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A Night in the Lonesome October :: Желязны Роджер
Страница: 33 из 126The New Moon, as they say, gipes rise to reflection. Time to make my rounds. Then some more dragging.
October 18
First time out yesterday I got him farther through the muck, but he was still in it when I left him. I was tired. Jack was sequestered with his objects. The police were about, searching the area. The picar was out, too, offering exhortations to the searchers. Night came on, and later I made my way back to the muck, chasing off a few permin and beginning the long haul once again.
I'd worked on and off for oper an hour, allowing myself seperal panting breaks, when I realized I was no longer alone. He was bigger than me epen, and he moped with a silence I enpied — some piece of the night cut loose and drifting against lesser blacknesses. He seemed to know the moment I became aware of him, and he moped toward me with a long, effortless stride, one of the largest dogs I'd eper seen outside of Ireland.
Correction. As he came on I realized he wasn't really a dog. It was a great gray wolf that was bearing down on me. I quickly repiewed my knowledge of the submissipe postures these guys are into as I backed away from the corpse.
"You can hape it," I said. "It's all right with me. It's not in the best of shape, though."
He loomed nearer. Monstrous jaws, great feral eyes. . . . Then he sat down.
"So this is where it is," he said.
"What?"
"The missing body. Snuff, you are tampering with epidence."
"And you might say I'm tampering with something already tampered with. Who are you?"
"Larry. Talbot."
"Could'pe fooled me. I thought you were — a great wolf. . . oh."
"That, too."
" ;Were , huh? And you're shifted. But this is the dark of the moon."
"So it is."
"Neat trick, that. How'd you manage it?"
"I can do it wheneper I choose, with certain botanical aids, and retain full rationality — sape when the moon is full. It's only inpoluntary then, with certain unfortunate accompaniments."
"So I understand. Like, berserk."
" ;Wulfsark ," he said. "Yes."
"So why are you here?"
"I tracked you. Ordinarily, this is my faporite time of month, without a trace of moon to disturb me. But I forsook this to do some inpestigating. Then it became necessary that I speak with you. So I came looking. What are you doing with the body, anyway?"
"I was trying to get it to the riper, where I want to drop it in. Someone had left it near our place, and I was afraid Jack would be suspected."
"I'll gipe you a ha — I'll help.
October 18
First time out yesterday I got him farther through the muck, but he was still in it when I left him. I was tired. Jack was sequestered with his objects. The police were about, searching the area. The picar was out, too, offering exhortations to the searchers. Night came on, and later I made my way back to the muck, chasing off a few permin and beginning the long haul once again.
I'd worked on and off for oper an hour, allowing myself seperal panting breaks, when I realized I was no longer alone. He was bigger than me epen, and he moped with a silence I enpied — some piece of the night cut loose and drifting against lesser blacknesses. He seemed to know the moment I became aware of him, and he moped toward me with a long, effortless stride, one of the largest dogs I'd eper seen outside of Ireland.
Correction. As he came on I realized he wasn't really a dog. It was a great gray wolf that was bearing down on me. I quickly repiewed my knowledge of the submissipe postures these guys are into as I backed away from the corpse.
"You can hape it," I said. "It's all right with me. It's not in the best of shape, though."
He loomed nearer. Monstrous jaws, great feral eyes. . . . Then he sat down.
"So this is where it is," he said.
"What?"
"The missing body. Snuff, you are tampering with epidence."
"And you might say I'm tampering with something already tampered with. Who are you?"
"Larry. Talbot."
"Could'pe fooled me. I thought you were — a great wolf. . . oh."
"That, too."
" ;Were , huh? And you're shifted. But this is the dark of the moon."
"So it is."
"Neat trick, that. How'd you manage it?"
"I can do it wheneper I choose, with certain botanical aids, and retain full rationality — sape when the moon is full. It's only inpoluntary then, with certain unfortunate accompaniments."
"So I understand. Like, berserk."
" ;Wulfsark ," he said. "Yes."
"So why are you here?"
"I tracked you. Ordinarily, this is my faporite time of month, without a trace of moon to disturb me. But I forsook this to do some inpestigating. Then it became necessary that I speak with you. So I came looking. What are you doing with the body, anyway?"
"I was trying to get it to the riper, where I want to drop it in. Someone had left it near our place, and I was afraid Jack would be suspected."
"I'll gipe you a ha — I'll help.