by Gene Wolfe
He turned to look at her. “Ya, her, too.”
“You let me go past you so you could look me over, and maybe so you could see if anybody came out of the bushes to grab me when I stopped at your place.”
This time he did not speak.
“But you don’t think your place is watched?”
“Here stop.”
He got out, walked away at an angle until he was only just visible in the moonlight, then motioned for her to follow. She did, and in a minute and a half was enveloped in the deeper night of pines. A faint light motioned her forward. From outside the Expedition there came a throaty yelping cry that was not in her mind. The faint light shone down upon crisp, undisturbed snow: she was to stop. She put the transmission in park and got out, followed by the Scotties.
“They are here,” Granstrom said. “My wolfs.” He did not shine his flashlight on them, but their eyes glowed. Shadows in the shadows, they passed back and forth, moaning and whining, clinking faintly like icicles rattling down from the highest branches of a big tree. She felt Wasabe tremble as she pressed against her calf. Kyoto was broadside to the wolves, tail erect as an obelisk, fur on end making her look larger than Janet had ever seen her.
“That is a brave little dog you got.” Granstrom had followed the direction of her eyes.
“Yes. She’s not really mine, but she is.”
“Don’t let her get too close to my wolfs.”
“I don’t think we have to worry about that.” Janet paused, looking around. “Don’t you have cages for them?”
“A big pile of brush.” Granstrom’s light shot over the wolves’ heads to illuminate it. “They go in there, ya? Get out of the wind, sleep all together. I got them on chains.”
“You have to have a cage for them!”
He indicated the Expedition with a nod. “I chain them for you in back so they don’t get at you.”
For a moment they stared at each other. “Open the back,” he said.
She did and he did. One wolf snapped at him, and he slapped its muzzle. When all three were inside the Expedition and the rear hatch was shut again, he motioned for her to get in.
“Aren’t you coming? I could give you a ride back to where you live.”
“No.” When he saw that she expected some further answer he added, “I stay to clean up.”
“In the dark?”
He did not reply.
She got back into the Expedition, followed reluctantly by Kyoto. Granstrom picked up Wasabe and handed her to Janet. “Thank you,” she said. “Sure you don’t want a ride home?”
He shook his head. “You go slow, ya? Till you get to the county road, you go slow.”
“I will,” she promised.
She had covered perhaps one-tenth of a mile when she saw him running behind her and stopped, and rolled down her window as she had before.
“My—wolfs.” He was out of breath and panting. “Where do—you bring them?”
“I don’t know if …”
“Where!”
Margaret Bishop had said nothing to indicate she should not tell him. “To a Larry Ventris in Michigan. There’s a big park close to where he lives. He’ll smuggle them into it and let them go.”
“Good—good.” Granstrom’s hands, clutching the top of the Expedition’s door, relaxed a trifle. “That is good. A good man.” She had assumed unconsciously that Granstrom never smiled, but he smiled now. “Up Suicide Road he will take them. This he tells once. Suicide Road or else Harrison Road.”
“You know him.”
“Ya.”
She waited for him to release the door so that she could roll up her window again, but he did not. At last she said, “If you don’t want a lift … ?”
“The mother wolf, she is dead.” He spoke slowly. “A trap or a hunter. Someone shoots, or else poisons. I don’t know. Three days I watch their den, and the little wolfs, they are weaker each day.”
Janet found herself nodding. “I understand.”
“Littler than your dogs they are. I keep them in the house till they get big. Larry Ventris, he is a good man.”
She nodded. “I feel sure he is.”
“You.” He did not point to her, but made a small gesture to indicate her; in the back of the Expedition one of the wolves whimpered. “You are a good woman. Such a good woman most men don’t ever see.”
She thanked him, sounding—to herself—exceedingly inadequate.
“I was going to tell you their names,” Granstrom said, “but they are wild wolfs again now. Wild wolfs in the woods, they got no names.”
