nothing were awry.
The boy peered out in the direction of the village expectantly.
“Wolf!” he cried, but none responded. “Wolf! Wolf! Wolf!”
A dark grin slowly crept over the old wolf’s face, and he rose to his paws with amber eyes gleaming. His tongue fell over his lips, and he began to make his way down towards his next meal.
“Yes, wolf. I am wolf. O clever wolf am I.”