It's Just Ralph and Maeve Talking

 

            “What’s the word bird,” said Ralph, comfortably suspended in air like he does sometimes, legs crossed, yoga style.
            “I’ve got one,” said Maeve. “This is from Millicent’s Colin, by way of Millicent.”
            “I hope it doesn’t make me put my feet down,” said Ralph. “What does her public want now?”
            “Three different readers, over the last year, have said your kind are nothing more than Indian paranoia, laid on top of Old Timer’s lies, and modern wishful thinking. IOW, you ain’t real because nobody finds bodies or graves. They think this is a fine, conclusive argument. No bodies, no Forest Giants. Obviously.
            “Well, Boss, Milly says she ignored the first two, but when the last one wrote in, she decided she needed to address the question,” said Maeve. “Then Colin asked her the same thing at home.” 

            She was on his shoulder, so she was levitating, too even though it’s silly for a bird to levitate, if you think about it.
            “Did she remind them that nobody finds bear bodies either?” said Ralph, putting one foot down on the forest floor.
            “She hasn’t written yet, Boss,” said Maeve.
            Ralph sighed and put his other foot on the ground. He took a seat on his cedar log.
            “They don’t find our dead because we are not animals, and we don’t want them to find our dead. Doesn’t that make sense?” he said.
            “It makes sense to me, but I bet that letter writer would like to know more,” said Maeve.
            “Tell Milly to tell that guy that we bury them deep and put a boulder on top that a Cat couldn’t move. That’s all  he needs to know. We bury them deep. If somebody did figure out where, they are very unlikely to dig one up. Of course, that’s just for public consumption.
            “The truth is a little more complicated,” said Ralph.
            “How complicated?” said Maeve.
            “I guess it’s OK if Milly knows this, but she has to not let on to anyone, oh maybe Colin is OK too.
            “Basically we hide our dead deep in the ground, or under a boulder, or deep in a cave, out of sight. But the body doesn’t stay there long. Over the course of a few days, it evaporates away, bones and all. The spirit goes back to the Maker, and the body returns to the world of matter like that. It just isn’t there after a while. Of course nobody has found a body. Our bodies don’t keep. We don’t preserve them, or burn them, or anything else,” said Ralph.
            “Well, that sure maintains the mystery,” said Maeve.
            “Yup. That’s the way we like it, nobody can prove one way or the other if we exist or not,” said Ralph, smiling again.
            “I like a mystery,” said Maeve.
            “So do I,” said Ralph. “But just between you and me, Birdy, some, such as babies, or very pure souls just leave. Poof.”
            “A mystery, within a mystery,” said Maeve.
            “Yes,” said Ralph, resuming his position in the air. “Mystery within a mystery.”

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