Read Online Werewolf Cop by Andrew Klavan - Free Book Online Page A

make her wrong. She was insecure and desperate to establish herself with her masters in Washington—who included, as near as Zach could tell, the Attorney General, the director of Homeland Security, some sort of FBI liaison, and about seven or eight congressional oversight committees—but that didn’t make her wrong either. If Goulart’s opinion of her got back to D.C., it could ruin her; if Goulart was dirty and she nailed him—well, that could make her name. But none of that made her wrong. Goulart had either gone over to the dark side or he hadn’t. The truth was true, no matter who spoke it or why. So after his meeting with Rebecca A-H, Zach found himself watching his partner more closely, combing their conversations for clues, even giving Goulart opportunities to confess, to come clean—and hating himself for it, and hating Rebecca Abraham-Hartwell for getting him started.
    He let out a long breath to clear his mind—to try to, at least. Returned his eyes to the pages in his hand.
    For twenty-five years, Griswold the werewolf roamed the countryside around Bedburg, wreaking havoc and spreading terror. At first, he limited himself to taking revenge on anyone who displeased or defied him, but as his anonymity stoked his confidence, he felt freer to indulge his worst impulses. As a man, he would waylay maidens in the lonely meadows and deflower them—then devour them in the form of a wolf, escaping afterward undetected into the deep forests. At last, he descended into every kind of cruelty and depravity. He committed long-running incest with his daughter and enticed her into complicity in his murders. He seems truly to have loved his son and “yet so far his delight in murder exceeded the joy he took” in him that he slaughtered the boy and “ate the brains out of his head as a most savory and dainty delicious means to staunch his greedy appetite.”
    In all this, he escaped detection—escaped even suspicion—by changing from a wolf back into the shape of a man when his crimes were done. So even as the countryside was gripped with terror, the killer remained incognito.
    Enter a local executioner, whose full name has been lost to history, but who is sometimes referred to in later documents by the generic name of “Hans.” A dishonorable outcast because of his bloody profession, Hans longed to establish himself in the community as a respected hero and thereby win the love of Margarethe, a farmer’s daughter. Convinced that the monster who had been terrorizing the countryside for so long was no mere wolf but some kind of demon, Hans devised a plan to catch him. He armed himself with a baselard—a short sword or dagger—which he had confiscated from one of the murderous highwaymen whom he had lately beheaded. This weapon he had now gotten blessed and anointed with holy water by a local priest. Hans believed these solemnities would redeem the dagger from its sinful history and transform it into an instrument of godly justice.
    The executioner set up a blind near a local meadow where the werewolf was known to roam. He lay in wait for three consecutive days, spying on the maids who came here to do their washing in the river and then lingered to gossip as the daylight waned. At last, on the third day, just as sunset approached, Hans discerned his quarry: an enormous wolf prowling through the trees hard by, sniffing for the blood of innocents. Before the beast could launch an attack on the young women gathered at the riverbank, the executioner leapt from his hiding place and confronted him. Though the werewolf’s claws tore across the executioner’s chest, Hans nonetheless managed to strike back, slicing the creature’s foot off with the sanctified dagger. The wolf swiftly limped away, howling in agony, and the wounded Hans followed its trail of blood until it led him, lo and behold, to the home of Peter Griswold. There, it was discovered that