Robert Adams - The Clan of the Cats

“Well, what in hell did happen, Dr. Stekowski?” demanded Bedford. “And why is Dr. Baronian going to be in need of protection from Dr. Harel?”

“Because he’s certain to be somewhat less than happy when he finds out that I put down one of his precious Russian wisents,” replied Dr. Baronian, matter-of-factly. “But I had no option. It was either kill that cow or watch her kill Dr. Stekowski.”

Bedford reflected that be had thought he had heard, despite the thick soundproofing layers of the complex walls, the sound of a gunshot, but he had of course just assumed it to be one of the state hunters in the forest below the plateau clearing out excess elk.

“You mean to try to tell me, Doctor, that you put paid to a full-grown wisent cow with a single shot? You must admit it’s hard to believe—they take a lot of killing. Where did you come by a rifle, anyway?”

Zepur Baronian smiled. “My rifle is up in my room, where I was myself when I heard the commotion down below. I’ve never loaded and fired so quickly, I don’t believe. But then I was granted a perfect target; the cow was coming at Dr. Stekowski, head lowered, so all I had to do was place my shot precisely where the spine joined the skull. And I did just that—my father taught me well.”

“Look,” said Bedford, “how did this all come about? The last I saw, as I came in here today, those wisents were fenced into the far-western enclosure. How the hell did one manage to get out? Have they learned to open the gate? I doubt that even one of them could knock down any of that fencing, not with every single post sunk and cemented the way they are.”

Stekowski sighed and shook his head, the fluorescents glinting on his scalp. “It was all my fault, I’m afraid. There were many other things I would’ve been better off doing, but I was curious to take a look at the calves, so I took one of the runabouts, the three-wheeler, and drove out to the far enclosure. I know, I know, I should’ve taken one of the silent, electric ones, but the gauges on both of them indicate that they needed recharging and I just did not want to wait for them to charge and—”

“Well, why the hell weren’t they, or at least one of them, charged?” demanded Bedford. “Have their batteries gone bad on us?”

“Most unlikely,” answered Ruth Marberg. “It was all the fault of our dear Führer . He can never be bothered with cleaning up after himself or even going to the vast trouble of plugging in the recharger plug after he’s used those ATVs, That’s what he uses all of us Untermenschen around here for.”

“Now, Ruth, dear,” Stekowski gently rebuked. “that is not at all fair.”

“No, Landislas,” she snapped testily, “but it’s all true, nonetheless. That despicable, detestable man considers all of us to be nothing more or less than his personal servants, his lackeys, his … his Spucknapfen , his Knechten ! I have endured much of him, far more than ever I would have but that you seemed to wish that he—rather than you or our Jimmy, here, as would have been more of a rightness—rule in all things. But now that his misbehavior has nearly cost your life … your so very precious life …”

“Ruth, Ruth,” said Stekowski placatingly, “it truly was my own fault, not that of Dr. Harel, really.”

Dr. Marberg’s face reddened and she opened her mouth to retort, but Bedford spoke first. “Hey, hey, let’s talk this out later, huh? I still want to know just what happened out there, how that wisent cow got loose and why Dr. Baronian had to put her down.”

“So,” said Stekowski, “I drove out and let myself into the far enclosure with the three cows and the two calves. The older of the calves, the bull calf, has started to graze already and his horn buds are quite pronounced. But I guess I got too close to them to please the cows, for they began to get most protective of the calves and to make threatening movements in my direction, so I decided to leave them in peace. Followed at a distance by that biggest cow, the barren one, I drove back to the gate, unlatched it and drove through, then closed it and, I thought, latched it again. But I must’ve not done it properly, for I had but just driven some few yards in this direction, it seemed, when I heard it swing back open and heard that big cow bellow, then start to gallop after me.

“It was then that I set the machine to maximum speed and made for the complex. I was within only a few yards of the side parking lot when the engine sputtered a few times, then ceased to function, and before I could even think of what to do next, the cow was upon me, had charged the machine from the side and knocked it over. I was shaken up a bit, of course, but the cage had held and I was not hurt, really. Not so with the machine, however; something in the rear compartment had commenced to spark and to smoke, and so, though I knew that if I remained in the cage I would most likely be safe from the loose cow, I decided to try to run the few yards to the parking lot, thinking that if all else failed, then I could clamber into the bed of Juan’s truck for refuge.

“But I had only run a short way when I twisted my ankle, fell and could not again arise. The cow, which had trotted off a distance after having knocked the three-wheeler over, had apparently seen me emerge and was in pursuit. It seemed that I could actually feel her hot breath upon me. I was terrified. Then came that booming rifle crack and the cow fell in her tracks as if she had been poleaxed.

“Dr. Baronian had but just helped me into the building when we heard your summons to meet you here. You were away a long while, this time. Did you experience some difficulty, perhaps?”

“More than just some difficulty, Dr. Stekowski,” sighed Bedford, then asked, “But where’s His Highness, Dr. Harel, pray tell? I’d not like having to go through all this twice.”

“Probably still in converse with his Russian buddy,” replied Zepur Baronian. “He wheeled the videophone into his office about an hour or so back and double-locked the door.”

Redford felt the heat as his face and neck suffused with his boiling blood. His voice came out under tight control. “ Harel has been on a satellite hookup to Russia for over an hour, this time? At one hundred and fifteen dollars and fifty-five cents per minute? He doesn’t hear very well, does he? Well, I’ll bring this to a screeching halt. You folks wait here. I’ll be back.”

From the window of the corridor, he saw the still, shaggy mound of the wisent carcass near the edge of the side parking lot. The black buzzards were already circling lower and lower over it. On a sudden impulse, he deliberately bypassed the door to Harel’s office and made his way all the way back, to the shop area. There he found the two men for whom he was searching.

Juan Vivás stood, meticulously wiping clean, then racking each tool in its proper place, while Joe Skywalker scattered compound chips on the concrete floor to absorb spilled fluids. Joe was the first to see Bedford enter the workplace, and he straightened with a warm smile—white teeth flashing against his dark, scarred face.

“Good to see you back again, Mr. Bedford, sir, Me and Juan, we just this minute finished fixing up that snowblower, and while we was at it, we tuned up the engine of the tractor, too. Won’t be no trouble now this winter coming like it was last spring.”

The squat, broad man turned from the tool rack. Since his own, dark face was considerably broader, so too was his smile. “¡ Jefe ! Bienvenido ! Do you hunger? Please to allow me the time to wash and I will prepare whatever you may wish, but …” A doleful look came over his features then, and he went on to say, sadly, “No meat is to be found, alas—fresh, frozen, freeze-dried nor even tinned. Of a night last week, the two so-distinguished and muy loco doctors, they searched my kitchen and the larders and even went into the cold place and cast everything of meat over the side of the mesa. Then they forbade me or Joe or anyone else to ever bring up any meat or fowl of any kind again, saying that did we so do our jobs would be the cost.”