Part 42 (2/2)

I started to take a swing, but the tall one caught my elbow and threw me off balance. The short one reached down and picked up a baseball bat.

”Use this, Cornell,” he told me. ”Then no one will get hurt.”

I looked at the pair of them, and then gave up. There are odd characters in this world who actually enjoy physical combat and 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 s.h.i.+ndy. ”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 h.e.l.l 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 n.o.body 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 n.o.body 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 Thornd.y.k.e. Thornd.y.k.e 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,” he boomed cheerfully. ”We've big plans for you.”

”Have I got a vote? It's 'Nay!' if I do.”

”You're too precipitous,” he told me. ”It is always an error, Mr.

Cornell, to be opinionated. Have an open mind.”

”To what?”

”To everything,” he said with an expansive gesture. ”The error of all thinking, these days, is that people do not think. They merely follow someone else's thinking.”

”And I'm to follow yours?”

”I'd prefer that, of course. It would indicate that you were possessed of a mind of your own; that you weren't merely taking the lazy man's att.i.tude and following in the footsteps of your father.”

”Skip it,” I snapped. ”Your way isn't--”

”Now,” he warned with a wave of a forefinger like a prohibitionist warning someone not to touch that quart, ”One must never form an opinion on such short notice. Remember, all ideas are not to be rejected just because they do not happen to agree with your own preconceived notions.”

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