THE MORMO

     He freewheeled down the hill, out from the tunnel of
     trees, to find himself at a crossroad. He decided to
     turn left, into a country road. There was no traffic.
     To his right small green fields, well-hedged; some
     with cattle. To his left parkland sweeping up to
     wooded hills. Occasionally, to right or left, lanes
     wound away. He decided to cycle straight on, and
     see where the road would take him. He saw no houses.

     After some miles the road became narrower, but still
     girt by broad grassy borders and high brambly hedges.
     It became sleepier, more unkempt. Signs of husbandry
     became harder to discern. No more cows in the fields
     beyond the hedges, which had almost become thickets,
     flowery and profuse. It was noon, but the air was
     fresh. The further he went the more content and relaxed
     he felt. Surely, this was paradise. The rasp of
     grasshoppers and the whirr of the bicycle made symphony.

     The road, or rather lane now, had to go somewhere, yet
     it was a few hours since he had last seen a building or
     a fence. And then, rising out of a small wood straight
     ahead, he saw a church tower. The village had no signpost.
     Within the trees he passed a couple of houses, hidden
     behind high brick walls, over which hollyhocks and
     overgrown bushes told of abandonment. The road dipped,
     crossed a stream and then curved up to the left, round
     a hill. Yew trees were visible on top. Up from the stream
     ran steps. Leaving the bicycle at the foot of the steps,
     he continued up the road on foot. Rounding the bend found
     himself at the road's end, in a farmyard that fronted the
     main entrance to the church.

     To his surprise he noticed a few yards off, at the back of
     an out-building, some washing hanging on a clothesline.
     And then to his right, behind a three-part stabledoor, he
     saw a woman through the open upper part. An icy pang of
     terror seized his head; a split second later he realised
     why. Visible in the lower section were her legs - the
     legs of a bird, or monstrous chicken. She was a Mormo.
     He turned away in a flash and strolled as nonchalantly as
     he could toward the church, praying that she had not seen
     that he had seen her.

     As he approached the church he saw that beyond it, hanging
     over the cemetry fence, was the fleece of a sheep. She
     must have eaten the last human inhabitant well over a year
     ago. The desolation of that beautiful country way was now
     explained. Once round the corner of the church and out of
     sight of the farm house, he raced on tiptoe, hardly daring
     to breathe, to where he guessed the steps up from the
     road emerged. Down he went, thanking destiny for the whim
     that had seized him to leave his bicycle and continue the last
     few hundred yards of the road on foot. He mounted and
     pedalled as silently as he could, in an agony of hope and fear.
     His mirror showed no pursuit. After a few miles he began to
     breathe more easily.