The Wolfen

by Whitley Strieber

  And they were from a nightmare. His mind was racing now as he remembered, an incident that had occurred when he was no more than six or seven. They were in the Catskills, spending the summer near New Paltz in upstate New York. He was asleep in his ground-floor bedroom. Something awakened him. Moonlight was streaming in the open window. And a monstrous animal was leaning in, poking its muzzle toward him, the face clear in the moonlight.

  He had screamed and the thing had disappeared in a flash. Nightmare, they said. And here it was staring at him again, the face of the werewolf.

  The librarian closed the book. “That will be enough,” she said. “I think you’re upset.”

  “Those engravings—”

  “They are horrible but I don’t think it quite calls for—hysterics.”

  This amazed Ferguson. How dare she accuse him like that. “What would you say, madam, if those were engravings of real animals?”

  “These are werewolves, Mr. Ferguson.”

  “Doctor. And I assure you that those animals are very real. You can imagine my shock when I saw them engraved in a book of that age, when the discovery was supposed to have taken place only a few weeks ago.”

  He left her to sort that one out. Too bad, too, she was a nice-looking woman, he wouldn’t have minded getting to know her. But not now. He went down to the basement cloakroom and picked up his coat. Outside it had stopped snowing and the pedestrian traffic had transformed the sidewalk into gray slush. He turned the collar of his coat up against the surging wind and walked toward Sixth Avenue. He was going to see Tom Rilker, to get his help in determining a logical forage in the city for these creatures. There must be some area where lots of homeless people congregated. Not the Bowery, it was surrounded by heavily populated areas. Rilker would have some ideas.

  Then he stopped. “My God,” he thought, “those two cops have a point, what if the damn things are hunting me too?” Had they seen him with the cops last night? No way to tell. But if they had made the connection then he could be in mortal danger right now, even here in the middle of Forty-second Street.

  He jammed his hands into his pockets and walked more quickly on. And he remembered the face of the nightmare in the moonlit window.

  Dick Neff padded naked into the kitchen to fix himself another drink. He glanced at the kitchen clock—nearly noon. A shaft of sunlight shone in the kitchen window, as sharp and silver as a blade. First the snow had stopped and then the clouds had blown away. Now the wind moaned around the corner of the building and a bright dust of snow glittered through the sunlight. The glare hurt Dick’s eyes, and he fumbled as he fixed his third Bloody Mary.

  His mind was working, turning in a haze of anguish that would not go away. Becky, shooflies, burns, sorrow. He took a long pull on the drink and went into the living room.

  Goddamn, he couldn’t believe what had almost happened to him, how close he had come to death. Burned and didn’t even know it. He had been moving with Andy Jakes for six months, really working in with him. Hell, the guy was the biggest dealer in the Northeast.

  The Goddamn biggest fuckin’ dealer. And Andy Jakes had been playing with Mr.

  Narcotics Cop. Jesus Christ! If he had collared Andy Jakes the shooflies would have laid off out of respect. Let it ride. But now he was just another victim of that brilliant crook’s mind.

  He had been about to enter Jakes’s apartment, just heading toward the elevator when his teammates had gotten to him. Hold it, Dick, we got trouble. Bobby says the bug’s pickin’ up a lot of movement in there. Jakes’s supposed to be alone?

  —Yeah, he’s alone. He’s got the stuff in there. Ten kilos, let me go.

  —Not alone. Don’t go in. There’s people in there, lots of people movin’ around, not talkin’.

  —Not talkin’? Shit, that must mean—

  —They suspect a bug. And they suspect you. They’re waiting for you, Dick.

  —Oh, shit shit shit.

  And he had stopped. He had not gone in. Follow your instincts, boy. Don’t go in there.

  Another man might have shrugged it off and gone in. But not Dick.

  And then they were off trying to get a warrant to bust the place when another call had come from the wire man. They were leaving. Christ! They had left. Surveillance followed them to Teterboro Airport, to a flight plan filed for Guadeloupe, Honduras, Brazil. Shit.

  And they got the warrant and entered the apartment. So it’s empty, of course, completely empty except for the Goddamn note. A note on nice engraved stationery, just as nice as you please. “Sorry, Richard,” says the note. “I know how much of an embarrassment this will be to you. You be careful now. Cordially, Andy.”

