No time for Toffee!
Date: 2021-07-27T00:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Science fiction; Fantasy fiction; Subconsciousness -- Fiction

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Title: No time for Toffee!

Author: Henry Farrell

Release date: July 27, 2021 [eBook #65931]
Most recently updated: October 18, 2024

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/65931

Credits: Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK NO TIME FOR TOFFEE! ***

NO TIME FOR TOFFEE!

By Charles F. Myers

Life was Marc's oyster, but: subversives
had shot him—a ghost was ready to haunt his
corpse—and Toffee was loving him to death!

[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Imagination Stories of Science and Fantasy
July 1952
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]

Just as he stepped to the microphone Marc caught sight of the swarthy man. He saw the red scar across the left eyebrow, the dull flash of metal in the large hairy hand. By then it was too late even to cry out. In the next instant the glass panel in the control booth shattered.

Marc felt an explosion of hot pain deep inside his chest. He was aware of looking around dumbly at Dick Drewson and seeing Drewson's face register shocked disbelief. Then the scene—the room, Drewson and the others—disappeared, engulfed in a blinding sheet of flame—and Marc knew he was falling....

Somewhere, in a place where time and space didn't exist, grey mists began to seeth and swirl, and withall there was an ominous rumbling. The High Council was almost in session.

In a sense, the High Council was already in session, for the Heads of the Council had developed their intellects to such an inconceivable degree that when a meeting of the Council was imminent they could send their thoughts on ahead of them and get the meeting under way even before putting in an appearance. There was an exchange of views and information long before the Heads accomplished the mundane and troublesome business of materialization. Thus it was that the mists of Limbo now rumbled with thought, counter thought and—on this particular occasion—downright aggravation, even before the arrival of the Supreme Head in the vapored chambers. There was an air of foreboding.

Having declined all vanities in the pursuit of the Ultimate Intelligence, the Heads had allowed themselves to evolve into literal representations of their titles. Directing all their energy and development to the brain and its encasement, their bodies had suffered proportionately so that now they were little more than a group of preposterously large craniums, shaggy with cerebration, bearing faces weighted with the ponderous woe of Life, Death, Eternity and other such mental ballast. Five in all, they made up a company to be avoided whatever the cost.

The Supreme Head cleared his throat and Eternity rattled with phlegmy discontent. Baleful glances were exchanged all around.

"Well," said the Supreme Head, after a pause for attention. "I suppose you all know the reason for this meeting by now?"

The Second Head, a bald party with large ears, nodded sadly. "You say this blighted Pillsworth has gone and got himself shot this time?"

"Precisely," the Supreme Head affirmed. "In a broadcasting studio, if you please. There's simply no keeping that man out of trouble."

"But why should we want to keep him out of trouble?" the Third Head, an elongated customer with eye pouches, wanted to know. "That's hardly our responsibility."

"There's George Pillsworth," the Supreme Head said fatefully. "Surely you haven't forgotten about George?"

A hush fell over the Council, a hush of horror.

"Not George again?" the Second Head shuddered. "We don't have to face him again, do we?" He looked around beseechingly at the others. "After all, Pillsworth's only injured, isn't he? He's not dying?"

The Supreme Head looked for a moment as though he wished he had shoulders so he might shrug them hopelessly. "The vibrations are confused again," he sighed. "I don't know what the interference is around Pillsworth, but the call never comes through clearly. All we know is that he's gotten himself into another mess of some sort and is either dead or dying."

"It seems that the subversives are still strongly active in the United States, and of course Pillsworth couldn't stay out of it like a good citizen. He was approached by some men delegated by government authority to take control of national advertising. The theory was that American advertising could be used as a strong combative propaganda weapon against the enemy propaganda already circulating through the country. A committee was delegated to secure the cooperation of the nation's leading advertising agencies. Naturally, since Pillsworth is the nation's leading advertising executive, they contacted him first."

"Then Pillsworth is a subversive?" the First Head enquired. "That's how he got into trouble?"

"Not at all," said the Supreme Head. "That's just it. Pillsworth wasn't subversive, but the government committee was."

"Eh?"

"Exactly. It turned out that the program was one of the cleverest propaganda schemes ever devised. Actually, their aim was to insert alien ideals into the nation's advertising."

"But you said the plan had government approval."

"That's the really clever part of it. The method of presentation, while seeming on the surface to denounce the foreign creed and uphold the American one, actually was designed to win support for the enemy. The sales psychology employed was of the negative."

