“We have a problem here, Harry,” he says. “I am ashamed to admit it, because I always pay my debts, but I am tapped out. I prowl all night, which is not even a minimum-wage job, and it tires me out so much that I fall asleep at my desk during the day so often that I am given my walking papers three weeks ago. This is why I came up with the dog track idea. I am desperate for money. You would be surprised at how little a wolf can earn between midnight and six in the morning.”

“If this is the case,” I say, “why did you choose to become a werewolf?”

“It is not a matter of choice,” says Tabasco. “I fall in love with this beautiful Gypsy woman named Yolanda Schwartz…”

“Yolanda Schwartz?” I say.

“Well, she is half Gypsy,” he replies. “And for some unknown reason her father disapproves of me.”

“Unknown,” I say.

“Well, it was unknown at the time,” answers Tabasco. “Only later do I find out that it is his Cadillac that I steal and sell to Straight Deal Sheldon’s chop shop.”

“I can see where this might cause him to view the situation with some concern,” I agree.

“And a modicum of fury,” adds Gently Gently.

“He winds up and hits me with his high hard one-a Gypsy curse,” says Tabasco. “And from that day to this, I have had a secret identity, just like Clark Kent and Bruce Wayne, the difference being that Clark Kent is gainfully employed and Bruce Wayne is independently wealthy, and what is more, they climb into their costumes while I grow into mine.”

Benny Fifth Street walks in just then.

“Hi, Tabasco,” he says. “Nice race, all things considered.”

Tabasco buries his head in his hands and starts crying. This causes him to choke, and he spits out still more gray hair.

“You’ve got to help me, Harry!” he says desperately. “This curse is ruining my life. I only enter the race to raise enough money to have the curse removed so I can get back together with Yolanda.” A tear runs down his face. “She still loves me, but it is a very smart curse.”

“Smart in what way?” asks Benny.

“She’s allergic to dogs!” he wails, crying and coughing up hair again.

“Boy, that’s some Gypsy curse,” agrees Gently Gently.

“Have you talked to Big-Hearted Milton or Morris the Mage?” I suggest. “They are masterful if mendacious magicians. Possibly they can remove the curse.”

“Possibly they can,” echoes Tabasco. “But they will not do it for free, and I have already explained my plight to you.”

“Well,” I say, “it appears we must help you find a way to make a living, if only so you can pay off my five large and have enough left over to speak to Milton or Morris.” I think of all the things I see dogs do in the movies. “Can you save a dying man in a blizzard?” I ask.

“I cannot even find a dying man in a blizzard,” says Tabasco, “and besides, when I am busy being a wolf, I tip the scales at no more than ninety pounds. Can you imagine me pulling Gently Gently to safety?”

“I cannot imagine you pulling him across the room unless you know how to operate a crane,” says Benny.

“Is there a market for Seeing Eye dogs?” I ask.

“I am nearsighted and I have astigmatism,” says Tabasco unhappily.

“I have never noticed you wearing glasses,” I say.

“I do not wish to spoil my manly good looks, especially once I meet Yolanda,” he says.

I am about to tell him that he is in no danger of that, that his manly good looks have gone the way of the dodo and the five-cent beer, but instead I concentrate on the problem at hand. “What else can you do besides eat greyhounds?” I ask.

Tabasco frowns. “Give me a for-instance,” he says.

I shrug. “Do you herd sheep?” I say.

“That is wrong,” says Gently Gently.

“How can a question be wrong?” says Benny. “It is answers that are wrong.”

“Do you herd sheep is wrong,” insists Gently Gently. “Have you heard sheep is right.”

“Get him some calories,” I say to Benny. “The crossword puzzle has sapped his mental strength, and he is now operating on two cylinders, three at the most.”

Benny leads Gently Gently off to the bar for nuts and pretzels, and I go back to considering Tabasco ’s problem, except Tabasco isn’t there anymore. I look down and there is Devil Moon, panting and drooling and looking mournfully into my eyes. Mournfully, and maybe a little hungrily, too.

“ Tabasco, do you still understand me?” I say.

Tabasco stares at me and yawns. He has very white teeth.

“ Tabasco, howl once if you understand me and twice if you don’t.”

Tabasco walks over to a nearby chair and lifts his leg on it.

“I like him better as a guy,” says Gently Gently, staring at Tabasco from the bar.

“Hell,” adds Benny, “I even like him better as a greyhound.”

“You know,” says Joey Chicago, “other guys decorate their places with the stuffed heads of lions and tigers and mooses and things like that, but me, I am too gentle and too sensitive to ever show off the remains of an animal in my establishment.” He raises his voice. “But if somebody lifts his leg in here again, we’re going to display a mounted wolf’s head over the bar.” He turns to Benny and Gently Gently. “And that goes for you, too!”

All the while this is going on, I am staring at Tabasco and trying to think of how to put his transformation to economic gain. For a while I think of the movies, but even though Rin Tin Tin has gone on to his reward, I can foresee numerous problems, because out there time is money, and once they get all the actors and cameras in position and yell, “Action!” it would not do for the new Rin Tin Tin to appear as the old Tabasco Sanchez.

I know that guard dogs are always in demand, but I also know Tabasco Sanchez, and whether he is busy being a man or a wolf, I would not want to put him near anything that was worth guarding.

I am beginning to think that maybe he has got a handle on the situation, that there is no way for a wolf to make a decent living working the third shift, especially in Manhattan, when a newspaper delivery truck drives by, and plastered all over it are ads for the forthcoming Southminster dog show, and suddenly I see a way for Tabasco to pay off his debt to me.

“ Tabasco,” I say, “if you can understand me, I think I have the solution to your problem. I do not know quite how you can answer me. Clearly you do not howl on cue, and telling you to lift your leg once or twice will clearly put you in dutch with Joey Chicago. Maybe you could paw the ground once if you understand me and twice if you don’t?”

Tabasco stares at me and remains motionless.

“Is that a yes or a no?” asks Benny.

“Maybe you should make it multiple choice,” suggests Gently Gently.

“ Tabasco,” says Joey Chicago, “if you will stop being a wolf for the next ten minutes, you can have an Old Peculiar on the house.”

“I call that damned sporting of you,” says Tabasco, who is a man again so fast that I do not even see him change.

“How do you do that?” asks Benny.

“And how come your clothes vanish when you are a wolf and come back when you are a man?” asks Gently Gently.

“You will have to ask Big-Hearted Milton or Soothsayer Solly,” replies Tabasco. “I do not seem to have any control over it-or over anything else, for that matter.”

“Do you remember what I say to you while you are being Kazan of the North?” I ask as he downs his Old Peculiar.

“Yes, and I am very grateful.”

“Then why did you not respond?” I say.

“When I am a wolf, I think wolfish thoughts, and I am concerned with wolfish things. I hear you say that you have solved my problem, but as a wolf I am much more interested if you had tell me where all the rabbits or the lady wolves were hiding.” He pauses for a moment, then continues: “But I am interested now.”

“I see that the Southminster dog show is coming up, and that first prize is six large, which means five for me and one for you. All we have to do is win it.”