target of the largest manhunt in San Francisco history."
"Make no mistake," he went on to say when the frenzy of questions had been allowed to crest, "we are dealing here with a dangerous and obviously psychotic individual."
"Is he a man wearing some kind of animal costume?"
"We,ll address this question when we,ve had more time to process the evidence."
So tell them about the abundant lysozyme in the saliva, Reuben thought, but of course you won,t. That would only exacerbate the hysteria. And he,d left no saliva evidence last night, just whatever might have come from the claws with which he,d slashed his victims.
One thing was clear. People weren,t fearing for their lives with the Man Wolf. But nobody, or so the radio call-ins seemed to indicate, believed the Man Wolf had actually spoken words to the North Beach victim and witness.
Reuben was about to shut the radio off when the news came in that the body of one little eight-year-old Goldenwood Academy student had been found two hours ago in the surf at Muir Beach. Cause of death: blunt force trauma.
There was a press conference in progress at the sheriff,s headquarters in San Rafael. It sounded like a lynching.
"Until we have a concrete plan for the return of the children and the teachers," said the sheriff, "we cannot accede to the kidnappers, demands."
Enough. Reuben couldn,t take any more. He turned off the radio. A little girl dead on Muir Beach. So these "tech geniuses" had done that, had they? Simply murdered one of their numerous victims to show they meant business? Of course. When you have forty-five potential victims, why not?
He was in a fury.
It was five o,clock, and dark, and the rain showed no sign of slacking. And the voices of the world were very far away. In fact, he heard no voices. That meant, obviously, that he could no more hear over an infinite distance than an animal. But what were the actual limits of his powers? He had no idea.
Little girl found dead in the surf.
That was all the more reason, wasn,t it, to conclude that the other victims were not very far away at all.
Abruptly, he came to the top of the final rise, and in the beam of his headlamps he saw the enormous house looming ahead of him, a giant phantom of itself in the rain, far more grand than memory had allowed him to envision it. There were lights in its windows.
He was awed by the sight of it, awed by the moment.
But he was also miserable. He couldn,t stop thinking about the children - about that little girl on that cold beach.
As he pulled up to the front door, the outside lamps went on, illuminating not only the steps and the door itself, but flashing upwards on the fa?ade at least as far as the top of the second-floor windows. What a glorious place it was.
Oh, how very far he was from the innocent young guy who,d first crossed that threshold with Marchent Nideck.
The door opened and the handyman appeared in a yellow rain slicker and came down to help Reuben with his bundles and suitcase.
The big room already had a roaring fire. And Reuben could smell the rich aroma of coffee.
"I,ve got some supper for you on the stove," said the handyman, a tall lean gray-eyed person, very weathered and wrinkled, with sparse iron-colored hair and a colorless but agreeable smile. He had one of those pleasant, accentless California voices that gave no hint of his home base or origins. "My wife brought that up here for you. She didn,t cook herself, of course. She got it at the local Redwood House down in the town. And some groceries, too. She took the liberty - ."
"I,m so pleased," said Reuben at once. "I thought of everything but food, thank you. And I was absolutely crazy to think I could get here by four o,clock. I am so sorry."
"No bother," the man said. "My name,s Leroy Galton and everybody calls me Galton. My wife is Bess. My wife,s lived here all her life, used to cook and clean up here now and then when there were parties." He took the suitcase from Reuben, and hefting the bundles in one hand he headed back the hallway towards the stairs.
Reuben felt the breath go out of him. They were nearing the spot where he,d struggled with Marchent,s attackers, the spot where he,d nearly died.
He hadn,t remembered the dark oak wainscoting. No bloodstains were visible. But