he one in front, a young, nice-looking one,
touched his cap and smiled quietly. "Here's your Drinko, ma'am," he
said, but I already knew the Drinko was back. Harry, Jr., stopped
crying. He gurgled happily. Somehow, I was willing to bet, he could see
the Drinko. I put him on the floor and the policeman put the Drinko on
the floor. It was beautiful, those squeals that came from my baby. The
young policeman smiled again, a quiet, tanned smile.

"We want to thank you, ma'am. These two are the worst criminals in the
dimension-system. I want you to know you may have the Drinko as a reward
for your part in apprehending them. Also, I wish to say that I admire
you for your trippo in pretending to be a dimension-citizen, when, of
course, you are not."

"Trippo?"

"Spunk, if you prefer."

"Well, I had to get my baby's Drinko back," I said.

"Naturally," he smiled. "Drinkos make wonderful pets. The day may come
when Earth 1954 will be connected with dimension-system--and then more
Drinkos will be available."

"Can't we," I asked, "just stay alone in our quiet nook of space?"

"My thought, too," said Mabel, getting to her feet at last and throwing
her hair back. "And is there any chance of getting out of here? It's
exciting, thrilling, and romantic, but Bill still has to eat."

"Immediately, Madam! It is merely a matter of disengaging the
chrono-beam, which happened to become tangled, in space-time, with the
gravitonic structure of the neutronic chrono-field."

"Well!" said Mabel. "That explains it! And so clearly!"

They set up an instrument that looked like the one Jake and Beany had.
They sighted along the diagonals of the room and pressed buttons. Then
they opened the door. "In two minutes, ma'am," the smiling cop said.
"Good day. It is my hope that we shall meet again." They disappeared out
the door. Sure enough, there was a cake-pan ship hanging in the grey
steam. They piled into it and the ship moved off, wobbling, until I
couldn't see it any more.

A minute later, the grey steam melted away and so did Mabel.

Harry came home on schedule. "Baby has hardly cried all day!" I told him
happily. "What a relief! I got a lot of your old clothes mended and I
read three installments of the Saturday Evening Post serial."

"Fine!" said Harry, looking around. "What else happened?"

"Not much," I said, deciding to break it to him gradually. "Except we've
got a Drinko." I took him into the nursery. Baby was sound asleep. I