The Woman at the Cave

A magic realism short story. Death is portrayed as a woman

She was a woman and she lived in the cave at the start of the creek. Her cave was a dark crack that ran through a rock, and from the crack came a trickle of fresh water that cascaded downwards, forming a stream down the side of the mountain. She wore a simple white gown and she had long white hair that hung down to her waist and she could sometimes be seen sitting next to the water washing her hair in the running water. I grew up in a house near the creek and when I was very young I would play in its cool water. The side of the mountain was forested and full of life. It was filled with ferns and insects and moss covered rocks and wildflowers. For a child it was a playground, and all of my afternoons were spent there. The cave at the start of the creek was a place that I knew of but that I never went to. Sometimes I could see the woman with the white hair sitting where the water started and I would wonder what was inside of her dark cave. Near the mouth of the cave the grass underfoot gave way to sand. Soft, cool sand that was interrupted by the occasional sharp rock. Silver strands of spiderweb hung everywhere, clinging to the rocks, draping like tattered banners in a ruined palace. As you got closer you could see that there weren't any spiders in the webs. If she ever spoke, she could have told you that there never had been. If you had walked in that place barefoot your feet would have bled. Webs would have stuck to your face. As a child, it was a place that terrified me, and I kept away from it.

 

The first time I saw the woman leave her cave was when I was a boy. My friend and I were climbing a tall tree that curved over the creek. My friend was the gardener's daughter. She and her father lived in a small cottage on the edge of my father’s property. She was about my age and when we were not in school we came down to the creek to play. From the tree we had climbed, the creek must have been 20 feet below us. From so high up, we could see her cave at the start of the river and I noticed that she was walking downstream. It was odd. I had never seen her leave her cave, but I payed it no mind. We were so high above her that I was sure she would not see us. We were edging out onto the branch, moving farther from the trunk, daring one another to see who would go the farthest. It was my friend’s turn to take a few more careful steps out onto the shaking branch. She moved carefully, but under the weight of her body the branch snapped and she fell. My friend landed in a standing position in the water, but the water was not deep enough to cushion her fall. Her legs crumpled beneath her, as she hit the shallow water. I sat in the tree, shocked, unable to move. But the woman with the white hair approached her. She moved across the water and she stopped where my friend had fallen. She picked up her body and she pressed it against hers and she kissed her on the mouth. Not in the way that mothers kiss their children, but in the way that lovers kiss, deeply, with mouths open. It was a terrible thing to see and my friend’s skin went white and cold at the touch of her lips. When the kiss was over, she picked up my friend and carried her back up the creek toward the cave. As death climbed from the water I saw that she stepped carelessly through the sand though she was barefoot. As her feet were sliced by the sharp rocks that were scattered through the soft sand, I saw that she did not bleed. She seemed to walk through the webs. She disappeared with my friend into the darkness inside of the cave and It was then that I realized the woman was Death.

 

For a long time I avoided that place. I wanted nothing to do with it. It wasn’t until many years later when I was a teenager that I saw Death again. It was a hot summer day and I had descended the path that ran from my house to the creek, to walk alongside the trickling water. I had been walking for about ten minutes when I saw her. She was sitting outside her cave. Seeing her, I realized that my childhood memories of her had not served me well. Now that I was older I saw how beautiful she really was. She had smooth pale skin and a shapely, womanly body. Her lips were a pale pink, her nose was thin, her eyes were a cold grey and above them sat two perfectly placed white eyebrows. She always wore the same simple white gown. Though her hair was white her face showed no sign of age. She looked young but she also looked old.  Not old in the way that a grandmother is old, with greying hair and wrinkles, but old as a soldier coming home from war is old, old as a mother who lost a child is old. Her age showed itself in bleak wisdom and in terrible beauty. Her face was without flaw and the effect was discomforting. She was beautiful, but she was inhuman, and she was terrible to look at.

 

A moment later I saw the man. He was wading through the creek. His clothes were ragged and torn and his sleve was stained with red. His face was twisted into a grimace. I knew the man though I barely recognized him. He had been rich and wealthy once. A successful man. A man who wore expensive clothes. But recently he had lost all of his money, and he had taken to living on the street. He who had turned up his nose at beggars now sat with a bowl, his clothes in tatters, asking for money. I wondered if the man knew what he was doing here. The creek behind my house was many miles from the town. The man walked through the water of the creek carelessly, splashing it every which way. He didn’t notice my presence, but he did see the woman sitting by the cave. As soon as he saw her the pain faded from his face. Death looked straight at him.He stared at her open mouthed for a moment, as if he was in a trance, and then he ran to her. She stood up to receive him. As he climbed up the rocks to the cave where Death sat he sliced his palms and his feet on the sharp rocks. His red blood trickled out into the sand. As soon as he was close enough to touch, Death reached out her hand and held his face. She pulled his lips to hers and she kissed him. The life came out of his body then, and he fell. And she caught him. She held his body in her arms and she carried it with her as she went into the cave. The last glimpse I caught of the man’s face showed a gentle smile, an expression of peace.

