Night Howl (29 page)

“I thought about it and decided he’d probably think I was crazy.”

“Tell me about this section of the Bronx. I don’t get into the city very often. I’ve got to have real earth under my feet most of the time, if you know what I mean.”

“Sure I do. I’m a country boy, too. This is the South Bronx. Maybe you remember President Carter was going to do something dramatic about it years ago. It looks a lot like Berlin immediately after the Second World War.”

“What did he say about the search so far?”

“They’ve combed ten square blocks but found no sign of him.”

Qwen sat back and thought. He had to admit that by this time, one of the major reasons for his wanting to do this was to set eyes on the animal. When Chief Michaels described his confrontation with the dog, Qwen felt the hunter’s envy. Michaels’s description was far from adequate. He had been too excited; the attack had been too quick. In his eyes the animal appeared to be six feet tall and weighed over two hundred pounds. It was a ridiculous description, the description of someone who had been in a panic.

Michaels didn’t make excuses for himself.

“I know I’m a cop; I’ve been a cop for years, and I should have been more professional about it all, but there was something more about this animal. It wasn’t
just a big, angry dog. I’ve had my times with dogs before, even mad dogs. Christ, I felt like a kid in the movies lookin’ up at a werewolf. Don’t laugh, you bastard.”

“I’m not laughing,” Qwen said. “It’s just that you described what I imagined as I tracked him, what I accused them of doing—creating a freak.”

Michaels nodded.

“If I had only gotten off a better shot . . . two more people dead. Damn!”

“If you’re lookin’ for someone to blame,” Qwen said, “you just have to go up to that secret compound.”

“Um. And that’s just what we’re going to do when this is all over.”

They crossed the George Washington Bridge and went to the Cross-Bronx Expressway. The late afternoon sun hung above the city, inflaming the thin clouds that passed over it. When they took the Webster Avenue exit and entered the inner city, Qwen understood what Michaels meant by “like Berlin immediately after the war.” He gaped in disbelief, amazed that human beings could live in such conditions. Even old Sam Cohen’s shack looked like a palace, compared to some of this.

After they parked at the precinct, Qwen stepped out of the car and opened the door for Maggie. The dog looked unhappy about it. The warmer than usual spring made the city air feel more like hot summer air. Qwen felt oppressed by it and by the lack of a breeze. Maggie’s tail drooped as she waited for them to move over the sidewalk and up the steps. Michaels came around the car and looked about.

“How do you like it?”

“Harder than hell to find good fish worms here,” Qwen said.

Michaels laughed. “Let’s meet the captain and find out what’s going on. Maybe they’ve got the bastard, already.”

Qwen, with Maggie at his feet, followed Michaels into the police station. Two patrolmen coming out nodded to them. When they got inside, the desk sergeant looked up quickly. He saw the insignia on Harry Michaels’s hat and badge.

“Town of Fallsburg police department? Where the hell’s that?”

“Upstate New York, Sullivan County. Is Captain O’Keefe in?”

“Yeah.”

“Did you find the dog yet?” Qwen asked quickly. The sergeant just looked at him.

“He means the German shepherd that went wild down here,” Michaels said.

“I know what he means. No, not yet. Whaddya know about it?”

“That’s why we’re here to see the captain,” Michaels said. “He’s expecting us. Tell him Harry Michaels, will ya.”

“Charlie!” the desk sergeant yelled. A hatless patrolman, carrying a clipboard, came out of an office in the corridor to the right. “Tell the captain Harry Michaels from upstate New York is here, will ya?”

The policeman nodded and went on down the hall. A moment later he returned to wave them in.

“What kind of dog is that?” the desk sergeant asked when he saw Maggie trailing along behind them.

“A country police dog,” Michaels said. Qwen laughed. They found Captain O’Keefe alone in his office, talking on the phone. He gestured for them to come in and take seats.

“I’ve got every available man out there, sir,” he was saying. “Right now we think it’s someone’s animal and it’s back in the apartment. That’s our best bet.
Yes, sir. I know. I’ll do my best, Commissioner. Thank you.” He hung up, wiped his brow with the palm of his right hand, and then sat forward.

Qwen couldn’t help contrasting the two policemen. Although Harry Michaels was along in years, he still looked virile and rugged. Of course, his size made a difference, but Qwen believed that even if Harry Michaels were fifty pounds lighter and five inches shorter, he would have a worn, tough look about him. There was nothing slick or polished in his demeanor.

