The Minks

In the backyard of our house on Norwood, there were five hundred steel cages lined up, each with a wooden box roofed with tar paper; inside, two stories, with straw for a bed. Sometimes the minks would pace back and forth wildly, looking for a way out; or else they’d hide in their wooden houses, even when we’d put the offering of raw horse meat on their trays, as if they knew they were beautiful and wanted to deprive us. In spring the placid kits drank with glazed eyes. Sometimes the mothers would go mad and snap their necks. My uncle would lift the roof like a god who might lift our roof, look down on us and take us out to safety. Sometimes one would escape. He would go down on his hands and knees, aiming a flashlight like a bullet of light, hoping to catch the orange gold of its eyes. He wore huge boots, gloves so thick their little teeth couldn’t bite through. “They’re wild,” he’d say. “Never trust them.” Each afternoon when I put the scoop of raw meat rich with eggs and vitamins on their trays, I’d call to each a greeting. Their small thin faces would follow as if slightly curious. In fall they went out in a van, returning sorted, matched, their skins hanging down on huge metal hangers, pinned by their mouths. My uncle would take them out when company came and drape them over his arm—the sweetest cargo. He’d blow down the pelts softly and the hairs would part for his breath and show the shining underlife which, like the shining of the soul, gives us each character and beauty.