The Fear In Yesterday's rings

sufficiently tested. My father wanted more.'

'You're not only a murderer, Luther, but you're full of shit. Are you going to blame it on your father? For Christ's sake, how many people had to die before you'd proved to yourself that a lobox was a viable assassination weapon? I think you were just getting off on it, Luther. You were so proud of yourself that you just wanted to keep on playing with the toy you'd created. It must have given you an enormous sense of power. Maybe you were even amused by all the werewolf stories; you liked reading about your pets in the newspapers.'

It was probably at least partially true, and he didn't like me saying it. 'There were problems, Frederickson. You don't know the whole story. You don't understand.'

'Poor you.'

'You've jeopardized years of work and millions of dollars.'

'Jeopardized? I'll be damn sorry if I haven't wiped it out-but I think that's what's happened. I'm curious as to why you're so short-handed, Luther. Last night, back at the circus, you certainly had plenty of hired help. Or was it loaned? Those men were provided to you by the same people, government or private industry, who helped you set up in this country, weren't they? Where are they now? And what the hell are you doing traipsing all over the countryside in a truck that size?'

Luther glanced at the lobox, then back at the truck. 'I have everything I need,' he said in a somewhat cryptic tone that was barely audible.

So he was alone, I thought. On his own. I pondered what could have happened, then thought I had come up with the answer. 'It was my last performance that did it. Right, Luther? That, and the death of your father. There was no way the local and state authorities could fail to hear about that; there were too many citizens. The cops' phones must have been ringing off the hooks. The people sponsoring you knew there were going to be too many questions, too much heat. They knew the game was up, and they closed you down, didn't they? They didn't care about you, or the lobox, or anything else except making sure they covered their tracks. They expected you to leave the country with all the rest of the performers, but you obviously had your own notions. You thought that if you could get this missing lobox, and kill the three of us, then everything might still work out. It won't. You've lost your sponsors, Luther, and at the moment I'll bet they're a hell of a lot more worried about you being a loose cannon than they are about me. You're lucky you're still alive.'

'You're not exactly in a position to gloat, Frederickson.'

'I'm not gloating,' I replied, noting that he had virtually confirmed my speculation. 'I'm just telling you the facts of life, as interpreted by me. I'm stating the obvious. So, why did you bring the semi? Couldn't you find anything smaller?'

He didn't answer-and then I knew. I felt a chill, and I swallowed hard. My mouth had suddenly gone dry. 'You've got the entire lobox breeding stock in there, haven't you? Christ, you still think there's a chance you can get them all back to Switzerland, keep breeding them, start selling them.'

'I believe you're sitting on my property.'

'What a startling change of subject, Luther. Why don't you come up here and join me, and we'll talk about it.'

It had been the wrong thing to say. He abruptly snapped the Smith amp; Wesson's bolt into place, put his finger on the trigger. 'I won't challenge Mabel's loyalty to you, Frederickson. You know how I feel about animals, but I am prepared to kill her if you try to get her to move against me.'

'I have no doubt of it. Relax, Luther. As you can see, Mabel and I are just kind of hanging out here, waiting for somebody to come around so I could surrender. However, now that the situation becomes clearer, I'm thinking that maybe you should surrender to me.'

'Don't be absurd, Frederickson. Why are you still here?'

'I just told you. That fanged fiend over there makes it imperative that I stay where I am, and it's tough being on the run when you have to run around on an elephant. You should try it.'

'Where are your brother and your girlfriend?'

'Garth and Harper? Oh, they split.' 'Split?'

'They left. Vamoose. Adios. Who wants to hang around this dreary place? Besides, they don't like elephants as much as I do.'

'I don't believe they'd leave you.'

'They didn't leave me, Luther; they went for help. As soon as we figured out just how single-minded a lobox is-in this case, single-minded about getting me-they split. Hell, there was no sense in all of us waiting around here for you or your people to come and get us. By now, they're probably sitting comfortably in some state police office telling their story.'

'I don't think I believe you,' Luther said after a long pause.

'You believe what you want, pal. The fact of the matter is that there are only us chickens here now, but that won't be the case for very long. Help is on the way-help for me, that is. Authorities your people don't control will know the story by now. Killing me won't do you any good, unless it will make you feel better. The best deal you can make is to put that lobox down there in the truck and then turn your guns over to me. You're a potential embarrassment to some very powerful people in this country, and you're probably in a hell of a lot of trouble for detouring from your established escape route. I know people who can guarantee your safety. You'll go to prison, sure, but prison is better than dead. You can spend your time trying to tame some of our wilder inmates.'

Luther wasn't amused. He stared at me. He continued to stare for some time, then abruptly spun around and walked quickly back to the truck. He went to the right side of the semi, where there were three sets of double doors. He opened the middle doors and quickly stepped back. Two loboxes-females that were smaller than the males by almost a half, grayer in color, and lacking the distinctive black markings on their backs-jumped from the truck to the ground and streaked toward the open doors behind Mabel and me. They disappeared inside the first silo without so much as a glance at the male lobox, or me.

'Your brother and the woman don't appear to have gotten as far as you thought,' Luther said as he walked back toward Mabel and looked up at me. His glacial blue eyes glinted in the bright sunlight.

There was no sound from inside the silo, and I imagined the two loboxes crouched somewhere in the semidarkness, lying in wait for their prey.

'Tough luck, Luther,' I said, glancing behind me toward the silo, then looking back at Luther. 'Garth and Harper were in there; we all were. But they took off out a door at the back of the third silo while I sat out here to make sure this lobox remained preoccupied with me. Those two females are on an old scent.'

'We'll see,' Luther said. His voice was even, but he looked slightly uncertain.

'Why are you running females now, Luther?' I asked, watching him carefully. 'And they look to be pretty puny females at that-maybe lobox-wolf hybrids. Considering all the years you and your father have spent breeding these things, I'd have thought you had a sufficient supply of males, but I guess not. Reverse breeding with a wolf and a kuvasz to get a lobox must be even more difficult than I thought. It looks to me like you're running low on stock.'

Luther said nothing, but the muscles in his jaw and face tightened revealingly. I wondered just how many loboxes were in the truck, and why he would run females after Garth and Harper now. Harper had killed one male. .

I wondered if the lobox crouching on the ground could be the only adult male Luther had left.

Finally, Luther said, 'If your brother and the woman are in the silo, and I believe they are, the females will be sufficient to find and kill them.'

Not unless Luther had trained them to climb vertical steel ladders. 'I told you they're gone, and the authorities are probably on their way here now. Maybe that's your good fortune, considering the other people who may be after you. After you've.thought about it a while longer, you'll see that it's in your best interests to surrender to me. In the meantime, let's talk about that whole story you said I didn't know. Maybe it will explain why you stuck around so long, and why so many innocent people had to die. There's something wrong with the lobox breeding program, isn't there? Tell me how you and your father failed-'

'My father didn't fail!' Luther snapped, and his blue eyes glinted with anger. 'The flaw was within the species, not with my father! The same thing happened to the lobox as is happening now with the cheetah! Their gene pool became too limited! The DNA of each lobox is virtually the same! You have birth defects! They are largely …'