"Negative?"

"That's correct. It's the old principle of telling people they don't want a thing until they develop a feeling of defiance and decide they are going to have it. It's an extremely subtle approach, but almost infallible if properly developed. Knowing this, these men had a perfect plan, so subtle that even the government didn't recognize it. Also, they had help from within. A certain Congressman Entwerp pushed through the legislation."

"But Pillsworth saw through it?"

"Instantly," the Supreme Head nodded. "It was a principle he had been using assiduously for years, in fact the very one through which he achieved his success. The whole plot was as clear as a May morn the moment he heard it. That's when the trouble started. He contacted Congressman Entwerp."

"Oh, dear!"

"Indeed. Entwerp responded by holding Pillsworth up to ridicule."

"But Pillsworth had logic on his side."

The Supreme Head smiled tolerantly. "That's the Earth for you every time," he said. "Show a human a bit of logic and he gets truculent on the spot. Pillsworth was denounced as a witch hunter and instructed under penalty of law to cooperate to the fullest."

"Shocking," the Third Head said. "I begin to feel sorry for this Pillsworth."

"Pillsworth was similarly shocked. But he didn't feel sorry for himself. Despite his inclination for the quiet conservative life, he fought back."

"Good," the Fourth Head put in. "I'm glad; it gives the story zip."

"My thought in telling you this," the Supreme Head said caustically, "is merely to inform, not entertain."

"Sorry, sir."

The Head nodded acknowledgment. "But to get on, Pillsworth presented his case to a news broadcaster and asked to be allowed to recite his story to the nation in the interests of national security. He was shot. By whom we do not know; the fellow got away. But the fact we must hold in mind is that he definitely was shot."

"Then it really is serious," the Third Head said. "We may have to interview this deadly George after all."

"It's unavoidable," the Supreme Head sighed. "There's no way around it."

"But we're not positive Pillsworth is dead yet. Couldn't we wait and be sure?"

"His vibrations have been broken," the Supreme Head said. "Actually we have no cause to hesitate." He sighed. "I suppose we might as well get it over with."

The others nodded in reluctant agreement. There was an oppressive silence.

"But didn't we banish George?" the First Head said. "We must have after his last excursion to Earth."

"That's right," the Second Head agreed. "I remember distinctly. He attempted to fire poor Pillsworth off into outer space without a pressure suit. We banished him to the Void to sing bass in the Moaning Chorus."

"We certainly picked the right party for the job," the First Head reflected. "There isn't a more base spirit in all Limbo. Has he been summoned?"

The Supreme Head coughed regretfully. "I issued the call through Message Center before I announced the council."

"Oh, dear," the First Head murmured, "then the stinker is practically on the sloop at this very moment."

"The stinker is crossing the sloop even now," the Supreme Head amended, his gaze fastened hauntedly on a disturbance in the outer mists. "Here he comes."

"Secure your valuables," the Second Head said morosely. "And keep your hands in your pockets."

Hesitantly, under the unblinking disapproval of the Council, George materialized. As the Council watched, a duplicate of Marc Pillsworth's long, lean body, made vague by misted robes, rose solidly out of the moiling vapors. It grew to full stature, rounded out at the shoulders, extended a neck, then stopped short of the head. There was an expectant pause, but nothing further developed.

"The rotter's ashamed to face us," the First Head observed sourly.

"Little wonder," the Third Head muttered. "After the way he's blotted the haunting profession, he hasn't got a leg to stand on."

"George Pillsworth," the Supreme Head intoned with exasperation, "spiritual projection of the mortal entity, Marc Pillsworth, approach the Council. And put on your head, you fool."

George stirred, and his head, working from the chin upward, materialized, revealing the face of Marc Pillsworth. All in all, as faces go, Marc's—and consequently also George's—hit very close to average. It was a nice face, a pleasant face, for all its lack of distinction. On George, therefore, it was a misleading face. With its lean plainness, its serious grey eyes and its shock of sandy hair, it failed utterly to express even a whit of George's unprincipled temperament.

"Is that better, sir?" George asked, edging warily forward.

"Hardly that," the Supreme Head groused. "The less of you the better. However it helps us somewhat to get a clue to the inner festerings of that depraved mind of yours." He gazed at George for a long, reflective moment, then made a sad, clucking sound. "I simply cannot imagine what Marcus Pillsworth must have thought when he discovered that his spiritual entity was a tacky, ebony-hearted, feather-headed wretch like you. Why aren't you more like your mortal source?"

