Of course you do, the goat-creature thought to him, aware of what was going on in his mind. She will be pleased.

And then Herb Asher caught a really dreadful mental impres- sion from the goat-creature's mind, one that horrified him and made him drive erratically for a moment. A sexual lust on the part of the creature for Linda Fox.

I must be imagining it! Herb Asher thought.

The goat-creature thought, I want her. It was contemplating her breasts and her loins, her whole body, made naked and avail- able. Jesus, Herb Asher thought. This is dreadful. What have I gotten myself into? He started to steer his car back toward Wash- ington, D.C.

And he found that he could not control the steering wheel. The goat-creature had taken over; it was in power within Herb Asher, at the center of his mind.

She will love me, the goat-creature thought, and I will love her. And, then, its thoughts passed beyond the limits of Herb Asher's comprehension. Something to do with making Linda Fox into a thing like the goat-creature, dragging her down into its domain. She will be a sacrifice in my place, the goat-creature thought. Her throat-I will see it cut as mine has been. "No," Herb Asher said. Yes, the goat-creature thought.

And it compelled him to drive on, toward California and Linda Fox. And, as it compelled and controlled him, it exulted in its glee; within the darkness of his car it danced its own kind of dance, a drumming sound that its hooves made: made in triumph. And anticipation. And intoxicated joy.

It was thinking of death, and the thought of death made it celebrate with rapture and an awful song.

He drove as erratically as possible, hoping that once again a police car would grapple him. But as the goat-creature had prom- ised none did.

The image of Linda Fox in Herb Asher' s mind continued to undergo a dismal transformation; he envisioned her as gross and bad-complexioned, a flabby thing that ate too much and wan- dered about aimlessly, and he realized, then, that this was the view of the accuser; the goat-creature was Linda Fox's accuser who showed her-who showed everything in creation-under the worst light possible, under the aspect of the ugly. This thing in my back seat is doing it, he said to himself. This is how the goat-creature sees God's total artifact, the world that God pronounced as good. It is the pessimism of evil itself. The nature of evil is to see in this fashion, to pronounce this verdict of negation. Thus, he thought, it unmakes creation; it undoes what the Creator has brought into being. This also is a form of unreality, this verdict, this dreary aspect. Creation is not like this and Linda Fox is not like this. But the goat-creature would tell me that- I am only showing you the truth, the goat-creature thought to him. About your pizza waitress.