The Laws of Man

And so that’s how the days have gone. The farm is prosperous now. I wake up with my rooster, I toil with my crops, I lay out sacrifices for the cow, and I go to bed with the queen. Day after week after month, I work and I work and I make sure the place doesn’t burn down around me. The times the queen whispers in my ears are my least favorite. She eggs me on and tells me not to worry. I can’t help but listen. This life is all I have. It’s all I’ll ever have at the end of my days.

The cow continues to give when it receives its offering. Milk, meat, and a healthy rain for my fields. It gives, and I take. I take it to the market in town. I sell to the locals. They smile at me. I smile back. They sing my praises. I hide my sins. Would they continue to buy from me if they knew the horrible things that happened? I dare not say. But others are suspicious. The authorities are asking around. Some people have gone missing and I was the last person to see a few of them. I tell the sheriff not to worry. I let him search the grounds. I give him my statement. But they can never find any evidence to press charges.

The offerings are complete. I allow the cow to devour them in their entirety. All the way down to their bones. I’ve watched it a few times. My morbid curiosity getting the better of my common sense. It was horrific. The way the creature consumes all that is before it. And yet, it gives what I need most. The days grow shorter. The winter closes in. I plant the winter wheat and prepare for a long and cold end of the year.

The queen is satisfied with my labors. She has begun to lend me her hands when it comes to preparing food storage for the bitter season. The cow is given the run of the barn. I make a proper bed for it with a blanket to keep itself warm. I do all this for the farm, and for the town.

The town is grateful more than ever for my work. With each new sacrifice, I grow the farm. As winter ends, I start planting apple trees. I use the money to purchase more land. More livestock. More types of seeds. Soon enough, I’m growing all kinds of things. Tomatoes, watermelons, pumpkins, and grapes. I have an orchard, a vineyard, and a couple more moonshine stills. I sell sheep’s wool, chicken eggs, churned butter, and other goods for people to turn into whatever they need.

This has been a boon for me. Soon enough, my name becomes well known around the town. Everyone is so happy when they see me. They tell me how much they adore my farm. Storekeepers are always glad to see new shipments. They tell me they can’t keep it in the store for more than a week. Everything flies off the shelf. A winery has started using my grapes. I wonder if this is what it really is all about. The town has grown a lot in such a small time. The mayor himself comes to my farm to visit. He makes a spectacle of my good fortune, and I catch the smile of the queen as she stands next to me.

Eventually, we do marry. I say my vows, and she says hers. She keeps close to me all the time, and lets me know when another offering must be made. I bring her wine from town to ease her in the cold and cider in the heat. I have the farmhands help make deliveries into town while I give the cow the special attention that it needs. The sacrifices require greater offerings. More attention comes to my farm. More deputies ask me questions. I smile, I nod, I answer. They search my premises, and I sit back and watch. I give them some free moonshine on their way out, and they leave happier than when they came.

The sheriff can’t get around what’s happening. He wakes me up in the middle of the night to do a surprise inspection. He and his boys tear the place apart. I sit idly by, looking confused and a little scared. The queen plays the part of the hysterical wife well. Our concern is believable. But when nothing turns up of all the missing people, the sheriff has nothing to say.

It’s becoming a routine. The sheriff comes by, searches, and leaves. He spends a lot of time in the barn, and the queen tempts me to have him fed to the cow. But I know better. I take action against the city. I get help from my friends. The town stakes its claim. It cannot live without my farm. The mayor agrees and the sheriff reluctantly stops investigating. It’s all becoming routine.

As the days go by, I’m putting the work in. I’m sweating and bleeding and feeding the farm. The sheriff stops by every now and then. He finally comes and asks me the burning question in his mind. Why do I have only one cow? I take him to see it. The cow looks at him. He looks at the cow. They share a tense moment, and I can see the gears turning in his head.

He leaves without questioning me further. I know in the deepest pit of that cow’s stomach lay the bones of many. I think about that for a bit. I think about the blood on my hands. But when I look out at my fields these days, I find the queen is right. She tells me it’s all worth it in the end. I nod my head. To think about the alternative would be too much.