George shrugged sheepishly. "I guess I'm just no damn good," he murmured.

"You flatter yourself," the Supreme Head said. "You're much worse than no damn good. You're simply awful. I wonder if Limbo will ever live you down."

"I hope so, sir," George said contritely.

"Nevertheless," the Supreme Head went on, "much as I loathe it, I suppose we must get on with it. I suppose you know why you've been summoned?"

George nodded dimly. "They reported me for teaching the Moaning Chorus to syncopate."

"What!" the Supreme Head gasped. "You did what?"

George looked up, afrighted; he'd given himself away again with no need. "Yes, sir," he sighed resignedly, "I thought that if we got up a good hot act we might be able to wangle a few guest shots with the Celestial Choir. Actually, we've worked out a really sock arrangement of the Wham Bam Blues. I'm sure that if you heard it...."

"No!" the Supreme Head roared. "You couldn't! Of all the unmitigated...!" He stopped and waited for his spleen to subside. "George Pillsworth," he said, "you are insufferable."

"I suppose so, sir," George said. "However my intentions...."

"Blast your intentions!"

"Yes, sir. I'm very sorry."

"Never mind. In that case it's probably just as well that things are as they are. It'll be a great relief to be rid of you."

"Rid of me?" George said fearfully. "You aren't going to...?"

"Unfortunately, no," the Supreme Head sighed. "What I mean is that your mortal part, Marc Pillsworth, has got himself shot."

George looked up sharply. His whole aspect changed; his eye brightened; his entire being grew more alert. "I'm to be sent to Earth as a permanent haunt? Oh, sir...!"

"Hold it!" the Supreme Head snapped. "Don't go into a spring dance. There's a hitch."

"Oh," George said, but his eagerness was not noticeably dampened.

To George, the merest prospect of a visit to Earth was only to be regarded with rapturous anticipation. To him that distant world of mortals was a place of boundless and exquisite attraction. It was made up in equal parts of liquor, women and larceny and anything else that existed there was merely the result of these things brought together in odd combination. For George, Earth was absolutely the last gasp.

Of course George had never achieved the ultimate accomplishment of establishing permanent residence on Earth, for on all of his previous visits he had arrived only to find that Marc was still alive and that he could not legitimately remain. If on these occasions, George had done his level best to rectify this error with whatever murderous means at hand, it did not imply that the ghost held any personal animosity for Marc. It was simply that George's was the sort of temperament which boggled at almost nothing to achieve its end.

"What's the catch?" he asked.

"Don't be flip," the Supreme Head admonished. "And stop syncopating."

"Syncopating?" George asked innocently. "I'm standing perfectly still."

"It's your mind," the Supreme Head said. "It's jogging about like a cat on hot bricks. It shows all over you. This is an occasion of enormous seriousness."

George did his best to assume an expression of profound sobriety. "Yes, sir," he murmured.

"First of all," the Supreme Head continued, "as usual there is some question as to Pillsworth's actual status. He has been shot, it's true, and his vibrations are definitely broken. However, experience has taught us to be wary in the case of Pillsworth. Often we have acted on false alarms in the past and have been sorry." The Head paused and beetled his brow. "Of course we need not have regretted those errors had you behaved yourself at all in the manner of a decent, self-respecting shade. Nevertheless, we don't dare take a chance despite our reluctance in the matter. Pillsworth's wound falls into the mortality class, so we have no alternative but to issue you your travel orders and the usual allotment of ectoplasm." He fixed George with an unhappy stare. "And get that look of evil delight off your face."

"Sorry, sir," George said.

"And make up your mind right now that this is a business trip. If Pillsworth is not dead or definitely dying when you arrive you will return instantly. Do you understand?"

"Yes, sir."

"And if he isn't dead or dying you will do nothing to alter this state of affairs. You will not undertake on your own initiative to shove him off tall buildings, under moving trucks or into open manholes. You will not threaten him with ropes, guns, explosives, rare poisons or knives, or attempt to dispatch him to heaven by means of rocket. Have you got all that straight?"

"Yes, sir," George said quietly. "Hands off. I understand."

"I hope you do," the Head said ominously, "for your own sake. Anyway, I suppose you'd better go along now and start checking out through Supply. All that's left here is for you to raise your right hand and swear by memory to the Ten Commandments of the Hunter's code. However, I suppose you've got them all cribbed on the sleeve of your robe."