Once they stopped beside the road, and she slept for two hours before the cold and Kyoto woke her. Once, too, she stopped for gasoline (careful to pay cash), bought five hamburgers and coffee at the gas station, and a mile down the road stopped again to eat a hamburger herself, share another between the Scotties, and feed the remaining three to the wolves, throwing the pieces at first, then letting them eat—each growling to keep the others away—from her fingers as Granstrom must have.
No one answered her repeated knocks at the Ventrises’, and at last a neighbor came to tell her that neither Ventris nor his wife were at home. Her voice dropped. “I think he was arrested. He always seemed like such a nice, nice man, but I think that they’ve arrested him.”
Janet said, “That was why they arrested him, I suppose.” But she did not say it loudly, and said it only to Wasabe and Kyoto after she was back in the Expedition with the doors closed and locked.
She looked into the rearview mirror, and one of the wolves, meeting her eyes there, spoke in Wolf: Aren’t we ever going to be free?
“You will,” Janet told it. “I swear you will. You’ll be free today. Kyoto, do you remember where in that park—Suicide Road. That was one. Who could forget Suicide Road?”
Nobody, Kyoto declared; to which Wasabe added, We only need one.
In another gas station, this one quite near the park, a mechanic who looked as weary as she felt gave her directions to Suicide Road. “It’s a pretty place, ma’am. Lot of people go snowmobiling there.” He himself looked out at the snow with longing. “This’s probably the last big fall this winter. Should be real pretty out there.”
“It sounds awful, but it’s where my boyfriend said he was going to go, so I’ve got to find it.” She had forgotten already who was dying—the father or the mother; it probably did not matter, she decided.
“Well, you just take Ninety-four and stay with it, then turn off where you see the red barns, like I said. I don’t believe there’s a sign though.”
“Will I be in much danger of going off the edge? Suicide Road sounds so scary.” One of the wolves was starting to howl. Janet wondered whether the mechanic heard it.
He grinned, weary still. “Not ’less you jump. It goes up to Suicide Cliff. That’s why they call it that.”
“How far?” she asked Kyoto. “That’s the question. We’re about a mile into this park already.”
A little farther, Kyoto advised. So they won’t run out right away and get shot.
She nodded, too tired to be sleepy. Kyoto was right as always. Go in deep, let out the wolves …
For the first time it occurred to her that she, unaided by Larry Ventris, Granstrom, Margaret Bishop, or anyone else, was going to have to unchain the wolves and release them. “You wolves,” she spoke to them over her shoulder, “had darned well better remember that I’m your friend and I’ve got a gun.”
One howled, then another; Wasabe began to yip in sympathy.
“Shut up!” She tapped the horn, and they did. “What I’m going to do is drive way deep in this park. Have you noticed that we haven’t seen any other cars?”
Kyoto had, and said so.
“I’m going to enjoy this winter scenery, which really is spectacular. Then I’m going to stop and let you wolves out. Let me do it, and you’re free. Bite me while I’m trying to unchain you, and you’re going to have a fight on your hands. Understand?”
A
wolf met her eyes in the mirror but said nothing.
“You think you’re big, tough wolves, but you’re not even half grown up yet. It’ll be three against three if we fight. Speaking for myself and the dogs, we don’t want to. It’s entirely up to you.”
A second wolf appeared in the mirror, saying in Wolf, Let us out here.
“Okay,” Janet told it. “That sign said there was a scenic overlook up ahead. We can pull off right up there.”
She did and got out, followed by both Scotties. “We’ll go on through the park,” she told them. “Did I say that?”
Wasabe nodded. I think so, Janet.
“Then we’ll find someplace that will take dogs and I’ll have a bath and sleep till next Wednesday.” She unlocked the hatch of Steve’s Expedition and held out her hand to the most docile-looking wolf. “That is the hand of friendship. Remember the hamburgers?”
The wolf said nothing, but allowed her to unsnap the chain around its neck. She took three quick steps backward as Kyoto barked a warning.
