then? Follow his nose, was the only thing. He knew he was closer to Halfway now, but he didn’t know how close, or how far. What he had to do was get out of this truck and get into the woods. There he could use his powerful sense of smell better. Maybe sniff out a way home.
No, keep driving. There was still some raw distance to be disposed of yet. He remembered the way the trees looked at Halfway. It was hard to see out there, but from what he could make of the vegetation, it looked similar, but not quite right. It might be easier to tell in the green season. But this was the dead of winter. Not a proper winter, actually. In fact, to Snowy it was positively balmy. Good for sunbathing.
The terrain didn’t look right, either. At Halfway it was more hilly. Mountainous, even. Keep to the truck for a little while at least.
Something ahead. A little town, it looked like, and a junction with another road. There was a single red light hanging above the intersection, but Snowy didn’t notice it until it was too late to stop. He blew through the intersection at fifty miles an hour.
He drove on out of town. Suddenly the red light seemed to be following him, and now it was flashing. He heard a high-pitched whoop that hurt his ears.
He saw that the light was mounted on a little vehicle, coming up fast. Snowy tromped on the power pedal.
But it was no go. The little vehicle was too fast.
It pulled alongside, its little red light still blinking. The human driver was in uniform.
Snowy knew a policeman when he saw one, but he wasn’t about to stop.
The cop looked up at him, motioning for Snowy to pull over. Snowy waved. The cop did a double take, then dropped back. Snowy laughed.
The truck’s engine coughed once, and Snowy eased off the pedal a little, but then it sputtered and quit altogether. Snowy worried the ignition key, and the starter whined and churned. But the engine wouldn’t catch. The truck was dead, and so was Snowy.
As the truck drifted to a stop, Snowy looked at the dials and gauges on the dashboard. He knew he had not done something right. Just what, he might never know. Probably had something to do with a “gas station.” You were supposed to stop into those every once in a while and fill the truck up with some kind of gas. He had watched the kid do it a while back. A good while back, and that was probably what the problem was.
“All right, get out of the truck, hands up!”
Snowy looked out the window. The cop had stopped and was crouching behind an open door of the car, gun drawn and pointed at Snowy.
“Do it!” the cop yelled.
“Anything you say,” Snowy said.
He got out.
The cop’s face went slack at the sight of Snowy’s huge bulk. “All right,” he said, trying to mask his nervousness. “Take off that monkey suit, right now.”
“What’s a monkey?” Snowy asked.
“Don’t give me any trouble, bud, or you’ll regret it.”
“You’re the boss.” Snowy began to peel off the running jacket that Dave had recommended he buy.
“Take off the mask!” the cop growled.
Snowy said, “That I can’t do, friend.”
The cop came out from behind the door. “All right, play it that way. Turn around and put your hands over the hood.”
Snowy threw off the jacket. The icy air felt good against his fur. “Sorry, friend. I don’t have any time to waste.”
“You’re gonna have all the time in the world now, pal. Turn around there.”
Snowy turned and let the human lay hands on him.
The cop ran his hand up and down Snowy’s back.
“Hey, what is this? Where’s the damn …?”
“Something wrong, Officer?”
“Jesus. Jesus! It’s real. There’s skin under here!”
“I told you.”
“Jesus Christ.”
Snowy whirled and knocked the gun from the cop’s hand. The weapon went flying off into the shadows, clattering against the pavement.
“Sorry,” Snowclaw said. “But I told you I didn’t have any time to waste.”
The cop stepped back. Snowy ripped off the rest of the jogging outfit. He was already unshod, his running shoes having split open when the spell broke.
“What in God’s name are you?” the cop gasped.
“I’m a stranger here,” Snowy said. “By the way, did you ever hear of a place called Halfway House? I don’t expect you ever did, but …”
The cop turned and bolted into the woods Snowy watched him disappear, then listened to his frightened, dwindling footsteps awhile. At length the quiet returned.
Well, so much for the truck, and for trying to get help. He was on his own. It was the Great Ice Hunter against the world, this world.
He jumped a low fence and entered the forest. Stopping, he took a deep breath. Ah, yes. Many smells, many strange scents. Now, were there a couple he recognized?
Maybe. A few.
He stalked off into the night.
Thirty-two
Laboratory
“How’s it coming?”
Jeremy went on typing as Incarnadine looked over his shoulder.
“The compilation’s almost done. There were like maybe two or three bugs in fifty million lines of code. Amazing.”
“Computers only err in being inflexibly literal. Give them a set of unambiguous instructions, and they’ll perform flawlessly.”
“Yeah. I don’t know how I’m doing all this so fast.”
“You’ve been getting a little magical help. But your skills have increased tremendously just in the last two hours.”
“It’s weird.”
Incarnadine laid a hand on Jeremy’s shoulder. “Keep up the good work. Let me know when we’re ready.”
Incarnadine walked to a raised platform and mounted it. Linda stood by, watching.
“Is that where it’ll appear?” Linda asked.
“That’s what we hope. I have to sketch a pattern here at the exact materialization locus. Would you fetch me some chalk from that bench over there?”
“Yes, sir.”
Linda returned with the chalk to find Incarnadine kneeling in the middle of the platform. His brow was furrowed and his stare troubled. Linda waited until he rose.
“Something wrong?”
“I wish the platform were over a little to the right, this way. There’s a node near here that might complicate things. An intersection of two of the castle’s lines of force.”
“Why don’t we just move the platform?”
“We could, but Jeremy would have to go back and recode some I think …” Incarnadine paced a few steps.
