The Wall

The weather turns cold and rainy at the end of August, and after a week, the protagonist decides it is time to move back to the hunting lodge. She packs everything and brings the animals down the mountain. She settles the cows and watches as Tiger rediscovers his favorite spots around the lodge. She goes to sleep and wakes to the cat pressing her nose to the protagonist’s face, happy that she is back.

Lynx and the protagonist walk back to the Alm to bring back the rest of their equipment. On one of their walks, the protagonist begins to worry about the winter ahead. Though she takes solace in the return of her routine, tending to the potatoes and milking Bella in the byre, the chilling weather fills her with dread. Before turning bitter, the weather grows nice for a brief time, and while it does, the protagonist enjoys the forest. She watches ants as they work together to build their colony, and feels bad at all the work they do.

October passes and the protagonist reflects on how much her life slows down in the forest. In her old life, in the city, she lived at a faster pace, though she took comfort in her life with her family. As her daughters grew older, however, she came to feel that she did not share that same connection with them, and they stopped being a safe haven. The protagonist believes that the forest is the right place for her now, and watches as nature reclaims the remnants of human civilization. Hugo’s car, still at the hunting lodge, is overgrown and now home to woodland creatures. Outside the wall, plants grow over buildings, breaking them down.

As winter approaches, the protagonist rushes to finish preparing for the harder weather. She harvests her potatoes and beans, collects fruit, and cuts the rest of the hay for Bella and Bull. When she finishes, she finds that she is surprised by how well she did. On All Saints’ Day, the weather turns warm, and the protagonist knows that this means winter will soon arrive. She reflects on the day and her feelings toward the dead. Though she never liked the holiday, she is relieved that everyone outside the wall is now peaceful.

The foehn returns again and the cats become agitated. They go out into the forest at night, and the protagonist, restless herself, can hear Tiger calling out. Even Bull seems agitated, surprising and worrying the protagonist. Dreams overwhelm her during these nights. When the wind dies, the cats return.

Bull does not calm down, and the protagonist realizes that he is maturing, and his agitation means he wants to mate. She worries for Bella, though she knows that this was going to happen eventually. She decides to move Bull to the garage and prepares the space. She leads him over to it, providing him with comfort and hay, but feels terrible. She sees his confusion, and realizes he is being punished for something he cannot control.

The protagonist hopes that Bella conceived a calf before she moved Bull, but is unsure. She feels guilty for separating the animals who only ever had each other and their connection. Bella bellows, responding to Bull’s unrest, and the protagonist occasionally reunites them, hoping that Bella will conceive and that they will have another calf.

As the winter months pass, the protagonist becomes preoccupied, worrying about her animals. Snow falls and she feels as though time passes strangely, unable to grasp time itself. She thinks of it as a spider’s web, with the moments of her life caught up in its trappings.

In December, the cat is pregnant again. Tiger grows restless, and begins going out into the forest again. One night, however, he does not return. The protagonist and Lynx go looking for him, and though Lynx picks up his trail, it ends at the stream. The cat gives birth to two kittens, but both are stillborn. After this, the cat grows severely ill, and the protagonist worries she will die as well. She nurses the cat back to health, only to fall ill herself.

The protagonist puts herself to bed, suffering from chills and a high fever. She dreams of people and animals, and can barely bring herself to move. She does her best to feed the cat and Lynx and milk Bella, but is wracked by her fever and the horrors it brings to her. She sees her husband’s face, though it dissolves when she tries to touch it. She does not know if the animals realize she is sick, but notices how the cat stays by her side and how Lynx watches over her.

After an unknown number of days, the protagonist wakes up feeling better. She feeds the cat and Lynx, and when she hears the crows descend into the trees around them, sets her watch for 9 o’clock. By mid-February, she feels fully healed, though she still works to not overburden herself. She resumes her adventures with Lynx, and though she is sad about the loss of Tiger, feels relieved the other kittens died. She is not ready to lose more love. The protagonist begins to feel like a brand-new person and credits her illness with helping her fully break away from her past.