Almost fearfully the wolf stood for a moment on the rear of the Expedition, looking at her and the dogs, the rocks, the snow, and the trees. It lifted its head, sniffed the wind, and jumped down, loped across the little snow-covered parking lot and across Suicide Road to what appeared to be a sheer cliff so steep that the snow had found only scattered points in which to lodge. Passing behind a roadside bush, it never reappeared.
Janet discovered that she had been holding her breath and let it out with a whoosh. “That was the greatest moment of my life,” she told the emptiness beyond the railing.
Wasabe, sniffing at the wolf’s trail, looked up with snow on her nose. Mine, too, Janet.
She had almost gotten up the courage to release the second wolf when the park ranger’s car pulled in. He marched grimly toward her, a good foot taller than she in his Smoky Bear hat. “Miss—” he began. His eyes opened very wide when he saw the Smith & Wesson.
“Were you about to say that I’m under arrest?”
He shook his head, the motion almost imperceptible.
“That’s good,” Janet told him. “Because if you do I’m going to shoot you and roll your body over that drop.” For a moment it seemed to her that she might actually do it.
“You’re bringing in wolves.” There was an odd, undecided quality to his voice.
She pointed to the back of the Expedition. “There they are.”
“Letting them go in the park.”
“I was. But that was before you came.” Something in her voice made Wasabe bark at him and Kyoto growl. “Now you are. If you want to keep breathing, you get over there and unchain them.”
He looked at the two remaining wolves, and back at her. “You don’t need that gun, Miss.”
“I’m glad to hear it. Get busy.”
“In a minute.”
She raised the gun. “The trigger was pretty stiff when I got it, but I had a gunsmith smooth it out.” It was something Steve had said. On her own she added, “I don’t have strong hands, but I can pull this trigger now, and it’s a lot easier to pull after the first time. It’s called double action.”
“I know what it’s called,” the park ranger said.
“Sure you do. And you know that if you can keep me talking somebody will come by. Get over there and unchain them.”
He took a hesitant step toward the wolves.
“I’m going to count to ten.” She tried to make her voice hard, and at least succeeded in frightening herself. “Is that understood? I don’t want to, but on the count of ten I shoot. One. Two. Three …”
Like playing hide-and-seek, she thought.
“Four. Five. Six. I am not joking. Do it!”
He edged nearer the wolves, but one lunged at him snarling.
“Never mind, I’ll do it.”
She was no longer tired. It’s getting out of the truck and into the fresh air, she thought, or it’s getting to stretch my legs, and whatever it is, it’s wonderful.
She gestured with the Smith & Wesson. “Get over closer to your car, but don’t get in.”
“I am not going to rush you,” he said. He sounded sincere.
“That’s good. If you’re not going to rush me I’m not going to shoot you, and that’s the way we both like it.”
“I was going to warn you, that’s all. Tell you to come in at night, because if somebody else saw you I’d have to—”
She made an angry gesture, and he backed away. She said, “I’m going to put this in my pocket. See?”
He nodded.
“If you can get to me before I can get it out again, you win. But you’d better be careful not to slip in the snow.” The wolf that had snarled at him snapped at her; she cuffed its muzzle and unhooked its chain. “Now get out of here,” she told it. “We’re tired of feeding you. Go kill a gopher or something.”
When she looked around at the ranger, his hands were no longer raised. “There,” she told him, “that’s another one. You arrested a friend of mine yesterday, but you still haven’t stopped us.” Us was Margaret Bishop, Granstrom, Larry Ventris, and how many others? It really wasn’t a question of how many others, she decided; it was a question of how many wolves.
The ranger had spoken, but she had been too occupied with her thoughts to hear him. As she unchained the third wolf she said, “Come again?”
“I said I was sorry about your friend. It wasn’t me.”
The third wolf jumped from the back of the Expedition and for perhaps fifteen seconds stood nose-to-nose with Kyoto and Wasabe. I’m going to live in these woods and have cubs, the third wolf said in Wolf, because that’s what I want to do.
