Wild Heart (24 page)

The racoons wouldn't go; they were too tame—they liked it here. He said, "Stay, then," and moved on.

Martens and fishers were smart; they knew what he was about even before he could show them. He had hardly gotten their wire gate open before they spilled out and tumbled away, black and brown balls of scrambling fur, gone in seconds.

But the foxes didn't trust him. They were beaten down, they couldn't believe anything would change. He had to run with them at first to wake them up, make them believe. He stopped at the foot of the hill, and the foxes who hadn't scattered already ran past him, sprinting flat out, racing to freedom.

The beavers had an enclosure, but inside it they had dammed up a stream that ran through the middle of the park. So he left them alone. They were already free—their life's work was right here. Same with the otters; all they needed to be happy was a mud slide, and they had one inside their roomy outdoor cage.

Badgers next. They were his favorite. The smartest, too—they knew exactly why he'd come. But they were so kindhearted, they wouldn't go. "Go," he told them. "Run!" It wasn't in them to hate anything, he realized, not even the zoo. It was a bitter disappointment.

He had to get different keys for the deer. They were the
artiodactyla,
and they lived in small, dusty, trampled paddocks at the front of the zoo. Good: he would herd them right out the main gate.

He didn't know there were so many different kinds, maybe ten, twenty, maybe more. But once he started he couldn't stop. He released the caribou and the white-tails first because he knew them, had lived through the thick and thin of their yearly migrations for as long as he could remember. The others he set free at random— Kashmir deer, European red deer, fallow deer, sambar, chamois, water buck, Alpine ibex, Virginia deer, American moose, eland, elk, big-horn sheep, Canadian goat, barasingha, axis, gemsbok, pronghorn antelope, mule deer, roe, Sika, Indian hog deer, white-bearded gnu—

What in the world had made him think he could herd them anywhere, much less through a twelve-foot gate fifty yards away? But he kept on, doing the best he could, and about a third of them went where he drove them. The rest scattered in fright and confusion, and it wasn't long before the sound of their hooves and the smell of their fear woke up the whole zoo. And brought all the guards running.

He wasn't afraid—they would never catch him. But he hadn't finished yet, and he wished he had let the deer go last. Moving fast in the dark, skirting the main building, easily eluding the men running here and there with lanterns and torches, shouting questions and curses at each other, Michael headed for the bear house.

In the caretaker's building, a choice slowed him down. Beside the key to the black bears' cage he saw the key to the wolverines'. He despised wolverines. Small, powerful, ugly, mean, they ate everything, even moose, even deer, porcupines, birds, bait, animals struggling in traps, and what they couldn't eat they spoiled with musk and urine and droppings. His hand hovered over the key too long— he couldn't decide! Outside, a man shouted. The nearness of the danger made his mind up for him. "Sorry," he muttered, although he wasn't sorry at all. Grabbing the keys to the bears' cage, he slipped back outside.

He let the black bears go, but not the others. He didn't know them, the hulking grizzlies, the enormous polars; they were like lions or elephants to him, strangers he couldn't trust. But black bears never hurt anyone: all they wanted to do with humans was stay out of their way.

Everything was chaos, caged animals screeching and bellowing, guards yelling, running in circles. Michael had hidden his shoes and his jacket under some shrubbery near the main building. He'd need them, once he got out of here, to look normal on the streets and not attract attention. Circling around, avoiding the lighted paths, he heard the rasp of a shoe on stone, just before a man walked out of a copse and straight toward him. Too late to hide—he had seen him. Michael ran right at him.

"Hey! Stop, you—" The man jumped out of the way at the last second, his moonlit face round with surprise. He started after him, shouting for him to stop, and then he yelled, "Get him—right there, he's the one! Stop that guy!"

Another guard appeared on the path, holding a lantern. He set it on the ground when he saw Michael and lifted his fists, preparing to fight. Michael changed direction and ran around him.

Too late to get his clothes now—too many people that way. He'd go the other way, back way, and disappear in the woods.

