Someday you’ll need someone.
Never. Never again.
Chapter 3
Colorado Springs, October 1880
“Is it real?”
“It can’t be. These circus people know every trick there is. Born thieves and swindlers, all of ’em.”
The two farmers stood a few feet away from the bars of the cage, just near enough to feel daring. The older one, a frayed bit of straw between his teeth, gave a knowing nod.
“Purest fakery, all of it, take my word.” He spat into the trampled straw at his feet.
“Maybe you’re right,” the younger hayseed said, “but it sure looks real to me.” He grinned slyly. “You want to go in there and find out?”
“They won’t let no one in there.”
“Then just put your hand up to the bar. See what it does.”
The milling crowd between the two men shouted mocking encouragement. “Go on!” a store clerk urged. “Stick your hand in and see what happens!”
The farmer glared. “I ain’t here for your amusement—” He jumped back with a cry as Morgan lunged at the bars, baring his teeth for effect. The farmer’s companion fell onto his knees and crawled away among the feet of the observers. Within seconds, the crowd was abuzz with delight and terror, pressed as far toward the rear of the tent as they could go.
“B’God, it is real!”
“Don’t you dare swear, Cal!” a woman cried. “It’s a minion of the Devil himself!”
“Aw, it’s just a man in a fur suit…”
Morgan stalked the length of the cage and back again, curling clawed fingers in menacing fashion, and retreated to his corner. Some foolhardy soul poked a stick through the bars; he snapped it in two with a casual swipe of a hand. A lady shrieked and pretended to swoon. He had seen it all a hundred times.
One of the sideshow talkers arrived to herd the townies to the next attraction and on to the big tent for the show. Once again The Terrifying Wolf-Man was a spectacular success.
Morgan released his hold on the Change and let himself become human again. He had grown used to the discomfort that accompanied the unnatural half-shaping, but it was only after the performance that he felt the ache deep in his bones and muscles.
Stiff and sore, he let himself out of the cage and shrugged into his dressing gown. He splashed his face with water as if he could wash away the stares of the humans, the constant smell of their bodies crammed into the small tent day after day. Always the same ritual, the same contempt, the same resolution.
Tomorrow. Tomorrow I’ll go. I’ve done enough.
He laughed and pushed wet hair away from his face. He’d let it grow until it reached his shoulders, heavy and wild like a wolf’s pelt. He meant it to remind him of who he was, and who he was not.
He stripped off the dressing gown and pulled on a shirt and trousers. Nearly five months he had been with the circus. Five months, and Harry had said just yesterday that the troupe had enough money saved to set up in winter quarters without the risk of disbanding.
Thanks to the Wolf-Man, whose fearsome reputation had preceded the circus in every town, village, and fly-speck camp they’d visited. It didn’t matter that French’s Fantastic Family Circus was still a modest wagon show, unable to compete in grandeur with the great Barnum or Forepaugh. Each farmer or rancher, merchant, or whore—young and old, male and female, simple or smart—had to see for himself if the creature was real, or as fake as the farmer had claimed. Some came back two or three times. None of them ever learned the truth.
They didn’t want to. And Morgan endured their ignorant speculation and taunted them with his poses and snarls. He had learned to be amused at the blindness of men.
The troupers were equally blind. They had accepted him completely, welcoming him as if he had always lived among them, but he had done for them all he was capable of doing.
Tomorrow, I go.
He rinsed the sour taste from his mouth and walked out into the night. Beyond the lanterns that marked the perimeter of the circus grounds lay a swathe of darkness, and beyond that the lights and bustle of Colorado Springs. The cries and applause of the audience in the big top drowned out the murmur of crickets and the soughing of the wind in the cottonwoods along the creek. Every night he stood and listened, poised to run from everything he despised.