The Wolfen

into place but could be raised if you jiggled it just right. If you yanked at it or shook it hard the putty would give way and the lock would secure itself. Then he closed the window and moved his bulky body down the ice-covered fire escape to the street.

The snow was becoming heavier. Not good, impeded his vision but not their sense of smell. Perhaps the muffling effect would reduce the acuity of their hearing a little.

He put his hand in his pocket, closing his finger around the trigger of the M-11. It was a mean weapon, designed for anti-guerrilla work, the kind of police work where you killed it if it moved. Right now it felt good. It was the right pistol for this hunt—the bullets would knock a man ten feet. A hundred-pound animal should go considerably farther.

He set out to find his quarry. He reasoned that the creatures would be more likely to hit Becky first because she was younger and presumably stronger, therefore more dangerous to them. Wilson, slow, old, sick, would be second in line. His theory was borne out by the fact that they had gone to such great lengths to get to Becky and had left him pretty much alone. Of course they had come in the basement window, Wilson was well aware of that. He had left it ajar as an invitation. His dusting of the basement of the rooming house last night had revealed two sets of pawprints as distinctively different as human fingerprints. They had gone up the basement stairs to the door. There were marks on the lock where they had tried to spring it with their claws.

But they had reserved their best effort for Becky, of that he felt reasonably sure. If he was wrong, if they were around him now… with luck he would take a few with him.

He walked through the deserted late-night streets with his hand in his pocket clutching the M-11. Despite the gun, he kept close to the curb, away from any trashcans and shadowy entranceways, out from under overhanging fire escapes. And every few steps he stopped and looked behind him. Only once did he see another human form, a man bundled against the snow and hurrying in the opposite direction.

When he reached the lights of Eighth Avenue he felt much better. He was safer out here under the bright sodium-arc lamps, with the passing cars and the more frequent pedestrians. Somehow he felt more anonymous taking the bus, so he waited at the bus stop instead of hailing a cab. Ten minutes passed before a bus came. He got on and rode it far uptown, to Eighty-sixth and Central Park West. Now all he had to do was cross the park and he would be in Becky’s neighborhood. Upper East Side cardboard box neighborhood… well, if that’s what she liked…

He thought better of crossing the park on foot— in fact he never really considered it at all. To the danger of the creatures he would add the dangers of the park, very foolhardy indeed.

After what seemed an hour a crosstown bus appeared, moving slowly in the deepening snow. Wilson got on, glad for the heated interior. He let himself relax in the bus, but he never took his hand out of his pocket.

When he got off he spotted Becky’s building at once. He counted the balconies. Good, she had left her lights on, an intelligent precaution. She would probably be furious at him for coming out alone like this, but it had to be done. If you’re going to take crazy risks, you take them alone.

He moved toward the alley where the creatures must have congregated. The snow had, of course, covered up all trace of them. They would be coming back here sooner or later, of that much he felt sure. But if their sense of smell was as good as Ferguson had implied they would know he was here long before they were even in sight. So what, let them move in on him. He hefted the M-11 a little in his pocket, then settled down behind a garbage bin to wait.

One o’clock. The wind moaned out of the north. Two o’clock. The snow blew in great waves past the streetlights. Three o’clock. Wilson flexed his toes, rubbed his nose hard, listened to his heartbeat. He began to fight sleep about three-fifteen. Taking his cheek between thumb and forefinger he pinched hard. The pain startled him into wakefulness.

Then it was quiet. The snow had stopped. Involuntarily he gasped—he had fallen asleep. What time—four-twenty. Damn, over an hour out. And across the street, through the alley, standing in the light, were six of the ugliest, most horrifying things he had ever seen. He didn’t move a muscle, just his eyes.

These things were big, big as timber wolves. Their coats were dusky brown, their heads perched on necks much longer than that of a wolf. They had large pointed ears, all cocked directly at this alley. He could practically feel them listening to him. Somewhere his mind began to scream, Fire the Goddamn pistol, fire the pistol! But he couldn’t move, he couldn’t take his eyes off those faces. The eyes were light gray, under jutting brows. And they were looking where the ears were pointing. The faces were… almost serene in their deadliness. And they had lips, strange sensitive lips. The faces were not even a little human but they were clearly intelligent. They were worse than the faces of tigers, more totally ruthless, more intractable.

Fire the pistol!

Slowly the pistol started coming out of his pocket. It seemed to take an hour for it to be raised, but at last the long barrel swung up and… without a sound they were gone.

Not a trace, not even the rustle of a foot in the snow. They had moved! Goddamn, he hadn’t counted on speed like that. Then he was running too—as fast as he could out of the alley and into the middle of the snowy street, running frantically, feeling like an old, old man as he wheezed along, running toward a lighted window, an all-night deli, and then through the door.

“Jesus, don’t scare me like that, man!”

“Sorry-sorry. I—I’m cold. You got coffee?”

“Yeah, comin’ up. You runnin’ your ass off out there. You in trouble, man?”

“Just trying to keep warm is all. Trying to keep warm.”

The counterman held out the coffee—and held on to it. “You got fifty cents, daddy? That’s fifty cents in advance.”

“Oh, yeah, sure.” Wilson paid him, took the hot coffee cup in his hands, moved it to his face, and sipped.

Great God I’m alive! I got that Goddamn gun out f-a-s-t! One second later and they would have had me, the s.o.b.’s! It was exhilarating—it might have felt slow but he had drawn that gun Goddamn fast. Fast enough to save himself from them and they were fast beyond imagining.

He sipped again, noticing how his hand trembled. That had to stop. Long ago he had learned how to overcome the special fear that came with the close proximity of death. Now he went through the routine, a system that had been taught to him by his first partner, back in the forties when he was a rookie cop. There was a man—shot dead by his oldest son in ‘52. Now wait a minute, Wilson thought, you’re digressing. You’re shocked. Come on now,