The next day Jens took Peter on the sled, down to the bay where the walrus herd basked. Jens warned him not to stray too close to the walruses. "They move much faster in the water," he said, "but they can hurt you well enough on land, and not even mean to. I'm experienced with them; you're not. Stay well back. That's what telephoto lenses are for. And besides that, we're trying to keep them from getting the idea that humans are safe. With the hunters out there-their instincts and natural behaviors will be their best protection."

Jens carried a small crossbow for tagging and tissue samples-a new development, he'd said, and far safer for walruses and humans than using anaesthetic to tag them. He still wandered much closer between the sunning beasts than Peter would have felt comfortable, even without the warning. Jens always seemed to know which way the walruses would shift and when to leap clear. Some of Peter's pictures were of just walruses, but others showed the parka-swaddled form of the man who studied them, moving with sure-footed wariness among them. He looked forward to more shots over the next few days.

But Jens was shaking his head the whole way back to the research station, and when they got in, he cornered Lotte immediately.

"The herds were mixing," he told her.

"What?"

"That's incredible!" said Lotte, and she switched to Danish, where she could more rapidly question him about the walruses' behavior.

The next morning, they told him with some regret that this unusual occurrence needed Lotte's attention, and he would have to stay behind.

"Sorry, Peter," said Jens. "The sled will only take two, and it's important to Lotte's work."

"Of course. I understand. I'll just fix up my notes, putter around here. I can take your noon ocean readings, if you like."

Jens glowed. "That would be most helpful, thank you."

So Peter watched Jens and Lotte speed off with the dogs. He got a raised eyebrow from Anna when he went back into the house, but when she saw he was going to leave her alone, she relaxed into the day's duties.

Peter wandered restlessly as soon as the readings were finished. He wished he hadn't taken so many landscape shots in his first days there-the column was already half-written, and there wasn't much else for him to do.

On a whim, he started poking around the boxes and cabinets in the lab. Some held instruments he'd seen in use all over the world. Others were unique to the Arctic, and still others appeared to be overflow for the pantry-tins of peaches and boxes of crackers in neat rows.

One huge box in the corner contained a deflated Zodiac raft, neatly folded. Peter saw something whitish in the corner, where the raft had curled upwards. He pushed it aside in idle curiosity, then stopped short.

It was a walrus tusk.

Pulling the folded raft out, he unearthed the other tusk, perfect gleaming ivory. They nestled on a bristled, dark brown surface. It smelled musky and pungent. He pulled that out, too, gasping: the skin of an adult walrus, whole.

Surely Jens and Lotte couldn't be poachers, ivory-smugglers! Peter thought. But what else could it be? There would be no scientific reason to keep a carefully intact walrus skin in a box under a raft. And what had they treated it with? It smelled fresh and had hardly dried around the edges.

Footsteps in the doorway made him look up. Anna was staring down at him where he crouched on the floor, her expression blank.

"Do you know anything about this?" he demanded.

"Yes," said Anna. She stooped to gather up the skin. She draped it around her shoulders, a tusk in each hand. "It's mine. Thank you for finding it."

She turned and walked away. Peter, biting his lip, followed her. "Look, I want to respect your culture and all that, but you can't go around killing walruses! It's not permitted. Jens took it from you for a reason."

Anna paused at the front door, walrus skin flapping heavily around her. She did not look at him. "He took it to make me his slave. Now I am free."

"What?" Peter stepped outside, shivering against the Arctic wind. Anna headed down the hill at a half-run, and as she ran, the cold made him tear up, and his vision blurred. Peter blinked and squinted. The walrus skin flapped-the tusks shifted- Anna slid into the water, a walrus.

Peter watched her swim off. When he could no longer make her out among the waves, he went back inside and closed the door. He sat at the kitchen table drinking cold tea and hoping that Anna would return and explain everything before Jens and Lotte got back.

He had no such luck.

Lotte came in first, shining with triumph. Jens followed on her heels, but he was the first to notice Peter's expression. He stopped, a questioning quirk to his eyebrows.

"I found a walrus skin and tusks," said Peter flatly. "Anna took them and disappeared into the water. It looked-it looked like she turned into a walrus."

Lotte thumped into the chair beside him, collapsing into it as though she could go no further. Jens seated himself more slowly, moving like an old man. "She got free?"

"Yes. Out into the water. You don't sound surprised."

"We took her walrus skin," said Jens, rubbing his eyes. "Of course we knew."

"Is it-some spell? Some shamanic trick?"

"It's how she was born," said Lotte. "There aren't many left with two skins."

"You know others?" said Peter.

"Not personally. Just rumors. Anna wouldn't say if she knew where her relatives were."

"I wish she wasn't out there," said Jens. "Damn! We try to protect the walrus population from human interference, and now this! It's an appalling level of human contamination!"

"But she's not a human," said Peter dazedly. "She's a-like a walrus selkie. A walkie."

"She's human enough," said Jens. "We've lived with her these years. Walruses don't scrub floors, no matter what happens to their tusks."