It’s up to you, Kyoto declared in Dog. We want to stay with Janet.
Wasabe added, Until Rachael and Andy get back.
Kyoto glanced up at Janet, saying, How long? And the third wolf trotted away as if she meant to trot straight down Suicide Road, but went someplace else before she reached it.
Good-bye, Kyoto called; and Wasabe, Janet, and the ranger joined her. Good-bye! “Good-bye!” “Good-bye!”
“Do you know what I worry about?” Janet asked him.
“Sure. You’re afraid one might bite a kid.”
She nodded. “I’m afraid one may kill a child. How did you know?”
“Because I worry, too. I worry about every kid that comes into this park, but we have bears and wildcats. Do you know how many kids have been bitten by bears and wildcats put together since I’ve been here? I’ve been here six years.”
She shook her head.
“Not a one. They’ve got wolves in Canada, just about everywhere except in the cities, and they’ve got wolves in Minnesota that came down from Canada. Do you think the TV news in Minneapolis and Toronto is yelling every day about kids torn to pieces by wolves?”
When she did not reply, his voice softened. “Can I tell you something? Wolves aren’t half as dangerous as deer. Deer aren’t nearly as smart, and the males get very aggressive in the fall. We’ve got more than a thousand deer in this park.”
She pointed toward his car. “You’ve got a radio in there?”
He nodded. “I’m not going to use it, though.”
“But if I put a bullet in it, you’ll have to explain what happened.”
He nodded again.
“All right.” With her hand on the gun in her pocket, she shut the Expedition’s hatch. “I’ll take my chances.”
“Thanks …” he said.
“What is it?”
He pointed to her left hand. “You’re not married.”
“No.”
He tried to smile. It was not something he did well. “My name’s Jerry, Miss. Jerry Baumgarten.”
She got back into the Expedition and whistled for the dogs. “This is the wild, wild woods,” she told him. A glance took in rocks and pines and snow that she knew she would never forget. “In the wild woods, we Woolfs have no names.”
As the Expedition pulled away, she watched its side mirror
to see whether he ran for his car and its radio. He did not.
Suicide Road struck another road, a Michigan state highway, and she turned onto it singing under her breath, a happy little song about a winter wonderland. There were curves and more curves, hills and valleys, pines, white birch, and snow-covered bushes.
Then suddenly and incredibly an impossibly tall man in snowy white, with outstretched arms and the finest smile she had ever seen. She slammed on the brakes so hard that the Expedition nearly skidded off into the ditch.
In the blinking of an eye, the man in white was gone. Where he had stood, three snowmobiles flashed across the road.
Janet turned off the ignition, told the dogs to stay inside, and got out. There were no footprints where the man in white had stood, only the tracks of the racing snowmobiles that, if she had not seen him and braked …
It did not bear thinking about. She looked up and down the empty road, and listened to the sound of their racing engines until they faded to bright winter sunshine and clear blue sky. Slowly and stiffly she knelt in the snow, clasped her hands, and closed her eyes. Thank you. Thank you very, very much. It was a pleasure, Lord, a pleasure and an honor to look after your dogs, even if it was only for a day. I’ll be happy to do it again anytime.
Back in the Expedition, traveling the state highway at a cautious twenty-five miles an hour, she waited for some word of thanks and approval from Him. There was none; instead, a vast questioning, as though God (too big to be seen) were waiting expectantly for something more from her.
What was it Margaret Bishop had said? Michigan, and another park someplace? Janet cast her mind back to the dark, crawling, jolting bus. A certain park in Michigan, and a new place …
“Saddle up, you li’l Scottie gals.” She risked a small nudge of the accelerator. “Round up them wolves ’n head ’em on out. We’re a-goin’ to Texas.”
“Yip-yip-yippee!” the wheaten Scottie replied, speaking even more plainly than usual.
Ever loyal, Wasabe seconded her. “Yippee-ki-yi, Kyoto!”
She loosed the bar, she slid the bolt, she opened the door anon,