The little girl’s hood was red, and it was lined with the fur of a wolf.
The lining made the hood warm, a perfect shield against the nipping teeth of autumn. The hood and cape were handmade from tough but light linen, a practical and hardy garment for a trek through the woods. The material was worn but spotless, meticulously purged of oil and grime.
In places, jagged rips in the fabric had been patiently mended with almost invisible stitches.
This was an old hood, made new.
And it was red. Red as strawberries, sunsets, roses, lips, and blood.
This was the girl’s first trip down the path alone. Her mother had taken her this way many times, drilling her on the beauties and pitfalls of the woods. By now, the girl could make the journey blindfolded, or backwards, or hopping on one leg. But this was her first trip down the path alone, and she knew to be cautious.
At the first signpost, she stopped. She unfolded her map and traced her progress with her finger. She examined the gentle wobble of the needle of her compass. She picked up a pebble, and balanced it on top of the signpost. And she sighed.
Her wolf was late.
The path was narrow, no more than a thread of dirt unspooled carelessly through the forest, fringed on either side by tufts of grass and the occasional self-reliant orange flower. Once a year, men from the village descended on the woods to rake the paths and clear fallen branches. The trails were not as spruce as the thoroughfares the farmers paved for noble’s carriages, but they linked the parishes and hamlets, and helped the farmers’ wives and daughters delve deeper into the woods for firewood, mushrooms, and wild onions.
The girl heard a rustle, and saw a shadow dart between the trees. She thought of calling out to it, but remembered her instruction to let the wolf speak first.
And speak it did:
“Hey.”
“Oh. Hello, sir. You gave me a startle, for I am but a little girl alone in the woods, and I have always been told not to speak to strangers.”
“Well, you are speaking to me, so I must not be a stranger.”
“That is true. What brings you out to the woods on this fine day?”
“I am on a stroll admiring all of these fine wildflowers. You may have heard it said, that one should always stop and taste the flowers. Such bright colours! Such delicate beauty! Scrumptious.”
“And these striking flowers are, I assume, just off the path?”
“Indeed, clever girl, a mere stumble off the path, a moment’s rewarding distraction, and then you can be safe on your way again.”
“That is a pleasant offer. Alas, I have brought flowers with me.”
“Uh… you have?”
“Yes, a fresh cut bunch of my village’s prizewinning irises, purple and yellow as the sky at dusk. See? Most beautiful. So you understand, I have no need to view other flowers today. Perhaps next time I take this trip, I shall adopt your kind offer.”
“Oh. Well. Uh… good day to you then, little one.”
“Good day, sir. I hope you enjoy the remainder of your stroll.”
And so the girl continued on her way.
For the girl, the woods were beautiful enough, even viewed only from the path. She could see squirrels and birds snatching twigs for their nests. She could hear the flies buzzing around oak trees, a sure sign of ripe truffles. She could smell the tingling musk of rain-nourished soil. And all around her, an undiscovered vocabulary of green, from swaddling blankets of grass, to the brash emerald of canopy-piercing trees, to thinning bushes like witch’s fingers clutching a frog. She held her cape up against the woods to admire its red, burning bright against the greens and golds and browns.
Once again, she heard the wolf stumbling through the woods. But she did not acknowledge it, and maintained her steady pace. Eventually, the wolf spoke:
“Hello again, little girl.”
“Hello, sir. How was your stroll?”
She kept walking, forcing the wolf to keep up with her.
“My what? What the devil are you… Oh, yes. My stroll. Yes. Nice. Very nice. Say… seeing your determined gait, I wondered if you might, by chance, enjoy making your journey a race!”
“A race? That hardly seems fair, with myself only a weak little girl, and you a big strong gentleman, and more experienced with the woods by far.”
“Hardly! You never swerve from the path, and as you know I am easily distracted by the delectable bounties of the woods. I am sure you will beat me easily! And for savour, stakes. The loser must treat the winner to… a delicious meal. Yes, a tasty dinner for the hasty winner.”
The girl could hear splashing droplets of acrid saliva.
“Very well. A race it is then.”
“Excellent! Uh… there is just one detail I need to confirm, before we start.”
“Yes?”
“Where are we going?”
“You don’t know?”
“I was… hoping you would tell me. For the race, you know.”
“I see. For the purposes of this race, our destination is the old mill not far from here, the one just past the bramble patch.”
The wolf unleashed a gibbering howl of relish, and scampered off.
