It's Alive! by Richard Woodley Page A

Her characteristics are mixed with your father’s in your body.”
    “Dad’s taller than you.”
    “He sure is. He was a good basketball player.”
    “How did you and him get to be friends?” Chris cast, and his line snapped back and became tangled on the reel.
    “Here, let me straighten that out for you. We were friends back in college. He was on the basketball team and I was a sportswriter for the school paper. We’ve been friends ever since those days. We’ve always helped each other out, especially those times when you need a friend the most.” He pulled several feet of line off the reel, until it was unsnarled; then he handed it back to Chris.
    “Thanks. Why didn’t you keep on writing, I mean when you got out of school? Couldn’t you get a job on a regular paper, for pay?”
    “Somebody had to take over my father’s paint store when he died.”
    “Did you want to?”
    “Watch where you’re casting now, use your wrist, look out for the branches behind you. Did I want to? I don’t know. I didn’t think about it. It was just the natural thing to do.”
    “Do you make as much money as Dad?”
    “Nope. The paint business is changing just like people are. You can’t always predict what business will be like in the future. For my father, it was a good business. But now everybody wants to shop at big discount stores, where paint is cheaper. So my business isn’t so hot.”
    “Dad always buys his paint at your store.”
    “Well,” Charley chuckled, “I guess that’s part of our being friends.”
    “Do you wish you were still married?”
    “In a way.” He chuckled again. “I’d like to be with my boys more, that’s for sure. That’s one reason I like being with you so much. You’re almost like another son to me.”
    “I like being with you too, Charley, except,” he arced his rod far back and snapped it forward, “that I’d like to be home with Mom and Dad and the baby. Oh-oh!”
    “Yeah, you got hung up on that limb, Chris my boy.” Chris’s lure was hooked on a low branch behind him. “Wait a second, I can reach it. I’ll get it down for you.”
    “I can do it.” Chris trotted back, crouched, and leaped for the branch, flicking the lure free with his fingertips.
    “Hey, terrific!” Charley laughed. “That’s one way you’re like your dad—you both can really jump!”
    Christ smiled proudly and reeled the line back onto his reel. “Maybe I’ll teach the baby how to play basketball.”
    “Maybe, Chris, maybe. Let’s go out in the boat for a while. You never know where the fish will turn up these days.”

A group of police officers sat in the small office around Detective Lieutenant Perkins.
    He gnawed on his cigar. “Okay, I know what’s going on. And I know what’s bothering you. You’ll just have to ignore what people are saying about us and do your jobs. It’s tough on me too. But that’s the way it is when you got a tough case.”
    He spat a piece of the cigar end into the wastepaper basket. “Everybody wants to put their two bits in, second-guess you, criticize you. It’s the nature of our business that we can’t run around giving progress reports every step of the way. So people think we’re doing nothing. Until we solve the case. Then they think we’re heroes. They’re wrong on both ends of the deal. But that’s the way folks are. They don’t ever think anything’s going on until it’s done. Folks think pigs are just fat-slob animals until they can bite into a good pork cutlet.”
    The men chuckled.
    “Could I ask a question, sir?” A young patrolman raised his hand. Perkins nodded. “I just wondered, why didn’t you tell the State Troopers what you think the pattern of killings indicates?”
    “I did.”
    “Well, I know you said about it being an unpredictable animal, but I mean your theory on what the thing might be after?”
    Perkins worked his lips and teeth vigorously around the cigar. “In the first place, I didn’t like those guys