By the Waterfall - short story

It is friday. Then saturday and sunday. According to the MSM there is no real news over the weekend. Oh, there might be local stories like car chases, or burning houses, perhaps even a kidnapping or two, and quite likely something about an execution, but nothing apparently happens anywhere else in the world that might be worthy enough to be offered to the American people. If we're lucky they might tell us something about the "war" in Iraq on monday, especially if they can claim it is going well. If it were not for the internet you might well think the world had come to a three day stop. As nothing much is happening here is another short story.


By The Waterfall (with apologies to Balzac)


In Spring the new cold water from the Sierras falls gracefully from a high worn cliff, runs across a small oak scattered meadow through stands of wildflowers, then plunges twenty feet into a narrow canyon where is formed a cool and attractive spot well hidden from the hot southern California sun. This is a private place under a giant oak and sheltered by huge granite boulders, a place where lovers should have little fear of discovery. It had suddenly become a place of horror.
"I never heard of a mountain lion attacking a full grown woman!" the Sheriff exclaimed, looking down at the mutilated nude body at the base of the waterfall. He peered suspiciously at Nathan, seated nearby with his head in his hands, still in shock.
"Finished with the pictures?" he asked the photographer, then he squatted on the heels of his worn cowboy boots to study the corpse. After a short time he rose, saying softly to himself, "Damned if I ever seen such a thing! Neck broke, tooth marks on her face and head, them long scratches on her body. Can't see what else it coulda been...then, she's not very big...lions have been known to attack children."
"Tell me again what happened," he ordered Nathan.
"Well," Nathan began, "as I told you, we were having a picnic...I went back to the car to get something...the camera. On my way back I heard a scream, a horrible scream. I ran here as fast as I could and that's when I found her, lying there, all bloody. Dead. I looked around but didn't see anything. But I'm sure she was attacked by a mountain lion. Oh god, it's so awful!"
"How do you know it was a mountain lion? Did you see it?"
Nathan paused, started to speak but stopped, then began again. "No, but I'm sure that's what it was. What else could have done it?"
"So, why was she naked? What were you doing here?"
"We just came to picnic. After we ate...I don't know...there's something about the waterfall that made her want to undress. She took off her clothes and went over there. That's when I went for the camera. I don't...I didn't...know her very well. We came to have a picnic. She went over to play in the water and..."
"To play in the water or to play with you?" the Sheriff's sarcasm seemed to Nathan brutal and inappropriate. "Am I supposed to believe that this beautiful girl undressed just to play in the water? You weren't screwing her? Come on, tell the truth."
"I didn't bring her here for that," Nathan blurted. "I told you, I hardly even knew her. But yes, after she took her clothes off we made love...there, on the bank." Nathan pointed to a protected grassy spot on the other side of the stream. "But what are you thinking? That I killed her? Why are you asking me so many questions? What difference does it make why we came here anyway?"
The Sheriff suspected that Nathan had not told him everything. Even so, he replied, "No, I don't think you killed her. There's no way you could have made those marks. But we'll have to get a coroner's report. I never heard of a mountain lion killing a grown woman before." Then, addressing the photographer again, he said gruffly, "Come on, let's wrap it up. Let's go."
The two medical assistants placed the body on a stretcher and struggled over the rough, hot terrain, picking their way carefully along the steep rocky path. When they finally reached the ambulance they placed the stretcher not so gently inside and immediately sat down to catch their breath and gulp greedily at the sheriff's canteen.
"Don't go out of town," instructed the Sheriff, looking directly into Nathan's eyes. "We may need to talk with you again." Then he added, "Sorry, son, I know how you must feel."
Nathan was surprised at the Sheriff's sudden expression of sympathy. He nodded and climbed miserably into his station wagon. "It had to have been the lion," he thought. "It could only have been her."
The coroner's report confirmed the accidental death caused, it concluded, by a wild animal, most probably a mountain lion. It went on to observe that as the dead woman weighed less than one hundred pounds it was possible, however unusual, that the animal had indeed attacked her. As far as the Sheriff was concerned that was the end of it. Not so for Nathan.
