Believing Is Seeing

But it got done in the end. Eggs showed me how to ignite a terrifying heat source that was totally invisible, and I fried the food on it in a glass skillet. Most of the vegetables were quite strange to me, but at least the steak was recognizable. We were just sitting down on glass stools to eat it at the glass table when a door I had not realized was there slid aside beside me. The garden was beyond. The long snout of Hugh poked through the gap. The pale eyes met mine, and the wet nose quivered wistfully.

“What do you want?” I said, and I knew I had jerked with fear. It was obvious what Hugh wanted. The garden must have filled with the smell of cooking. But I had not realized that the wolves could get into the kitchen when they pleased. Trying to seem calm, I tossed Hugh some fat I’d trimmed off the steaks. He caught it neatly and, to my intense relief, backed out of the door, which closed behind him.

I was almost too shaken to eat after that, but Eggs ate his share with obvious pleasure, though he kept glancing at me as if he was afraid I would think he was making a pig of himself. It was both touching and irritating. But the food—and the “juice”—did him good. His face became pinker, and he did not jig so much. I began to risk a few cautious questions. “Eggs, did Petra live in this house or just work here?”

He looked baffled. “I don’t not know.”

“But she used the wolves to help her in her work, didn’t she?” It seemed clear to me that they must have been laboratory animals in some way.

Eggs shifted on his stool. “I don’t not know,” he said unhappily.

“And did the Master help in the work, too?” I persisted.

But this was too much for Eggs. He sprang up in agitation, and before I could stop him, he swept everything off the table into a large receptacle near the door. “I can’t say!” I heard him say above the crash of breaking crockery.

After that he would listen to nothing I said. His one idea was that we must go to the living room. “To sit elegantly, Lady,” he explained. “And I will bring the sweet foods and the juice to enjoy ourselves with there.”

There seemed no stopping him. He surged out of the kitchen with an armload of peculiar receptacles and a round jug of “juice” balanced between those and his chin, weaving this way and that among the devices in the windowless room. These flared and flickered and the unsupported knife danced in the air as I pursued him. I felt as much as saw the fluted glass structure changing shape again. The sound of it dragged at the very roots of me.

“Eggs,” I said desperately. “How do I call the Master? Please.”

“I can’t say,” he said, reeling on into the living room.

Some enlightenment came to me. Eggs meant exactly what he said. I had noticed that when he said “I don’t not know,” this did not mean that he did not know; it usually seemed to be something he could not explain. Now I saw that when he said “I can’t say,” he meant that he was, for some reason, unable to tell me about the Master. So, I thought, struggling on against the drag of the chiming apparatus, this means I must use a little cu

In the living room Eggs was laying out dishes of sweets and little balls of cheese near the center of the large blue sofa-like block. I sat down—at one end of it. Eggs promptly came and sat beside me, gri

“Eggs,” I began. Then I noticed that the wolf Hugh was crouched on the veranda facing into the room, with his brindled nose on his paws and his sharp haunches outlined against the sunset roses. Beyond him were the backs of the two others, apparently asleep. Well, wolves always leave at least one of their pack on guard when they sleep. I told myself that Hugh had drawn sentry duty and went back to thinking how I could induce Eggs to tell me how to get hold of this Master. By this time I felt I would go mad unless someone explained this situation to me.

“Eggs”—I began again—“when I ask you how I fetch the Master, you tell me you can’t say, isn’t that right?” He nodded eagerly, obligingly, and offered me a sweet. I took it. I was doing well so far. “That means that something’s stopping you telling me, doesn’t it?” That lost him. His eyes slid from mine. I looked where his eyes went and found that Hugh had been moving, in the u

Eggs’s face lit up. “I like games, Lady!”

“Good,” I said. “The game is called Calling-the-Master. Now I know you can’t tell me direct how to call him, but the rule is that you’re allowed to give me hints.”

That was a mistake. “And what is the hint, Lady?” Eggs asked, in the greatest delight. “Tell me and I will give it.”

“Oh—I—er—” I said. And I felt something cold gently touch my hand. I looked down to find Hugh standing by my knees. Beyond him Theo was standing up, bristling. “What do you want now?” I said to Hugh. His eyes slid across the plates of sweets, and he sighed, like a dog. “Not sweets,” I said firmly. Hugh understood. He laid his long head on my knee, yearningly.

This produced a snarl from Theo out on the veranda. It sounded like pure jealousy.

“You can come in, too, if you want, Theo,” I said hastily. Theo gave no sign of understanding, but when I next looked, he was half across the threshold. He was crouched, not lying. His hackles were up, and his eyes glared at Hugh. Hugh’s eyes moved to see where he was, but he did not raise his chin from my knee.

All this so u

Eggs bounced up with a triumphant laugh. “I know! It was in the lead box! Lead protects. I can marry her!” He rolled about in delight. “Are you that lady?” he asked eagerly.

I suppressed a strong need to run about screaming. I was sure that if I did, either Theo or A

“Told him,” said Eggs.

“No, she was forbidden to do that,” I said. God give me patience! “Just like you. She had to give the man hints instead. Just like you. Before he came to choose the box, she got people to sing him a song and—remember, it was the lead box—every line in that song rhymed with ‘lead.’ A rhyme is a word that sounds the same,” I added hurriedly, seeing bewilderment cloud Eggs’s face. “You know—‘said’ and ‘bled’ and ‘red’ all rhyme with ‘lead.’”

“Said, bled, red,” Eggs repeated, quite lost.

“Dead, head,” I said. Hugh’s cold nose nudged my hand again. Wolves are not usually scavengers, unless in dire need, but I thought cheese would not hurt him. I passed him a round to keep him quiet.