In the present, as she writes her account, the protagonist notes that she watches the crows closely, using them as a clock. Recently, an all-white crow appeared with the others, though it is shunned by them. She identifies with the crow’s isolation, and feeds it when she can. She wonders if she is helping it live when it shouldn’t.

Back in her account, when March arrives, the protagonist notices that the illness seriously hurt the cat. She does not go out into the woods looking for a mate as she did the year before. All month, the protagonist saws and chops wood and stays in and around the hunting lodge. Lynx complains that she does not adventure with him, but she soon breaks out of her routine when he comes home with a smashed paw. She tends to his paw, puts a splint on him, and he heals. She feels guilty for abandoning him and realizes she must do a better job with her responsibilities.

The weather remains cold, but as spring approaches, the protagonist begins making plans to return to the Alm again. She knows that the cows need to return, especially as Bull is bigger than ever. She does worry about leaving the cat, but decides they must go. She spends some time repairing her clothing, waiting for the weather to improve.

In April, her alarm clock breaks. At first, she does not notice the new silence, but when the cat looks up, she notices. It stops ticking, and she cannot fix it. This leaves her with only her watch, which her husband once gave her, though it is not accurate either.

Better weather arrives in May. The protagonist begins preparing for the journey up to the Alm, and realizes that the cat notices what she is doing. The cat grows moody and cold toward the protagonist. She feels guilty for abandoning the cat. When she is ready, the protagonist takes the cows and Lynx to the Alm. The cows are happy, though the protagonist struggles to settle into the lodge, expecting to see Tiger in his usual places.

On the fifth day at the Alm, the protagonist and Lynx hike into the woods. The protagonist looks out through the wall and sees how much nature works to reclaim the land. The roads, cracked by the frost in winter, are breaking apart, with new plants growing up and through them. Seeing the devastation this time, the protagonist expects the usual anxiety to arise. To her surprise, it does not come, and she realizes she no longer feels connected to her previous life.

The summer passes peacefully. The protagonist finds that there is less work to do this year, and watches as Bull grazes and spends a lot of time with Lynx. Lynx revels in her presence, and seems to calm down, more confident than ever that she will stay with him.

In July, the protagonist returns to the hunting lodge to hoe the potato field. She stays overnight, and is happy when the cat wakes her up. She starts harvesting the meadow as well, splitting her time between the hunting lodge and the Alm. She stays for times at both places, making quick progress with the harvest. She spends time with the cat, but always makes sure to return to the Alm to milk Bella.

The protagonist spends August at the Alm before returning to the hunting lodge one day in September to see to the potatoes. She leaves Bull and Bella in the field when she leaves, wanting them to enjoy the nice day. Later, as she and Lynx return to the Alm, Lynx bolts out from the trees into the field. When the protagonist emerges into the field, she sees a man with an ax, standing over the corpse of Bull. Bull’s head is split open. Lynx rushes at the man, but the protagonist calls him off.

She rushes into the lodge and grabs her hunting rifle. As she runs out, she sees the man bring his ax down on Lynx’s head. She shoots and kills the man. She kneels by Lynx’s body, picks him up and places him on a bench by the lodge. She then goes to the byre, and tries to calm Bella down. Next, she drags the man away, bringing him to where she looks out from the wall and rolls his body down the hill. Bull, too large to move, she leaves in the field.

The protagonist buries Lynx and spends the night in the byre with the grieving Bella. The next morning, she packs everything and leads Bella away, back to the hunting lodge. As they leave, Bella keeps turning around and bellowing toward Bull. Back at the hunting lodge, Bella mourns for two days before she falls silent. The protagonist returns to her daily routine. In October, she harvests the potatoes.

Having cut so much wood in the spring, the preparations for the winter are minimal. With nothing to do, the protagonist wonders why the man killed Bull and Lynx. In November, the protagonist decides to write her report as a way to keep herself from obsessing over Bull and Lynx’s deaths. It takes her four months to complete, but once she finishes, she feels calmer. She looks ahead to the spring, and her plans to move Bella closer, into the lodge.



The protagonist writes that it is the 25th of February, and that she will end her report, with no paper left to write. She hears the crows leave the trees around her. Once she finishes writing, she will take some food outside to feed the white crow. She knows it will be waiting for her.