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A window, high up in the bathroom. He moved the great metal paper towel drum over, stood on it and managed to reach the window. Stuck shut, painted shut. He smashed upward against its wooden frame with the heels of his hands.
Creaking, the window rose.
Room enough. He hoisted himself up, squeezed through. Darkness, the Titanian night ... he dropped, fell, listening
to himself whistle down and down like a feather, or rather like a bug with large surface-area in proportion to mass. Whooeee, he shouted, but he heard no sound except the whistle of his falling.
He struck, pitched forward, lay suffering the pain in his feet and legs. I broke my goddam ankle, he said to himself. He hobbled up to his feet. An alley, trashcans and cobblestones; he hobbled toward a street light. To his right, a red neon sign. Dave's Place. A bar. He had come out the back, out of the men's washroom, minus his coat. He leaned against the wall of a building, waiting for the numbing pain in his ankles to subside.
A Rushmore circuit cruising past, automatic policeman. "Are you all right, sir?"
"Yes," Pete said. "Thank you. Just stopped to—you know what. Nature called." He laughed. "Thanks." The Rushmore cop wheeled on.
What city am I in? he asked himself. The air, damp, smelled of ashes. Chicago? St. Louis? Warm, foul air, not the clean air of San Francisco. He walked unsteadily down the street, away from Dave's Place. The vug inside, cadging drinks, clipping Terran customers, rolling them in an educated way. He felt for his wallet in his pants' pocket. Gone. Jesus Christ! He felt at his coat; there it was. He sighed in relief.
Those pills I took, he thought, didn't mix with the drinks, or rather did mix; that's the problem. But I'm okay, not hurt, just a little shaken up and scared. And I'm lost. I've lost myself and my car. And separately.
"Car," he called, trying to summon its auto-auto mech system. Its Rushmore Effect. Sometimes it responded; sometimes not. Chance factor.
Lights, twin beams. His car rolled along the curb, bumped to a halt by him. "Mr. Garden. Here I am."
"Listen," Pete said, fumbling, finding the door handle. "Where are we, for chrissakes?"
"Pocatello, Idaho."
"For chrissakes!" "It's god's truth, Mr. Garden; I swear it."
Pete said, "You're awfully articulate for a Rushmore cir-
cuit, aren't you?" Opening the car door he peered in, blinking in the glare of the dome light. Peered suspiciously, and in fright.
Someone sat behind the tiller.
After a pause the figure said, "Get in, Mr. Garden."
"Why?" he said.
"So I can drive you where you want to go."
"I don't want to go anywhere," he said. "I want to stay here."
"Why are you looking at me so fu
"Who the hell are you?" he said. "I don't know you."
"Why, you certainly do. You met me at Joseph Schilling's rare record shop in New Mexico."
"Mary A
Mary A
"But how'd I get mixed up with you?"
"First you dropped by the apartment in Marin County. I wasn't there because I was at the San Francisco public library doing research. My mother told you and you flew to San Francisco, to the library, and picked me up. And we drove to Pocatello because you had the idea that an eighteen-year-old girl would be served in a bar in Idaho, and she isn't in San Francisco as we found out."
"Was I right?"
"No. So you went in alone, to Dave's Place, and I've been sitting out here in the car waiting for you. And you just now came out of that alley and began yelling."
"I see," he said. He lay back against the seat. "I feel sick. I wish I was home."
Mary A
"How'd I get mixed up with that vug?" he said, after a time.
"What vug?"
"In the bar. I guess. Doctor something Philipson."
"How would I know? They wouldn't let me in."
"Well, was there a vug in there? Didn't you see in?"
"I saw in; I went in at first. But there was no vug while I was there. But of course I came right out; they made me leave."
"I'm quite a heel," Pete said. "Staying inside drinking while you sat out here in the car."
"I didn't mind," Mary A
"Yes, Miss McClain," the car said.
"It likes me," Mary A
"Evidently," Pete said. "What time is it?"
"About four."
"A.M.?" He couldn't believe it. How come the bar was still open? "They don't allow bars open that late, in any state."
"Maybe I looked at the clock wrong," Mary A
"No," Pete said. "You looked at it right. But something's wrong; something's terribly wrong."
"Ha ha," Mary A
He glanced at her. At the tiller of the car sat the shapeless slime of the vug. "Car," Pete said instantly. "What's at the tiller? Tell me."
"Mary A
But the vug still sat there. He saw it.
"Are you sure?" Pete said.
"Positive," the car said.
The vug said, "As I said, I can charm Rushmore circuits."
"Where are we going?" Pete said.
"Home. To take you back to your wife Carol."
"And then what?"
"And then I'm going to bed."
"What are you?" he said to it.
"What do you think? You can see. Tell someone about it; tell Mr. Hawthorne the detective or better yet tell E. B. Black the detective. E. B. Black would get a kick out of it."
Pete shut his eyes.
When he opened them again it was Mary A
"You were right," he said to the car. Or were you? he wondered. God, he thought; I wish I was home, I wish I hadn't come out tonight. I'm scared. Joe Schilling, he could help me. Aloud he said, "Take me to Joe Schilling's apartment, Mary A
"At this time of night? You're crazy."
"He's my best friend. In all the world."
"It'll be five A.M. when we get there."
"He'll be glad to see me," Pete said. "With what I have to tell him."
"And what's that?" Mary A
Cautiously, he said, "You know. About Carol. The baby."
"Oh yes," Mary A
"Freya said that? Who to?"
"To Carol."
"How do you know?"
Mary A
"Damn that Freya," Pete said.
"I don't blame you for feeling like that. She's a hard, schizoid type, it sounds like. We studied about that in psych."
"Do you like school?"
"Love it," Mary A
"Do you think you could be interested in an old man of one hundred arid fifty years?"
"You're not so old, Mr. Garden. Just confused. You'll feel better after I get you home." She smiled at him, briefly.
"I'm still potent," he said. "As witness Carol's impregnation. Whooee!" he cried.
"Three cheers," Mary A
"We don't generally refer to ourselves as Terrans," Pete said. "We generally say 'people.' You made a mistake."
"Oh," Mary A
Pete said, "Is your mother part of this? Is that why she didn't want the police to scan her?"