"Humans don't survive a plunge in the North Atlantic without gear, no matter what they do with a walrus skin."

"Whatever she is, she doesn't think like a normal walrus," said Lotte. "The contamination in their behavior patterns is inevitable if she stays. How will we know if the herd mixing would stay or break up if she hadn't come? What if she teaches them behaviors that ruin their chances of survival because they don't have the options she has? It's really quite impossible. Surely you must see that."

"What are you going to do about it?"

Jens sighed, rolling his shoulders. "Attempt to find her and talk her into leaving, I suppose. If we can't find her in human form and take her skin again."

Peter's stomach roiled. "That's how you did it last time? You stole her skin to trap her?"

"We had to keep her away from the walruses, once we knew what she was," said Jens.

Peter found himself at the center of a storm of activity he had no idea how to stop. Whenever he tried to object, Jens and Lotte assured him that they knew more about protecting the walruses than he ever could. That Anna could not be allowed to contaminate them.

"How will you know when you've found her?" he asked them desperately. "What if you mistake another walrus for her?"

"You must not have had the skin long enough to see the markings," Jens explained. "There are white streaks on her back. No walrus has them."

"What if you can't get her to come with you voluntarily?"

"Walruses are very susceptible to anaesthetic," said Lotte, loading her crossbow. "We will do what we need to do."

Peter shuddered. "How do you know that the walrus herd isn't full of others like her?"

Jens smiled patronizingly. "Peter, Peter. Surely you aren't suggesting that all walruses have human forms."

"Well, no . . . ."

"I'm sorry you stumbled upon this," said Lotte. "But we'll handle it. Wait here until we get back. Then we'll take you for some more photos on the other side of the bay. Photos of real walruses, not humans!"

Peter didn't want to stay in the station by himself, nor to leave Anna without aid, whether she was in her human or her walrus form. He bundled up as heavily as he could and set out after the dogsled on foot.

By the time he reached the bay where the walruses had congregated the day before, he was sure he'd frostbitten at least two fingers. He kept expecting Lotte and Jens to pass him going home, with Anna in tow-but no, he reminded himself, only two could ride the dogsled at a time, so someone would have to walk. Would they pack Anna's skin on the sled? Would they be able to catch her with her walrus skin off? Would they have to use the anaesthetic? Was it dangerous to her?

He paused at the crest of the hill. Jens and Lotte's bright parkas stood out among the brown backs of the walruses down on the beach. They were picking their way among the torpid creatures. Some of the walruses were watching them, eyes half-lidded but still alert.

Peter spotted her, or thought he did-but then there was another white-marked walrus, and another. Which was Anna? Would Jens or Lotte be able to tell the differences in the markings? Or were some of them simply spotted with bird guano?

"Anna, watch out!" he shouted. Jens and Lotte were not particularly near any of the white-marked walruses, but that was probably safer for Anna-she could maybe make it to the water before they could find her and shoot.

Instead, the walruses moved suddenly, in groups more coordinated than Peter would have expected of non-verbal beasts. He watched, unable to move or speak, as the walruses, marked and unmarked alike, thundered over Jens and Lotte, trapping them, forcing them to the ice, then down into the half-frozen sea.

Peter cried out, but the sodden parkas disappeared under the swells.

The walruses all swam off: the males in one direction, the females in another, and the small, mixed group of marked walruses on their own, straight for the sea. He could have sworn one or two of them waved their tails at him as they went.

Peter stared down at the water for quite some time.

The whining of the sled dogs brought him back to awareness of how cold he was, and how dark it was getting. Peter gathered the dogs and headed back to the station to make the necessary calls.

A SONG TO THE MOON.

RICHARD BOWES.

This is the early nineteenth century part of Manhattan. Normally on such a night in a quiet cul-de-sac in the West Village you'd be able to see the full Dog Day moon hanging right over the low buildings.

But tonight outside the Cherry Lane, that tiny old theater, banks of klieg lights blot it out. You'd hardly think those still in town would be willing to come out of their air-conditioned apartments. However a crowd chokes curving, ancient Commerce Street on this muggy night in a torrid August.

We didn't get intense publicity but with a cult that's not necessary. All it took were brief notices in Time Out, a bit in the Village Voice, mention on internet sites, especially L-ROD the Luna-Related-Obsessive-Disorder blog. The message was: Thad Ransom live!

Just that slogan, this place and time. The crowd started to line up in the afternoon. The theater only seats one hundred and eighty-three and those first in line were let inside an hour ago.

Many others, old theater devotees and a lot of young people, are still in the street waiting for a glimpse of a legend, a touch of lunar magic.

People with a certain edge who have been in the city since mythic times remember a very young Ransom at a tiny cafe on Cornelia Street in an unknown writer's first play on a night very much like this one. He was transformed before them, his eyes got huge, his face awe-struck as he described the crash of an airplane.

For others Thad Ransom is a screen icon, famous for moments like the one where the camera a slides past a crowd of onlooker's in The Kindness of Wolves.

