The Ultimate Werewolf (27 page)

Of course, my belt wasn't studded with cop toys, just a long, black flashlight and two old rope leashes. I might look like a cop, but I worked for the S.P.C.A., enforcing the animal control and cruelty laws of the District of Columbia. To the public, I was, at best, a dogcatcher— at worst, someone who gassed puppies for a living.

Not that we gassed them. Our animals were humanely euthanized with a painless injection of sodium pentobarbitol, a powerful anesthetic pumped into the foreleg vein by a skilled technician. That it was merciful didn't make it easier.

Tonight's shift had been a
bitch.
The city's Animal Control Facility operates around the clock. I worked the night shift, driving a big, white van Tuesday through Saturday, five
p.m
. to one
a.m
. We called it the "nut" shift; the worst time to be on the streets, with the drug dealers, prostitutes, junkies, street people, headline-hungry politicians and— worse yet—tourists.

Tonight I'd had over forty calls, picked up thirty-two animals, and had had to euthanize twenty-seven before I could go home. The paperwork had taken me until three.

I'd barely walked in the door when I'd had to kill six three-day-old kittens with feline distemper. Then I did seven healthy mixed shepherds whose time had run out. We gave animals four days more than most places, so we were always cramped for space.

Around six-thirty I picked up three seriously injured strays (no collars, no tags) hit by cars in less than an hour. One of them had been neatly eviscerated. She looked at me gratefully as I talked soothingly to her, then pushed the plunger.

At nine, Linda, the night manager, said they couldn't hold the old stray hound any longer. I'd picked her up ten days ago. In spite of our posters, and ads in the
Post,
no one had claimed her. I loved her, but couldn't take her. My cat, Alfred, had died last year at seventeen, and I'd euthanized my fifteen-year-old Dobie, Dove, just six months ago, but my landlord had slapped a "no animals" clause on me before Dove got cold.

The hound licked our hands when Linda and I came to get her. She left this earth no doubt wondering where her people were.

At ten-fifteen I killed three raccoons we'd trapped, and one small brown bat who'd had his wings shattered by a terrified second-string Redskins linebacker wielding a broom. Each would have to be checked for rabies.

But the worst thing that'd happened tonight was that damned puppy. Even hours later, I found it hard to think about him. I'd chased his mother for half an hour, finally cornering her in an alley. She was nothing but drab fur, bones, and big nipples.

She led me to the nest where I found her pup safe and warm in a tumble of rags, paper and trash. He was fat and plush, about two weeks old, eyes just barely open—mixed beagle, mostly. I picked the trash off him . . . then I saw it.

It made me sick, and after ten years on the job, not much got to me. He must've crawled through one of those plastic six-pack holders right after he was born. His head and right front leg were through one of the rings, and he was wearing it like a bizarre bandolier across his pudgy chest. Once in it, he couldn't get out, and he'd grown—but the plastic hadn't. The ring was sawing him neatly in half. Exposed muscles glistened red and swollen . . . organs clearly visible. If I'd cut the damned thing, his entrails would've fallen out. All I could think of was Linda's favorite saying . . . there are worse things than death.

I put mom in the van, then sat in the alley, finding the tiny vein by the light of the street lamp, in spite of the danger. Clean needles pull junkies out of the woodwork, crazed cockroaches after sugar, and I'd been beaten and held up at gunpoint before for them. But I couldn't let his mom watch.

Both mom and I cried all the way back to the shelter. You'd have thought it was my first week on the job. At least she'd have a warm bed for a week and an endless supply of food. Then I'd probably have to do her. It killed me to think that those seven days would probably be the best in her short, bitter life.

I remembered all this and swallowed hard. I lived with ghosts each night. In my lap was that puppy with the ring; I could feel him squirm on my legs. At my feet the old hound wagged her tail. The mixed Shepherds and sick kittens watched me sadly. The raccoons stared. On my shoulder crouched the little bat. Every night I brought a crowd home—the ghosts of all the animals I killed. Every night for ten years.