On the other hand, this New York City police captain looked more like an agent in the FBI. He looked professional but also bureaucratic. Qwen wondered just how much real experience in the field he had. He was a slim man. In fact, he looked like someone who had recently been on a diet. The suit he wore seemed a size too big. To Qwen he looked more like an actor portraying a big city police captain.

“As you can imagine, this thing’s heating up. The media are having a field day. A few hours ago it was bedlam out in that lobby. There are network cameramen out there on the streets, just hoping for some action. I hope none of them get mugged.” He looked at Maggie, who sat obediently at Qwen’s feet. “We’re bringing in some dogs, too. Something special about yours?”

“Yes,” Qwen said. “She’s been trackin’ your dog.”

“Oh?” He stood up and walked around to the front of his desk. “Might as well introduce ourselves proper. I’m Captain O’Keefe.”

“Harry Michaels,” Harry said. “This here’s Mike Qwen.”

“So you’re a trapper? You do that for a living?”

“Among other things.”

“What’ja mean, she’s been trackin’ your dog?”

“The dog you’re after down here came from our area,” Qwen said.

“Came from? Whaddya mean, someone down here bought him up there and brought him down here? That’s great. If we have the name, we . . .”

“No, Captain, that’s not what Qwen means.”

“It’s not? What do you mean then? You said he came from your area, didn’t you?”

“I meant the dog came from our area, himself.”

Captain O’Keefe looked at Michaels and then at Qwen. He leaned back against his desk. “Didn’t you say you came from upstate New York, around Sullivan County?”

“Right,” Michaels said.

“That’s about ninety-odd miles, isn’t it?” Qwen nodded. “You mean that dog walked down here?”

Qwen looked at Michaels.

“We don’t know how he got down here, Captain, but we’re fairly sure that’s our dog.”

“Wait a minute. When you say ‘our dog,’ you’re talking about the military dog that killed some people?”

“Exactly.”

“Only it wasn’t a military dog,” Qwen said.

“How do you know all this?” Captain O’Keefe asked.

“I was hired to track him. Me and Maggie, that is.”

“And you’ve tracked him to the city?”

“In a way. Look, Captain, I don’t want to get into the whole thing right now, but believe me when I tell you this is not an ordinary animal. It’s smarter, wiser. It knows it’s being hunted. Take my word for it for the moment and let us help you. Show us where the dog did its damage and where it was last seen. We’ll do our best from there.”

O’Keefe looked at Qwen and then at Michaels. He thought for a moment and shrugged.

“Okay,” he said. “But when this is over, someone’s
going to have a lot of explaining to do. I almost lost a good officer out there.”

“That’s why we’ve come here, Captain,” Qwen said. “To make damn sure that explaining gets done.”

Qwen sat with Maggie in the back of the patrol car. His dog seemed just as disgusted as he was by the things they saw as they rode along. Young children played in lots strewn with garbage. There were wrecked and deserted automobiles everywhere, most stripped of their valuable parts by unseen junk parasites. Qwen wondered how anyone could feel any sort of dignity living in such an environment.

Although Michaels wasn’t as shocked by the decrepit neighborhoods, he anticipated Qwen’s reactions and shook his head in silent agreement. He sat up front with Patrolman Horowitz, the twenty-eight-year-old policeman Captain O’Keefe had assigned to them. His first duty was to take them to the apartment building in which the dog had killed the teenager.

At first the young patrolman was upset with his assignment. He thought it was just his bad luck that he was available to play chauffeur to a small town policeman and a hick who looked like someone as out of place here as an Amish farmer on Forty-second Street. Who the hell came into New York with a hound dog and was surprised to learn that the subway came out of the ground?

But as he drove them to the apartment building, he heard things that made him wonder. Perhaps these two knew what they were doing, even here. After all, dogs were being used to sniff out drugs and fires and bombs. And when he thought about it, he had nothing to brag about; the dog had eluded a big city police force up until now.

“I was just thinking,” Qwen said as they turned
down one street and started up another, “that to the dog, this might be something like being in a maze. It certainly feels that way to me.”

“So maybe moving through the streets wouldn’t be so terrifying to him,” Michaels said.

