Wolf and Iron

turbulent water and rocks.

Wolf had apparently realized that if he ran out on it and added his own weight to the end, it would tilt down enough so that he could jump to the further bank. Jeebee had observed this while slipping and sliding over the rocks of the same stream bed twenty-five yards downstream, feeling the fast water tugging at his lower legs and threatening to pull him off his feet—while Wolf lay down dry and comfortable, grinning at him from the opposite bank.

A corner of his mind was still busy puzzling over the problem of why understanding Wolf should be so important to him. Part of the reason was obvious, of course. Wolf had come into his life at a time when he felt desperately lonely, at the culmination, in fact, of a life that had been, in many ways, always lonely. He loved Wolf. He could not really assume that this affection was returned, and for purely human emotional reasons he wanted it to be. At least in one sense he was searching for a way to read into Wolf’s behavior the fact that a real, personal affection for his human associate could exist.

But there was something else. There was also some elusive connection between understanding Wolf and the personal dark shadow and nightmare that had pursued him out of Stoketon. Wolf, once understood, might in the similarity of social instincts between his kind and human, offer a deeper understanding of what Jeebee had been working at with the study group in Michigan.

Certainly, what had happened to the world was something that would have been better off not happening. From the creation of the study group, Jeebee had felt that it had been on the track that would lead to some better understanding of the human race and why things happened to it. Possibly it could even have turned out to be a basis for foreseeing and preventing disasters, such as the Collapse itself had triggered.

Certainly, even now, the world ought to be able to pull itself up by its bootstraps again in no more than a couple of centuries, at most—and possibly in much less time. There was too much twentieth-century technology now in existence for the knowledge of it to be lost completely. People like Paul Sanderson would be finding ways to use it, keep it alive, and build it back toward what it was before everything fell apart.

Somehow, he felt, an understanding of the Collapse and why it happened could be tied in with the understanding he needed of Wolf and of what he was. It was an elusive connection, a ghost of a connection, but he had learned to trust such little tickles of queries in his mind.

He had also learned how to deal with them. Which was to put each of them consciously out of mind as much as possible, push ahead, and wait for the back of his head to make connections that the front had been unable to do.

This reaching out for understanding of Wolf had some tie-in to an understanding of why the human race should commit this sort of partial suicide. That was the other element in his need to understand. Forget it for now, he told himself. But it was not easy to forget it.

They were beyond the large cities now that Billings had been passed. They traveled either in open range or in foothills. It was full summer and the days were often hot. But these passed, and in between them the weather was very pleasant, particularly at night. Jeebee had fallen back into the habit of being the same sort of outdoor creature he had developed into, coming west.

Again he fell into the habit of wearing the same amount of clothing no matter what the temperature was, and being more or less indifferent to whether he needed warmth or was too hot—except that he stowed the leather jacket away. Also, the daily habit of shaving he had resumed briefly at the pass was forgotten. His beard once more was full and black. It was almost as if his clothing had become his pelt, as Wolf’s pelt was his; and there was no reason to think of making changes in it simply to adapt to small changes in temperature.

So he let his beard grow and lived in his clothes. These things were unimportant. Important, was the fact that he was now in territory where he would be more visible and more conspicuous. Consequently his concerns were with the precautions of traveling within the cover of trees, in folds of land, or along river bottoms, as much as possible.

The rivers in these parts, particularly in these midsummer months, were small and not fast flowing. But they tended to have cut their path below the level of the surrounding ground. Also, they were commonly bordered and hidden by thick clumps of willow, occasionally so close-stemmed that passage was difficult.

These willow stands, however, offered a place for him to hide, if he suspected someone else might be about. He could vanish into them, horses and all, and simply stay still until whoever it was had passed, animal or human.

Traveling as he did, any sight of other humans was unusual, even though this was an area that seemed to be almost untouched by the change that had come upon the world. Most of the buildings he saw, he passed at a distance, and many of them had lights showing at night, if it was early, or gave other evidence of being actively lived in at the present time.

But one night he did finally come across a group of ranch buildings that had been burned almost to the ground—and not too long ago, because the smell of burnt wood was still about them—and when he rubbed a finger on the remains of a burned-out window frame, his skin came away black in the moonlight with soot from the wood.

It was true that this was not the season for rain, and in fact there had been remarkably little rain in the last few weeks, so that he was accustomed to finding the cattle clustering around what water was available and grazing as close to it as possible. But still the building must have burned sometime since last winter’s snows, and possibly within the last month or so, for there was little sign of weathering of surfaces in rooms now exposed to the elements.

But the discovery of the dead building alarmed him. A place like this could attract scavengers. He moved further into the foothills, still following stream beds and willow clumps as much as possible. He came at last into an area in which there was a certain amount of tree cover, but willows still clustered by the running water.

Here, up in the hills, he began to let himself travel more into the daylight hours, because the area was so free of people. He got into the habit of going on foot, leading Brute by the reins, with Sally still patiently tethered to the saddle on Brute’s back. This was as much to spare the horses as because he had become more and more able to read the ground before him; at the same time he felt himself to be less visible than he would be sitting up on the back of a horse, even down here in the hollow of the creek bed.

The sky was lightening one morning when Brute suddenly balked—stopping, pushing hard and back with all four feet. Jeebee stiffened and looked swiftly around him. It was just before dawn, all but full day. He could see clearly, except for what was hidden from view by the willow clumps, just ahead and around him and also clustered on the far side of a stream that could be no more than twenty or thirty feet wide. There was no sign of anything to alarm the horse, but Sally was also pulling back on the rope with which she was tied to Jeebee’s saddle.

Jeebee pulled hard on the reins but Brute resisted him with all his equine muscle and did not move an inch.

“What the fuck’s wrong with you?” Jeebee snarled—and was astonished at the sound of his own words in his ears. It was not merely that he had sworn at the horses. It was the fact that even a year ago, it would never have occurred to him to do so.

It was a shock to realize that he had changed so much. The restraint that had been second nature in him as far back as he could remember, had been scoured off by what had happened to him in the last few months. He was uncomfortably reminded of how he had been equally startled to discover in himself a readiness to kill Wolf, if necessary, to keep for himself the food he had found in that root cellar.

Then, suddenly more thoughtful, Jeebee forgot his momentary temper. He had learned to trust the awarenesses of the animals beyond his own. And if horses’ noses were not the superb instruments Wolf’s was, they were still far better than his human one. He was suddenly aware that the breeze was blowing toward them from upstream, in the direction they were going.

He turned, led the horses back until the tension began to go out of them, then tethered them in a small open spot on the riverbank. They might as well browse and drink while waiting for him. Jeebee looked around for Wolf. The other had been with them just a short while ago. Where was he now?

Jeebee cupped his hands around his mouth and howled. He waited. No answer came back. He howled again.

Still no answer. Wolf should not have been able to go beyond hearing range in the short time since Jeebee had last seen him. Jeebee had trusted the other’s natural curiosity to bring him back to investigate what was causing Jeebee to do all the calling. But when no response came to a third howl after a good three-minute wait,