The Wolves of Midwinter (The Wolf Gift Chronicles 2)

“I do understand,” he said.

“You were some kind of miracle, something monstrous yet fabulous, and the radio and the TV and the newspapers had been chattering about you, this Man Wolf thing, this incredible being, this hallucination, this spectacular chimera, I don’t know how to describe it—and there you were—there you were—and you were absolutely real, and I saw you and I touched you. And I didn’t care! I wasn’t going to turn away. I didn’t care.”

“I understand. I know. I knew it at the time.”

“Reuben, I want to live now. I want to be alive. I want to be alive with every fiber of my being, don’t you see, and for you and me, this is being alive.”

He was about to pick her up, to carry her back into the house, but she stepped away and put her hands up. Her nightgown was soaked and cleaving to her br**sts, and her hair was dark around her face. He was chilled to the bone and it didn’t matter.

“No,” she said, stepping back, yet holding firmly to his lapels. “Listen to what I’m saying. I don’t believe in anything, Reuben. I don’t believe I’ll ever see my father again, or my kids, or my sister. I think they are just gone. But I want to be alive. And this thing means we don’t die.”

“I do understand,” he said.

“I care now, don’t you see?”

“Yes,” he answered. “And I want to understand more, Laura. And I will understand more. I promise you. I will.”

“Go now, please,” she said. “And I’ll be home soon.”

He passed Thibault on the way to his car. Thibault, portly and dignified, in a shining black raincoat standing under the great Douglas fir, with an umbrella, a big black umbrella, and maybe Thibault gave him a nod, he didn’t know. He just got in his car and headed north.

* * *

* The name Nideck is pronounced with a long i to sound like “Nigh-deck” or “Neideck.”

2

IT WAS TEN O’CLOCK when he reached home, and the house was cheerful, with a lot of the sweet-smelling evergreen garland already around the fireplaces, and the fires going as always, and a scattering of cheerful lamps lighted throughout the main rooms.

Felix was at the dining table, in fast conversation with Margon and Stuart about the plans for Yuletide, a map or diagram spread before them on butcher paper, and a couple of yellow notepads laid out with pens. The gentlemen were in their pajamas and Old World satin-lapel robes, while Stuart wore his usual dark sweatshirt and jeans. He looked like a wholesome American teenager who had wandered into a Claude Rains movie.

Reuben smiled to himself over that little bit of musing. It was wonderful to see them all so animated, so happy in the light of the fire, and to smell the tea and the cakes, and all the fragrances he now associated with home—wax, and polish, and the oak logs burning on the hearth, and of course the fresh smell of the rain that always worked its way into this big house, this house with its damp dark corners that surrounded so many yet never really embraced anyone.

The old French valet Jean Pierre took Reuben’s wet raincoat, and immediately set a cup of tea for him at the table.

Reuben sat quiet, drinking the tea, distracted, thinking of Laura, half listening and nodding to all the Christmas plans, vaguely aware that Felix was stimulated about all this, uncommonly happy.

“So you’re home, Reuben,” said Felix cheerfully, “and just in time to hear our grand designs, and to approve, and give us your permission and your blessing.” He had his usual radiance, dark eyes crinkled with good humor, his deep voice running on with easy enthusiasm.

“Home but dead tired,” Reuben confessed, “though I know I can’t sleep. Maybe this is my night to become a lone wolf and the scourge of Mendocino County.”

“No, no, no,” whispered Margon. “We’re all doing so well, cooperating with one another, aren’t we?”

“Being obedient to you, you mean,” said Stuart. “Maybe Reuben and I should go off together tonight and, you know, get in real trouble like the little wolves that we are.”

He made a fist and slammed Margon a little too hard on the arm.

“Did I ever explain to you boys,” asked Margon, “that this house has a dungeon?”

“Oh, complete with chains, no doubt,” said Stuart.

“Amazingly complete,” said Margon, narrowing his eyes as he gazed at Stuart. “And proverbially dark and damp and dismal. But that never stopped some of the expiring inmates from carving grim poetry into the walls. Would you like to spend some time there?”

“As long as I can have my blankie and my laptop,” said Stuart, “and meals on schedule. I might get some rest down there.”

Another mocking growl came from Margon and he shook his head. “ ‘They flee from me that sometime did me seek,’ ” he whispered.

“Oh not another secret poetic communication,” said Stuart. “I can’t stand it. The poetry’s getting so thick in here I can’t breathe.”

“Gentlemen, gentlemen,” said Felix. “Let’s keep it brisk and light and in keeping with the season.”

He looked intently at Reuben. “Speaking of dungeons, I want to show you the statues for the crèche. This will be a splendid Yuletide, young master of the house, if you’ll allow it.”

He went on quickly explaining. December sixteenth, two Sundays before Christmas, was the perfect day for the Christmas festival in Nideck, and the banquet here at the house, for all the people of the county. The booths and shops in the “village,” as Felix more often than not called it, would close at dark, and everyone would come up to Nideck Point for the evening festivities. Of course the families must come, Reuben’s and Stuart’s, and whatever old friends either wanted to include. This was the time to remember everybody. And Father Jim must bring the “unfortunates” from his church in San Francisco, and buses could be provided for that.

Of course the sheriff would be invited, and all the law enforcement officers who had so recently been crawling over the property on the night the mysterious Man Wolf had perpetrated his murderous attack on the two Russian doctors in the front room. And the reporters, they’d all be invited too.

They’d have huge tents on the terrace, tables and chairs, oil heaters, and twinkling lights beyond imagining.

“Picture the entire oak forest,” said Felix, gesturing to the woods beyond the dining room window, “completely festooned in lights, tree limbs positively dressed in lights, and the paths strewn with thick mulch, and strolling mummers and carolers roaming about, but naturally the boys’ choir and the orchestra will be on the front terrace along with the crèche and the bulk of the tables and chairs. Oh, this will be too splendid.” He pointed to the rough diagram he’d drawn on the butcher paper. “Of course the banquet proper will be served in this room, continuously from dark until ten p.m. But there’ll be stations properly positioned at all key points for the mulled wine, the mead, the drinks, food, whatever people want, and then all the house flung wide open so every soul in the neighborhood can see the public rooms and bedrooms of mysterious Nideck Point once and for all. No secrets anymore as to the ‘old place’ where the Man Wolf recently ran rampant. No, we’ll show the world. ‘Welcome, judges, congressmen, police officers, teachers, bankers … good people of Northern California! It was through that front room that the notorious Man Wolf rampaged, and out that library window that he vaulted into the night.’ Say the word, young master. Shall all this be done?”