  The guys got a whoop out of that note. “Hey Richard, Andy’s some cool sonofabitch!

  Hey, beautiful, what a shit-heel.”

  The other guys were almost happy that Dick hadn’t made his collar. Robin Hood. Sam Bass. The beautiful crook. Although there was also the other thing. Every gold shield in the division lusted after Andy Jakes and now it was open season on him again. Now other guys could take a crack, now Neff had blown it.

  “Dick, you know what was waiting for you in there,” Captain Fogarty had said. Good old Fogarty, always looking on the bright side. “A Goddamn arsenal. Wires says six or seven people were in there creepin’ around as silent as cats. Waiting for you, Dick. Blown you away. I doubt if we’d ever laid eyes on you again, old buddy.”

  Maybe that would have been better. Because another captain, Captain Lesser of the Internal Affairs Division, was closing in on Dick Neff. Another job blown. Somehow or other IAD had gotten wind of Dick’s little deal with Mort Harper. What the hell was it anyway, a nice clean gambling establishment. The best clientele, even the fuckin’ DA was there once. The fuckin’ DA playing blackjack and lovin’ it. Mort was protected! But he had put the finger on Neff, had built up his City Hall connections to the point that he didn’t need Neff’s silence anymore. “Hey, Mr. DA, y’know I got this monkey on my back, a little shit shakin’ me down—”

  “What the hell, this is a decent place.” Movie stars. Politicians. Stockbrokers. Marble bar. Crushed-velvet carpets. Honest tables.

  “Takin’ out a grand a month, Mr. DA.”

  “Oh stop singin’, Morty, I’ll take care of it.”

  Oh, Morty was beautiful too. Smarter than Dick Neff. Everybody was smarter than Dick Neff. Even the shoofly Captain with his funny questions. “How many bank accounts you got? Your wife? Fine, could we see your income tax returns? Just routine. Somebody turned up a little dirt, Dick. Nothing really. Just routine. I got to go through the motions is all.”

  Go through the motions like hell! Dick Neff was due for a Board. Early retirement—hell, he’d be lucky to stay out of Attica! “You have a right to remain silent.

  You have a right to an attorney.”

  Silent, damn right. An attorney, damn right. He swallowed the last of the Bloody Mary and went to the sliding doors, looked out on the bright snow that covered the balcony.

  And what he saw there made him gape. Pawprints as nice and clear as you please. He stared at them confused and disbelieving. Pawprints? And on the glass door a smear of another print. He squatted down and examined it. It could just be… a smeared pawprint…

  where something had tried the door. These prints must have been laid in the early morning after the snow had stopped. Shit, Becky wasn’t imagining things after all. These damn prints were real. No way to deny it, and they didn’t belong here.

  He felt suddenly exposed in his nakedness and returned to the bedroom to dress. He shook his head, physically trying to shake out the welter of thoughts that clamored for attention. Dressing automatically, he fought for clarity. Those two crazies were right then? That scabrous old shitkicker Wilson wasn’t senile after all. It seemed impossible, a trivial detail suddenly expanded to fill his whole consciousness with its importance. If she was in danger! If she was in danger and he didn’t help her he would kill himself. That was the size of it,
he would take out his Goddamn .38 and put the barrel in his mouth and pull the Goddamn trigger. Let the department face that one.

  He put on a conservative suit and brushed down his hair until he looked reasonably presentable. He had to get that Starlight camera out of Yablonski in the Photo Unit. He had to look the part. Would the good news about Dick Neff have traveled as far as Yablonski? Probably not. Just routine, gimme the camera. Orders? Shit, c’mon man, I got to use this thing tonight. Easy. Peaches.

  He left the apartment, then returned. As soon as he had gotten into the hall he had felt the absence of his pistol. Like he wasn’t wearing underpants or something. The gun. He dropped off his overcoat and his jacket and pulled the holster containing the .32 out of his bureau drawer. The larger .38 he left behind. This pistol fitted neatly into a holster nestled in the small of his back, easy to get to, hard to spot. You weren’t too comfortable when you sat down in a hard chair but other than that the small of the back was a beautiful hiding place for a weapon.

