Wolfbane

9

Roget Germyn, of Wheeling a Citizen, found himself thinking of Glenn Tropile much more than he would have liked.

It was not seemly for a Citizen’s thoughts to keep flashing back to a cried-upon Wolf. It wasn’t even sense. At this time of all times he should have devoted a seemly proportion of his thoughts—actually, nearly all of them—to his work, for this was the time when Germyn’s occupation of banker was both very demanding and very enjoyable.

It was always that way in the first weeks after the birth of a New Sun. It was the time when even the soberest Citizen might permit himself to dream largely. Six months from now, when the first big harvests were already in and the earliest of the second ripening for the granaries, that was the time when a banker needed to be extremely conservative. Saving was the order of the day then. So Germyn would delicately remind his clients, deferentially counseling them to put away rather than spend, borrow only if they must, save, save, for the hard times that surely lay ahead.

Then the hard times would begin to come.

The crops would dwindle. Then Germyn would have to try harder than ever to find the words, the properly indirect and mannerly words, to keep his investors from drawing on their hoard before they had to.

Then the Old Sun would begin to die, and the harvests went from slim to zero. That was the long-drawn-out time when everyone’s savings melted slowly away. Stretch it out if you can, he would say—as persuasively as a proper Citizen could. Make it last. Always keep a reserve in your account—for if you spend too much too fast, not only will you risk running out of reserves before the Re-Creation of the Sun, but you will perhaps drive up prices, and then everyone will suffer.

And then the New Sun would be born, and the world would bloom again. Like now. And if Germyn had done his work well, his bank would still have funds on deposit to make loans—to finance new ventures—to plant more farmland—to hope.

It was the best time of year for bankers, as well as for everyone else. It was the only time when anyone dared hope at all.

So when Germyn came home one night, he was vastly pleased with his work and his world. He was mulling over the words of mild exultation with which to share his pleasure with his wife when he opened the door.

The exultation did not last.

He contemplated his wife from behind his hand, unwilling to believe what reason and evidence told him was true.

Possibly the events of the past few days had unhinged her reason, but he was nearly sure that she had eaten a portion of the evening meal secretly, in the serving room, before calling him to table.

He felt sure that it was only a temporary aberration; she was, after all, a Citizeness, with all that that implied. A—a creature, like that Gala Tropile for example, someone like that might steal extra portions with craft and guile. You couldn’t live with a Wolf for years and not have some of it rub off on you. But not Citizeness Germyn.

There was a light thrice-repeated tap on the door.

Speak of the devil, thought Roget Germyn most appropriately; for it was that same Gala Tropile. She entered, her head downcast, looking dark and haggard and—well, pretty.

He began formally, “I give you greeting, Citi—”

“They’re here!” she interrupted in desperate haste. Germyn blinked. “Please,” she begged, “can’t you do something? They’re Wolves!”

Citizeness Germyn emitted a muted shriek.

“You may leave, Citizeness,” Germyn told her shortly, already forming in his mind the words of gentle reproof he would later use. “Now, what is all this talk of Wolves?” He realized with a pang that his words were almost as gracelessly direct as her own. So completely had his wife and Tropile’s erased the sweetness of his day at the bank.

Gala Tropile distractedly sat down in the chair her hostess had vacated. (Sat without being invited! Not even in a guest chair! How far gone the woman was!) “Glenn and I ran away from you,” she began drearily, “after—you know—after he decided he didn’t want to make his Donation? After he escaped from the House of the Five Regulations? Anyway, we ran as far as we could, because Glenn said there was no reason he should just sit still and let you all murder him just because he helped himself to a few things.” Germyn was shuddering as he listened to that tale of horrors, but what she said next made him sit straight up in shock. “And then—you won’t believe this, Citizen Germyn—and then, when we stopped to rest, a day’s march away, an aircraft came!”

Citizen Germyn didn’t. “An aircraft!” He allowed himself a frown. “Citizeness, it is not well to say things which are not so.”

“I saw it, Citizen! There were men in it, and one of them is here again. He came looking for me with another man, and I barely escaped him. I’m afraid!”

“There is no cause for fear, only an opportunity to appreciate,” Citizen Germyn said mechanically—it was what you told your children. But within himself, he was finding it very hard to remain calm. That word, Wolf—it was a destroyer of calm, it was an incitement to panic and hatred! He remembered Tropile well, and there was Wolf, to be sure. The mere fact that Citizen Germyn had doubted his Wolfishness at first was now powerful cause to be doubly convinced of it; he had postponed the day of reckoning for an enemy of all the world, and there was enough secret guilt in his recollection to set his own heart thumping.

“Tell me exactly what happened,” said Citizen Germyn, in words that the stress of emotion had already made far less than graceful.

Obediently Gala Tropile said: “I was returning to my home after the evening meal and Citizeness Puffin—she took me in after Citizen Tropile—after my husband was—”

“I understand. You made your home with i “ her.

“Yes. She told me that two men had come to see me. They spoke badly, she said, and I was alarmed. I peered through a window of my own home, and they were there. One had been in the aircraft I saw! And they flew away with my husband.”

“It is a matter of seriousness,” Citizen Germyn admitted doubtfully. “So that then you came to me?”

“Yes, but they saw me, Citizen! And I think they followed. You must protect me, I have no one else!”