Deer everywhere. He could hardly run in a straight line. But he could hide sometimes, crouching down among them, running alongside them in their panic. So many deer. It was funny, really. Maybe someday he would laugh.

He lost his cover when a loud
crack
scattered the deer. He knew that sound. Every animal knew what it was. Gunshot.

Crack,
again—from the direction of the wolf pen. Everything in him said
escape,
run as fast as he could from the sound. He started to—then swerved back onto the concrete walk, his feet slapping loud on the hard pavement, and pounded down a long, shallow slope toward the shots.

Two men, one with a lantern, one with a gun. They had backed the wolves, the two who wouldn't run, against the outside front of the fence to their pen. The female had lost her mind. Frenzied by fear, she made short, snarling dashes at the men, then hurled herself back against the fence, slamming her body against it, mad to escape. The open gate to the pen was eight feet away—all she had to do was run through it to be safe. Caught, but safe. The male, snarling and whimpering in his confusion, darted to the opening and almost went through it, but then shied away and ran back to his mate.

The man with the gun raised it to his shoulder. Michael was too far away to stop him. He screamed,
"No,"
a second before the rifle spat fire. The she-wolf gave a high cry as her body hurtled back against the fence, hung for a second, and dropped. Blood spattered the white of her ruff. She twitched and went still. The man made the
click
sound with his gun that meant he would shoot again.

Michael smacked into him at a full run. The gun fired and the man said, "Hunh," at the same time. The rifle flew out of his hands and they went sprawling on the ground, turning and turning, trying to grab each other's hands. Michael saw the gray wolf standing frozen, stiff-legged, eyes crazed with grief.
Run.
Sounds of men running, men shouting.
Run.
The man he was fighting struck him in the face with his fist, and he tasted blood. When he looked again, the wolf was gone.

Someone yanked his head back by the hair. He growled out his rage, snapping his teeth at the air, trying to twist away. Shouting, wild-eyed men surrounded him, jumping back when he lunged at them. He heard the
click
sound of a gun, and his blood turned sluggish, froze in his veins. A black stick saved him. Before the gun could shoot, it came slashing down, first on his shoulder, then his cheek. He slumped over his enemy and let the blackness take him.

* * * * *

Aunt Estelle wasn't enjoying her party. She had wanted the theme of the evening, the primary topic of conversation on the lips of her important guests, to be Sydney's second coming out. Instead, what everyone was talking about was what sort of madman would break into the zoo and set all the animals free.

"I heard the elephants stampeded," Lincoln Turnbull pulled Sydney closer to say, raising his voice over the waltz music Reggie Arrow's orchestra was playing at the rear of the terrace. "Randy Collier said he heard the lions ate the leopards, the tigers ate the lions, and the bears ate everybody."

Sydney turned her face away.

"The
Tribune
said only a few species were released, but the
Morning Herald
said it was all of them. They're still rounding deer up from as far away as Oak Park."

"I'm sure that's an exaggeration. The,papers never get anything right." The sharpness in her tone silenced him. She thought of apologizing—he was her guest, after ail-but she wasn't sorry. If she had to smile through one more outrageous zoo story tonight, she was going to fly to pieces. The afternoon paper said the animal-freeing madman had been "subdued by clubbing" before he'd managed to shake off his captors and escape. The phrase chilled her. She imagined him hurt, wounded, alone and frightened and unable to come home.

She stole a glance at her watch, pinned to the wrist that lay across Lincoln's broad, sturdy shoulder. Seven-forty. He had been missing for over twenty-four hours. By now at least a dozen people had asked her where he was. "I hear he's quite civilized now," Marjorie Clemens, whom Sydney had never liked, had been silly enough to add. "I'm just
dying
to meet him. Where is he?" "Oh, somewhere," she had answered vaguely, glancing around, as if he might be out on the lawn, or eating shrimp toasts with Sam under the striped canopy. She had answered everyone that way, when she had answered them at all— sometimes she pretended not to hear. The family ought to have come up with a story, she realized too late. Who knew what Philip was saying, or Papa, or Sam?