  Now he glanced at the pawprints again. They were ugly, frightening. He tested the door and then pulled the curtains closed. This time he left and did not return. Outside the wind hit him with the force of a powerful shove. It bit right through his coat and made his muscles grow taut with cold. He wanted another drink, better make a pit stop on the way down. What the hell, make it now. Across the street was O’Faolian’s where he usually made a stop on his way to the apartment. He went there now.

  “Hiya, Frenchie,” he said as he slipped up to the bar, “gimme a Bloody.” The bartender made it and set it in front of him. Instead of going about his business, though, he hovered there fooling with glasses.

  “You want something?” Dick asked. Frenchie was not a friendly guy, not the type to make small talk.

  “Nah. A guy’s been in is all. A guy wantin’ to know about you.”

  “So?”

  “So I don’t say nothin’.”

  “Good. What else is new?”

  “You don’t wanna know what he’s askin’ about?” Frenchie looked surprised, a little disappointed.

  “I can pretty well guess,” Dick said expansively. “He wanted to know if I had ever been seen in here with a little kike five-two, greasy black hair, wire-rimmed glasses, name of Mort Harper. And you said no.”

  “Hell I didn’t say nothin’. Not yes or no.” He looked pleadingly at Neff. “The guy, he flashed on me, see. What could I do? You don’t get ‘em flashin’ unless it’s serious business.”

  Dick chuckled. “Thanks, Frenchie,” he said. He put a five on the bar and left. Damn decent of the little jerk to tell him that Captain Lesser had been in here confirming that this was where Dick met Mort Harper to take the pass. How long had it been going on?

  Dick couldn’t remember exactly. God, though, it must be years. All that money right up to the Stranger Nursing Home. Right up there to keep the old man in cigars.

  The old man. A pang of sentiment went through him, thinking of the old senile man who had once been so powerful, so determined. Drove a bus for the Red and Tan Line.

  Retirement pay plus Social Security: $177.90 a lousy month. Senile decay, Parkinson’s disease,

  helplessness

  had

  turned

  to

  violence,

  periodic

  seizures,

  a

  thousand-dollar-a-month problem. You don’t give your old man over to the tender care of the State, not when you’ve seen the inside of those places firsthand. “Gonna make you go naked for a day, you old fart, you don’t stop that shakin’. Stop it, you gettin’ on my nerves. OK, fuck you, gimme that gown!” That’s the kind of thing that went on. A bunch of monsters making life hell for the old and helpless. “Come on, guinea, light my cigarette!

  Fuckin’ old shit.” Dick had seen what it was like in those State hospitals, a playground for sadistic perverts masquerading as attendants. No place for his old man.

  All of a sudden he was shaking uncontrollably, standing there in the doorway of the bar. He grabbed at the door handle to steady himself, then reeled back into the bar. He dropped to a table. “Shit, Frenchie,” he said, “get some food in me. I feel like shit.”

  Frenchie produced a hamburger and some stale fries and as soon as he bit into the food Dick found that he was ravenously hungry. He wolfed down the burger, ordered another.

  Now he leaned back, relaxed into the mild fog that the drinks had produced, that and the ease of the food.

  What the fuck had he been doing? Oh yeah, going to get that damn camera for Becky, his kid bride. Kid, hell, she was only a year younger than him and he was no kid. She was still a damn good lay, though, especially the way she came. Like a Goddamn female freight train. She made you feel like you were worth something. None of the others ever really did that. They were all pretending, wanting to fuck a cop for reasons that had nothing to do with love. Pros that needed a friend, most of them. What the hell, they threw it at you.

  Becky didn’t know and never would if Dick had anything to say about it. What they had together was something special, something no pro was going to take away from them.

  Well, what the hell, what she didn’t know wasn’t going to hurt her.

  “Frenchie! Bring me another Bloody.”

  Frenchie came over. “Nosir,” he said, “can’t do that.”

  “Why the fuck not! What is this, a Salvation Army Shelter?”

  “You’re on duty. I’m not gettin’ you drunk in here. Shit, you came in here half looped.