For a few seconds a face caught by the lens sharpens into a muzzle, the eyes gleam, the viewer tries to catch another glimpse and can't. It's the first sight of a serial killer.

Theories abound as to what tricks were used to produce that effect. But insiders know the scene was intentionally filmed at a certain moment on a certain night. And many believe that live on nights like this is the only way to see our kind perform.

Cops, emergency medics, and bartenders will tell you that a full moon brings out the beast. But all they have is anecdotes. Ransom is the proof, as am I in my way.

I should be inside but I feel the tension they call Moon Itch stirring inside me and need to be out here tonight. So I stand in the doorway of the old apartment house across the street from the Cherry Lane. In tight black slacks and a black turtleneck, wearing light make-up I'm ready to perform. A ritual is about to take place and I am the priest and also the priestess.

New Yorkers are ever on the watch for celebrities and some have noticed me. "Josie Gannon" I hear them murmur as they stare like I'm the Sybil or a shaman.

My book, The Why of Were, makes me an L-ROD expert gets me on TV as a talking head when Lunar-Related-Obssessive-Disorder gets discussed. And Ransom aficionados know I'm embedded in his story. When we were both new in this city, I was the androgynous roommate.

Edia, his first New York girl friend, died of an overdose and can't be here tonight. Random and Selka, his first wife, parted under unfortunate circumstances. He stabbed her on a certain night of the month. It wasn't a really serious wound and she didn't press charges. But she also won't be showing up.

Wife Two hasn't been heard from lately. On parting she said, "It's waking up every day figuring out how long it is till the next full moon and wondering who he's going to be when it happens."

Before and after each of them I was best girl, therapist and pillow boy. I think of myself as a shaman: a woman with the strength of a man and a man with the insight of a woman. But after all these years I wonder if this is love, obsession or the absence of an alternative. At times it feels like he and I are the only true examples of a breed.

Channeling our ability or affliction is the skill. A shiver goes through me and I let my face shift from older woman to young boy, from girl to old man. For all their fascination the fans are afraid to approach me and that I think is only right.

Some members of the crowd and I share a tension, a discomfort in our skin as the time slips close to midnight. A face here and there flickers, a appears to be fluid. The Moon Itch real or imagined is almost palpable. Many are impatient, some think this is a last chance to see Thad Ransom, the great shape shifter.

Then from a sound system in the theater lobby comes a crystal clear soprano: Dvorak's water nymph Rusalka laments to the silver night goddess her hopeless love for a mortal. Our show tonight is called, A Song to the Moon.

On cue, hand drums are heard around the corner and the crowd turns. A voice proclaims, "You know who I am. I'm the thunder at twilight and the cry at the gates."

And there amid a phalanx of young, black-clad players is Thad Ransom, six foot four with a shock of white hair, half man, half mythic creature, all actor. At this moment the voice is Barrymore's, the eyes could belong to an intelligent coyote. But the haminess is all his. Ransom's managed to become a man notorious for being notorious.

A camera and a boom microphone follow him. Another camera is inside the open door of the theater. He is the subject of a documentary which explains the venue, the lights and the hour.

As I step forward the young players see me, reach out and get me through the crowd. Some of our company are actors, a couple are musicians. Some are just shape shifter wannabees but tonight there are gleaming eyes and bared teeth in the group.

I notice that especially in Tomlinson, called Tommy, the company bad boy and favorite, the one who reminds everyone of the young Ransom. Tommy's bouncing on his toes.

A couple of punks in the crowd bark, someone howls and Tomlinson answers with a long howl of his own. I'm used to danger but I wince at how the crowd plays with moon-driven actors.

A young actress Mary Kowal, puts her army around Tommy. Ransom kisses me on the cheek and sweeps me with him. He turns at the lobby door and says to the crowd, "I am the fear every factory owner feels when he finds himself awake in bed in the hours after midnight."

Great stuff: 1940 Broadway socialism. This being the crowd that it is many besides me recognize the lines from the Kaufman and Hart comedy Sat On A Wall.

In act one the daughter of a dull, rich family brings home a Greenwich Village artist named Pierce Falkland. His specialty is huge murals of heroic workers and farmers. In the second act Falkland paints his greatest work on the living room wall and turns their world upside down.

A young John Garfield played it originally on Broadway. Clark Gable, of course, did the movie with a lot less socialism and a lot more kissing.

On the night of a full blue moon almost forty years ago young Ransom as Falkland blew the minds of the second string critics sent to view a revival of that rickety comedy. "Pure Animal Power!" one of them wrote.

Tonight, for a few moments, the white hair and the years are wiped off his face and he is the young stage radical. Ransom and I have planned and discussed tonight's show for months. But this is unrehearsed and spontaneous. With such an actor at such an hour it's impossible to predict what will happen.

The crowd, the people looking down from apartment windows applaud. A few howl. At times I wish the Food and Drug Administration would speed up the approval of drug therapy for Luna-Related-Obsessive-Disorder, not for the actors but for the fans.