The girl continued on. The basket on her arm was becoming heavy. Cake and butter for grandma, and plenty of bottles of red wine. Why did the adults love their wine so much? All it seemed to do was make them quiet and sad. Perhaps it was the reason her mother was tired all the time, too much wine. When she grew up, she would certainly never drink it.
The girl thought back on the lecture her mother had bequeathed along with the hood. Caution of wolves, recitation of landmarks on the path, and insistence that she knew what thoughts ran through the head of a young woman out alone in the woods for the first time. The girl reflected that some of the mended wounds on the hood could have been from when her mother wore it. It was like her mother to forget the toast and burn it, neglect to budget for the salt tax, or go to church on the wrong day. It would have been in character for her mother as a girl to wander from the path, more from carelessness than any need for adventure. Her mother’s memories of her own rashness might be the origin of her strident warnings towards her own daughter. But where her mother had been reckless, the girl resolved to be careful. She would allow no damage to the red hood while she wore it, and planned to one day pass it to a future daughter unblemished.
Much later, the wolf returned.
“There you are! Where have you been? I sprinted to the old mill as fast as I could! I waited for an hour! And here I find you walking in the opposite direction, pleased as punch! I hurt my paw on a stone! I’ll be picking thorns out of my fur for weeks!”
The girl halted, and confronted the shadow in the woods. Rage had made it brash, and now it was close enough that she could see its shining yellow eyes.
“Hello, sir. I am on my way to the old mill, but my path is not as direct as yours, for I have another errand to run first.”
“Cheek! In my father’s day, little girls knew their manners.”
“I venture that you are not your father, no more than I am my mother. But it seems you are the clear victor of our contest, is that not so?”
“What? Oh - yes! Yes, I am! And to the winner goes a delicious meal! Agreed, signed, sealed, de-livered!”
“Just so. And here you are.” The girl produced a bundle wrapped in paper from the basket, and tossed it towards the eyes. “A juicy tenderloin cut of beef, red as my cape.”
“Oh… beef, you say? Tenderloin, you say? Juicy, you say? Well, perhaps it will be a satisfactory amuse-bouche. Thank you, little girl.”
And the wolf scarfed it down in a single swallow, paper and all.
“Well, sir, thank you for your company through the woods, but my journey is almost complete, and I must be on my way.”
“Oh, not so fast, not so fast! You’re a clever one, I’ll give you that. I was hoping you might lead me to a greater feast, and you led me a merry game instead. I don’t want to wait any longer for my meal, and the only thing that will satisfy my appetite is… Oh… Let’s see… Yes, I simply must have a little girl in a red hood. Would you like to run? Oh, it won’t do you any good, for you’ll never be fast enough, but you might like to try. It’s the ceremony of the thing. Go on then, little girl! Just… oh. Oh my.”
“Why, sir, is your belly troubling you?”
“Yes, you little… Oh! You little witch! You didn’t!”
“It is as you surmise. In my village, when we have problems with wild animals raiding our crops, we resort to poisoned bait. You have ingested nightshade berries. At this point, you should have a dry mouth and a pounding heart. I suggest you take yourself off somewhere safe, before the convulsions begin. And have the kindness not to bother me again, wolf.”
The wolf screeched and vanished deep into the woods.
After that, the girl was soon at the gate of her grandmother’s cottage.
Fifty years later, she was still there.
Those fifty years had been abundant with events, matters, and incidents. Events such as the death of her grandmother in her sleep, and of her mother in a tragic building collapse. Matters such as her marriage to a plain man with a lucrative office in the tax farming corporation, which had the dual benefit of funding a comfortable life, and ensuring her husband would be away for months at a time. Incidents such as her passionate romance with a strapping wheelwright, but that ran its course, and her husband never learnt of it.
She had five children, and was fortunate to see three of them live into adulthood. One boy vanished into the church, one boy into the world of Paris, and one girl into a love match with a prosperous farmer. The hood had long since passed to this daughter. True to her resolve, the hood was pristine when she passed it on. Only recently, it had gone to her daughter’s daughter. She treated herself to a little smugness, that before it could be inherited she needed to fix a few cuts and stains from her daughter’s tenure as custodian of the hood. Such were the duties and satisfactions of a grandmother.
