have an idea," he said.

"To get out?" asked the woman.

"No, ma'am. I think I know where we are."

"Where?" asked everyone, except the big man, Summersby, who was sitting
on the tire looking away from them.

"In a lab! This is a laboratory, and those big things are some kind of
scientists!"

"You could be right," said Watkins reluctantly. "My God, what a spot, if
you're right!"

"Sure. That's why we were snatched off the coaster, however it happened.
They wanted to experiment on us, and study us. They got this lab
someplace where it's secret, and they make tests--"

"There was a contrivance like a milking machine," said Full.

"You don't know _what_ it's used for," said Adam darkly. He imagined it
might be an especially nasty way of picking over a man's brains or body.
"Look, it all fits. That stool, that's a funny way to punish a person,
but all their stuff is a little cockeyed."

"By our standards," added Watkins.

"That's what I meant. Look, you punish a guinea pig when it does
something wrong, if you're trying to teach it some trick or other; I
mean, suppose you want to determine its intelligence, you give it a
problem, and if it does the thing wrong it gets a shock, maybe, or a bat
on the nose. That stool was punishment. If you hadn't crashed the
rocket," he said to Mrs. Full, "it might have given you a reward."

"Maybe some food," said Villa.

"Here's another angle," said Watkins, who obviously knew something about
lab work. "They may be trying to give us neuroses. Scientists induce
neuroses in all kinds of critters, by punishment and complex problems
and--"

"What is that?" asked Villa.

"Neuroses?" Watkins rubbed his chin. "Well, say they want to make an
animal nervous, anxious, worried." Villa nodded.

"You mean they might be trying to drive us mad?" said the woman in a
high scared voice.

"I doubt it," said Calvin Full.

"They might be," said Watkins.

"Then let's get out of here," said his wife. She went trotting to the
wall. "Didn't anyone shove a barrier into this?"

"I forgot," said Full. She gave him a dirty look.

"Anyway," Adam went on, "that could explain why we were fixed up before
they woke us--it was like quarantine. They wouldn't want sick animals."

"Who was fixed up how?" asked the Mexican suspiciously.

"My astigmatism," he said to Villa, "and this gentleman's sinus trouble,
and his wife's headache."

"And they pulled a rotten wisdom tooth for me," said Watkins. "I