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Small Town Monsters

11

“I don’t expect you to understand, Mr. McCammus.”

“How many times have I told you to call me Kurt?”

“I don’t expect you to understand it at all, Mr. McCammus.”

Kurt planted his elbows on the desk on either side of Artemus’s book. “I’m listening.”

“I and the rest of the city council are wondering, just what it is you plan to do about … it?”

Kurt’s eyebrows netted. “To what are you referring?”

“About … you know … what has happened.”

“I’m afraid you will have to refresh my memory; nothing has happened in DePalma Beach short of the occasional speeder or maybe a good old boy getting drunk and picking a fight.”

Harmon cleared his throat. “You can hardly say that what you witnessed on Mr. Peoples’s ranch is nothing.”

Kurt pursed his lips. Here it goes, he thought. “Harmon, what I saw on Buren’s ranch was nothing more than the work of a pack of wolves coming down from the mountains.”

“That is how it always starts. The animals are the first to go.”

“Nothing but wolves, Harmon.” Kurt wasn’t used to an anxious Harmon Bently. Harmon taught violin lessons and gave candy to children.

“Might I remind you that you are the chief-of-police.”

“No crime has been committed. An animal attack is a matter for the rangers, not for me.”

“Do you know what he did?”

“What who did?”

“That boy: that creature.”

“I’m not following you.”

“You know who I’m talking about, Danny Slade. Do you know what he did?” Harmon squeezed down on the brim of his fedora until his knuckles showed white moons.

“I know about Danny Slade; his case is unrelated.”

“We were eighteen. Rather, I was eighteen and she was seventeen. It would be my last year at DePalma Beach High School. She had my ring; she wore it on a little gold chain