George lowered his gaze. "Yes, sir," he murmured. "I have."

"Then skip it," the Head sighed resignedly. "Just clear out."

"Yes, sir," George said, brightening. "Thank you, sir."

As the mists swirled up around George, and he gradually dissolved into their vaporish currents, a joyous grin lighted his face....

Three sets of eyes fastened clinically on the X-ray with worried, professional interest.

"There's a slight chance," the first doctor said, "if we operate immediately."

"Too slight," the second murmured. "The bullet's too close to the heart. He'll die on the table."

"He'll die anyway. We're merely taking the only chance there is."

"I suppose so. Has his wife arrived yet?"

"She's with him now."

"He's not conscious, is he?"

"No, certainly not, but they could not keep her away."

"We'd better explain how it is. We're almost certain to lose him."

"I suppose so."

There was a pause before they turned and reluctantly left the room. Outside, in the hospital corridor, the first doctor proceeded to the door at the end of the hall while the other two stayed behind. He opened the door and quietly stepped inside.

Marc lay still on the bed, his pleasant face drawn and pale against the pillow. Julie sat beside the bed, a classic figure of silent grief, her blonde beauty drained with uncomprehending fright. She did not cry. Nor did she move as the doctor walked toward her from the door.

"Mrs. Pillsworth ..." the doctor said, but Julie remained motionless. He moved closer to her and placed his hand gently on her shoulder. "We've just seen the X-ray." At this Julie looked up. "We'll have to operate instantly. The preparations are being made now." He paused. "The chances for success are negligible."

Julie nodded dazedly. "I know," she whispered. "I know...."

She did not resist as the doctor took her arm and guided her to the door. At the last moment, though, she paused and looked back at the lean face on the pillow.

"He looks so peaceful," she said. "He looks so content. Does a dying man ever dream, doctor?"

Even Marc himself could not have fitted a positive answer to Julie's question. Did he dream? Or had he merely retreated from the world to a realm of absolute reality? He didn't know himself.

He remembered passing through caverns of roaring darkness, only to be caught up by a tongue of searing flame and hurled into some obscure dimness where it seemed that all the thought, melody, all the remembered sensation of a lifetime writhed about him like vague forms, one interposed upon the other, in unpatterned confusion.

But now these entangled vagaries faded away and suddenly he found himself sitting on a green slope at the outer perimeter of a grove of graceful trees. A blue mist drifted lightly up the far rise to soften the horizon. Marc was no stranger to this place for he had visited it often. He felt no dismay at finding himself again in the valley of his own mind. Indeed, through the last few years, it had become as familiar to him as his own home or office. So had the redheaded minx who found her existence there.

Marc stirred and looked around. The landscape was uninhabited. No lovely, lightly clad figure appeared on the horizon, no lithe form emerged from the groves and ran toward him.

Marc frowned anew over the improbable fact of Toffee. Certainly she existed in his mind, a constant and consistent product of his imagination. That was perfectly easy to understand. The parts of it, though, that he never quite got used to were her periods of existence outside his mind, in the world of actuality.

What Marc had never been able to really comprehend was that his mind could project into the physical world a physical being—to such an extent that her existence was not only apparent to himself but also to everyone else who came within the radius of the mental vibration which produced the girl.

The question in Marc's mind, then, was whether Toffee really existed, was truly real, or whether she was merely an hallucination, a sort of contagious hysteria.

Toffee's personality always got in the way of the answer. The girl was infinitely distracting, from the pert aliveness of her quick green eyes to the full redness of her lips. Beyond that there was the almost shameful perfection of her supple young body. These things blocked analytical thought. Then, too, there was her unerring instinct for roaring, bounding madness, and her absolute contempt for the logical, the moral or the conservative. Toffee, in brief, was at once brash, embarrassing, impetuous, warm, high-handed, endearing, maddening and completely unforgettable. So to all practical purposes, then, she was real; the matter of Toffee's source was pallidly unimportant next to the vivid fact of Toffee herself.

Marc stretched luxuriously and got to his feet, but as he did so he peered around toward the green obscurity of the forest. There was still no movement, no sound. He frowned quizzically. This wasn't at all usual. Always before Toffee had been there to greet him almost at the instant of his arrival. Another time she would be swarming all over him by now.

He shrugged and started aimlessly up the rise. At first he climbed unhurriedly, but as he drew nearer the trees his gait quickened. At the outskirts of the forest he found himself pausing to listen, but there was no sound. The feathery branches swayed in silent grace before him. A small concern began to trickle into his mind.

