"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?"
Gala Tropile distractedly sat in the chair her hostess had vacated.
"We were running away," she babbled. "Glenn--he was Wolf, you see, and
he made me leave with him, after the House of the Five Regulations. We
were a day's long march from Wheeling and we stopped to rest. And there
was an aircraft, Citizen!"
"An aircraft!" Citizen Germyn allowed himself a frown. "Citizeness, it
is not well to invent things which are not so."
"I saw it, Citizen! There were men in it. 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 one told one's children.
But within himself, he was finding it very hard to remain calm. That
word Wolf--it was a destroyer of calm, 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
powerful cause to be doubly convinced of it now; 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 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 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 then you came here 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 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. The same man had
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 Haendl's lack of
breeding and airs.
Now he wondered no longer.
But the man made no overt act and Citizen Germyn postponed the raising
of the hue and cry. It was not a thing to be done 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?"
"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 bent over the ID bracelet that once had
belonged to the one PFC Joe Hartman, fingering it to hide his thoughts.
He said at last: "Perhaps you are right. Perhaps the Citizeness is with
my wife. If this be so, would it not be possible that she is fearful of
those who once were with her husband?"
* * * * *
Haendl laughed sourly. "She isn't any more fearful than we are, Germyn.
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!"
he 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, shrugged. "It has been disturbing. Some of
our finest Citizens have ceased to Meditate; they have been worrying.
So many Eyes and nobody 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 is that it is very strange and
therefore I am worried."
"Then take us to Gala Tropile," said Haendl. "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
ruffled and ill at ease with her guest.
"Will you ask if Citizeness Tropile will join us here?" he requested.