Ellen Datlow - Tails of Wonder and Imagination

“I do not do favors for those who practice certain unnatural acts.”

“Such as?”

“I hear you and your kin will eat… bugs.”

“So will humans,” the dude notes calmly.

“That is not all. I also hear that your kind will dine on—” I swallow and try not to let my whiskers quiver—“the dead.” Why else was Anubis head jackal of the Underground in ancient Egypt? My visitor looks like a lineal descendant.

“We will, when there is nothing living to eat,” he concedes with chilling calm. “In the city, such as we are called refuse managers.”

I say nothing, unconvinced.

When sitting this dude looks exactly like an Egyptian statue, and he gazes idly on the lush, landscaped surroundings so different from his usual arid turf. I realize that it has taken some nerve and a good deal of courage for this popular pariah to venture into the very heart of Vegas. Just to see me. Well, Midnight Louie is a teensy bit flattered, come to think of it.

“When did you last,” he asks, “partake of a bit of mislaid Big-o-Burger from down the street?”

“That is different,” I begin.

“Dead meat,” he intones relentlessly. “Someone else killed it, and you ate it.” The yellow eyes slide my way. I detect a malicious twinkle. “What about the contents of the cans so feverishly hawked at your kind?”

I am not misled; this dude is about as twinkly as the mother-of-pearl handle on a derringer.

“I do my own fishing.” I nod at the silent pond. “So what is your problem?”

“Murder.” His answer sends a petite shudder through my considerable frame. I was hoping for something minor, like roadrunner attack.

“Who is the victim?”

“Victims.”

“How many?

“Six, so far.”

“And the method?”

“Always the same.”

“You are talking serial killer here, pal.”

“Oh, are we friends?” Another shrewd golden glint. This dude has Bette Davis eyes… when she played the homicidal Baby Jane.

“Business associates,” I say firmly. No dude in his right mind would turn down this character.

“Who are the victims?”

“My brothers and sisters.”

“Oh.”

I do not know how to put it that one—or six—dead coyotes are hardly considered murder victims by the majority of the human population, and, face it, humans run this planet.

For now I know this dude, by type if not name: Don Coyote himself, one of an accursed species, with bounty hunters everywhere ready to clip their ears and tails for a few bucks or just the principal of the thing. It does not take a genius to figure out that any suspects for the so-called crime of killing coyotes are legion.

“If you are so smart,” I note diplomatically, “you know that it would be easier to find those who did not kill coyotes than otherwise.”

“This case is different,” he says sharply. “We are used to the hunters. We have outwitted them more often than not. We survive, if not thrive, and we spread, even while our cousin Gray Wolf clan has been driven to near extinction. We have evaded steel trap and strychnine poison. We are legendary for defying odds. What kills us now is new and insidious. Not just our green young succumb, but those who should know better. This is not the eternal war we wage with both prey and hunter; this is what I said… murder.”

“That is no surprise, either. You are not exactly Mr. Popularity around here.”

His lips peel back from spectacular sharp white teeth much improved, no doubt, by grinding such roughage as beetle shells and bones. “That is why I seek an emissary.”

“Why not try a police dog?”

“Frankly, your kind is more successful at undercover work. Even a domesticated dog”—his tone is more than condescending, it is majestically indifferent; on this subject we agree—“is handicapped. He is assumed to belong to some human, which attracts notice and sometimes misguided attempts at rescue. Your breed, on the other hand, although equally commonplace in human haunts, is known to walk alone by sly and secret ways and is more often ignored.”

I shrug and adjust one of my sharp-looking black leather gloves. “Say I was to accept this commission of yours. What would I get?”

His long red tongue lolls out. I cannot tell if he is grinning or scanning the ground for a Conga-line of ants. Antipasto in his book, so to speak.

“I am head honcho around this turf,” the coyote ruminates with a certain reluctance, like he is giving away the combination to the family safe. “I keep caches of hidden treasure here and there. If you successfully find—or simply stop—the coyote-killer, I will tell you the whereabouts of one. That would be your payoff.”

“How much is it worth?” I demand.

The yellow eyes look right through me. “Beyond price.”

“How do I know that?”

“I can only say that humans highly prize these objects.”

Hmmm. Coyotes are scavengers of the desert. I speculate on the array of inedible goodies they might run across in the wide Mojave, but silver comes first to mind, perhaps because Jersey Joe Jackson, the high-roller who helped build and bilk Vegas in the Forties, also hid huge caches of stolen silver dollars both in town and out on the sandy lonesome.

Then there are plain old silver nuggets left over from mining days. I am not fussy. Or… maybe jewels. Stolen jewels. I do not doubt for a minute that this wily old dude knows secrets even the wind-singing sands do not whisper about.

I stand and stretch nonchalantly. “Where do I begin?” For a moment I am eye to eye with those ancient, ocher orbs.

Then the dude also rises, and vanishes into the dark at the back of the canna lilies. “Follow me to the scene of the crimes.”

It is night by the time we get there. I have forgotten that dudes of this type are always hot to trot and can keep it up for miles. After I showed him a quick exit from the city, we were off through the boonies.

Miles of surly sagebrush have passed under my tender tootsie pads when we finally stop for good. I huff and puff and could not blow down a mouse house at the moment, but I was loath to let this dancing dog outpace me.

Although I pride myself on my night vision, all I can spy are a skyful of stars the wizards of the Strip might do well to emulate for sparse good taste, towering Joshua trees with their thick limbs frozen into traffic-cop positions, and a lot of low scrub, much of it barbed like wire. Oh, yes, and the full moon floating overhead like a bowl of warm milk seen from a kitchen countertop, and, occasionally, the moon-sheen in the coyote’s sun-yellow eyes as he gives me mocking glances.

“I forget,” he says, “that the city-bred are easily tired.”

“Not in the slightest,” I pant, hissing between my teeth. “But how can I study the crime scene in the dark?”

“I thought your breed could see despite the night.”

“Not enough for a thorough investigation. Where are we anyway?”

“At an enclave of humans away from the city. My unfortunate brothers and sisters ventured near to snag the errant morsel and were cut down one by one.”

“Listen, my kind are not noted for longevity either, so I dig the problem. Still, what can I do about it?”

“Perhaps you can interview the survivors.”

With that he steps back, braces his long legs, and lifts his head until his snout points at the moon. An unearthly howl punctuated by a series of yips emerges from between those awesome teeth.