“Because of the proximity to the UCLA campus,” added Camilla, “early reports suggested that this was nothing more than a college prank.”

“Now that KMA has obtained exclusive pictures of this strange creature, however, we can confidently state that this is not a hoax or prank. Later in this hour we’ll be talking to Professor Marshall Terping of the USC Zoology Department as to the true nature of this phenomenon.”

Camilla said, “Let’s take a look at this exclusive two-minute footage.”

I leaned forward, eyes narrowing.

A very jiggly, long shot of the front of a Fanny’s Undies lingerie shop appeared. Coming out of the darkened store was a shaggy wolf-man. In his arms he clutched a tangled bundle of what looked to be lacy panties, half-slips, and frilly nightgowns. Clutched in his sharp teeth, dangling by one strap, was a white uplift bra.

The guy with the cell phone apparently got up the nerve to move closer at this point.

Dropping his collection of underwear, staring straight at the camera, and spitting out the bra, the wolf-man snarled at Wally Needham. Then he went loping away along the night street. In the distance a siren sounded, somewhere nearer a woman screamed. The film ceased.

The wolf-man had been wearing a plaid shirt.

Turning off the set, I dropped off the bed. “But that’s not my plaid shirt,” I told myself, starting to pace. “The shirt I’m wearing is the MacMurdie tartan. That wasn’t.”

Or was it?

I’d only seen his shirt up close for about half a minute and the color of the amateur footage was bad.

“No, that wasn’t me. I know damn well I haven’t been anywhere near Westwood,” I told myself. After I’d morphed into a wolf-man, I’d chased rabbits. As far as I could remember. Besides, it would’ve taken quite a bit of time for me to get down there on foot. And I couldn’t drive my six-year-old Volvo with furry feet.

But that meant there were two wolf-men, both fond of plaid shirts. A strange coincidence. But, no, that wasn’t me.

“I don’t have a lingerie fetish, either.”

My pacing slowed. All at once I felt very drowsy again. Not bothering to climb back onto the bed, I curled up on the floor and drifted into sleep.

• • •

I was awakened by an immense thunking sound from outside, followed by a harsh metallic snapping and an assortment of birds cawing and cackling along with an anguished flapping of many wings.

“Someone’s attacking the birdbath!” I exclaimed, popping up off the carpet.

As I started to run toward the bedroom door, I chanced to notice my feet. They were no longer furry. I stopped, held both hands up to my face. “Back to normal,” I said, chuckling.

Ducking into the bathroom, hesitating a few seconds, I took a look in the mirror over the sink. I was no longer a wolf-man.

From out on my front lawn came more loud, angry bird sounds.

Barefooted, I hurried to the stairs. I was only halfway down when my oaken front door was unlocked and flung open.

“Popsy?” called my daughter.

“Beth, you can call yourself Mutiny Skylark, you can even call yourself Carmen Miranda,” I said as I continued my descent, “but, damn it, don’t call me Popsy.”

“Sorry, Dad.” Wearing cargo pants and a T-shirt that had END OF THE WORLD TOURlettered across the front, my daughter entered the house.

I inquired, “What, pray tell, just occurred on the lawn?”

She shrugged one shoulder. “Nothing much.”

“What’s the condition of the birdbath?”

“Well, it sort of fell over.”

“What caused that, Beth?”

“I accidentally drove into it with my Porsche.”

“You seem to make a habit of driving into things.”

She shut the door with a backward push of one foot. “I do, yeah. It’s like you and your plaid shirts.”

“Want a cup of herb tea?” I headed for the kitchen.

“Don’t you have anything with caffeine in it?” she asked. “No, never mind. I know you don’t.” She followed me along the hall into the big white and yellow kitchen.

I took a half gallon of vanilla soy milk out of the yellow refrigerator, poured about a cup into my blender, peeled and cut up a banana, and tossed that in along with a spoonful of honey.

“Ugh,” commented Beth as I pushed the Blend button.

After the machine had roared for about a minute, I turned it off and poured myself a glass and sat down at the raw-wood table. “You’re really going to have to do something about your driving, kid.”

She sat opposite me. “If you’d been around to teach me to drive, I’d-”

“What’s going to happen with Destry?”

“I’ve got two of my agents, one of my attorneys, and a manager over talking to them.”

“Maybe you ought to toss in a couple of personal trainers.” I took a sip of my banana smoothie.

She rested an elbow on the table edge, studying me for a few silent seconds. “Can I ask you something, Dad?”

“Sure.”

“How do you feel about Mom?”

“How did the residents of London feel about the Black Plague?”

“You aren’t fond of her?”

“Not so you’d notice, no.” I set down my glass. “What prompts this question?”

Beth leaned back in her chair. “You haven’t felt differently lately?”

“As a matter of fact, I sure as hell have. But it has nothing to do with your mother,” I told her. “Just last night I… never mind.” I decided not to confide in Beth about my wolf interlude. She still lived with Mandy and I didn’t want my former spouse to know what’d happened to me.

“You felt something last night?”

“Did you come here expecting to find me changed? You dropped in only two days ago, Beth, and your visits aren’t usually that frequent.”

“Well,” she said, sighing in a disappointed way, “I was expecting you’d be more favorably inclined toward Mom.”

“Why would I totally lose my powers of reason and assume an attitude like that? Why would I feel anything but fear and trembling about the woman who’s going to immortalize me in a book entitled I Married an Asshole?”

My red-haired daughter took a deep breath, exhaled slowly. “Really effective sorcery and black magic is expensive,” she began. “But, heck, I can afford it. Some friends of mine introduced me to a very effective sorcerer named Vincent X. Shandu and he-”

“I’ve heard of the guy. What the hell did you hire him to do?”

“Well, to bring you and Mom back together,” she answered quietly. “So I’d have a real family again and wouldn’t bang up so many cars and-”

“How was he going to do that?” I got up and stood looking down at my daughter, considerably pissed off.

“Well, with a magic potion. Guaranteed to be effective or your money back,” she replied. “He took the recipe from a forbidden eighteenth-century magic book by an infamous black magician named Count Monstrodamus. He showed me his copy, the rare first edition. The one that’s rumored to be bound in human skin and-”

“Have you already slipped me this damn potion?”

“Two days ago,” she admitted. “I stirred it into your smoothie while you were pitting cherries to put on your bowl of granola.”

I sat, slumped some. “Ask for your money back, hon,” I advised. “I still can’t abide your mother.”

“It didn’t work?”

“Oh, it was very effective but what it did was turn me into a werewolf.”

She shot to her feet. “Shit, that jerk screwed up.”

“That he did,” I agreed. “Could you, do you think, contact this guy and have him whip up an antidote to whatever it was you actually slipped to me? Otherwise, come nightfall, the odds are I’m going to turn into a wolf-man yet again.”

“Gee, I don’t think I can do that right away, Dad,” she answered apologetically. “See, I called him yesterday to ask why the potion was taking so long to affect you and all I got was his answering tape. Vincent is out of town.”

“So where the hell did he go?”

“Into the desert to meditate.”