“You’re not going to need Nick and me to come out here any more?” Cathy asked as they walked to the van. “I mean, besides the fact that this place makes me nervous, we do have finals starting next week.”
“I guess not,” Harmon said. “I can handle things here. You two will be of more use putting in your time at the lab, observing our mice there and taking care of them.”
“We should probably build them a better habitat,” Nick said. “Something they might think of as normal, if we want to get the best breeding results we can.”
“We’ll work on that,” Harmon said.
It was then that movement across the street caught their attention. Cathy was the only one to give a visible start, as well as a sharp intake of breath, but both of the men took note as well. It was not just two or three locals standing there watching them this time, but eight or nine young men, and they were already at the far curb.
“Play it cool,” Harmon advised in a whisper. “We’ll just get in and drive off as usual.” Mrs. Harmon and her two sons should be watching from their home. Marietta had promised that they would, to try to see who might be menacing their visitors.
I hope she doesn’t wait too long to call for help, if we need it, Harmon thought. He unlocked the front door on the right side of the van. Cathy got in, unlocked the rear door for Nick, locked her own door, then reached across the front, ready to open the driver’s door—but she didn’t do that right away. She wanted to wait until the professor got to it.
Harmon tried to act infinitely casual as he went around the front of the van, paying no obvious attention to the young men standing across the street. He thought about whistling, but decided that he would almost certainly botch it. His mouth felt much too dry. He saw Cathy stretching over to unlock the door for him. He had the ignition key in his hand.
“Hey! You the funny mouse man?” one of the young men demanded loudly. His companions shared a raucous laugh.
Harmon’s regular pace faltered for an instant as he found himself caught between the desire to hurry into the comparative safety of the van and the instinct to reply. He glanced across the street, uncertain which of the young men had spoken.
“I guess you could—” he started, the need for a retort overcoming common sense.
He did not finish the sentence. From somewhere close, to his left, there was one terrible screech of pain. There was an almost human quality of terror to the sound. Harmon was almost certain that it had come from a cat. It stopped his words. It also diverted the attention of the watchers. There was no repetition of the screech, but from the same direction—farther off—a dog started barking, then two or three others joined in.
“What the hell was that?” one of the young men asked his companions. For the moment, they had all forgotten their quarry.
Harmon moved closer to the van’s door. He was reaching for the handle when he saw something running down the street toward him. More than one something, low to the ground.
Professor Griffin stared. At first he did not truly believe what he was seeing. Two very large brown rats—more a grayish brown in color—were running right down the center of the street. The lead rat was carrying a cat, apparently dead, in its mouth. The orange tiger-striped cat hung limply, blood discoloring its fur as the rat dragged it.
But that was not the most arresting part of what Griffin was seeing. The rats themselves were different, and not only because they appeared to be rather larger than average Norway rats.
It was the teeth, the incisors, that were unusual. Rodents are gnawing animals. Rats and mice gnaw much of the time just to keep their incisors from growing out of control. Without that, the lower incisors of a rat could puncture the top of its snout and curve up into its brain, killing it. The lack of incisors had been one of the points of difference in the elephantnosed mice. The dead one had only molars to grind its food.
These rats had upper and lower incisors protruding from the mouths. The teeth were at least four inches long. The first rat used its teeth to clutch its prey—which must have weighed two or three pounds more than it did.
The rats raced between Harmon and the line of watchers across the street, giving the humans no notice at all. Harmon turned, staring open-mouthed after the animals, oblivious to his earlier worry. Inside the van, both Cathy and Nick were also watching, but Cathy gave the rats only part of her attention.
When Harmon took a step in the direction of the rats, Cathy rolled down the driver’s window and whispered, “Come on, Professor, get in,” as urgently as she could.
He backed toward the door, fumbling for the handle while he continued to stare after the disappearing rats, already half a block away. He got in the van slowly. Before he closed the door, one of the young men across the street had turned to look, but he did not say anything.
Harmon started the engine and pulled away, wondering if he would be able to catch the rats before they left the street and started to eat the cat.
“What were those?” Nick asked, leaning up between the two front seats.
“I think that elephant-nosed mice aren’t the only new species around,” Harmon said. “I think we’ve just seen a pair of saber-toothed rats.”
“What?” Cathy asked.
The professor ignored that question. “It looks as if the equilibrium might be getting punctuated.”
It was Nick’s turn to ask, “What?”
“New species,” Harmon said. He slowed the van near the last spot where he had seen the rats and looked around. There was no trace of them though. “We’ve got elephantnosed mice and saber-toothed rats. I wonder how many more new species we’ve got crawling around the Back-of-the-Yards.”
He stopped the van, just pulling to the side of the lane. All three of them looked for the rats—without success—for a minute or more. Then Harmon moved his foot from the brake to the accelerator again.
“Is it too late to start over on my thesis?” Nick asked.