There was no word on the street, though everyone listened for it. The county fair had come to an end. Most everything was packed up onto trailers and trucked off to some other small town where kids would run around like banshees and spend every last penny they had to ride in rusty, creaking, swirling cages. It was days later and the square was still littered with the aftermath. Except for a few desperate-looking souls rooting through the rubble, the town appeared to be sleeping off its deluge.
   On the high school football field, where the fighting had broken out, the cow sat in the endzone.
   Nobody in this town could sleep. Barbers and shop keepers, businessmen and farmers, school children and their teachers could all be found with a radio nearby, listening. The fighting had all died down. Everyone awaited the inevitable. There was no more energy to riot. There was work to be done. The weary eyed people in this little town picked up the pieces and tried to carry on.
   The cow was full and content to lie down.
   Most everyone in town had been there that night, all gussied up. The sweat and dust of a day at the fair had been rinsed away, and with Sunday care the crowd was primed on the edge of its seats, waiting for the saving testimony to be delivered. Anticipation filled the stands, and with the impatience of a child they watched and wished; but mainly waited.
   The cow moaned and moved little more than its cud.
   People booed and threw things to get it to move. They shouted obscenities with children on their laps. None of it was enough. When throats went dry and the garbage had all fallen, nobody won. It was brother against brother that night. Not since the days of the forefathers they celebrated had an incident such as this been recorded in the town annuls. Once the townspeople converged on that field, things got ugly. The red, white, and blue banners that decorated the scene were left torn and trampled.
   Each time the cow mooed, it sounded more like a moan.
   Twenty-thousand dollars were on the line. Every civil servant, Shriner, and business with a budget held stock in the event. It was a source of great civic pride to make a generous donation. Even the children sold their share of fundraising candy bars. Everyone in town pitched in; everyone was in on the game right down to the school custodian who took honor in chalking the bingo squares onto the field. Additions had been planned for houses, vacation brochures had been arriving, and all the kids had mapped the spoils out in the back of Sears catalogs.
   The cow chomped its cud lethargically without relief, while its hide, thoroughly cleaned for the event, shone in the sun.
   When the fighting broke out most hadn't heard the rumor that triggered it, but teased and frustrated they fought just the same. A prize cow never sits down or looks so pathetic. There had to be a reason. This cow had been saved special; anywhere else a first-prize cow would have been pimped to the highest bidding rancher with a stud or butcher with a knife. Posters emblazoned with the past year's cow were plastered around town. All year long people looked at those posters and planned how they would eat their winnings. Those with low numbers prayed for lax bowels. Those with high numbers prayed for it to run. Despite all the prayers that night, the cow sat down and nobody thought of eating it.
   The cow just rolled from hip to hip, and never got up.
   From the cab of his truck the farmer watched the cow, still his cow, with his radio turned off. He hadn't slept much. Mostly he hid through the night. What sleep he did get he was obliged to grab in the front seat of his truck. A small mob still waited at his farm for him to return. Talk was he had cheated, but nobody knew for sure. It was talk, and talk was talk. The money was so close. Nobody thought of much other than the money.
   The cow let out a fart and a moo of satisfaction. Listening ears didn't hear, but it caught wind.
   Periodically people appeared to report on its condition. After lunch, the mayor joined the farmer at the field. The police showed up as school was let out to disperse the students, and from five o'clock on, there was a steady stream of people stopping by the field. The farmer kept his doors locked. No one talked to him. Tired and reflective, there was nothing anyone could do. Mostly people just stayed home, listened and talked about how bad the cow looked.
   The cow laid its head in the grass and writhed in the dark. Its only peace in flatulence.
   The mayor came on the radio at ten-thirty, some seventy hours since the melee, to announce that the cow had passed on. All thirteen members of the police force were called in anticipation of trouble. The mayor expressed his sorrow and reassured the town that the cause would be investigated thoroughly. The money, he said, would be held until next year. People cried in every corner of the county as they turned off their radios.
   The cow was stiff as it was loaded into the vet's truck. The excrement it released when it passed grew hard and cold and was forgotten in the endzone. Nobody held that ticket.

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