Larry dressed in a suit coat, wore glasses, and had neatly combed hair. He was not like other wolves that had tried to enter the flock, who shouted obscene things, talked like they knew more than the sheep, and always got caught by Shepherd. Larry was flashy and neat, and said all the right things. He was such a sneaky, well-disguised wolf that none of the sheep were alarmed when, instead of awakening to the shepherd’s call, they heard the smooth, soothing voice of the wolf. “Shepherd’s sent me to take care of you while he’s away.”
“Where did he go?” Ben asked. “He didn’t say he was going anywhere.” Ben was a smart sheep, and the oldest of the flock. He knew his Shepherd well. “Something came up at the last minute.” Larry smiled convincingly, but Ben wasn’t sure about Larry. He dressed fancy, and looked a little like a shepherd, but there was something else familiar about him. Something dangerous.
None of the sheep recognized Larry as a wolf. They went on grazing and flocking, and being generally content. Larry was a lot like the Shepherd. He listened to the sheep’s needs. He gave them advice on what to eat. He made promises about leading them to better meadows with fresher water and greener grass. And he always had an answer for any of their questions.
After a few weeks, the flock trusted Larry so much, that they followed him away from their pen to a new meadow. “We shouldn’t leave. The Shepherd will be back soon,” Ben warned. But no one listened to him, so he followed them to the new stream. The water didn’t look as clear as the other places the flock had used, but they trusted Larry, so they carefully climbed the rocks to drink the murky water.
Ben only took one drink of the water. It tasted terrible, and dried his mouth out. It was not the kind of water Shepherd took them to. While Ben watched the other sheep, he caught a reflection in the water that troubled him deeply. It was Larry’s, but in the water, without the clothes and glasses, Larry looked a lot like a wolf.
That night, after Larry had gone to bed, Ben shared his concerns. “He said the shepherd sent him, but he doesn’t talk like the shepherd. And he led us to bad water that left us thirstier.”
“Larry said it’s better,” Deacon insisted.
“What about Shepherd!”
“Larry said if he cared about us, he would have found us by now.”
“He’ll be looking for us until he finds us. Larry is a wolf. He’ll eat us in the night if we don’t find Shepherd!”
“Why should we listen to you?” one sheep asked defiantly.
“Yeah. We want to stay with Larry,” the other sheep agreed.
“I know the shepherd, and he wouldn’t lead us to bad water. He wouldn’t take us so far away from the safe places! We need to find him!”
“Baaa,” the sheep said, and plugged their ears.
Ben kept trying to argue, but no one would listen. Pretty soon, the sheep got tired of hearing him. They demanded that he leave the flock. Ben knew there was no way to make them listen except to find Shepherd, so he left them.
After days of looking, Ben found Shepherd at the murky stream. None of the other sheep were with him. Shepherd was sitting alone on a rock, crying. When Ben came near, Shepherd grabbed him and held him tightly. “I tried to warn them,” Ben said weakly.
Shepherd nodded his head. “If only they had known me as well as you do. Then they could have been saved.”
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