Heated Bellow

The crowd assembled slowly, a bit before dawn. Their overcoats and head coverings wrapped tightly about them in the crisp early morning air. The makeshift stage rose before them, surrounded by chain link fences on all sides. It’s erection was hurriedly completed in the night on the old Smith dairy farm past the outskirts of town. Just when the biting wind seemed to make the visitors too uncomfortable, the sun rose over the horizon and streamed a revelatory light on the scene before them.

From behind the stage, a holding area for the four men condemned suddenly came into view out of the weakening darkness. The door swung open swiftly. They were right on schedule for the event. The man charged with the rites for the day’s business, clad in black, led four men in chains up the crooked stairs of the creaking stage. Upon which, a bronze bull, twice the size of one found in nature, was placed precipitously over a hole fashioned within the platform itself. It’s four legs steadied the huge metallic bovine as the added weight of the five men loaded onto the boards.

The recently mute crowd suddenly began to move, agitated, edging closer to the chain link fence dividing them from the display, each man and woman hemming the sequestered space with a peculiar eagerness.

The man enrobed in black unfurled a tinged parchment, and read with authority, the list of crimes committed by the condemned. As he rattled off the offenses, the crowd began to sway. Jostle became push, which then evolved to shove, as they were enraged by each misdeed the herald announced. The coolness of the morning gave way to a manufactured, yet stifling heat, as body mashed against body, filled with anger for every infraction committed. Coats and hats were tossed under arms as the people drew closer, squeezing into an impossible space, confined by nothing but their own insatiable curiosity.

The day was just beginning for the natural order, and the soft rays of light that had illuminated such a harsh vista, had finally stirred the cows that had, up until that point, been sleeping soundly. One of these greeted the new day with a long and bellowing low, and it reverberated across the dewy fields and metal constructs.

As if a catalyst to the speechless throng, their silent, swaying bodies finally vocalized their duress at the sight of the criminals, hawing incomprehensible utterances at the disgrace before them. Their voices were strained, as untested as the light of the day, hoarse with pent up rancor. But soon they came to speak in unison, their voices overcoming the solitary sound of the announced crimes, filled with an unfailing hostility. So quickly did the voice of truth drown out among the howls from the mob, in which one could find no man capable of telling the sins of the four miscreants with surety. Simply caught up in the fervor of the moment, the mob moved and acted as one, completely given over to their unstable ire and madness. But what a comfort it was, to find common ground, in the hate for another. A world, so uncertain at any moment, finally brought into meaning and clarity through this one fleeting moment shared between all.

If and when the speaker had finished, not a man present would know it, nor would it have turned the swollen tides of their fury. With parchment curled back, stuffed under cloak, he pulled upon the shackles joining the four men in their common punishment. With a strong motion, he opened wide the door on the side of the bull, now shining brightly in the early sun. A push against the leading convict led to each man being pulled within the hollow beast, and just as quickly, the door was shut.

No sound could be heard over the roaring of the crowd, their hollering overwhelmed all other semblance of peace beyond the immediate scene. And with a spark from his flint, the executioner lit the pyre built beneath the platform, engulfing the bull on all sides with flames. And as the fire grew stronger, and the heat became unbearable, the chaos of the day finally aligned into unity, as the lows of the dairy cows, the groans of the mob, and the screams of the immolated, transformed into an apocalyptic symphony.