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"Nathan, nice to see you after all these years. What can I do for you?" Professor Loftus pulled Nathan gently into his office with his right hand while closing the door with his left.
"Well..." Nathan began slowly, "I felt I had to talk with you. I've had a very strange and terrible experience. I...I just have to talk to someone. You may be the only person in the world who will understand. I'm sure everyone else would think I was crazy."
"Oh, come now, I'm sure it can't be that bad." Professor Loftus thought Nathan looked ill and motioned him to a comfortable chair.
"Well Professor Loftus, I..."
"Please Nathan, you can call me Bob. Now that you've finished your degree and are an up-and-coming assistant professor don't you think we should dispense with the formality?"
"Yes sir, I'll try. But please, I have to tell you what happened. Its been horrible! I have to tell someone and I can't tell anyone but you because no one else would believe it. I was with this girl," Nathan blurted, "up in the mountains. She was killed by a mountain lion. Maybe you read about it? It's been in all the papers."
"Yes, I did see something about it. It must have been terrible for you as well as for that unfortunate girl. But why do you feel you have to tell me about it?"
"Because Professor...uh, Bob...because you're an anthropologist. You were my advisor. You're the only one that can possibly understand. There's much more to it than anyone knows. Than anyone could possibly know or believe. I have to tell someone. You. Otherwise I think I may lose my mind..."
"Well, then, yes, of course, go on." The professor, sensing now a touch of hysteria in Nathan's voice, encouraged him. He removed a bottle of sherry and two glasses from the back of one of the filing cabinets that lined his office.
Nathan leaned back in the deep leather chair and paused for a full minute. Then he began in a quiet voice, "I know this will probably sound stupid, maybe even insane, but what I am about to tell you is true. Every bit. I swear it." Nathan paused again for a moment, then continued nervously. "You remember that when I first came here as a graduate student my main interest was in American Indians. It was only after I met you that I changed my interest to Melanesia. Well...anyway, the second year I was here I decided to go...to go...on a vision quest. You know, go off by myself and fast and all that to see if I could get a vision. A guardian spirit. I realize this sounds pretty stupid but I was a true anthropological romantic in those days. I wanted to see if it would work. It seemed to me that if American Indians had sought visions for generation after generation there must be something to it." Nathan reached for his sherry and, satisfied that Professor Loftus was listening, continued.
"So I went off into the mountains. I went exactly to the place I took Lorraine."
The professor, deducing that Lorraine must have been the girl who was killed, nodded at Nathan to continue.
"I knew of this place up in the mountains," Nathan began again. "Even though it's not very far from L.A. it's like being at the end of the earth. You can go up there for days and not see another person. I drove there and parked on the side of the road. It's a really bad road, just dirt and rocks. Hardly anyone ever goes there, or even knows about it for that matter. I left everything in the car except the shorts I was wearing and went off to find a place to stay. I followed some sort of animal trail, a deer trail I guess, until I came to a small waterfall. There was a nice place there, well hidden and sheltered from the wind. I decided to stay there as long as it would take. I had no food, nothing, not even a knife. I thought that if I stayed there long enough I would get a vision. And then, believe it or not, I did." Nathan began to speak faster.
"Oh, It didn't come right away. I spent five days and nights there before it finally came to me. I slept, or tried to anyway, on a huge flat boulder near the waterfall. I didn't eat anything the whole time except a little bit of that stuff they call miner's lettuce. I chewed on some bark sometimes and I drank water from the stream. During the day I meditated and at night I deliberately tried to dream. The nights were cold. I was hungry and utterly miserable. But I didn't give up. I kept on trying. Then, on the fifth night I had the vision. It was nothing like I had imagined it would be. Nothing at all. It came to me in the form of a beautiful woman. The most beautiful and sensuous creature I've ever seen. I couldn't tell what nationality she was, not even her race. But she was tall and willowy with tawny hair and the most incredible luminescent eyes. Her eyes were like the eyes of an animal when you see them at night." Nathan paused and then continued, speaking more rapidly.
"It happened so fast! All of the sudden she was just there! Right by my side. There was no warning, nothing. She just appeared. She snuggled up against me and I didn't feel cold anymore. She was soft and warm." Nathan paused, looked at the Professor, then shouted, "It's true! Every bit! I swear every word is true!"