Don't get me wrong, I didn't hate my job, but I didn't love it, either. It was something I had to do because I loved animals.
Someone
had to kill the thousands of sick, injured and unwanted animals discarded annually, and who better than someone who loved them? I know.
You
love animals and
you
couldn't do it—well, that's why
I
had to.

While I was thinking this, the old werewolf touched me on the shoulder, nearly scaring me to death. He was hanging onto the overhead bar, staring at me. His expression was kindly, but I fingered my flashlight. I'd had to use it as a weapon before.

"You've had a hard night, haven't you, bubeleh?" he said in a sober, gravely voice that was laced with a thick, Old World accent. It was the last thing I'd expected. A Jewish werewolf? In New York, maybe, but D.C.?

His unexpected sympathy hit me hard; tears welled up. I couldn't speak for fear I'd start bawling with ten years' backlogged heartache, so I just nodded. Here was this old man, homeless from the look of him, comforting
me.
I took a deep breath, glanced away, trying to pull myself together. That's when I noticed the number tattooed on the underside of his hairy arm as he held the bar. It was the old, faded, concentration camp number survivors of the Holocaust wear.

"You shouldn't work so hard, a nice girl like you," the old man rumbled, still smiling. "Goodnight, Therese." Therese. Not Theresa. Everybody said Theresa. Then he got off the bus.

I was still shaking my head as I stepped down onto Morris Road. I didn't believe in monsters . . . just like I didn't believe in ghosts . . . but when I thought of that old man, all I saw was a werewolf. A kindly Jewish werewolf . . . right. Sure.

I walked home, the ghosts of twenty-seven animals trailing behind me, wondering whether there'd been a full moon tonight.

▼▼▼

"Hey, Tee, good to see you," the cop said the next night, as he opened my van door. Joseph WhiteCrane was a K-9 cop with Metro police. The shelter often supplied Metro with dogs, and Joe's dog, Chief, a big white shepherd, had been one of my finds. Joe was part Sioux, part Hispanic, and part Irish. About 5'8", he wasn't handsome, with his hooked nose and pock-marked face, but his dark skin, black hair and ice-black eyes were magnetic, fiercely alive. Inside, Joe was a red-tailed hawk.

A good night's sleep had erased any lingering willies I had over my odd delusion on the bus. I felt secure being back at work dealing with my normal run of real-life horrors.

"I just got the call," I said. "You impound a dog?" Drug dealers often protected themselves with bad dogs, so it wasn't unusual to be called to a crime scene to pick up animals. But this didn't look like a drug bust—for one thing, the coroner's wagon was sitting next to Joe's car. Inside the car, Chief lunged and whirled, frantically barking.

We were in the business district, the fourteen-hundred block of I Street, so at this time of night, there weren't many bystanders. Besides the handful of street people and hookers gawking at the crime scene, there were a few businessmen who must've been in the local club that served lunch to the clericals during the day, and topless shows to the bosses at night.

"No dog for you tonight—at least, not yet," Joe said, then looked at me, frowning. "What's that smell?"

I'd been hoping he wouldn't notice. "Gasoline and burnt hair. Some kids cooked a cat. I found her tied by her tail to a lamppost, still smoldering . . . and screaming." I rubbed my hands on my pants, feeling bits of her still stuck to me. Her skin had sloughed off when I hit the vein.

Joe looked away, knowing better than to show any sympathy. "Well, like you say, there's worse things than death. Look, we need an expert opinion. An old guy's been killed, maybe by animals. We called the zoo, and nothing's loose. Would you look at the body and tell the coroner what you think of the wounds?"

I nodded. After the barbecued cat, nothing could bother me. At first, the coroner only wanted to show me the bites on the arms, but finally Joe convinced him to uncover the corpse. Damn right, there's worse things than death. The man's throat was torn out, but the coroner said he survived that, only to endure the rest without being able to scream. His chest was torn
open ...
his heart ripped out.

"I've seen feral dogs do stuff like this to each other," I said, "but, eat
just
the heart? Weird." I stared at the bites. "Big jaws, wide muzzles, almost flat-faced."

