51 greatest trepidation and infinite precautions, for Angela Carter, “The Company of Wolves” 52 if you stray from the path for one instant, the Published in The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories (1979). 53 wolves will eat you. They are grey as famine, 54 they are as unkind as plague. 1 One beast and only one howls in the woods by 55 The grave-eyed children of the sparse villages 2 night. 56 always carry knives with them when they go 3 The wolf is carnivore incarnate and he’s as 57 out to tend the little flocks of goats that 4 cunning as he is ferocious; once he’s had a taste 58 provide the homesteads with acrid milk and 5 of flesh then nothing else will do. 59 rank, maggoty cheeses. Their knives are half as 6 At night, the eyes of wolves shine like candle 60 big as they are, the blades are sharpened daily. 7 flames, yellowish, reddish, but that is because 61 But the wolves have ways of arriving at your 8 the pupils of their eyes fatten on darkness and 62 own hearthside. We try and try but sometimes 9 catch the light from your lantern to flash it 63 we cannot keep them out. There is no winter’s 10 back to you – red for danger; if a wolf’s eyes 64 night the cottager does not fear to see a lean, 11 reflect only moonlight, then they gleam a cold 65 grey, famished snout questing under the door, 12 and unnatural green, a mineral, a piercing 66 and there was a woman once bitten in her own 13 colour. If the benighted traveller spies those 67 kitchen as she was straining the macaroni. 14 luminous, terrible sequins stitched suddenly on 68 Fear and flee the wolf; for, worst of all, the 15 the black thickets, then he knows he must run, 69 wolf may be more than he seems. 16 if fear has not struck him stock-still. 70 There was a hunter once, near here, that 17 But those eyes are all you will be able to 71 trapped a wolf in a pit. This wolf had 18 glimpse of the forest assassins as they cluster 72 massacred the sheep and goats; eaten up a mad 19 invisibly round your smell of meat as you go 20 through the wood unwisely late. They will be 73 old man who used to live by himself in a hut 21 like shadows, they will be like wraiths, grey 74 halfway up the mountain and sing to Jesus all 22 members of a congregation of nightmare; hark! 75 day; pounced on a girl looking after the sheep, 23 his long, wavering howl . an aria of fear 76 but she made such a commotion that men 24 made audible. 77 came with rifles and scared him away and tried 25 The wolfsong is the sound of the rending you 78 to track him into the forest but he was cunning 26 will suffer, in itself a murdering. 79 27 It is winter and cold weather. In this region of and easily gave them the slip. So this hunter 28 mountain and forest, there is now nothing for 80 dug a pit and put a duck in it, for bait, all alive- 29 the wolves to eat. Goats and sheep are locked 81 oh; and he covered the pit with straw smeared 30 up in the byre,1 the deer departed for the 82 with wolf dung. Quack, quack! went the duck 31 remaining pasturage on the southern slopes – 83 and a wolf came slinking out of the forest, a big 32 wolves grow lean and famished. There is so 84 one, a heavy one, he weighed as much as a 33 little flesh on them that you could count the 85 grown man and the straw gave way beneath 34 starveling ribs through their pelts, if they gave 35 you time before they pounced. Those slavering 86 him – into the pit he tumbled. The hunter 36 jaws; the lolling tongue; the rime of saliva on 87 jumped down after him, slit his throat, cut off 37 the grizzled chops – of all the teeming perils of 88 all his paws for a trophy. 38 the night and the forest, ghosts, hobgoblins, 39 ogres that grill babies upon gridirons, witches 89 And then no wolf at all lay in front of the 40 that fatten their captives in cages for cannibal 90 hunter but the bloody trunk of a man, headless, 41 tables, the wolf is worst for he cannot listen to 91 footless, dying, dead. 42 reason. 92 A witch from up the valley once turned an 43 You are always in danger in the forest, where 93 entire wedding party into wolves because the 44 no people are. Step between the portals of the 94 groom had settled on another girl. She used to 45 great pines where the shaggy branches tangle 95 order them to visit her, at night, from spite, and 46 about you, trapping the unwary traveller in nets 96 they would sit and howl around her cottage for 47 as if the vegetation itself were in a plot with the 97 her, serenading her with their misery. 48 wolves who live there, as though the wicked 98 Not so very long ago, a young woman in our 49 trees go fishing on behalf of their friends – step 99 village married a man who vanished clean away 50 between the gateposts of the forest with the 100 on her wedding night. The bed was made with 101 new sheets and the bride lay down in it; the 1 102 groom said, he was going out to relieve himself, 156 off again and he was just as he had been, years 103 insisted on it, for the sake of decency, and she 157 ago, when he ran away from his marriage bed, 104 drew the coverlet up to her chin and she lay 158 so that she wept and her second husband beat 105 there. And she waited and she waited and then 159 her. 106 she waited again - surely he’s been gone a long 160 They say there’s an ointment the Devil gives 107 time? Until she jumps up in bed and shrieks to 161 you that turns you into a wolf the minute you 108 hear a howling, coming on the wind from the 162 rub it on. Or, that he was born feet first and 109 forest. 163 had a wolf for his father and his torso is a 110 That long-drawn, wavering howl has, for all its 164 man’s but his legs and genitals are a wolf’s. And 111 fearful resonance, some inherent sadness in it, 165 he has a wolf’s heart. 112 as if the beasts would love to be less beastly if 166 Seven years is a werewolf’s natural span but if 113 only they knew how and never cease to mourn 167 you burn his human clothing you condemn 114 their own condition. There is a vast melancholy 168 him to wolfishness for the rest of his life, so 115 in the canticles2 of the wolves, melancholy 169 old wives hereabouts think it some protection 116 infinite as the forest, endless as these long 170 to throw a hat or an apron at the werewolf, as 117 nights of winter and yet that ghastly sadness, 171 if clothes made the man. Yet by the eyes, those 118 that mourning for their own, irremediable 172 phosphorescent eyes, you know him in all his 119 appetites, can never move the heart for not one 173 shapes; the eyes alone unchanged by 120 phrase in it hints at the possibility of 174 metamorphosis. 121 redemption; grace could not come to the wolf 175 Before he can become a wolf, the lycanthrope 122 from its own despair, only through some 176 strips stark naked. If you spy a naked man 123 external mediator, so that, sometimes, the beast 177 among the pines, you must run as if the Devil 124 will look as if he half welcomes the knife that 178 were after you. 125 despatches him. The young woman’s brothers 179 It is midwinter and the robin, the friend of 126 searched the outhouses and the haystacks but 180 man, sits on the handle of the gardener’s spade 127 never found any remains so the sensible girl 181 and sings. It is the worst time in all the year for 128 dried her eyes and found herself another 182 wolves but this strong-minded child insists she 129 husband not too shy to piss into a pot who 130 spent the nights indoors. She gave him a pair of 183 will go off through the wood. She is quite sure 131 bonny babies and all went right as a trivet until, 184 the wild beasts cannot harm her although, well- 132 one freezing night; the night of the solstice, the 185 warned, she lays a carving knife in the basket 133 hinge of the year when things do not fit 186 her mother has packed with cheeses. There is a 134 together as well as they should, the longest 187 bottle of harsh liquor distilled from brambles; a 135 night, her first good man came home again. 188 batch of flat oatcakes baked on the 136 A great thump on the door announced him as 189 hearthstone; a pot or two of jam.