The Fear In Yesterday's rings

His voice trailed off, but I finished for him. 'Sterile,' I said. 'Maybe that's why they became extinct.'

'The problem can be corrected, with enough time. I must produce more hybrids in order to-'

'It's over, Luther. You've run out of time. Garth and Harper are gone, and the story is out. Even if you do kill me, you'll never make it out of the country. Although it may not look like it at the moment, I'm in a position to help you. Let's talk about how we can get you and your stock to people who will protect you. How about it?'

Luther took the Magnum from his holster. 'Get down, Frederickson.'

I glanced over at the lobox. 'Thanks, but I'd prefer to stay where I am.'

Luther raised the Magnum and pointed it at me. 'I think you'd better come down anyway. I don't believe your brother and Miss Rhys-Whitney left you. They're somewhere in the silos, and the loboxes will eventually get to them. Nobody is coming to help you, but my sponsors will again agree to help me when they find out I still have the means to develop what they're looking for.'

'If I come down, your pet will tear me apart.'

'If you don't come down, I will shoot you.'

'I wonder. It seems important for you to keep up appearances. If you wanted to shoot me, I'd be on the ground right now with a bullet in my head. You'd like the police to keep speculating about 'werewolf killings,' and if I'm found with a bullet in me, people may start to wonder why a werewolf would carry a Magnum. If that's what you've got in mind, forget it. It's all unraveled, Luther, and there's no way you're going to weave it together again. If you're going to shoot me, shoot me; nearness just doesn't count anymore.'

Luther reholstered the Magnum, gripped the Smith amp; Wesson with both hands, swung the barrel around. 'I would hate to kill Mabel, Frederickson, but I certainly will if that's what it takes to get you down on the ground. You'll have to decide whether it's worth sacrificing this magnificent animal's life just so that you may enjoy, at most, a few more seconds of your own.'

Crunch time.

Luther, of course, had no way of knowing what had been going on between his last, presumably virile male lobox and me-but then, I had no way of knowing if the lobox's previous submission to me was going to make any difference now that his master, with his Magnum, was back in the picture. Now seemed as good a time as any to find out just what the creature would do.

I reached behind me for the nunchaku sticks lying on Mabel's back, draped them by their chain around my neck, abruptly stood up. Luther said nothing about them; if he knew what nunchaku sticks were, he obviously didn't consider them a threat. Considering his perception of the situation, which might very well be the correct one, I couldn't fault him.

Mabel, sensing that I wanted to get off, obediently curled her trunk upward. I stepped into the cradle of muscle and leathery hide, and Mabel slowly lowered me to the ground. I stepped off the trunk, then slowly turned and positioned myself so that Luther was on my left and the lobox on the right; man and beast were about twenty yards away from me, in opposite directions.

It wasn't taking Luther long to catch on to the fact that something was wrong, for he was staring with intense curiosity at the lobox, which had raised its head but had not gotten to its feet. It was certainly not the reaction the animal trainer had expected.

Luther bent down and laid the Smith amp; Wesson on the ground-very slowly, obviously wary, keeping his eyes on the lobox. Then he straightened up, drew the Magnum from his holster, cocked it. The sound of the hammer clicking back seemed to me almost as loud as a gunshot.

'Kill!' he commanded.

Now the lobox sprang to its feet and stood stiff-legged, its hide quivering. But its ruff did not expand, and it did not move. It looked at me, lowered its head, and began to shake. This was one conflicted lobox.

I took the nunchaku sticks from around my neck, clicked them together.

Luther went pale, and his jaw dropped open slightly. He stared for a few moments at the reluctant lobox, then pulled the trigger of his gun, firing a bullet into the ground. Dirt kicked up at his feet, and the sound of the gunshot echoed in the surrounding forest of grain silos.

'Kill, damn you! Kill!'

The lobox's reaction was to spin around and race full bore around behind the silo.

There wasn't any moss growing on that lobox, I thought. In attempting to resolve its dilemma of choosing between dying from a bullet-and I no longer doubted that it could conceive of its own death-and killing, or at least attacking, its new 'leader,' the lobox had opted to simply depart the premises, at least for a while. I considered it an excellent choice, and I wished I could join it. Since I couldn't, I instead took advantage of Luther's momentary distraction to dart around behind the formidable shield of Mabel's left front leg. I doubted he was ready yet to kill Mabel; he would do that only as a last resort, or if she attacked him. First, I hoped, he would try to angle around to try to get a clear shot at me.

If he did that, and if he wandered too close to the silo, I would have the opportunity of seeing how much moss was growing on Garth.

However, Luther didn't seem to be in any hurry-for the moment, at least-to flush me out. He still seemed stunned by the lobox's behavior. For almost a minute he simply stood and stared at the corner of the silo where the creature had disappeared. Then he slowly turned toward where I was peering out from behind Mabel's leg.

'This is somehow your doing, Frederickson,' he said in a low, tense voice, his Swiss-German accent suddenly more pronounced, giving his tone a guttural sound. 'I can't conceive of how you managed it. You are a most remarkable man.'

What I did next was dangerous, but I considered it worth the risk. Discovering that Luther had brought along two fresh loboxes primed for Garth and Harper had been a nasty surprise, but the unpleasantness had been tempered considerably by the fact that they had, of course, immediately run into a cul-de-sac in pursuit of their prey. I wanted to make sure they stayed put, and I took advantage of Luther's continuing dyspepsia and distraction to back up, and then move quickly over the five yards or so to the silo. I closed the double doors, secured them with the chain I had left hanging on one of the inside pegs, then scurried back behind my elephant barricade.

Luther hadn't moved. He didn't appear to have even noticed that I had temporarily exposed myself to his gun-or he didn't care.

'Flattery will get you nowhere, Luther. Are you ready to surrender?'

'How did you do it, Frederickson? How is it possible?'

'Throw your guns over here and back away, and I'll tell you all about it. Obviously, I know things about loboxes you don't. Give it up.'

'I can't, Frederickson,' he said in an odd-almost plaintive- tone of voice. 'I couldn't. . survive in prison. I'm only happy when I'm with animals. To spend the rest of my life caged like a beast myself. . no. I would much prefer to die.'

I believed him, but it didn't answer the question of why he hadn't yet made any attempt to move on me. I was resigned to the fact that he would eventually shoot Mabel, thinking that would be the end of it for me too; but if he did, he would soon find out just how formidable an obstacle the corpse of an African elephant can be. He was going to have to stalk a dwarf over and around a mountain of tons of dead flesh. I had no doubt that I was quicker than he was; if he made just one mistake, and he would, he was going to find out how quick I was and how deadly a pair of nunchaku sticks can be.

'Hey, Luther,' I said quietly. 'Was I right before, about most of the loboxes being sterile? Is that lobox that ran off the last male you have?'

At first I didn't think he was going to respond. Then, after some time, he slowly nodded. 'The only one that is so close to a full-blooded lobox-the actual, separate breed. It would take many breeding generations to produce another like him.'

'Too bad. I guess that one animal is even more valuable than I thought.'

Luther apparently didn't feel like chatting any longer, for he abruptly wheeled around and stalked back to the semi. I didn't like the feel of the the situation, and I liked it even less when he stopped next to the tractor-trailer, yanked a second set of double doors open, and quickly stepped back.

Even before the grayish-brown shape shot from the opening, hit the ground, and came sprinting toward me, I guessed why Luther had been in no hurry to play hide-and-seek with me between and around Mabel's massive legs. He'd hedged his bets with me, as well as with Garth and Harper, and before setting out had primed another lobox to kill me.