nd don't mind getting
hurt if they can hurt the other guy more. These were the type. Taking
that baseball bat and busting it over the head of either one would be
the same sort of act as kids use when they square off in an alley and
exchange light blows which they call a "cardy" just to make the fight
legal. All it would get me was a sore jaw and a few cracked ribs.

So after my determination to take after them with murderous intent,
they'd pulled my teeth by scooping me up in this van and disarming me.

I relaxed.

The short one nodded, although he looked disappointed that I hadn't
allowed him the fun of a shindy. "You'll find U.S. 40 less rough than
you expected," he said. "After all, it's like life; only rough if you
make it rough."

"Go to hell and stay there," I snapped. That was about as weak a
rejoinder as I've ever emitted, but it was all I could get out.

The tall one said, "Take it easy, Cornell. You can't win 'em all."

I looked across the nose of our trapped car to Farrow. She was leaning
against the hood, facing her pair. They were just standing there at
ease. One of them was offering a cigarette and the other held a lighter
ready. "Relax," said the one with the smokes. The other one said, "Might
as well, Miss Farrow. Fighting won't get nobody nowhere but where you're
going anyway. Might as well go on your own feet."

Scornfully, Farrow shrugged. "Why should I smoke my own?" she asked
nobody in particular.

Mentally I agreed: #Take 'em for all they're worth, Farrow!# And then I
reached for one, too. Along the side of the van were benches. I sat
down, stretched out on my back and let the smoke trickle up. I finished
my cigarette and then found that the excitement of this chase, having
died so abruptly, left me with only a desire to catch up on sleep.

I dozed off thinking that it wasn't everybody who started off to go to
Homestead, Texas, and ended up in Marion, Indiana.

* * * * *

Scholar Phelps did not have the green carpet out for our arrival, but he
was present when our mobile prison cell opened deep inside of the
Medical Center grounds. So was Thorndyke. Thorndyke and three nurses of
Amazon build escorted Farrow off with the air of captors collecting a
traitor.

Phelps smiled superciliously at me and said, "Well, young sir, you've
given us quite a chase."

"Give me another chance and we'll have another chase," I told him
grumpily.

"Not if we can help it,