The Werewolf Principle

17

It was fifteen minutes until her favourite dimensino programme came on. Elaine Horton had looked forward to it all day, for Washington was boring. Already she was looking forward to the time when she could return to the old stone house in the Virginia hills.

She sat down and picked up a magazine and was idly flipping through its pages when the senator came in.

'What did you do all day? he asked.

'Part of the time I watched the hearing.

'Good show?

'Fairly interesting. What I can't understand is why you bothered to dig up that stuff from two hundred years ago.

He chuckled. 'Well, partly, I suppose, to shake up Stone. I couldn't see his face. I would guess his eyeballs might have popped.

'Mostly, she said, 'he simply sat there glaring. I suppose that you were proving that bioengineering is not so new a thing as many people think.

He sat down in a chair and picked up a paper, glanced at the glaring headlines.

'That, he said, 'and that it can be done — that it, in fact, was being done, and rather skilfully, two centuries ago. And that we were scared out once, but shouldn't be again. Think of all the time we've lost — two hundred years of time. I have other witnesses who will point that out, rather forcefully.

He shook out the paper and settled down to read.

'Your mother get away all right? he asked.

'Yes, she did. The plane left a little before noon.

'Rome this time, isn't it. Was it films or poetry or what?

'Films this time. Some old prints someone found from the end of the twentieth century, I believe.

The senator sighed. 'Your mother, he told her, 'is an intelligent woman. She appreciates such things; I'm afraid I don't. She was talking about taking you along with her. It might have been interesting if you had cared to go.

'You know it wouldn't have been interesting, she said. 'You are an old fraud. You make noises as if you admired these things that Mother likes, but you don't care a lick.

'I guess you're right, he agreed. 'What's on dimensino? Could I squeeze in the booth with you?

'There is plenty of room and you know it. And you would be very welcome. I'm waiting for Horatio Alger. It will be on in another ten minutes or so.

'Horatio Alger — what is that?

'I guess you'd call it a serial. It goes on and on. Horatio Alger is the man who wrote it. He wrote a lot of books, back in the early part of the twentieth century, maybe before that. The critics then thought they were trashy books and I suppose they were. But a lot of people read them and that apparently meant that they had some sort of human appeal. They told all about how a poor boy makes good against terrific odds.

'It sounds sort of corny to me, said the senator.

'I suppose it does. But the producers and the writers have taken those trashy stories and turned them into social documents, with a good bit of satire laced into the story. And they have done a marvellous job of recreating the background, the most of it I suppose is the late nineteenth century and the early twentieth. And not just the physical background, but the moral and social background. It was a barbarous age, you know. There are human situations in it that make your blood run cold…

The phone beeped at them and the vision panel blinked. The senator hoisted himself from the chair and crossed the room.

Elaine settled more comfortably in her chair. Five minutes more to go before the programme would come on. And it would be nice to have the senator join her in watching. She hoped that nothing happened to prevent him joining her. Like that phone call, for instance. She flipped the pages of the magazine. Back of her she heard the mumbled voices of the conversation.

The senator came back.

'I'll have to go out for a while, he said.

'You'll miss Horatio.

He shook his head. 'I'll catch it some other time. That was Ed Winston, down at St Barnabas'.

'The hospital. Anything wrong?

'No one hurt. No one ill. If that is what you mean. But Winston seemed upset. Said he had to see me. Wouldn't tell me what was going on.

'You won't stay out too long. Get back early if you can. With these hearings, you need sleep.

'I'll do my best. he said.

She went to the front door with him, helped him with his cloak, then came back into the living-room.

The hospital, she thought. She didn't like the sound of it. What could the senator possibly have to do with a hospital? Hospitals made her edgy. She had gone to that very hospital just this afternoon and she hadn't wanted to, but she was glad she had. That poor guy, she thought, is really in a jam. Not knowing who he is, not knowing what he is.

She went into the dimensino booth and sat down in a chair, the curving screen, glinting in front of her and on either side. She pressed the buttons and turned the dial and the screen began its preliminary flicker.

Strange, she thought, how her mother could get excited about an ancient piece of film — an old flat, two-dimensional entertainment medium that most people had forgotten ever had existed. And the worst of it, she thought wryly, was that people who professed to see something of great value in the old-time things also professed a great contempt for modern entertainment as devoid of all art. In a few hundred years, perhaps, when new entertainment mediums had evolved, the old dimensino would be rediscovered as an ancient art that had not been properly appreciated at the time it flourished.

The screen quit its flickering and she seemed to stand in a downtown street.

A voice said: …no one yet can give an explanation of what happened here less than an hour ago. There are conflicting reports and no two stories absolutely check. The hospital is beginning to calm down now, but for a time there was pandemonium. There are reports that one of the patients is missing, but the reports can't be confirmed. Most accounts agree that some animal, some say it was a wolf, went raging through the corridors, attacking everyone who stood in its way. One story is that the wolf, if wolf it was, had arms that sprouted from its shoulders. The police, when they arrived, fired at something, spraying the reception room with bullets…

Elaine caught her breath. St Barnabas! This was St. Barnabas. She had gone there to see Andrew Blake and her father now was on his way there — and what was going on?

She half rose from her chair, then sat down again. There was nothing she could do or should do. The senator would be able to look out for himself; he always had. And whatever had been in the hospital now was gone, or apparently it was. If she waited just a little while, she'd see her father get out of the car and walk up the stairs.

She stood and shivered in the chill wind that was sweeping down the street.