office in San Francisco had just received word of
the quake recorded by the seismograph at Berkeley when a staffer on the
other side of the desk answered a call from the AP stringer in Carson
City, reporting the blast and mighty cloud in the desert sky. One fast
look at the map showed that the explosion was well north of the AEC
testing ground limits. The Carson City stringer was ordered to get out
to the scene on the double and hold the fort while reinforcements of
staffers and photographers were flown from 'Frisco.

Before any of the official or civil agencies had swung into action, the
Circle T station wagon had rocketed off the ranch road and turned onto
the oiled, county highway leading both to Carson City--and the
now-expanding but less dense column of smoke.

Johnny hunched over the wheel and peered through the thickening pall of
smoke and dust, reluctant to ease off his breakneck speed but knowing
that they had to find Hetty--if she were alive. Neither man had said a
word since the wagon raced from the ranch yard.

* * * * *

There was no valid reason to associate the explosion with Hetty, yet
instinctively and naggingly, Johnny knew that somehow Hetty was
involved. Barney, still ignorant of his error of the oil drums, just
clung to his seat and prayed for the best.

The dust was almost too thick to see, forcing Johnny to slow the
station wagon as they penetrated deeper into the base of the smoke
column. Hiding under his frantic concern for Hetty was the half-formed
thought that the whole thing was an atomic explosion and that he and
Barney were heading into sure radiation deaths. His logic nudged at the
thought and said, "If it were atomic, you started dying back on the
porch, so might as well play the hand out."

A puff of wind swirled the dust up away from the road as the station
wagon came up to the smoking crater. Johnny slammed on the brakes and
he and Barney jumped from the car to stand, awe-struck, at the edge of
the hole.

The dust-deadened air muffled Johnny's sobbing exclamation:

"Dear God!"

They walked slowly around the ragged edges of the crater. Barney bent
down and picked a tiny metallic fragment from the pavement. He stared
at it and then tapped Johnny on the arm and handed it to him,
wordlessly. It was a twisted piece of body steel, bright at its torn
edges and coated with the scarlet enamel that had been the color of the
Circle T pickup.