“If they be Wolf,” Germyn said calmly, “we will raise hue and cry against them. Now, will the Citizeness remain here? I go forth to see these men.”

There was a graceless hammering on the door.

“Too late!” cried Gala Tropile in panic. “They i i” are here!

Citizen Germyn went through the ritual of greeting, of deprecating the ugliness and poverty of his home, of offering everything he owned to his visitors; it was the way to greet a stranger.

The two men lacked both courtesy and wit; but they did make an attempt to comply with the minimal formal customs of introduction. He had to give them credit for that; and yet it was almost more alarming than if they had blustered and yelled.

For he knew one of these men.

He dredged the name out of his memory. It was Haendl. This man appeared in Wheeling the day Glenn Tropile had been scheduled to make the Donation of the Spinal Tap and had broken free and escaped. He had inquired about Tropile of a good many people, Citizen Germyn included; and even at that time, in the excitement of an Amok, a Wolf—finding and a Translation in a single day, Germyn had wondered at his lack of breeding and airs.

Now he wondered no longer.

But the man made no such overt act as Tropile’s terrible theft of bread, and Citizen Germyn postponed the raising of the hue and cry. It was not a thing to be undertaken lightly.

“Gala Tropile is in this house,” the man with Haendl said bluntly.

Citizen Germyn managed a Quirked Smile.

“We want to see her, Germyn. It’s about her husband. He—uh, he was with us for a while and something happened.”

“Ah, yes. The Wolf.”

The man flushed and looked at Haendl. Haendl said loudly: “The Wolf. Sure he’s a Wolf. But he’s gone now, so you don’t have to worry about that.”

“Gone?”

Haendl said angrily: “Not just him, but four or five of us. There was a man named Innison, and he’s gone too. We need help, Germyn. Something about Tropile—God knows how it is, but he started something. We want to talk to his wife and find out what we can about him. So will you get her out of the back room where she’s hiding and bring her here, please?”

Citizen Germyn quivered. He vent over the ID bracelet that once had belonged to the late PFC Joe Hartmann, fingering it to hide his thoughts. He said at last: “Perhaps you are right. Perhaps the Citizeness is with my wife. If this were so, would it not be possible that she was fearful of those who once were with her husband?”

Haendl laughed sourly. “She isn’t any more fearful than we are, Germyn. Let me tell you something. I told you about this man Innison who disappeared. He was a Son of the Wolf, you understand me? For that matter—” He glanced at his companion, licked his lips and changed his mind about what he had been going to say next. “He was a Wolf. Do you ever remember hearing of a Wolf being Translated before?”

“Translated?” Germyn dropped the ID bracelet. “But that’s impossible!” ne cried, forgetting his manners completely. “Oh, no. .Translation comes only to those who attain the moment of supreme detachment, you can be sure of that. I know. I’ve seen it with my own eyes. No Wolf could possibly—”

“At least five Wolves did,” Haendl said grimly. “Now you see what the trouble is? Tropile was Translated—I saw that with my own eyes. The next day, Innison. Within a week, two or three others. So we came down here, Germyn, not because we like you people, not because we enjoy it. But because we’re scared. What we want is to talk to Tropile’s wife—you too, I guess; we want to talk to anybody who ever knew him. We want to find out everything there is to find out about Tropile, and see if we can make any sense of the answers. Because maybe Translation is the supreme objective of life to you people, Germyn, but to us it’s just one more way of dying. And we don’t want to die.”

Citizen Germyn bent to pick up his cherished identification bracelet and dropped it absently on a table. There was very much on his mind.

He said at last: “That is strange. Shall I tell you another strange thing?”

Haendl, looking angry and baffled, nodded.

Germyn said: “There has been no Translation here since the day the Wolf, Tropile, escaped. But there have been Eyes. I have seen them myself. It—” he hesitated, and shrugged—”it has been disturbing. Some of our finest Citizens have ceased to Meditate; they have been worrying. So many Eyes, and no one taken! It is outside of all of our experience, and our customs have suffered. Politeness is dwindling among us; even in my own household—”

He coughed and went on: “No matter. But these Eyes have come into every home; they have peered about, peered about, and no one has been taken. Why? Is it something to do with the Translation of Wolves?” He stared hopelessly at his visitors. “All I know,” he said, “is that it is very strange, and therefore I am worried.”

Haendl boomed: “Then take us to Gala Tropile. Let’s see what we can find out!”

Citizen Germyn bowed. He cleared his throat and raised his voice just sufficiently to carry from one room to another. “Citizeness!” he called.

There was a pause and then his wife appeared in the doorway, looking concerned.

“Will you ask if Citizeness Tropile will join us here?’ he requested.

His wife nodded. “She is resting. I will suggest to her that it would be pleasant to speak together. ...”

But that Citizeness Germyn did not do.

As she turned, there was a sound of two hands loudly clapping from the other room.

All four of them jumped, and stared. Then the nearly self-admittecdWolf, Haendl, ran for the door and the others followed.

The thunderclap had been real, though not of any human hands. Air had rushed in to fill a void. The void had been the volume of space that once had been occupied by Citizeness Gala Tropile.

Roget Germyn turned pale. This woman—this Wolf-tainted woman, surely in no state for the grace of meditation—she had been Translated, too!