The pretty and shapely, thirty-year-old blonde slammed her front door and stood with her back to it, panting with fright. Always so sophisticated and worldly compared to the local populace of Pickford's Meadows, Liz Clark now found herself in a situation with which she could not deal. Peeking through the curtains that now stayed permanently drawn over the living room window, she saw the big, menacing form of John Proctor standing there with the axe handle swinging in his hand. She wondered if she should call the police, but that would only mean trying to summon Clete Anderson, her hard-hearted erstwhile lover who still bore her a terrific grudge.

John Proctor was a forbidding-looking person at the best of times and his chubby, pouting, middle-aged wife had nothing to be liked either, but as long as the burly farmer was not bothered, he was as harmless as any bull in a pen. But somehow, one of the free-roaming dogs that ran with Lobo, or perhaps Lobo himself, had appeared too near the old harridan and frightened her, and the dog-pack hysteria that was gripping the country town and surrounding farming community had settled on Emma Proctor as well. In this formerly secure and peaceful town, women no longer walked the streets during the night, and only cautiously during the day. There were rumors of women and girls being set upon, though no one had yet dared confess that she had been sexually assaulted by these dogs, who had acquired a definitely mystic and ghostlike quality. Being dog-raped was not something one liked to broadcast throughout the conservative Christian community of Pickford's Meadows.

Yes, Liz had trained Lobo, and taught him the techniques that had made him such an excellent standby lover. She had never intended that he should rape human females, but it was after all the town's brutal police chief that had turned the loyal animal renegade.