I never get used to it. I have nightmares when I sleep. My heart is heavy. But whenever I go into town, everyone is so happy to see me. New buildings are being made. Kids are running around. The mayor calls me in and tells me that if it weren’t for my farm, the town would’ve died years ago. He’s happy to see business booming. I tell him that I do everything I can for the town.

And that’s how it goes. Until, one day, there’s a fancy new car parked in my driveway. A man walks up. He asks me some questions. He’s wearing a suit and tie. Very dressy fellow. He looks out over my farmland. In between questions about my whereabouts, he asks me what I grow here. I tell him I grow all kinds of things. I tell him it’s all fresh and natural. I tell him it all goes to the market.

He asks me how much I make. I tell him I get by as much as I can. He turns to a new line of questioning. Some certain people have gone missing. Their families are worried. He’s already looked at the reports but hasn’t gone into town. I tell him he can look all over to his heart’s content. He does just that. Like the sheriff, he can’t find anything out of sorts.

Except the cow. He gets a weird feeling. Asks me all kinds of questions. Where did I get it? Where’s the rest of the herd? What do I feed it? All given the most mundane responses. I’m a simple man, with simple answers. He doesn’t like it. He gets in his car and leaves. The queen leans on my shoulder and watches him go. “You’ll have to take care of him.” She tells me in that sickly sweet voice of hers. I know. I know all too well.

A day goes by. The car comes back. This time the sheriff is with him. The sheriff asks me if I know the man. I tell him I do. He tells me he’s a federal agent, looking into the same disappearances from the years before that he was. I smile, I nod, I offer him a glass of cider. He takes it and chugs it down. My cider is the best in the state. Everyone knows this. Everyone but the agent.

The agent comes back. He asks me about the cow again. He’s a smart guy. Smarter than me. He tells me there’s no way it adds up. He says that the meat product numbers are unreal. He accuses me of sending corpses to the butcher. I’m shocked. I would never do something as heinous as that. Nothing so evil and vile. The sheriff doesn’t speak up.

The agent is frustrated. He can’t take me in with such a flimsy reason. He needs testimony. Witnesses. Motive. He has none so far. The agent is trying to rattle my cage. I’m not rattled in the way he would hope. I’m taken aback. I sigh, and I apologize for how weird things are. It throws him through a loop. He doesn’t know what to say next. I offer to let him tear the place apart again. He jumps at the opportunity.

He looks to the sheriff and tells him he wants his whole department here to do a full scale search. He talks about this new fangled equipment he’s going to use. New methods of science or some such. The sheriff smiles and nods along. The agent wants to start in the barn. The sheriff and I oblige him.

I unlock the barn. The sheriff goes in. I stand outside and look at the cow. The agent walks all over. Tosses hay around. Gets it all over himself in the process. I look at the sheriff. He looks at me. I jerk my head to the side. He slowly walks out of the barn. I hear the agent talk to the cow. “What are you looking at, you dumb animal?” He says to it.

The agent is staring it down. I watch. The sheriff doesn’t. He’s smoking a cigar and looking anywhere but there. The agent loses his temper. He kicks some hay towards the cow. The cow chomps down on his head. It makes a disgusting sound as it slurps his spine from his body. The corpse falls to the floor, and the cow begins to feast.

“There’ll be others now, you know.” The sheriff tells me.

“I know.” I tell him.

“How long do you think you can keep this up?” He asks.

“As long as it takes.” I reply.

The sheriff drags on his cigar. He looks at the cow as it chows down on the agent’s leg. It looks back at him. He looks away and sighs.

“Well, I suppose we’ll have some work to do.”

“We all have work to do, sheriff.” I tell him, heartily slapping him on the shoulder.

“That’s right. I’ll talk to the mayor and we’ll come up with a plan. It’ll take a few weeks, but eventually they’ll buy it. After all, there’ll be no bones to speak of around here.”

“That there won’t, sheriff.”

“Good. We’ll be in touch.”

I watch him head to the agent’s fancy new car and drive it off my land. I watch the grass sway in the wind. I watch the clouds drift in the sky. I watch the cow chew on the intestines of the agent. I close up the barn for the night and head inside. It’s almost supper time for me too, and I’ve sure worked up an appetite.