A Werewolf Among Us

feel.'

The others trooped in ahead of him, providing him an opportunity to massage his bandaged shoulder, which had begun to throb painfully. He should have obtained a booster shot of pain-killer from the autodoc before they left, but he hadn't felt that there was time for that.

Teddy was the last in the bus; he swung into his niche beside the seat designed for a human driver. By- passing the wheel, he plucked several control leads from beneath the dash and plugged them into his gleaming body trunk.

St. Cyr sat in the last seat in the bus, a position from which he could observe everyone else. He touched his shoulder, pressed down on the bandages and realized that was no good. He was just going to have to be stoical about it.

Up front, Teddy's head swiveled on his body trunk and faced the rear of the bus, an unnecessary gesture, since the robot had no face except for the soft green sight receptors. He said, 'Mr. St. Cyr, something has happened to the power cell.'

'For the bus?'

'Yes. I am not even recording a trickle charge on the meter.'

'Check it out'

The master unit detached itself from the control cables, opened the door and exited the bus. It opened a panel on St. Cyr's side of the vehicle, took one look in the small cavity that housed the compact drive system, closed the panel and came back into the bus. 'The power cell is gone, Mr. St. Cyr.'

'Gone?' He felt ponderously slow, as if he were reacting to the world at quarter speed, a man moving through syrup.

'Someone removed it.'

Wearily, St. Cyr rose and herded them out of the bus again. No one objected, not even Jubal. Apparently some of his own fear had finally filtered down to them.

'We'll go in two groundcars,' he told them. 'Three of us in each, Teddy driving the first car. We keep the vehicles close together and keep an especially good eye on each other.'

Perhaps the other power cells are also gone.

St. Cyr nodded to himself and directed Teddy to look into all the other vehicles. 'All empty, Mr. St. Cyr,' he reported as he floated back to them. 'Someone's removed all the power cells.'

St. Cyr looked at the others and smiled grimly. He was feeling grim; the smile was no stage piece. 'One of you is certainly a clever bastard, always a step or two ahead of me.'

'I'm frightened,' Alicia said, moving closer to her husband. The old man put an arm around her and squeezed her shoulder. St. Cyr could not help but wonder if that same arm had applied the pressure that broke Salardi's neck…

'What now?' Hirschel asked. He was the only one in high spirits.

'We're two hours or more from help, by car, but we have no cars. The telephones are out. The only thing we can do, until morning, is stay in the same room and keep watch in shifts, never more than three of us asleep at one time.'

'Which room?' Hirschel asked.

'The kitchen, I believe. It doesn't have any windows.'

Still somewhat angry at St. Cyr's put-down, Jubal said, 'No windows? What does that matter?'

'I'm sure the killer is one of us,' St. Cyr said. 'But I'm still not ruling out other possibilities. Besides looking out for each of you, I don't want to have to guard the windows.'

'Very good,' Hirschel said, nodding his approval of the tactic.

St. Cyr had drawn his own pistol and was pointing it in their general direction. 'Let's go.'

Jubal said, 'Is the gun really necessary?'

St. Cyr looked hard at the old man and, this time, did not attempt to conceal the pain that worried his shoulder like sharp teeth. Evenly, he repeated: 'Let's go.'

This time no one questioned his authority. They went up to the second level, where — if they survived — they would spend the remainder of the night.

TWELVE: A Murderer Revealed

A cyberdetective rarely removes his bio-computer shell during an investigation, for he knows that many cases are solved by taking notice of the smallest developments. Often, some mundane action is the trigger that fires the memory and shoots down the veil of confusion shielding the true nature of events. In the case of the Alderban murders, for Baker St. Cyr, understanding was triggered by an ordinary back-scratcher…

When they reached the kitchen, St. Cyr dispatched Teddy to patrol the main corridor on the second level and to keep a special watch on the elevator light-boards in the event that someone had illegally entered the mansion. Next, he carefully marked off limits in the huge kitchen, making it clear that no one was to move out of the large, open center of the floor, and certainly not toward one of the many utilities drawers that might contain a knife or other weapon. This done, the others sitting either on the floor or in the few chairs that were in the room, he perched on the block table to the right of the open area, keeping all of them in sight.

They talked among themselves and occasionally asked him questions. What were they waiting for? He didn't know — perhaps for the killer to make a move of some sort or to give himself away through a bad case of nerves. Preferably, they were just waiting for morning. What would happen in the morning? The delivery boy from Worldwide Communications would copter in with St. Cyr's light-telegram. He would probably be riding a one-man machine, but he could send help when he returned to the port.

When they had been in the kitchen more than an hour, everyone was quiet, wrestling with his own fears and working out his own suspicions. By morning, St. Cyr thought, they would all be just as cynical as he was. Even Jubal would no longer find it impossible to accept the notion that the killer was one of them. Already he was looking oddly at Hirschel.

Tina, who had been sitting on the floor with her pretty legs tucked under her, rose and stretched, walked slowly toward St. Cyr. She stood to his side so that she would not interfere with his view of the family. She said, 'How's the shoulder?'

'I'll live.'

'You should have had another dose of morphine by now.'

He used his good hand to scratch his back and said, 'I'm getting used to the pain, but I'll soon be nuts if it doesn't stop itching.'

'Want a back-scratcher?' she asked.

'You have one?'

'In that drawer over there,' she said. 'It's full of odds and ends.'

'Knives?'

She did not smile. 'No knives.'

'Get it for me, would you?'

She crossed the room, opened the drawer and rummaged through it while everyone else in the room watched her closely. She turned a moment later and came back with a stainless steel back-scratcher. It was formed like a human hand, with five blunt fingers.

'Turn around and I'll get it for you.'

He smiled and took the tool out of her hand. 'I'll do it myself.'

'Of course,' she said, 'I forgot. I might try to beat you with it, knock you out or something like that.'

'Something like that,' he agreed.

She was angry, but she did not go away. She folded her arms under her full breasts, making them fuller, and leaned against the edge of the table. Even now, during this penultimate moment, he could not help but want her.

Re-direct your attention.

St. Cyr reached over his shoulder with the silvery tool and began clawing at his back below the bandages. He