25
Jack and Wolf Go to Hell
1
They had to flip from downstairs. He concentrated on that rather than on the question of whether or not they would be able to flip at all. It would be simpler to go from the room, but the miserable little cubicle he and Wolf shared was on the third floor, forty feet above the ground. Jack didn’t know how exactly the Territories geography and topography corresponded to the geography and topography of Indiana, but he wasn’t going to take a chance that could get their necks broken.
He explained to Wolf what they would do.
“You understand?”
“Yes,” Wolf said listlessly.
“Give it back to me, anyway, pal.”
“After breakfast, I go into the bathroom across from the common room. I go into the first stall. If no one notices I’m gone, you’ll come in. And we’ll go back to the Territories. Is that right, Jacky?”
“That’s it,” Jack said. He put a hand on Wolf’s shoulder and squeezed it. Wolf smiled wanly. Jack hesitated and said, “I’m sorry I got you into this. It’s all my fault.”
“No, Jack,” Wolf said kindly. “We’ll try this. Maybe . . .” A small, wistful hope seemed to glimmer briefly in Wolf’s eyes.
“Yes,” Jack said. “Maybe.”
2
Jack was too scared and excited to want breakfast, but he thought he might attract attention by not eating. So he shovelled in eggs and potatoes that tasted like sawdust, and even managed one fatty piece of bacon.
The weather had finally cleared. There had been frost the night before, and the rocks in Far Field would be like chunks of slag embedded in hardened plastic.
Plates taken out to the kitchen.
Boys allowed to go back to the common room while Sonny Singer, Hector Bast, and Andy Warwick got their day-rosters.
They sat around, looking blank. Pedersen had a fresh copy of the magazine the Gardener organization published,
Wolf looked a question at Jack. Jack nodded. Wolf got up and lumbered from the room. Pedersen glanced up, saw Wolf cross the hall and go into the long, narrow bathroom across the way, and then went back to his magazine.
Jack counted to sixty, then forced himself to count to sixty again. They were the two longest minutes of his life. He was dreadfully afraid that Sonny and Heck would come back into the common room and order all the boys out to the trucks, and he wanted to get into the bathroom before that happened. But Pedersen wasn’t stupid. If Jack followed Wolf too closely, Pedersen might suspect something.
At last Jack got up and walked across the room toward the door. It seemed impossibly far away, and his heavy feet seemed to bring him no closer; it was like an optical illusion.
Pederson looked up. “Where are you going, snotface?”
“Bathroom,” Jack said. His tongue was dry. He had heard of people’s
“They’ll be upstairs in a minute,” Pedersen said, nodding toward the end of the hall, where the stairs led down to the chapel, the studio, and Gardener’s office. “You better hold it and water Far Field.”
“I got to take a crap,” Jack said desperately.
“Well, go on, then,” Pedersen said crossly. “Don’t just stand there and whine about it.”
He looked back at his magazine. Jack crossed the hall and stepped into the bathroom.
3
Wolf had picked the wrong stall—he was halfway down the line, his big, clunky workshoes unmistakable under the door. Jack pushed in. It was cramped with the two of them, and he was very aware of Wolf’s strong, clearly animal odor.
“Okay,” Jack said. “Let’s try it.”
“Jack, I’m scared.”
Jack laughed shakily. “I’m scared, too.”
“How do we—”
“I don’t know. Give me your hands.” That seemed like a good start.
Wolf put his hairy hands—paws, almost—in Jack’s hands, and Jack felt an eerie strength flow from them into him. Wolf’s strength wasn’t gone after all, then. It had simply gone underground, as a spring will sometimes go underground in a savagely hot season.
Jack closed his eyes.
“
“I do,” Wolf breathed. “I will if I can! Wolf!”
