He hitched her to the birdcage that was wrapped around the tree and she pulled it loose as pretty as you please. Then he loaded it on the stoneboat and hauled it up the hill and stowed it in the back of the machine shed, in the far corner by the forge.

After that, he hitched Bess to the garden plow and gave the garden a cultivating that it didn't need so it would be fresh dirt all over and no one could locate where he'd dug the grave.

He was just finishing the plowing when Sheriff Doyle drove up and got out of the car. The sheriff was a soft-spoken man, but he was no dawdler. He got right to the point.

'I hear, he said, 'you found something in the woods.

'That I did, said Mose.

'I hear it died on you.

'Sheriff, you heard right.

'I'd like to see it, Mose.

'Can't. I buried it. And I ain't telling where.

'Mose, the sheriff said, 'I don't want to make you trouble, but you did an illegal thing. You can't go finding people in the woods and just bury them when they up and die on you.

'You talk to Doc Benson?

The sheriff nodded. 'He said it wasn't any kind of thing he'd ever seen before. He said it wasn't human.

'Well, then, said Mose, 'I guess that lets you out. If it wasn't human, there could be no crime against a person. And if it wasn't owned, there ain't any crime against property. There's been no one around to claim they owned the thing, is there?

The sheriff rubbed his chin. 'No, there hasn't. Maybe you're right. Where did you study law?

'I never studied law. I never studied anything. I just use common sense.

'Doc said something about the folks up at the university might want a look at it.

'I tell you, Sheriff, said Mose. 'This thing came here from somewhere and it died. I don't know where it came from and I don't know what it was and I don't hanker none to know. To me it was just a living thing that needed help real bad. It was alive and it had its dignity and in death it commanded some respect. When the rest of you refused it decent burial, I did the best I could. And that is all there is to it.