"Incredible," the Professor remarked calmly. "But it doesn't sound that unusual. It could have been a dream, or even an hallucination. Hallucinations occur easily under those circumstances."
"Hallucination? A dream? Perhaps. But it was real to me. As real as my being here now. In fact, even more real. But there's more...I don't know how long I actually spent there. It seemed like forever. We wandered in the forest, enjoying the solitude and each other, sleeping close together wherever we found ourselves...and yes, even making love. We never seemed to be hungry or tired. There was a strange, surrealistic quality to it. At times we floated effortlessly over the ground, just above the trees. The trees appeared to glow, especially the black oaks. In the morning when the sun first came up and filtered down through the leaves it was like being in heaven. Or at least what I've always pictured heaven to be like. Not that I ever believed there was such a place. We wandered over the mountains with thoughts only for each other. She was so beautiful. Her name, she told me, was Llona."
Nathan paused once again, staring out of the office window into the twilight. "One of the strangest things about it," he began again thoughtfully, "is that I never felt I was in love with her. I guess that loving her was irrelevant as what I felt was so much more intense. It was as if she was really part of me. She told me she would look after me always and help me whenever I needed her. She said I had only to believe in her and she would always come to me. She taught me what to do to summon her and made me practice over and over again so I would never forget. And she made me swear that I would never forget her."
"But Nathan," the professor interrupted, "it doesn't strike me as unusual that you would have had such a dream, or whatever it was. Out there alone, exhausted and hungry and cold and all. Why do you think it was a vision?"
"Please. Wait. Let me finish." Nathan looked up at the professor who was now seated on his desk looking down at him with obvious concern. "After this happened to me I was terrified. I don't even remember how I got back to my car. I don't remember driving home. A few days later, after I had rested and eaten and recovered somewhat, I began to doubt my sanity. I never told anyone. Not a soul. I was afraid to go back there so I never did...that is, until now. I went there with Lorraine. I never tried to summon Llona. Never! It was much too frightening an experience. I studied for my exams. You helped me get the grant for the work in New Guinea. I was there for almost two years as you know. Then, when I returned to write my dissertation, I couldn't afford to live in L.A., so I went to Berkeley where a friend let me stay with him. It was only after I finished and you helped me get the job here that I returned. I hadn't forgotten the experience. I could never forget it, but it was sufficiently past that I felt no fear of going back. It was, after all, four years later."
"But you surely realized by then that it had to have been just a dream or an hallucination?"
"You keep insisting that's what it was," Nathan protested. "But I tell you it wasn't like that at all! It was real! It's true! I know it, and I'll prove it to you!"
"Nathan, Nathan," Professor Loftus said gently, "how could you ever prove such a thing? You're just upset. Take it easy. Here, have some more sherry." As the professor poured, Nathan began to speak faster.
"You see. Llona wasn't a woman at all! She disappeared! No! No! That's not right. She didn't really disappear. She was replaced. By a lioness! That's why I was so afraid. Don't you see? Don't you see? You know that spirits can take on different shapes. They can appear in whatever guise they wish. One moment it was Llona and the next the lioness. Oh, it was still her all right, the same creature. She was right there next to me where Llona had been. She licked my face and rubbed up against me. She walked back and forth against my legs and then, later, she lay there with her head in my lap. There is absolutely no doubt in my mind about this."
Professor Loftus began to think that perhaps Nathan really was insane but, not knowing what to say, simply waited.
"Don’t you see? Don't you understand? Lorraine wasn't killed by accident! No. She was murdered!"
"You mean you think the lion that killed your friend was the same lion?"
"Of course it was. What else could it have been? She was there! I saw her!"
"You actually saw the lion? But no, even if you had seen one how could you have known it was the same one? Besides, why would the lion want to kill your friend? Nathan, I'm sorry, but perhaps you ought to get some help. See a doctor."
"I tell you I saw her! She was there just as sure as you are here!"
"Did you tell the Sheriff?"
"How could I tell the Sheriff? Don't you understand? It was not the lion I saw. It was Llona!"