Now for the fun part, he thought to himself. He set the manila envelope down in the snow and picked it up again, this time completely enclosed in his mouth.
Ben inhaled deeply through his nose and plunged into the freezing waters. He was relieved to find that he was still comfortable. In fact, he could swim just fine, paddling with all four legs and holding his eyes and nose above the surface.
Behind him, the lights of Manhattan glowed with spectral white beauty through the blizzard. He didn't lift his head to look forward toward New Jersey and the various islands, fearing that he would need all his energy to swim the distance to Ellis Island. He only focused on the lights of Ellis Island itself. The waves splashed against his face, making it hard to see, but he was able to blow out any water that got in his nose.
The polar-bear body was powerful and suited to a long swim in frigid waves. He just kept paddling through the darkness. Though he couldn't judge the distance very well, he was pleasantly surprised that he wasn't tiring.
Suddenly, however, he felt a tremendous desire to give up, to turn around. It surprised him; he fought it, focusing his eyes on the lights ahead. The very water seemed thicker, the waves stronger, the wind harder.
Maybe he was getting tired, after all. He tried to guess how far he had to go. It might have been several hundred yards, but suddenly it looked like more. He forced himself to keep swimming.
It's farther to go back now anyway, he told himself. Actually, he didn't really feel tired at all. He just felt a compulsion to turn around and swim away.
Leslie Christian wouldn't think much of that.
Ben churned his legs in the water, harder and harder.
Suddenly a wave. of fear swept over him, making his stomach muscles clench. It came without thought or logic; he felt a primal panic rising in him, lifting the ursine hackles on the back of his neck and shoulders. He kept swimming, but his legs were reluctant, weakening with dread.
Another crest of fear rose in him, and he stopped swimming. His huge body bobbed in the tossing waves, held aloft by his fur and layer of fat. Ellis Island, no more than a light or two in the distance, filled him with revulsion. As he looked at it through the blizzard, the island grew blurry and seemed to shift even farther away from him.
Ben blinked a splash of water out of his eyes, trying to focus. Even the falling snow ahead of him seemed to turn oddly in his vision. He was disoriented, scared, and wanted to go home.
He forced his legs to start kicking again, in a dog paddle. Instead of turning, though, he paddled straight ahead. He concentrated on his legs, just to keep them moving. The island, the fear and dread of the unknown he would meet there, and this strange panic that had struck him were still present, but he ignored them. Two legs at a time, pushing against the water, filled his mind. That was alclass="underline" one, two; one, two.
Ben kept swimming.
The trip seemed to take forever. At last, however, he entered a cone of bright light and dared to look up. It was a single powerful lamp on one of the buildings; others near it were burned out. Ellis Island was a rectangle, with a ferry slip in one long side that created a horseshoe shape. The 'island was smaller than he had expected, maybe less than two city blocks.
Now that he knew he was going to make it, he slowed down, looking for signs of life. Only certain windows illuminated from inside suggested anyone was here, but in this weather that was no surprise. He paddled into the ferry slip, still looking around, and finally reached up to the dock with his front legs and pulled himself out of the water.
On an impulse, he shook himself, spraying icy water in all directions.
As he got his bearings, he became aware of an unpleasant smell. It reminded him of garbage barges, but the smell was more varied, and worse. Fortunately, the hard wind was blowing it away from the island.
He squinted his bear's eyes into the rush of snow against his face. The main building was maybe six stories' worth of brick and limestone trim, considerably longer than a football field from left to right as he faced it. At each corner, copper-domed observation towers stood another forty feet higher than the roof against the storm. The building had an old look, as though it was from the turn of the century, but Ben was no student of architecture.
An eerie feeling of being watched from behind ticked the back of his neck. He turned to look as his hackles rose, but nothing was behind him except the water. The sensation persisted and he looked up, to see only the heavy snowfall swirling down at him.
A movement in the shadows to his left caught his eye. He turned, tensing. Someone took a wary step forward. "What do you want?" a woman's voice demanded. Ben hadn't expected anyone to be outside here. Also, he couldn't talk as a bear. He only watched as the speaker came forward another step. She walked upright, at least six feet tall. Her face was that of a ferret: black nose, wedge-shaped head with round ears, and a black mask around her eyes over buff fur. Her fur shifted toward silver on her abdomen. Most notably, two-inch fangs curved downward from her mouth.
"Careful, Mustelina," said a young man's voice. " I never saw him before."
Ben looked at him. He was a strange bushy bundle of average height for a man, steely gray in color.
"Shut up, Brillo," said Mustelina. "A joker's a joker. What's your name?"
Ben shook his head and tried to shrug, still watching them suspiciously. At least he understood what Mustelina was doing out here; she was made for this weather, nearly as much as he was. She probably handled the blazing, humid New York summers better than he would in this form. Brillo, too, was apparently warm enough out here. "What if he's not a joker?" Brillo yelled harshly against the wind. "What if he's a real polar bear?"
"Oh, get off it, will you?" She took another step toward Ben. The wind rippled her white fur. "Can't you talk at all?"
Ben carefully swayed his head from side to side in a definitive gesture that Brillo could not deny. Then he inclined his head toward the main doors of the big building. His mouth was still clamped shut.
"Bloat better meet him," said Mustelina firmly. "Come on." She walked along the ferry slip toward the main doors with a springy, prancing step, her head bent against the wind.
Ben padded after her, keeping an eye on Brillo. Brillo stayed away from him, though, as they both approached the entrance.
As Ben drew closer to the building, he looked up at the huge triple-arched doors that reached up into the second story. Over them, snow lay on some kind of concrete birds flanking an insignia in relief. Thousands of people could be in a building this size.
"Bloat runs things here," said Mustelina as she pulled open the heavy door.
An incredible stench hit Ben's sensitive ursine nose. He forced himself to walk inside, his stomach rebelling. Mustelina and Brillo followed him.
Ben blinked in the light of the huge room, which had apparently been a lobby at one time. Then he stopped in surprise as the door slammed shut behind him. He was staring face-to-face with the most repulsive joker he had ever seen.
Bloat was monstrous in size, a gross mountain of flesh maybe fifty feet wide and eight feet high. His head and neck looked normal enough at the top and his shoulders and arms were ordinary, but they stuck out uselessly from the incredible mass of his body. Five inlet pipes of some kind jabbed into his body. The stench originated with a resinous black sludge that had accumulated around him on the floor.
Several jokers were hanging around, of all shapes. Some were nearly lost in the shadows at the edges of the big room. At this hour, most of them were probably asleep. Those who were here turned to look with suspicion and hostility at Ben.