“Yeah, and in that case, every obstacle would become a test, and with the way he likes a challenge...”

“You guys talk about this dog as though he’s a person,” Horowitz said. Michaels looked at him and then back at Qwen. Horowitz caught the smile between them and questioned what was going on here. Who the hell were these guys? “This is it,” he said, turning onto the block.

Some people were still gathered in front of the building, listening to the elderly black man retell the events from beginning to end. He had been out there all day, relating the tale to anyone wanting to hear it. Actually, after what had happened to him, he clung to company and put off going back into his apartment for as long as he could. But as soon as the police car pulled up, everyone turned away from him. They watched Qwen and Maggie, Michaels, and Patrolman Horowitz get out.

“What made him stop at an apartment on this block?” Michaels asked. Horowitz’s eyes widened. Could Qwen answer that?

“Just the scent of food, I’d say. There’s nothing that resembles anything back home, nothing that would bring him to it in a search for something familiar. The apartment belongs to that old man on the stoop?” Qwen asked.

“Huh?” Horowitz said. “Oh, yeah. His name’s Russel.”

Qwen nodded and went to him. The crowd parted as he and Maggie approached with Michaels and Horowitz right behind.

“Howdy.”

The old man looked up at Qwen and at Maggie.

“Who the hell are you? The dogcatcher?”

“Sort of.” Qwen laughed and took out a chaw of tobacco. He bit into it and looked up the street. “Mind if I ask you some questions about what happened?”

“Get in line.”

“Know what you mean . . . quite a thing, quite a thing. Tell me, how the hell did he get into your apartment? Was the door open?”

“Door open? In this neighborhood?” Everyone laughed. “Hell no, mister. I even had my chain lock on, but I heard this scratchin’ and I opened the door. Stupid, plain stupid.”

“He just went chargin’ in?”

“Like he owned the place. He went right to the kitchen. Knew I had my breakfast out on the table. Jumped right up on the table. I couldn’t get him out.”

“What’dja do?”

“I hit him with the kitchen chair, but it might as well been a fly swatter. He was a big bastard. Maybe it was a wolf.”

“No.”

“Escaped from some circus.” He played to his audience. Some heads nodded.

“No, no way. Besides, a wolf’s half the size.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yes, sir,” Qwen said. He looked up the stoop. “I see the front door is closed. Is it always that way?”

“Hell, yeah. We got a spring on it makes it shut. It don’t lock, though. The lock’s broke. Still, some son-of-a-bitch let that dog in, huh?”

“I don’t think so,” Qwen said. He looked at Michaels, who closed and opened his eyes. “Did you see him kill the boy?”

“No, sir. I was out here. He just chased the other two out and went right by me.”

“Okay, thanks.” Qwen turned to Horowitz. “Take
us to where he attacked the policeman. Any doubts about it bein’ our dog?” he asked Michaels.

“I’m losin’ ‘em.”

They got back into the car and started away. The crowd watched them until they disappeared around the turn.

“From what we got,” Horowitz said, “he entered Webster Avenue from here. He met the patrol car just at the traffic light.”

“Pull over,” Qwen said. After he did so, Qwen looked out at where the policeman’s blood still stained the street.

“From here he headed east. Everyone lost sight of him at the end of the block.”

“Okay.” Qwen got out of the car. Maggie followed but remained very close to his feet. When the light turned red and the traffic stopped, Qwen walked out to the spot. Maggie sniffed about and then Qwen and his dog started east.

“Hey!” Michaels called.

“Just follow along in the car,” Qwen said. “Maggie’s excited. She recognizes the scent and she knows what I want.”

“What’s he saying?” Horowitz asked.

“Please just do what he says,” Michaels replied. The policeman shrugged and made the turn at the intersection. He drove very slowly as Qwen moved up the sidewalk. Maggie picked up her pace, seemingly oblivious to the noise and activity around her. When they came to the end of the block and saw what seemed to be an endless strip of crumbled buildings and piles of rubble, Qwen stopped.

“Holy shit,” he said. The patrol car came up beside him and Michaels leaned out.

“What’sa matter? The dog’s still goin’.”

“It looks like the end of the world.”

“Maybe it is.”

Maggie’s bark grew louder and shriller. She went through a pile of cement blocks and worked herself around some rolls of wire.