The Anything Box

"Got it!" gasped Crae, "Got it!" That was the last rational thought Craehad for the next crashing eternity. Yanked by the leaping, twisting, fightingGrunder, upstream and downstream, sometimes on his feet, sometimes draggedfull length through the tangled under-brush, sometimes with the Grundercharging him head on, all fire and gleam and terror, other times with only thethread of light tenuously pointing the way the creature had gone, Crae had noworld but a whirling, breathless, pain-filled chaos that had no meaning orpoint beyond Hold on hold on hold on.
Crae saw the bridge coming, but he could no more stop or dodge than arailway tunnel can dodge a train. With a crack that splintered into a flare oflight that shamed the Grunder in brilliance, Crae hit the bridge support.
Crae peeled his cheek from the bed of ooze where it was cradled and lookedaround him blindly. His line was a limp curve over the edge of the bank. Heavywith despair, he lifted his hand and let it drop. The line tightened andtugged and went limp again. Crae scrambled to his feet. Was the Grunder gone?Or was it tired out, quiescent, waiting for him? He wound the line clumsilyaround his hand as he staggered to the creek and fell forward on the shelvingbank.
Beneath him, rising and falling on the beat of the water, lay the Grunder,its white fire dimming and brightening as it sank and shallowed, the wide blueheadband as glittering, its mouth fringe as crimson and alive as the firsttime he saw it. Crae leaned over the bank and put a finger to the silveryscales of the creature. It didn't move beyond its up and down surge.
"I have to stroke it," he thought. "Three times, three times the wrongway." He clamped his eyes tight against the sharply jagged gleam of everyseparate scale.
Rip hell outa your hand first stroke, but three it's gotta be.
"I could do it," he thought, "if it were still struggling. If I had tofight, I could do it. But in cold blood—!"
He lay in the mud, feeling the hot burning of the sick thing inside him,feeling the upsurge of anger, the sudden sting of his hand against Ellena'sface, her soft throat under his thumbs again. An overwhelming wave ofrevulsion swept over him and he nearly gagged.
"Go ahead and rip hell out!" he thought, leaning down over the bank. "Ripout the hell that was in it when I hit her!"
With a full-armed sweep of his hand, he stroked the Grunder. He ground histeeth together tight enough to hold his scream down to an agonized gurgle asthe blinding, burning pain swept up his arm and hazed his whole body. He couldfeel the fire and agony lancing and cauterizing the purulence that had beenpoisoning him so long. Twice again his hand retraced the torture— and all the
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accumulation of doubt and fear and uncertainty became one with the physicalpain and shrieked out into the night.
When he lifted his hand for the third time, the Grunder leaped. High abovehim, flailing brilliance against the invisible sky, a dark stain marking itfrom tail to head, the Grunder lifted and lifted as though taking to the air.And then, straightening the bowed brightness of its body, it plunged straightdown into the creek, churning the water to incandescence as it plunged,drenching Crae with sand-shot spray, raising a huge, impossible wave in theshallow creek. The wave poised and fell, flattening Crae, half senseless, intothe mud, his crimson hand dangling over the bank, the slow, red drops fallinginto the quieting water, a big, empty cleanness aching inside him.
Dawn light was just beginning to dissolve the night when he staggered intocamp, tripping over the water buckets as he neared the tent. He stood swayingas the tent flap was flung open hastily. Ellena, haggard, red-eyed and wornplunged out into the early morning cold. She stood and looked at him standingawkwardly, his stiffening, lacerated hands held out, muddy water dripping fromhis every angle. Then she cried out and ran to him, hands outstretched, loveand compassion shining in her eyes.
"Crae! Honey! Where have you been? What happened to you?"
And Crae stained both her shoulders as his hands closed painfully over themas he half whispered, "I caught him. I caught the Grunder—everything's allright—everything—"
She stroked his tired and swollen face, anxiety in her eyes. "Oh, Crae—Inearly went crazy with fear. I thought—" she shook her head and tears ofgladness formed in her eyes "—but you're safe. That's all that matters. Crae—"
He buried his face in the softness of her hair. He felt sure. For the first time he felt really sure. "Yes, dear?"
"Crae—about what I said—I'm sorry—I didn't mean it, oh, I couldn't livewithout you—"
Gladness swelled within him. He pushed her gently from him and looked intoher tear-streaked face. "Ellena —let's go home—"
She nodded, smiling. "All right, Crae, we’ll go home— But first we’ll havea good breakfast."
He laughed, a healthy, hearty laugh. "We’ll do even better than that! We’llstop by at the camp of our four visitors. They owe us both a good meal for thedrinks!"
Her eyes glowed at his words. "Oh, Crae—you really mean it? You're not—"
He shook his head. "Never again, honey. Never."
The porch of the Murmuring Pines Store and Station was empty as Craestopped the car there at noon. Crae turned to Ellena with a grin. "Be back ina minute, honey, gotta see a man about a fish."
Crae left the car, walked up the steps and pushed open the screen door. Askinny, teen-age girl in faded Levis put down her comic book and got off ahigh stool behind a counter. "Help you, mister?"
"I'm looking for Eli," he said. "The old feller that was out on the porchabout two weeks ago when I stopped by here. Old Eli, he called himself."
"Oh, Eli," said the girl. "He's off again."
"Off? He's gone away?" asked Crae.
"Well, yes, but that isn't what I meant exactly," said the girl. "You see,Eli is kinda touched. Ever once in a while he goes clear off his rocker. Youmusta talked to him when this last spell was starting to work on him. Theytook him back to State Hospital a coupla days later. Something you wanted?"
"He told me about a fish," said Crae tentatively.
"Hoh!" the girl laughed shortly, "The Grunder. Yeah. That's one way we cantell he's getting bad again. He starts on that Grunder stuff."
Crae felt as though he'd taken a step that wasn't there. "Where'd he getthe story?"
"Well, I don't know what story he told you," said the girl. "No tellingwhere he got the Grunder idea, though. He's had it ever since I can remember.
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It's only when he gets to believing it that we know it's time to start
watching him. If he didn't believe—"
If he didn't believe. Crae turned to the door. "Well, thanks," he said, "I
hope he gets well soon." The screen door slammed shut behind him. He didn't
hear it. He was hearing the sound of water smashing over rocks, surging
against the creek banks. Then the sound faded, and the sun was bright around
him.
"Crae! Is everything all right?"
It was Ellena calling to him from the car. He took a deep breath of the
clean, crisp air. Then he waved to her. "Everything's fine!" he called, and in
two steps, cleared the porch and was on his way to the car.