the dilemma of a dead weasel

I like weasels, very much, and I was deeply sorry to meet a deceased long-tailed one on my walk this morning (I know her tail doesn't look very long, but her ears are different from those of a short-tailed weasel).  But how did she die?  Was she hit crossing the road?  (there are, in fact, some escaped entrails on the far side, but this is a decorous photograph).  Or was she a victim of rat poison?  No sign of a swollen belly; no sign of distress around the muzzle ... but this continued to worry me for the rest of my walk.  Was she a suitable lunch for a crow?  But what if she was discovered by a bobcat - and we have a number in Eldorado, including new families with little bobkittens - what if they ingested her, and, with her, horrible anti-coagulants?

So after twenty minutes more pondering, I went home, got in the car, drove up the road, and, going backwards and forwards, backwards and forwards, flattened her.  She may have been a victim of an earlier vehicle - but I couldn't live with the thought that, on the other hand, through her, the worst kinds of poison might be getting into the eco system.  

And I know that she was (very) dead - but as I did the flattening, I couldn't help feeling, just a little, as though I was channeling my Inner Villanelle.