His own voice made Wilson suddenly very tired. The long night ahead was bearing down remorselessly; he felt a knot growing in his stomach. Already the light in the room had changed. This time of year the days were quick, the nights long. And tonight moonrise would be late. Despite the lights of the city there would be shadows everywhere in just a few hours. The world around him seemed to be frowning, looming down at him, revealing within its softness a savagery he had never suspected. You think that the world is one thing, it turns out to be another. What appeared to be a flower is actually a gaping wound. The fact that time was passing ate at him, drove him closer and closer to—the truth, and the truth was they were going to die. Soon he would feel it, he knew it. He would feel what Evans had felt, the sensation of those
He had always had a knack for prophecy—now he had a premonition. He was standing in the middle of Becky’s bedroom when one of them jumped out of the curtains and buried its head in his stomach. As the sheer pain killed, he saw its tail wagging.
Then something hit him.
“Come on! Good Christ, kid, what the hell’s got into you?” Becky? Becky was shaking him.
“Now, now calm down—here, sit him down. It’s a stress reaction, that’s all. Call his name, don’t let him get away.”
“Wilson!”
“Wha—”
“Call a doctor, you jerk! What the hell’s the matter, he acts like he’s made of rubber!”
“Stress did it, extreme stress. Keep calling him, he’s coming back.”
“Wilson, you motherfucker, wake up!” In response he pulled her down to the chair and clumsily embraced her, held her against him. A choked noise started in his chest. She felt his stubbly beard rub against her cheek, felt his dry lips come into contact with her neck, felt his body trembling, smelled his sour, rumpled jacket. After a moment she drew back, pushing at his shoulders, and was immediately released.
“God, I feel awful.”
Ferguson gave him some water in a little paper cup, which he spilled at once. “Hell, I—”
“Take it easy. Something happened to you.”
“It was a stress reaction,” Ferguson said. “It’s not uncommon. People in crashing planes, burning buildings, trapped people, experience it. If the situation isn’t terminal, the condition passes.” Ferguson was trying to smile but his face was too pale to make it seem very real. “I’ve read about it, but I’ve never seen it before,” he added lamely.
Wilson closed his eyes, bowed his head and put his fists to his temples. He looked like a man shielding himself from an explosion.
“Goddamn, I wish to hell we were out of this!” He had shouted it so loud that the faint hubbub beyond the tiny office came to a halt.
“Please,” Ferguson said, “you could cause me problems.”
“Sorry, Doctor,
“Well, you have to admit—”
“Yeah, yeah, save it. Becky, I’m sorry.”
“Yeah. I’m sorry too.” His eyes pleaded up at her, and she met them with what she hoped was a look of reassurance.
“Don’t think about death. You thought about death. Think about—our camera. Tonight we’ll get our pictures and then things’ll start to move. All the evidence, plus the pictures—nobody will be able to deny it.”
“And we’ll get some protection?”
“Damn right. Whatever the hell happens, it’ll be something. Better than this, God knows.”
For the first time Becky allowed herself to imagine it What form would protection take? A cold stab of realization went through her—about the only thing that would help would be virtual imprisonment. At first it would mean a good night’s sleep, but then it would get stifling, finally unendurable, and she would give it up—and every moment outside would hold danger, every shadow the potential to kill. It was hard to turn her mind away from this train of thought. And now death flashed into her own imagination—how does it feel to be ripped to pieces: will there be desperate agony or will some mechanism of the brain provide relief?
She couldn’t think about that either. Think about the next moment, not the future. Think about the camera. Men in battle must do it that way, keeping their minds fixed on the next shell hole, shutting out the deadly whisper of bullets, the groans of the unlucky, until they themselves…
She turned her mind from it again and said in a tired voice, “Dick probably has the camera by now. It’s nearly three. What say we get over there and plan the stakeout? It’s gonna be a long night.”
Ferguson smiled a little. “Frankly, I think it’ll be exciting. Obviously there’s danger. But my God, look at the magnitude of the discovery! All of history mankind has been living in a dream, and suddenly we’re about to discover reality. It’s an extraordinary moment.”
Both the detectives stared at him in amazement. Their lives and habits of thought emphasized the danger of the quest, not its beauty. Ferguson’s words made them realize that there was beauty there too. The presence of the werewolf, once proven, would completely change the life of man. Of course there would be panic and terror— but there would also be the new challenge. Man the hunted—and his hunter, so skilled, so perfectly equipped that he seemed almost supernatural. Man had always confronted nature by beating it down. This was going to require something new—the werewolf would have to be accepted. He wasn’t likely to submit to a beating.
Becky felt her inner resolve strengthening. She knew the feeling. It often came when they were confronting a particularly rough case, the kind of case where you really