Oh, Michael.
She scoured the edges of the trees when Lincoln twirled her around the terrace in time to the music. Could he be out there somewhere, watching and hiding? What in the world had he been thinking of? How could he have done such a mad thing? Oh, if only he would come home!

Lincoln said something, and she nodded, smiled, pretended to listen. Would it have been better if they had caught him? At least then he'd be safe. Men with guns were looking for him now. So far, thank God, they didn't know
who
they were looking for. If they found him—

"Music's stopped."

"What? Oh." She dropped her arms, laughing to cover her awkwardness.

Lincoln frowned at her with real concern. "Sydney, what's the matter? Are you all right?"

"Yes, fine, just, you know, in a dither. Parties do that to me. My own, I mean. Oh—my aunt's giving me one of those looks; it means she wants me." Her aunt wasn't even looking at her. "Excuse me, will you?"

"Sydney—"

"I'll come back. I will, I promise." She twinkled her eyes at him until he finally smiled. Then she escaped.

The orchestra began a new song. She put on a purposeful face so that no one would ask her to dance, moving smoothly through the crowd toward the lawn. Air, she just needed some air. And if she could be by herself for five minutes—

"Sydney?"

Camille, blond and beautiful in a gown of shimmering white organza, put a hand on her arm to make her stop. Her blue eyes, so much like Spencer's in the way they crinkled at the corners, narrowed on her with worry. "Are you all right?"

Why did people keep asking her that? "Yes, I'm fine. Don't I look all right?"

"You look lovely," Cam said quickly. "I love your hair that way. You have to show me how to do that. Is it a French roll?"

“What? Yes." She patted the back of her head distractedly. "Cam, go and dance with Lincoln, will you?"

"Lincoln?"

"You don't mind, do you?"

"No, but why? Is he being a pest?"

"No, no, he's just. . . oh
_v
you know."

Cam looked at her strangely. "All right, if you want me to."

"Thanks." It would keep him occupied for a while, out of her way. She left Cam, forgetting to say good-bye.

The night turned into a blur. She greeted, smiled, danced, talked, laughed, her secret goal always to get away from where she was without being rude or too obviously distracted. Time crawled. An hour went by, but when she looked at her watch she saw it had only been ten minutes. How could she stand this? If it didn't end soon, she was sure she would lose her mind.

". . . such a nice idea, having it outside. And aren't we lucky the weather cooperated? What would you have done if it rained?"

She answered something, but her restless gaze traveled past her friend Helen Ivy's head, always searching the dancing, milling crowd. A scowling face startled her out of her abstraction. Charles West, standing by himself at the edge of the terrace, stared straight back at her, not returning her tentative smile. Her briskness to him lately had finally gotten through, to the point that he had not only stopped asking her to marry him, he had stopped talking to her at all. His anger seemed unjustified to her— she had treated him, under the circumstances, as gently as she could—-but she supposed it was understandable. Ought she to go over to him, speak to him, try to pretend nothing had happened? He looked uncomfortable and out of place in his borrowed evening clothes, one hand nervously stroking his gingery beard. She sighed. What good would it do? It might even give him false hope. Besides, her mind was too fragmented; she had too much on it right now to try to deal tactfully with Charles.

Mrs. Prettiman, a friend of her aunt's whom Sydney had known all her life, approached her between dances and spoke to her so kindly she was afraid she might weep. How close to the surface her emotions were tonight! "I won't keep you standing here talking to
me"
Mrs. Prettiman said, with an old lady's self-deprecation to the young, "but I had to tell you how very glad I am to see you again, Sydney, Out and about," she added meaningfully. "Spencer was a dear man; I always liked him, always thought you and he made a perfect couple." She took Sydney's hand and pressed it gently. "I'm happy for you, my dear. Because the time has come. You're young and beautiful, and you've done enough grieving."