‘And how do you propose doing that?’
‘Why, it seems simple to me. Call off the hunt, then release the news. Have the newspapers and the electronic media in and…’
‘You think a wolf will read a newspaper or watch dimensino?’
‘He wouldn’t stay a wolf, most likely,’ Daniels said. ‘I have a hunch that as soon as possible, he’ll turn back into a man. For one thing, an alien creature might find this planet confusing and uncomfortable.’
‘Gentlemen,’ said the chief of staff. ‘Please, gentlemen.’
They all turned to look at him.
‘We can’t do that,’ he said. ‘Such a story would make the hospital appear ridiculous. It would be bad enough in any instance, but the werewolf connotations! Can’t you see the headlines? Can’t you see the holiday the Press would have at our expense?’
‘But if we were right?’ asked Daniels.
‘That’s the point. We can’t know that we are right. We might have all the reason in the world to believe that we were right, but that still wouldn’t be enough. On a thing like this, we must be dead certain and we can’t be that.’
‘Then you refuse to let such an announcement be made?’
‘So far as the hospital is concerned, I can’t. If Space would give clearance to it, then I would agree. But I can’t, not on my own. Even if I were right, Space would be down on me like a ton of bricks. They’d raise holy hell …’
‘Even after two hundred years?’
‘Even after that long a time. Can’t you see that if Blake is what we think he is, he belongs to Space? It’s up to them. He is their baby, not mine. He is something that they started and…’
Stone’s chuckle rumbled through the room.
‘Don’t pay any attention to him, Chandler. Go ahead and tell the newspaper boys yourself. Go on and break the story. Show us you have some guts. Follow your convictions. I just hope you do.’
‘I just bet you do,’ said Horton.
‘If you do,’ said Stone, ‘I warn you, friend. One public word from you and I’ll blow you so far out of the water it’ll take you two weeks to come down.’
20
The steady beeping of the phone finally beat its way into the illusion-world bounded by dimensino. Elaine Horton roused herself, came out of the booth in which she had been sitting with the shadow-world of ancient days going on about her.
The phone kept up its beeping, the vision panel flashing in impatient pulses. She made her way to it and switched it to receive. A face looked out at her, faintly lighted by a defective light bulb in the ceiling of a public phone booth.
‘Andrew Blake?’ she cried, surprised.
‘Yes, it’s me. You see…’
‘Is there something wrong? The senator was called down to the…’
‘I seem to be in a bit of trouble,’ Blake told her. ‘You probably heard what happened.’
‘At the hospital, you mean. I watched it for a while, but there wasn’t much to see. Something about a wolf and they said one of the patients seems to have disappeared…’
She drew her breath in sharply. ‘One of the patients disappeared! Did they mean you, Andrew?’
‘I’m afraid they did. And I need some help. And you’re the only one I know, the only one that I could ask…’
‘What kind of help?’ she asked.
‘I need some clothes,’ he told her.
‘You mean you left the hospital without any clothes? And it’s cold out there…’
‘It’s a long story,’ he said. ‘If you don’t want to help me, go ahead, say so. I will understand. I don’t want you to get involved, but I am slowly freezing and I am on the lam…’
‘You mean you’re running away from the hospital?’
‘You could call it that.’
‘What kind of clothes?’
‘Any kind at all. I haven’t got a stitch.’
She hesitated for a moment. Maybe she should ask the senator. But the senator wasn’t home. He hadn’t returned from the hospital and there was no telling when he would.
When she spoke again, she made her voice calm and hard. ‘Let me get this straight. You were the one who disappeared from the hospital, and without your clothes. And you say you aren’t going back. You’re on the lam, you say. You mean someone’s hunting you?’
‘For a while,’ he said, ‘the police were after me.’
‘But they aren’t now?’
‘No. Not for the moment. We gave them the slip.’
‘We?’
‘I misspoke. I mean I got away from them.’
She took a deep breath, committing herself. ‘Where are you?’
‘I’m not absolutely sure. The city’s changed since I knew it. I figure I’m out at the south end of the old Taft bridge.’
‘Stay there,’ she said. ‘Watch for my car. I’ll slow down and be looking for you.’
‘Thanks…’
‘Just a moment. Something occurred to me. You’re calling from a public booth?’
‘That’s right.’
‘You need a coin to operate that kind of phone. Without any clothes, where did you get that coin?’
A sour grin split his face. ‘The coins drop into little boxes. I’m afraid I used a stone.’
‘You broke open the box to get a coin to use the phone?’
‘Just a natural criminal,’ he said.
‘I see. You’d better give me the number of the phone and stick close to it so I can call you if I can’t find you – if you aren’t where you think you are.’
‘Just a moment.’ He looked at the plate above the phone and read off the number. She found a pencil and copied the number on a newspaper margin.
‘You realize,’ she said, ‘you’re taking a chance on me. I’ve got you nailed to that phone and the number can be traced.’
He made awry face. ‘I realize that. But I’ve got to take the chance. You’re the only one I have.’
21
-This woman? Quester asked. She’s a female, is she not?
-Yes, said Changer. Very much a female. Beautiful, I’d say.
-I grasp faintly at the connotation, Thinker said. The concept’s new to me. A female is a being to whom one can demonstrate affection? The attraction, I take it, must be a mutual one. A female you can trust?
-Sometimes, said Changer. It depends on many things.
-I do not understand your attitude towards females, Quester grumbled. They are no more than continuators of the race. In the proper time and season…
-Your system, Thinker said, is inefficient and disgusting. If the need arises, I am my own continuator. The present question seems to be not the social or biological importance of this female, but is she someone we can trust?
-I don’t know, said Changer. I think so. I’ve made a bet we can.
He crouched behind a clump of bushes, shivering. His teeth had a tendency to chatter. The wind, blowing from the north, had a touch of frost in it. He shifted his feet under him cautiously, trying to ease their soreness. He had stubbed his toes running in the dark and he’d stepped on something sharp and now his feet complained.
Out in the front of him stood the phone booth, the sign above it glowing dimly. Beyond the booth ran the street, practically deserted. Once in a while a ground car went thrumming along it, but always travelling fast. The bridge boomed hollowly as the cars passed over it.
Blake hunkered closer behind the bushes. Christ, he thought, what a situation! Squatting out here, naked and half frozen, waiting for a girl he’d seen only twice to bring him clothes and not entirely sure she would.
He grimaced, remembering the phone call. He had been compelled to crank up his courage to make it and he would not have blamed her if she’d not listened to him. But she had listened. Frightened, naturally, and perhaps somewhat suspicious, but who wouldn’t be? A total stranger calling with a silly, if not embarrassing plea for help.
He had made no claim on her. He knew that. And to make it even more ridiculous, this was the second time he’d been forced to call upon the senator’s household for clothing to get him home. Although this time, he’d not be going home. The police would be watching and they’d nail him before he could get close.
He shivered and wrapped his arms about himself, in a futile attempt to conserve his body heat. From above him came a purring noise and he glanced quickly up. A house came slanting across the trees, losing altitude, perhaps heading for one of the downtown parking lots. Light shone from its windows and the sound of laughter and of music came to him. There were carefree, happy people up there while he crouched, shivering in the cold.
He watched the house until it disappeared, dropping east and lower.
And what did he do now? What did the three of them do now? Once he got the clothes, what would be his next move?