Dean Koontz - Winter Moon

Mile by lonely mile, he waited for the distinctive rustle of plastic in the cargo space behind the back seat.

He was certain the raccoons were dead. He didn't understand why he should expect them to revive and tear their way out of the bags, but he did.

Worse, he knew that if he heard them ripping at the plastic, sharp little claws busily slicing, they would not be the raccoons he had.shoveled into the bags, not exactly, maybe not much like them at all, but changed.

"Foolish old coot," he said, trying to shame himself out of such morbid and peculiar contemplations.

Eight miles after leaving his driveway, he finally encountered other traffic on the county route. Thereafter, the closer he drew to Eagle's Roost, the busier the two-lane blacktop became, though no one would ever have mistaken it for the approach road to New York City-or even Missoula.

He had to drive through town to the far side, where Dr. Lester Yeats maintained his professional offices and his home on the same five-acre property where Eagle's Roost again met rural fields. Yeats was a veterinarian who, for years, had cared for Stanley Quartermass' horses-a white-haired, white-bearded, jolly man who would have made a good Santa Claus if he'd been heavy instead of whip-thin.

The house was a rambling gray clapboard structure with blue shutters and a slate roof. Because there were also lights on in the one-story barn-like building that housed Yeats's offices and in the adjacent stables where four-legged patients were kept, he drove a few hundred feet past the house to the end of the graveled lane.

As Eduardo was getting out of the Cherokee, the front door of the office barn opened, and a man came out in a wash of fluorescent light, leaving the door ajar behind him. He was tall, in his early thirties, rugged-looking, with thick brown hair. He had a broad and easy smile.

"Howdy. What can I do for you?"

"Looking' for Lester Yeats," Eduardo said.

"Dr. Yeats?" The smile faded. "You an old friend or something?"

"Business," Eduardo said. "Got some animals I'd like him to take a look at."

Clearly puzzled, the stranger said, "Well, sir, I'm afraid Les Yeats isn't doing business any more."

"Oh? He retire?"

"Died," the young man said.

"He did? Yeats?"

"More than six years ago."

That startled Eduardo. "Sorry to hear it." He hadn't quite realized so much time had passed since he'd last seen Yeats.

A warm breeze sprang up, stirring the larches that were grouped at various points around the buildings… The stranger said, "My name's Travis Potter. I bought the house and practice from Mrs. Yeats. She moved to a smaller place in town."

They shook hands, and instead of identifying himself, Eduardo said,

"Dr. Yeats took care of our horses out at the ranch."

"What ranch would that be?"

"Quartermass Ranch."

"Ah," Travis Potter said, "then you must be the… Mr. Fernandez, is it?"

"Oh, sorry, yeah, Ed Fernandez," he replied, and had the uneasy feeling that the vet had been about to say "the one they talk about" or something of the sort, as if he was a local eccentric.

He supposed that might, in fact, be the case. Inheriting his spread from his rich employer, living alone, a recluse with seldom a word for anyone even when he ventured into town on errands, he might have become a minor enigma about whom townspeople were curious. The thought of it made him cringe.

"How many years since you've had horses?" Potter asked.

"Eight. Since Mr. Quartermass died."

He realized how odd it was-not having spoken with Yeats in eight years, then showing up six years after he died, as if only a week had gone by.

They stood in silence a moment. The June night around them was filled with cricket songs.

"Well," Potter said, "where are these animals?"

"Animals?"

"You said you had some animals for Dr. Yeats to look at."

"Oh. Yeah."

"He was a good vet, but I assure you I'm his equal."

"I'm sure you are, Dr. Potter. But these are dead animals."

"Dead animals?"

"Raccoons."

"Dead raccoons?"

"Three of them."

"Three dead raccoons?"

Eduardo realized that if he did have a reputation as a local eccentric,he was only adding to it now. He was so out of practice at conversation that he couldn't get to the point.

He took a deep breath and said what was necessary without going into the story of the doorway and other oddities: "They were acting funny, out in broad daylight, running in circles. Then one by one they dropped over." He succinctly described their death throes, the blood in their nostrils and ears.

"What I wondered was'ould they be rabid?"

"You're up against those foothills," Potter said. "There's always a little rabies working its way through the wild populations. That's natural. But we haven't seen evidence of it around here for a while.

Blood in the ears? Not a rabies symptom. Were they foaming at the mouth?"

"Not that I saw."

"Running in a straight line?"

"Circles."

A pickup truck drove by on the highway, country music so loud on its radio that the tune carried all the way to the back of Potter's property. Loud or not, it was a mournful song.

"Where are they?" Potter asked.

"Got them bagged in plastic in the Cherokee here."

"You get bitten?"

"No," Eduardo said.

"Scratched?"

"No."

"Any contact with them whatsoever?"

Eduardo explained about the precautions he'd taken: the shovel, bandanna, rubber gloves.

Cocking his head, looking puzzled, Travis Potter said, "You telling me everything?"

"Well, I think so," he lied. "I mean, their behavior was pretty strange, but I've told you everything important, no other symptoms I noticed."

Potter's gaze was forthright and penetrating, and for a moment Eduardo considered opening up and revealing the whole bizarre story.

Instead, he said, "If it isn't rabies, does it sound like maybe it could be plague?".Potter frowned. "Doubtful. Bleeding from the ears? That's an uncommon symptom.

You get any flea bites being around them?"

"I'm not itchy."

The warm breeze pumped itself into a gust of wind, rattling the larches and startling a night bird out of the branches. It flew low over their heads with a shriek that startled them.

Potter said, "Well, why don't you leave these raccoons with me, and I'll have a look."

They removed the three green plastic bags from the Cherokee and carried them inside. The waiting room was deserted, Potter had evidently been doing paperwork in his office. They went through a door and down a short hallway to the white-tiled surgery, where they put the bags on the floor beside a stainless-steel examination table.

The room felt cool and looked cold. Harsh white light fell on the enamel, steel, and glass surfaces. Everything gleamed like snow and ice.

"What'll you do with them?" Eduardo asked.

"I don't have the means to test for rabies here. I'll take tissue samples, send them up to the state lab, and we'll have the results in a few days."

"That's all?"

"What do you mean?"

Poking one of the bags with the toe of his boot, Eduardo said, "You going to dissect one of them?"

"I'll store them in one of my cold lockers and wait for the state lab's report. If they're negative for rabies, then, yeah, I'll perform an autopsy on one of them."

"Let me know what you find?"

Potter gave him that penetrating stare again. "You sure you weren't bitten or scratched? Because if you were, and if there's any reason at all to suspect rabies, you should get to a doctor now and start the vaccine right away, tonight-"

"I'm no fool," Eduardo said. "I'd tell you if there was any chance I'd been infected."

Potter continued to stare at him.

Looking around the surgery, Eduardo said, "You really modernized the place from the way it was."."Come on," the veterinarian said, turning to the door. "I have something I want to give you."