The Wind From a Burning Woman: Six Stories of Science Fiction by Greg Bear

Dinner smelled better than usual that evening, but I had none of it. Somehow I wasnt brokenhearted. It gave me time to think of a scary story for the country-colored woman on the rock.
    * * * *
    School was the usual mix of hell and purgatory the next day. Then the hot, dry winds cooled and the bells rang and I was on the dirt road again, across the southern hundred acres, walking in the lees and shadows of the big cotton woods. I carried my Road-Runner lunch pail and my pencil box and one booka handwriting manual I hated so much I tore pieces out of it at night, to shorten its lifetimeand I walked slowly, to give my story time to gel.
    She was leaning up against a tree, not far from the rock. Looking back, I can see she was not so old as a boy of eight years thought. Now I see her lissome beauty and grace, despite the dominance of grey in her reddish hair, despite the crows-feet around her eyes and the smile-haunts around her lips. But to the eight-year-old she was simply a peculiar crone. And he had a story to tell her, he thought, that would age her unto graveside.
    Hello, boy, she said.
    Hi. I sat on the rock.
    I can see youve been thinking, she said.
    I squinted into the tree shadow to make her out better. Howd you know?
    You have the look of a boy thats been thinking. Are you here to listen to another story?
    Got one to tell, this time, I said.
    Who goes first?
    It was always polite to let the woman go first, so I quelled my haste and told her she could. She motioned me to come by the trees and sit on a smaller rock, half-hidden by grass. And while the crickets in the shadow tuned up for the evening, she said, Once there was a dog. This dog was a pretty usual dog, like the ones that would chase you around home if they thought they could get away with itif they didnt know you or thought you were up to something the big people might disapprove of. But this dog lived in a graveyard. That is, he belonged to the caretaker. Youve seen a graveyard before, havent you?
    Like where they took Grandpa.
    Exactly, she said. With pretty lawns, and big white-and-grey stones, and for those whove died recently, smaller grey stones with names and flowers and years cut into them. And trees in some places, with a mortuary nearby made of brick, and a garage full of black cars, and a place behind the garage where you wonder what goes on. She knew the place, all right. This dog had a pretty good life. It was his job to keep the grounds clear of animals at night. After the gates were locked, hed be set loose, and he wandered all night long. He was almost white, you see. Anybody human who wasnt supposed to be there would think he was a ghost, and theyd run away.
    But this dog had a problem. His problem was, there were rats that didnt pay much attention to him. A whole gang of rats. The leader was a big one, a good yard from nose to tail. These rats made their living by burrowing under the ground in the old section of the cemetery.
    That did it. I didnt want to hear any more. The air was a lot colder than it should have been, and I wanted to get home in time for dinner and still be able to eat it. But I couldnt go just then.
    Now the dog didnt know what the rats did, and just like you and I, probably, he didnt much care to know. But it was his job to keep them under control. So one day he made a truce with a couple of cats that he normally tormented and told them about the rats. These cats were scrappy old toms, and theyd long since cleared out the competition of other cats, but they were friends themselves. So the dog made them a proposition. He said hed let them use the cemetery anytime they wanted, to prowl or hunt in or whatever, if they would put the fear of God into a few of the rats. The cats took him up on it. We get to do whatever we want, they said, whenever we want, and you wont bother us. The dog agreed.
    That night the dog waited for the sounds of battle. But they never came. Nary a yowl. She glared at me for emphasis. Not a claw