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Way smarter, radically smarter

They had understood the purpose of Bobby’s camera, and they had stolen it They filched his new ca the faces of the thirty dolls in Angela’s workroom, and they used that one to taunt ela’s ed in secret bacteriological-warfare research, but that didn’t explain why their laboratory monkeys were markedly smarter than any monkeys that had previously walked the earth

Just how sh to win a bundle on Jeopardy! Maybe not sh to teach poetry at the university level or to successfully e a radio station or to track the patterns of surf ide, h to write a New York Tierous, uncontrollable pest hue rats could do, how rapidly their nurow, if they were even half as ss and could learn how to avoid all traps and poisons

Were these monkeys truly escapees fro capture? If so, how did they get to be so intelligent in the first place? What did they want? What was their agenda? Why hadn’t a massive effort been launched to track thees from which they could never break free?

Or were they tools being used by sos The way the Navy uses dolphins to search for enemy subnetic packages of explosives on the hulls of targeted boats

A thousand other questions swarhon the answers, the raence could be earth-shattering The possible consequences to hu when you considered the viciousness of these aniela’s prediction of dooht actually have been less pessimistic than my assessment of the situation would be when--if ever--I knew all the facts Certainly, dooela herself

I also intuited that the monkeys were not the entire story They were but one chapter of an epic Other astonish discovery

Compared to the project at Wyvern, Pandora’s fabled box, froue huht prove to have held only a collection of petty nuisances

Intoo fast to allow Orson to keep pace withhard, but falling steadily behind

In truth, I was cranking the bike to the max not because I was in a hurry to reach the marina but because, unconsciously, I wanted to outrace the tidal wave of terror sweeping toward us There was no escaping it, however, and nobutand coasted until Orson was able to stay at my side without heroic effort

Never leave a friend behind Friends are all we have to get us through this life--and they are the only things from this world that we could hope to see in the next

Besides, the best way to deal with a rising sea of trouble is to catch the wave at the zero break and ride it out, slide along the face straight into the cathedral, get totally Ziplocked in the green roo, showing no fear That’s not only cool: It’s classic

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With a gentle and even tender sound, like flesh on flesh in a honeyainst the sea wall The dae of brine, fresh kelp, creosote, rusting iron, and other fragrances I couldn’t quite identify

The marina, tucked into the sheltered northeast corner of the bay, offers docking for fewer than three hundred vessels, only six of which are full-tih social life in Moonlight Bay does not center around boating, there is a long waiting list for any slip that becomes available

I walked my bike toward the west end of the main pier, which ran parallel to shore The tires swished and bumped softly across the deet, uneven planks Only one boat in the hts in its s at that hour Dock la

Because the fishing fleet ties up farther out along the northern horn of the bay, the comparatively sheltered marina is reserved for pleasure craft There are sloops and ketches and yawls ranging froh more of the forth and price, a few Boston Whalers, and even two houseboats The largest sailing yacht--in fact, the largest boat--docked here is currently Sunset Dancer, a sixty-foot Windship cutter Of the est is Nostromo, a fifty-six-foot Bluewater coastal cruiser; and it was to this boat that I was headed

At the west end of the pier, I took a ninety-degree turn onto a subsidiary pier that featured docking slips on both sides The Nostroht

I have been one acquainted with the night

That was the code Sasha had used to identify theme, who hadn’t wanted his name used on the phone, and who had been reluctant to come to Bobby’s house to talk with me It was a line from a poem by Robert Frost, one that nize, and I had assumed that it referred to Roosevelt Frost, ned the Nostro near the gangway to Roosevelt’s slip, tidal action caused the boats toin their berths They creaked and groaned like arthritic oldfeeble complaints in their sleep

I had never bothered to chain ht Moonlight Bay had been a refuge from the crime that infected the modern world By the tiht lead the country in s, per capita, but we probably didn’t have to worry about a draas steep because the tide was not high, and it was slippery with condensation Orson descended as carefully as I did

We were two-thirds of the way down to the port-side finger of the slip when a low voice, hardly ically frooes there?"