Unhappily Thereafter

A long time ago, a lumberjack appeared from the woods. He donned a grey and white trapper hat made from the pelts of wolves, and overalls from the same beasts. His axe perfectly balanced on his shoulder, with a handkerchief tied to its shaft, bundled to carry his leftover lunch. He had just finished his cut for the day, and emerged from the forest dirty and exhausted. Yet as tired as he was, he still found time to whistle a tune.

As he made his way toward the village, he couldn’t help taking notice at a little cottage. The whistling stopped, as did the lumberjack's progress, when he noticed something peculiar. The front door to the cottage was still parted open, as it was when he strolled by this morning. He was accustomed to seeing the grandmother in her garden, or the little girl in the red hood picking the flowers. But as he stood there looking at this particular door being open, he didn’t recall seeing the grandmother or her granddaughter this morning. In fact, he was rather curious that he didn’t see them now, and the door was still slightly ajar.

The lumberjack made his way up the brick path toward the door. He graciously knocked on the frame.

“Grandmother,” he called out, with no answer.

He pushed the parted door open to unveil an evil that had never crossed his mind. There on the cottage floor in a pool of blood lay the little girl and her red hood. Without hesitation he quickly ran inside and knelt down beside the body. He picked her up to see if she was somehow alive, only to find there was nothing he could do. The lumberjack gently laid the girl back onto the floor and ripped a sheet off the bed to cover her. Just as quickly as he was in the house, he was gone.

A couple hours had gone by, and in the doorway stood the lumberjack. He stood there with the village constable by his side—both men starring silently into the horror of the cottage. The constable slowly entered the house. Taking note of everything as he walked in, he quickly concluded that this was no robbery. And that there were no signs of struggle. The cottage seemed intact except for a curious print on a closet door. High up near the top of the door was an imprint of a bloody paw. The constable opened the door, only to find a second victim. The grandmother had been placed in the closet, mauled just like her granddaughter on the floor.

“A wolf," he muttered as he pointed to two more prints in blood, from hind legs exiting the home.

The constable exited the cottage, and went to his wagon, where he removed his hunting rifle. Without a word, the lumberjack entered the house to retrieve his axe and joined the man on his track.

Into the night the men searched for the killer; the lumberjack had a notion of his whereabouts recalling a wolf’s den he had come across during his cuts. Deep into the woods the men went until coming across the clearing—where a stack of boulders lay and an opening to a den. In the light of the full moon, the appearance of a bloody wolf emerged.

“I knew you'd come,” said the Wolf. “And what a mighty big axe you have.”

“The better to kill you with,” replied the lumberjack.

“That the same axe you used on three of my pups? You left your scent near the den. I've been watching you, waiting,” exclaimed the Wolf.

The lumberjack stood questionable, “Waiting for what?”

The Wolf smiled, “Their litter mates to get stronger!”

From the shadows appeared three sets of glowing eyes from his remaining grown wolves. The three surrounded the lumberjack, and before the constable could raise his rifle, a fourth set appeared from the shadows. The mother raised up on her hind legs behind the constable, and drove her jaw right down upon him, leaving the lumberjack to fend for himself.

“Killing the little red hood and her grandmother was unfortunate, however you set this in motion, to make a hat,” preached the Wolf.

And with those closing words, the three sibling wolves attacked the lumberjack under the full moon. His screams were masked by the howls of the Wolf and his mate as they watched their remaining pups feast on the revenge they had so long been waiting for.