"Pack of pit bulls?" Joe asked.

"Maybe ...
or bull mastiffs. How big are the paw prints?"

Joe and the coroner looked at each other. "No paw prints," the cop said finally.

"Come on. This guy had to bleed like a fountain."

"Footprints," Joe said. "The victim's. Nothing else."

"Are you guys sharing this with the press?" I asked quietly.

Joe shrugged. "Don't know."

"C'mon, give a poor working girl a break," I urged. "Remember the rabies outbreak? The city'll go nuts if the media talks up a crazed pack of killer dogs."

Joe smiled. "I'll talk to the captain. We might be able to keep this on low profile until we know more about the victim."

As we left the coroner's wagon, I saw Joe's still-frantic dog. "What's wrong with Chief? I've never seen him like this."

The cop shrugged. "He's been crazy since we got here. Let's take him out. You got your pole?"

"Yeah." I retrieved the aluminum rabies pole with its plastic-covered cable loop that enabled me to snag animals and hold them at a distance.

Joe put Chief on a short lead and let him out. The dog was high- strung, hackles up, whining. Normally, the big shepherd was as steady as a brick.

"Think he can smell those dogs?" I asked.

Joe shrugged. "If we spot 'em, we're going to catch them from a distance." He patted the pistol resting on his hip.

Chief pulled Joe for a few blocks, then turned up an alley. Suddenly, he rounded on a doorway, barking furiously. A huddled form was hiding in the shadows. I moved closer. Gray eyes, silver hair, muddy overcoat . . . the old man from the bus . . . and damn it, he
still
looked like a werewolf!

"Easy, Chief, easy!" Joe said to the frenzied dog. "Hey, Grandfather, what're you doing here?"

"Resting, officer," he muttered tiredly. "Please, to hold your dog! Ach, Therese, tell him not to loose the dog!"

"You know this guy?" Joe asked me.

Something made me nod my head. "Grandfather," I said, using Joe's term, "It's not safe here. A man's been killed nearby. Did you see or hear anything?"

"Tsk, tsk." He shook his head. "Killed?
Such
a world!" "Let us take you to the D Street shelter," Joe offered.

"In the same car with such a dog? Thank you, no."

I gazed at the old man—he seemed exhausted, weary to his soul, and my heart went out to him. Usually I only felt this kind of concern for animals,
but ...
he was different. "Have you had anything to eat tonight, Grandfather? A hot meal?"

He smiled. "Say 'zeyde,' Therese. Yes. I've had a good, hot meal. Not kosher, but . . . how nice you should worry."

I wasn't sure I believed him. Impulsively, I shoved three dollars into his pocket. "Then this is for breakfast, Zeyde."

Joe and I walked back to my van. We had to drag Chief the whole way.

"So, is Zeyde his name?" I wondered to Joe.

He shook his head. "Means 'grandfather.' It's Yiddish."

Joe
would
know that. He was a mine of cultural knowledge. "What does 'bubeleh' mean?"

" 'Grandchild. It's an endearment." Joe paused. "Did you smell anything when you got near him?"

"Me? All I can smell is that poor cat. Why?"

Joe glanced back towards the alley. "I thought I caught a whiff of blood. Didn't see any, though. Might've been why Chief was so spooked. Could've been his breath."

I looked at Joe, my eyes wide. "His
breath?"

"Lots of street people are sick . . . ulcers, whatever."

Oh
, I thought, embarrassed by my weird thoughts.

▼▼▼

The next day was Friday, and by eleven forty-five p.m., Linda was helping me do my twentieth kill of the night. It was a full grown dobie, weighing thirty pounds. Should've weighed eighty. The people said they'd run out of dog food and couldn't afford more, so they just stopped feeding him. He couldn't even stand. Only his eyes looked alive.

Linda took him in her arms. "Hey, pretty dog," she crooned, petting him, her blond curls falling around her face. We ribbed Linda for looking like Jane Fonda. Lovely, quick and clever . . . inside she was a gray fox.