text: Mr. Seymour is the moral center of Elsinore, the pole star by which the rest of you can easily gauge your value to humanity. To the best of your knowledge, he has never missed a day of work and would never dream of saying anything false. He is as true as the beams that make up the barn's rafters, and as solid as the poles that hold them aloft.
  
  You squeeze through two of the wires in the fence and run toward the well-lit pole barn. Inside, you find Mr. Seymour and two of the other hands distributing feed to each of the stalls.
  
  "Dinner must be over, I see," he says. He is dressed in his customary green shirt and dirt dungarees. "And what on earth are doing in here with that gun?"
  
  "I came to see if you've seen anything unusual tonight," you say.
  
  You are surprised when he doesn't respond right away. Instead, he exchanges nervous glances with the other hands.
  
  "It looks like you might have seen something, Li'l Hammie," he says.
  
  "Yes," you say. "Something killed the dogs while we were sitting down for dinner, and I followed the tracks down here."
  
  One of the hands, a small fellow with greasy hair, turns to the other. "The Old Man used to bring us dinner on Thanksgiving," he mutters.
  
  Mr. Seymour ignores them. "Killed the dogs? Are you sure they didn't just run off?"
  
  "They were hooked up on steel cable ties, Mr. Seymour. Something severed each one."
  
  "Hammie, how many years do I have to work here before you start calling me by my first name?"
  
  "Horatio, sorry," you correct yourself, but saying that name feels as awkward as you imagine it would be to address your high school English teacher with the same familiarity. "But have you seen something or no?"
  
  "And if we did?"
  
  "Then I would want to know what did this!"
  
  "Look, Hammie, there are more things on this earth than are dreamt of in that school they sent you to. More things in this earth, too."
  
  "All right, now I know something's happened," you say.
  
  "He might want to count the stalls," the greasy-haired hand chuckles to his companion.
  
  "You two!" Horatio says to them. "If one of you ever puts in an honest day's work, I'll cook your Thanksgiving Dinner myself!"
  
  "What do they mean, I should count the stalls?"
  
  "Just that, I'm afraid. When we brought the girls in this afternoon, there was one missing. We found her back by the woodlot."
  
  It strikes you as odd that he would entertain the notion of keeping this information from you.
  
  "Look," he continues. "Your family has been through a lot this fall. It was too late in the afternoon to do anything about it, so I was going to tell Claude first thing in the morning."
  
  "For all that would accomplish," you say, your ire roused just at the thought of your uncle-father.
  
  "What else is there to do?" Horatio says. "We could report this to the police, but they'll just file a report saying the heifer was killed by coyotes. Next thing you know there'll be a bunch of guys coming around to shoot every coyote they can find."
  
  "But you know it wasn't coyotes that did this."
  
  "No, it wasn't no coyote."
  
  "So what if it comes back?" you say. You're pretty sure that you are both considering the same stories at this point.
  
  "All the other girls are safe here in the barn," he says.
  
  "But how can you be sure, Horatio?"
  
  "They've never gotten inside here before. What I'd be more worried about that dead heifer out there, and what else it will attract."
  
  "Isn't it too late for that?" you say.
  
  "Until you came along, I wasn't going to worry about it," Horatio says. "But clearly losing the dogs has upset you. If you like, we can take the quads out and stand watch over the carcass. What you see might be... educational."
  
  Based on the tracks that you saw leading straight to the barn — stopped only by the barbed-wire fence — you're convinced the immediate threat is here. That's what your gut says, anyway. Your brain says to listen to Mr. Seymour — Horatio — and take advantage of his knowledge and experience in these matters.
  
  > inspect the dead heifer.
  "Well let's go see that dead heifer," you say.
  
  After dismissing the two hands for the evening, Horatio takes down two shotguns from a shelf high above his workbench, along with a box full of shells. The barrels of each gun have been sawed off.
  
  "We shouldn't need these," he explains, "but if we do, that deer rifle of yours will be useless."
  
  "I had no idea these were even here!" you say.
  
  "There's a few things your father never had the chance to tell you."
  
  Behind the barn are a couple old Yamaha quads used for hauling small loads or for patrolling the outer reaches of the farm. You fire them up, and then head off for the far end of Elsinore. You ride along the edge of the road, passing the two trailers where the farmhands dwell, and then cut right toward the pasture where the cows spent the day grazing. The gate is closed, so it takes a moment to open it, pass through, and close it behind you again. If the cows aren't present then you don't see the need to close the gate, but Horatio has always been thorough in his methodology.
  
  The far end of this pasture swings up a small knoll, at the top of which is a copse of trees. There are still small wisps of snow remaining on the uneven grass. You ride partway up the hill, following your friend until he stops beside something dark.
  
  You step off the ATV and recognize at once one your cows — even though there is not much left of it.
  
  "No coyote did this," you say.
  
  "Of course not. But most folks around here don't want to speculate about what the the other options might be. No one wants to admit we live in a place where such unimaginable creatures lurk in the darkness."
  
  After seeing the carcass up close, you get back on the quads and continue riding up the hill. You stop at the edge of the woodlot.
  
  "Do you really think it will come back?" you say. "It looked like the heifer was already picked over."
  
  "There's never any guarantee," Horatio says. "But with the rest of the herd safely locked up in the barn, it will have to come back here if it wants to finish feeding."
  
  An hour passes, during which time you become exceedingly chilly. The temperature is falling through the twenties, and a breeze rattles the trees. When you first set off from the house this evening, it was just to get some fresh air and check on the dogs. All you have to keep warm is your hoodie.
  
  Horatio watches as you fidget to keep warm. "If I had been thinking, there is an extra Carhartt back in the barn."
  
  The beast never returns. However, after ninety minutes of waiting in the cold your attention is drawn by the sight of flashing lights down the road.
  
  "What do you suppose is going on there?" you ask.
  
  "Maybe the police have been called back to another domestic dispute at the Thompsons'?" Horatio says, referring to a family that lives a few doors down from you.
  
  Standing on the edge of the pasture is no longer appealing, so you get back on the quads, go through the routine of passing through the gates, and ride the shoulder of the road back to the farm. But to your dismay, the police are not at the Thompson household, but at Elsinore.
  
  The two of you come to a stop amid a confusing scene. The barn is completely lightless, and the front sliding door has been knocked off its track. In the light of the sheriff's patrol car parked in the driveway, you can see where blood streamed out of the barn and froze in a great puddle.
  
  "Where the hell have you two been?" Claude says. He has a blanket pulled over his shoulders and head to keep warm.
  
  Horatio ignores the question. "What happened here?" he asks the deputy.
  
  "And you are...?" the officer asks.
  
  "Horatio Seymour. I manage these cows."
  
  "Well Mr. Seymour, you might need a new line of work. These animals are all dead."
  
  You follow Horatio to the off-kilter door and look inside. The cows are not only dead, they have been sliced to pieces.
  
  "Any ideas what might have caused this?" the sheriff deputy asks.
  
  "Would you believe it if I told you it was vicious mole-beasts from hell?" Horatio says.
  
  When the deputy chuckles at what he believes is a joke, it is completely out of keeping with the grisly scene inside the barn.
  
  "That's a good one," he says. "For a second I thought you were going to blame it on Sasquatch."
  
  Horatio fakes a laugh too. "Obviously it was a pack of coyotes did this."
  
  "Obviously," the deputy agrees, and he continues to fill out his report.