Old man Erickson was a hasbeen long before he ever had the chance to become anything of note. This wiry grizzled man had somehow survived his twenties, into his thirties, and beyond his fortieth year. The only son of Erik Johnson was tired. He had been tired for twenty years – tired of all the brawls, the endless parade of women, the tedious labors of life. He was well and ready for these old bones to be put to rest. lt was that thought he held in his head when he walked out into the woods carrying nothing but an axe.

Nobody saw him go, except for an old beggarwoman who held her hand out to him as the man passed by without so much as a glance. The old woman muttered a curse under her breath and pulled her sinuous hand back beneath her threadbare  cloak.

Erikson had heard the curse and it stopped him in his tracks. A wave of fear ran down the spine of the beggarwoman for she knew not his intent. Slowly, he turned to face the fragile figure huddled against the stone wall in the urine-soaked alleyway. He removed his fur cloak as he made his approach and then gently wrapped it around the old woman’s knobby and gnarled shoulders. 

The beggarwoman sat astounded. Never in her life had she worn such a pelt as fine as this. 

“Wear it in good health,” he said with a gentle pat.

The old man stood slowly and strode away into the woods with shoulders bared and an axe dangling loosely from his massive and arthritic hand. He was never seen again, but some say if you walk into the woods on the coldest winter night a body can hear him whisper on the wind.