Legend of the Goat Lady

“Goat Lady” Martha Allison, eighty-year-old matriarch and tough-minded pioneer reminisced. She felt old and tired sitting on the filthy divan covered in years of scrapes and stains, where cats and critters had left their marks.

“Dirty Shirt” David Clark listened to Miz Allison. David, slow-speaking odd-jobber, gave Martha all the time she needed to tell her stories. He knew Martha’s stories and loved her rascally ways.

He thought about that day when Martha earned her nickname, “Goat Lady”. David remembered when the billy goat jumped fences, stood off stray dogs, and strutted the main street like he was boss billy of the neighborhood.

As a small farming and ranching community, the hardware store was the place for a chew or nip. One particular Saturday, the town’s men were gathered at the hardware store when the old billy goat jumped his fence. He walked straight down Main Street. Men at the hardware store hollered and threatened to slaughter and serve up the goat for dog food.

The billy goat became annoyed. The noisy taunts opened the devil-eyes of the goat. In front of the hardware store, in the middle of the road, the billy goat stomped his hooves and his eyes glowed red.

A man dressed in overalls and work boots took aim at the goat and spit a wad of tobacco towards the critter. Before any of the men could laugh, the goat charged with downturned head and horns. Billy scattered the men in every direction. One man jumped the hitching post. Another unfortunate fellow landed in the horse tank, and hardware store owner, well let’s just say, he bore the brunt of the attack. Billy caught the man’s britches with flashing horns and head-butted him through the store’s plate glass window

The crazed store owner stood. In one hand, he carried a shotgun and with the other hand, he wiped the blood from his eyes. With the shotgun, he took aim at the billy goat standing on the wooden sidewalk. He took a shot at the nimble four-legged goat. He missed.

The goat reared his hooves and took another run at him. And, again, the store owner crashed through another window.

As the store owner pulled himself from the glass, Miz Allison strolled with umbrella raised, without concern, down the dusty street. Not realizing the store owner’s plight and the previous events, she walked to the goat, leashed her recalcitrant billy goat, and led him home to his pen without further incident. The goat was saved from the butcher shop, and the store owner was left with a shattered ego.

The story grew into town legend. The goat became infamous. The store owner endured endless leg-pulling.

Dirty Shirt David knew the story from Miz Allison’s telling and the town’s buzzing. The legend eclipsed time and Miz Allison became known as the “Goat Lady.”