12
On the morning of the fourth day Jack heard someone sliding down into the gully. A startled bird squawked, then noisily lifted itself off the roof of the shed. Heavy footsteps advanced toward the door. Jack raised himself onto his elbows and blinked into the darkness.
A large body thudded against the door and stayed there. A pair of split and stained penny loafers was visible through the gap.
'Wolf?' Jack asked softly. 'That's you, isn't it?'
'Give me the key, Jack.'
Jack slipped his hand into his pocket, brought out the key, and pushed it directly between the penny loafers. A large brown hand dropped into view and picked up the key.
'Bring any water?' Jack asked. Despite what he had been able to extract from Wolf's gruesome presents, he had come close to serious dehydration - his lips were puffy and cracked, and his tongue felt swollen, baked. The key slid into the lock, and Jack heard it click open.
Then the lock came away from the door.
'A little,' Wolf said. 'Close your eyes, Jacky. You have night-eyes now.'
Jack clasped his hands over his eyes as the door opened, but the light which boomed and thundered into the shed still managed to trickle through his fingers and stab his eyes. He hissed with the pain. 'Better soon,' Wolf said, very close to him. Wolf's arms circled and lifted him. 'Eyes closed,' Wolf warned, and stepped backward out of the shed.
Even as Jack said, 'Water,' and felt the rusty lip of an old cup meet his own lips, he knew why Wolf had not lingered in the shed. The air outside seemed unbelievably fresh and sweet - it might have been imported directly from the Territories. He sucked in a double tablespoon of water that tasted like the best meal on earth and wound down through him like a sparkling little river, reviving everything it touched. He felt as though he were being irrigated.
Wolf removed the cup from his lips long before Jack considered he was through with it. 'If I give you more you'll just sick it up,' Wolf said. 'Open your eyes, Jack - but only a little bit.'
Jack followed directions. A million particles of light stormed into his eyes. He cried out.
Wolf sat down, cradling Jack in his arms. 'Sip,' he said, and put the cup once more to Jack's lips. 'Eyes open, little more.'
Now the sunlight hurt much less. Jack peered out through the screen of his eyelashes at a flaring dazzle while another miraculous trickle of water slipped down his throat.
'Ah,' Jack said. 'What makes water so delicious?'
'The western wind,' Wolf promptly replied.
Jack opened his eyes wider. The swarm and dazzle resolved into the weathered brown of the shed and the mixed green and lighter brown of the gully. His head rested against Wolf's shoulder. The bulge of Wolf's stomach pressed into his backbone.
'Are you okay, Wolf?' he asked. 'Did you get enough to eat?'
'Wolfs always get enough to eat,' Wolf said simply. He patted the boy's thigh.
'Thanks for bringing me those pieces of meat.'
'I promised. You were the herd. Remember?'
'Oh, yes, I remember,' Jack said. 'Can I have some more of that water?' He slid off Wolf's huge lap and sat on the ground, where he could face him.
Wolf handed him the cup. The John Lennon glasses were back; Wolf's beard was now little more than a scurf covering his cheeks; his black hair, though still long and greasy, fell well short of his shoulders. Wolf's face was friendly and peaceful, almost tired-looking. Over the bib overalls he wore a gray sweatshirt, about two sizes too small, with INDIANA UNIVERSITY ATHLETIC DEPARTMENT stencilled on the front.
He looked more like an ordinary human being than at any other time since he and Jack had met. He did not look as if he could have made it through the simplest college course, but he could have been a great high-school football player.
Jack sipped again - Wolf's hand hovered above the rusty tin cup, ready to snatch it away if Jack gulped. 'You're really okay?'
'Right here and now,' Wolf said. He rubbed his other hand over his belly, so distended that it stretched the fabric at the bottom of the sweatshirt as taut as a hand would a rubber glove. 'Just tired. Little sleep, Jack. Right here and now.'
'Where'd you get the sweatshirt?'
'It was hanging on a line,' Wolf said. 'Cold here, Jacky.'
'You didn't hurt any people, did you?'
'No people. Wolf! Drink that water slow, now.' His eyes disconcertingly shaded into happy Halloween orange for a second, and Jack saw that Wolf could never really be said to resemble an ordinary human being. Then Wolf opened his wide mouth and yawned. 'Little sleep.' He hitched himself into a more comfortable position on the slope and put down his head. He was almost immediately asleep.
PART III A COLLISION OF WORLDS
CHAPTER 20 Taken by the Law