A Fine Wolf

Miss Eula didn't have much use for store bought or outsiders.

She raised her own chickens, grew her own garden, kept cows for milk, did her own canning and became a beekeeper rather than pay the price for sugar in town. When the need for coffee or tobacco arose, she hitched up her old hay wagon and made the trip into town to barter fresh eggs or honey at McIntyre's. She could curse with the best of them, drink any man under the table, hold her own at a poker table and in her old straw hat and faded overalls rolled up to her knees was the best barehanded eel catcher anyone had ever seen.

As many island women did, she lived alone and liked it, preferring the company of nature and farm animals to most people. She minded her business and demanded that others do the same - she rose each day before the sun and worked in solitary silence until after dark, taking pleasure in familiar routines and chores, never allowing a moment of idleness to interfere with her daily plans. She kept her old house in immaculate order, swept her porch every morning and night, washed every window once a week and pulled weeds as if she was battling the devil himself. When evening came, she would read by lantern light or make notes in her journal, random thoughts she shared with no one, a simple one sided conversation about everyday life.

She met the wolf on a moonlit September night just as she finished an entry reminding herself that one of the hay wagon wheels needed looking at. Closing the cover of the ragtag old book, she heard a soft growl and looked up to see a pair of yellow eyes not twenty feet from the porch. Not one to panic, she calmly reached for her shotgun and braced it against her shoulder, drawing down and taking careful aim, unwilling but still prepared to shoot if need be. The standoff didn't last long, Just a few seconds, I reckon, she told my grandmother a few days later, Then he up and slunk off. But there was a blood trail. The following morning, she did a careful count of her chickens and cows before setting off, shotgun under her arm. Took three days 'fore I found her, she admitted to Nana, and when I did, wasn't a way in hell I could put her down. She had found the beast in a cave on the coast, scrawny and half starved with a badly fractured back leg, too weak to put up a fight. She muzzled it with her neckerchief and carried it home, packed it in the hay wagon and drove to Rowena's. Lord a mercy, Eula, Rowena had exclaimed, It's a wolf! The two women, each too tender hearted for their own good, doctored the animal for a month, force feeding it, keeping it warm, and eventually realizing that the leg would have to come off. They accomplished this with a good deal of whiskey, a bottle of ether Rowena kept for emergencies, and an axe - Nana cringed at this part of the story, not able to imagine the force which must have been required and the fortitude. Bandaged her up proper, Eula recounted proudly, then carried her back to the old chicken coop and fenced her in.

Neither woman held much hope for the crippled animal but the damaged wolf survived and slowly made the transition from four legs to three, learning to walk, then trot, then flat out run. Learning to trust and overcome her instincts was another matter altogether and it took over a year of Eula's patience and caregiving before they developed a cautiously distant relationship - Eula stopped carrying her shotgun and the wolf stopped baring her teeth at the old woman's approach, they seemed to respect their differences and territory and over time they worked out a plan of peaceful coexistence. Not countin' the chickens and cows, 'course, Miss Eula told me with a wink, They never did come a trustin' place. Another year passed before the nights began to be punctuated with clear, eerie howls that sent shivers down Eula's spine. She thought they might be calls, messages sent on the nightwind, pleas for freedom. She thought it might be time.

One fine fall evening, the old woman walked to the chicken coop and the sleeping wolf and unlatched the gate. She watched as the animal woke and got to her feet, lifted her head and gave out a long, lonely, wail of a howl, then trotted slowly out of the enclosure and toward the woods, back to the dark woods and the wild things. She never returned but Sometimes, Eula told Nana, Sometimes I think I see those yellow eyes through the trees, like she's passin' by and just checkin' in to make sure everythin's right. Three legs or not, she was a fine wolf.