With her husband dead and her grandchildren of age, it had been time to hand over the responsibilities of village life, and she moved into the cottage that had once been her grandmother’s. Here, she could enjoy the woods in comfort. It was close enough to the village that visitors could make the trip, but not so close that she was constantly bothered by them. She cultivated a flower garden out of the front, and vegetables in the backyard. She developed her knitting technique, and began to submit entries in the knitwear contests on market days. She took long walks, always on the path. Every night, before bed, she savoured a glass or two of red wine. She also kept chickens, and somehow wolves never bothered them.
After a busy life, she had decided she deserved to relax. But after a few months of this quiet, she found herself watering the flowers so many times a day it drowned them, knitting scarves that would suffocate giants, and feeding the chickens such elaborate meals that they developed haughty eating habits, and would snub any feed that did not include truffles.
More and more, she thought of those yellow eyes, still clear in her mind after so many years.
And she began leaving the front door unlatched every night.
So it was that one morning, still in bed, she heard a whimper at her feet. She pulled herself up in bed, and saw her wolf.
Her wolf had patches of fur missing, and cataracts in its yellow eyes. It rested its head on the foot of her bed.
Finally, she told herself, the wolf was here to eat her, and now she was too old to outwit it or run. Thrills had left her as the ache in her bones grew, but she felt a flicker of exaltation at the prospect of the wolf’s jaws closing on her, and sucking her down to a moist and slimy pace. For the first time in her ordered life, she felt the delicious pang of danger.
“That was a dirty trick, you know. The bait. I wasn’t right after that. Best I could hunt was rats.”
This was not the proud and terrible wolf she had been dreaming of. “I have no sympathy for any wolf who survives on a diet of little girls.”
“Little girls! Don’t talk to me about little girls. The girls these days, they’re scarier than wolves. One girl slashed my brother’s eye with a hatpin. Another set iron wolf traps along the path. Crippled my father. Those weren’t the worst, though. The worst had a lamp with her, and doused her wolf in burning oil. Almost burnt down the entire woods. And that wasn’t enough for this one. She leads the woodcutters on expeditions. They hunt us now, not even for our pelts, just for fun. Like the path doesn’t mean anything to her.”
“You haven’t come to eat me?”
The wolf started to sob.
“I haven’t any teeth left! I couldn’t eat you if I wanted to. I came here because I had nowhere else to turn… this little girl, she won’t stop until all the wolves are gone. You’re all I have left! I need your protection!”
At that moment, they heard a knock on the door.
The wolf stifled a whimper. “It’s her! The little girl in the red hood! Please, you have to protect me from her!”
The grandmother directed the wolf to hide under the covers, closed the bedroom door, and walked to her front door.
Her granddaughter had already let herself in. She was dressed in the family’s prized red hood. The edge of the hood and cape had recently been trimmed with gold embroidery.
“Why, granny! You left your door unlatched all night!”
“Hello, stringbean. You’re here very early! Presents for your granny?”
“Mother thought you might like some new blankets. I’ll go put them in your bedroom.”
“Oh! No, that won’t be necessary, you sit down and I’ll heat you up some scones. We’ll smother them in butter. I think I may even have some tea for you.”
The granddaughter sank in the big chair, the special one for visitors, and prattled happily about her adventures at the church school, and a big trek with her mother to look at a new breed of cow. Normally, her granddaughter did not stay for more than an hour. She had too much energy to stay in any one place for long. The grandmother let her talk, nudging her with questions.
Once the scones and tea were finished, the girl in the red hood stood up. She sniffed the air, her nostrils twitching.
“Here? Oh, they’re bold creatures, aren’t they granny! I’ll sort this for you.”
“Oh, no, stringbean, really, that won’t be necessary… Yes, there’s one of those here, but I’ve known this one for a long time. Almost all my life. It’s not a dangerous one. Really, you should just leave it alone. It’s a pathetic thing.”
The girl laughed, a laugh like the ringing of tiny bells. “The only good wolf is a dead one, in my book. Sorry granny, this is the way of the world. Our happy ever after.”
Before the grandmother could react, the girl in the red hood had entered the bedroom. There was a howl of terror from the wolf. The girl in the red hood closed the door. From inside, the grandmother heard a loud crack, and then a series of complex wet noises. Then silence. And then, a laugh like tiny bells.
The little girl emerged from the bedroom. She had turned the hood and cape inside out, so that it now displayed the gray fur of a wolf. Blood on her chin, she grinned. Her eyes were yellow.
The grandmother collapsed into a chair. With the death of her wolf, she found it hard to stand, or think, or speak. With an effort, she forced out some words.
“Why, granddaughter. What big teeth you have…!”
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