  Now you go on about your business. I don’t want no cops gettin’ drunk in here. It’s a bad rap with the department and you know it. Go somewhere else.”

  “I’m not on duty. I’m graveyard this week.”

  “You’re carryin’ a piece, Lieutenant Neff. I can’t serve you any more booze.”

  “Jesus Christ, Mr. Hot Shit—OK, I’ll take my trade elsewhere. But don’t say I didn’t warn you, Frenchie. You look out for your ass, hear. Just look out real careful, you never know what’s gonna come up your back.”

  Frenchie walked away shaking his head. Dick left, wanting at once to say something to appease Frenchie, wishing he hadn’t been so nasty, yet still feeling in himself the urge to be even nastier, to strike out at somebody. He hailed a cab to go to headquarters.

  Yablonski’s office was a clutter of photographic equipment, report forms, pictures tacked to walls, half-empty coffee cups. “Hey, Dick,” the little man said when he looked up. “What brings you down here?”

  “Your beautiful face. I need some night photography equipment.”

  “Yeah? You got infrared uptown. If you need a photographer forget it until next week, my guys are—”

  “Hooked up. No, we don’t need a photographer.”

  “You guys take up time. I can’t spare men to spend days and days sitting in cars doing what any moron—”

  “Like me can do.”

  “Yeah. So why don’t you just use your own infrared equipment and let me the fuck alone.”

  “Because I don’t need infrared. I need high power and long range. You know infrared’s no good over fifty yards.”

  “No, I didn’t know that. Hell, Dick, it’s my business, don’t take that tone with me.”

  Neff closed his eyes. What made this little fart so Goddamn difficult to deal with? He always talked in arguments. “I need the Starlight camera.”

  “Like hell.”

  “For one night.”

  “I repeat: like hell. That camera doesn’t leave this Bureau without a trained operator, meaning me. And I’m not takin’ it out without a signed letter from somebody I can’t turn down.”

  “Come on now, don’t get crazy. I only need it for one night. Think if you don’t give it to me and I lose an important collar as a result. Think how that’ll look.”

  “It won’t look like nothin’. Officially you don’t even know that camera exists.”

  “Oh, cut the crap. We got an eyes only
on it in 1975. That thing’s been goin’ in and out of Narcotics ever since.”

  “Well, I didn’t know that.” Yablonski glowered, pugnacious, aware that Dick was somehow edging him into a corner.

  “How’s the wife?”

  “What’s she got to do with it? She the suspect?”

  “Just trying to be friendly. Look, I’ll level with you. I got a big collar coming up but we need evidence. We got to have pictures.”

  “Big deal. Use fast film. There’s plenty of light in the streets.”

  Dick sighed, pretended to give up on something. “I guess I gotta tell you more than you need to know. We got a big pass comin’ up. We just can’t risk missin’ it. We gotta have that camera.”

  Yablonski glared at him. He did not like to let his precious Starlight camera out of his personal control. On the other hand he had no intention of spending the night on some dangerous narcotics stakeout. He stood up, brought out his keys and went to a bank of lockers that covered one wall of the office.

  “I’m gonna be a sucker,” he said, “let you take this thing out and get it smashed. You know how much this thing cost the City of New York?”

  “Nothin.”

  “About a hundred grand. Hardly nothing.”

  “It’s CIA surplus circa Vietnam. You know damn well we got it for nothing.”

  “Well, I’m not sure we’d get another if we lost or busted this one.” He removed a metal case from the locker and placed it gently on his desk. “You used this before?”

  “You know I have.”

  “Well I’m gonna go through the drill anyway!” He opened the case and pulled out a boxy object made of gray, burnished metal. It was about the size and shape of a two-pound can of coffee with binocular eyepieces on one end and a large, gleaming fisheye of a lens on the other. The body of the thing was entirely featureless, except for a barely visible indentation obviously intended for a thumb.

  “You open the control panel like this,” Yablonski said, pressing on the indentation. A three-inch square of surface metal slid back to reveal a panel containing two black knobs and a small slit. “You slide in the film.” He pushed a small black rectangle into the opening. “That gives you two hundred shots. That’s the bottom number in the readout you’ll see in the lower right quadrant of the frame when you look through the camera.