 

My father died when I was a young man, but I never saw death take him. I had been traveling, and I was very far away from the cave where the water started. When news of his death reached me, I came home, to take care of my mother and to take ownership of the house. I brought a woman with me. We married then, in our house by the creek, and the years following were good ones. I only saw Death a few times in my adult years. Once, when one of the servants in my house went into labor I saw her climb from her cave and walk downstream to the place where my house stood. She walked through the door to my house and into the room where the woman was giving birth. She sat down next to the woman. The woman turned her sweaty head and saw her and there was fear in her eyes. Death did not kiss the woman, though, she merely sat and waited, her face as expressionless as always. The woman suffered all through the night, and stared at Death’s face, refusing to close her eyes. It wasn’t until morning when the child was safely delivered that Death reached over and kissed the woman, ending her pain. Death then picked her up, as easily and gently as if she were a baby, and carried her out the door and up the hill to the place where the water started.

 

I saw her again when one morning, through my window. She was walking down the stream, her gown trailing in the water behind her. I followed her, curious. Death never noticed me when I followed her, or if she did she never said anything. She was only ever concerned with the next person she was to meet. She followed the stream all the way into the town, into the lumberyard. In the lumberyard men were at work cutting and stripping logs. She stopped in front of a man who was working a large circular saw. He was carefully running wood through its teeth. Behind him several men carried a large log. One of the men tripped and the log fell into the man working the saw, pushing his head into the spinning blade and ending his life. Death was upon him in a moment. She kissed his bloody disfigured face and she carried him away. As she left the town the men from the mill went to break the news. At the doorstep of his home they were greeted by his wife and his child. As they told what had happened to her husband, she began to cry. The three year old daughter in her arms stared into the distance. She was too young to understand what had happened, but down the street she could see a woman with white hair carrying her father. She wondered where she was taking him.

 

Years later there was a war in our country. It never affected me for by that time I was too old to fight in the army. When it approached our home my family and I locked ourselves inside our home with enough food to last for weeks. The battle took place only two towns away. We could hear muffled gunfire and the shouting of men’s voices. We sat inside and held each other and waited for it to end. Through the window I could see death moving and up and down the stream carrying the broken body of a soldier on the way up, and carrying nothing at all on the way back down. She made trip after long trip and even after night had fallen and the noises of battle had stopped, she continued to travel up and down the creek, the clear water lit silver by the moon, a new soldier in her arms each time.

It was years after the war had ended that a traveler came to my door and asked if he might have a place to sleep for the night. In my younger days I might have turned such a man away, but as I had grown older I had grown kinder and more gracious. I told him that he would be welcome and I set up a bed for him in the barn and had my wife set an extra place at the table for dinner that night. The traveler wasn’t well. I realized it at dinner when I saw that he barely ate and that his face was abnormally pale. As I led him into the barn that night he began cough. A great ugly, heaving cough. I asked him if he was alright and he shook his head. I asked him if he wanted me to call a doctor and he shook his head again. I opened the gate to the barn and inside was Death, sitting on his bed, looking directly at him. The man was already pale but he went as white as ivory when he saw her. He knew who she was and he feared her. He turned and ran, coughing and gasping, moving as fast as his feet would take him. Death rose calmly and followed him, walking at her own steady pace, not stopping to look at me as she passed me by. She followed the man into the woods, and this time I didn’t follow her. I knew that It didn’t matter how fast he ran. She would catch up with him and she would have her way with him. I went into my house to where my family was and I slept.

 

One morning I was walking alongside the river and I saw Death washing her long white hair in the water that flowed from her cave. It was a good day when she was washing her hair. It meant that there was no one for her to visit. I stood and I watched her and after a moment she turned and she looked at me. She had never looked at me before but I had always known that someday she would. I went inside my house and I put on my traveling coat. I kissed my wife and my family and I told them that there was a trip I had to make. I waved to them as I walked out the door. I followed the path that ran alongside the stream. I followed it for miles and miles until the stream widened and became a river. Then I followed the river. I never turned to look behind me, I never stopped to listen for footsteps. They were there and I knew it. I didn’t hurry. I walked at my own pace. The river grew wider and wider as the sun sank lower and lower. When night fell, I did not stop to sleep. I kept walking. It was cold and I was hungry, but moving kept me somewhat warm. Sometimes there were towns or boats. I passed them all by. Their glowing lights passed me as I walked.

 

As it was becoming unbearably cold there was light in the east. The light widened and grew and eventually there was the sun. With the sun came warmth. My legs were tired but I knew that the journey was almost over now. The river was very wide and it moved straight. Already I could see seagulls in the sky. I walked for several more hours and began to feel uncomfortably hot. The sun shone on me, chapping my lips and burning my face. I was sweating now, a thick wet sweat. My body moved slower than it used to. It didn’t have much left to give. I pushed it onwards. At last, suddenly, there was the sea. I went all the way to the water's edge and there I stopped. I wanted to sit down but I didn’t. The water stretched all the way from my feet to the horizon. It was endless. Turning my back on the water I looked behind me. There were dunes of sand and green hills and mountains and there was Death, descending the last dune of sand to where I stood at the water's edge. Her hair and her white gown blew in the wind. She looked directly at me and she stopped when she was only a few feet away. Her face was without flaw and was perfect and terrible. Her eyes were cold and grey. My face was old now, and covered in wrinkles. She looked much younger than me, but she also didn’t. She looked ancient. Ancient and ageless. I reached out my hand and I touched the side of her face. Her skin was soft and hard at the same time. She was cool to the touch. The warmth of my hand did not affect the temperature of her skin. I was exhausted and feverish but she was here and she was strong and cool. Leaning forward I kissed her, gently, and the touch of her lips was relief. I was falling and I could feel her arms wrapping around me. She would carry me home.

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