Hard mercy

I was walking up the alleyway, as I usually do. A squirrel in the prime of his life, lay dead in the packed snow before me. I nudged it to the edge with my shoe, on to a frozen patch of grass, so that the squirrel would not get flattened. But the squirrel was already dead.

I walked on.

Then soon again, I was walking on a bright and warm day – for the still of winter. As I approached the spot in the alleyway, I saw a tall man in a brown leather jacket, gaunt in face and scarred. A squirrel struggled along the alley’s edge, legs scrabbling in the dead leaves.

“He doesn’t look good,” I said.

“I’m going to put him out of his misery,” the man replied. “My son shot him with his BB gun.”

He flicked the blade of a switchblade knife he held in one outstretched hand and he bent towards the squirrel.

I walked on.