The blue mists broke smoothly before his stride as he entered the cool enclosure of the forest. Again he paused.

"Toffee...?" he found himself calling.

There was no answer.

He shoved ahead, and now there was a sort of anxiety in his step, and he took care not to break the stillness lest Toffee answer. An odd feeling of bereavement came over him, though he told himself it was foolish. After all, the girl was entirely imaginary, and a pack of trouble into the bargain. Then suddenly he stopped.

An odd murmuring seemed to come from the left. He moved in that direction, stopped to listen, then hurried on. Ahead he saw a dim lightness sketched through the trees, a suggestion of a clearing obscured by the dense branches. He approached it, parted the foliage and looked out. He stopped short.

Toffee sat in the middle of the clearing, her legs folded under her. Her eyes were closed and one slender hand was pressed to her forehead in an attitude of labored concentration. Her slight tunic, an emerald transparency at best, did little to conceal the impertinent perfection of her figure. She was leaning forward just a bit, and her flaming hair hung loose over her shoulders. She seemed to be chanting something to herself, though Marc couldn't make it out.

"Toffee...?" he said, and stepped forward to brace himself against the inevitable rush of brash affection.

The girl opened her eyes and looked around hastily.

"Sit down somewhere," she said, "and be quiet."

"Huh?" Marc asked.

Toffee didn't answer. Instead, she closed her eyes, swayed back lightly on her shapely haunches and began the muttered chant anew.

Marc swayed a trifle himself, with astonishment—and perhaps a tinge of disappointment. This wasn't like Toffee at all, not by a long shot. He moved slowly to her side and gazed down at her intent, upturned face.

"Toffee...?" he hazarded.

She didn't open her eyes. Her lips moved. "Molecules," she said.

"What?" Marc asked.

"Molecules," Toffee repeated. "Molecules ... molecules...."

"Molecules?" Marc said. "What are you talking about?"

Toffee opened her eyes at this and looked up at him with anxious irritation.

"Please be still," she said. "I've got to think about molecules exclusively. It isn't helping any, your gabbing away in my ear."

"But why?" Marc asked. "What about molecules?"

"Everything depends on them, that's all," Toffee said impatiently. "Now, just...."

"But wait a min—!"

"Quiet," Toffee said. "Don't you realize that you're tottering on the brink of death at this very moment? Me, too, for that matter."

"Death?" Marc asked. "What are you talking about?"

Toffee looked at him aghast. "Don't you remember?" she asked. "Have you actually forgotten about being shot in the studio?"

Marc stared down at her in growing horror. A small, agonized memory screamed out of the dark inner shadows of his awareness.

"Oh, Lord!" he cried. "I'm dying!"

"And if those licensed butchers get to hacking you up, you're a goner," Toffee said anxiously. "I have the inside information. There isn't much time. I've got to concentrate like wild."

"But...!"

"Quiet!" Toffee broke in. "Please be quiet," she closed her eyes again and her lips began to move as before. "Molecules," she murmured.

Marc remained rigid at her side. Panic rose inside him and filled his throat. His impulse was to turn and run blindly—perhaps back to that dying mortal body—but his terror held him transfixed. Staring down at Toffee, he felt he might go mad in the next moment. In the next moment he was certain he had.

Just in front of Toffee, close to the mossy greenness, he caught sight of a quick flicker of light, a strange disembodied illumination that was at once its own source and product. As he watched it flickered again, grew brighter and became a steady radiance. He glanced back at Toffee, but her face had become fixed and masklike. Her lips no longer moved.

The radiance grew swiftly, to an almost unbearable brightness. In it there was a cold hard suggestion of metal. Then it began to take form and solidify. Marc blinked as the thing, whatever it was, grew slowly out of the gleaming brilliance.

First a cylinder emerged, about a foot long and four or five inches in diameter. For a moment the object seemed to have completed itself, but then, one at either end, a pair of funnel-shaped openings emerged. These completed, a small, two-way switch arrangement appeared at the top and in the center of the cylinder. After that, the radiance was gone and only the strange instrument remained, lying on the grass before Toffee as though cast there by a careless hand.

"What—!" Marc gasped.

Toffee's perky features relaxed. She opened her eyes.

"Did it turn out all right?" she asked brightly. "Is it finished?"

"Huh?" Marc asked. He pointed. "You mean that?"

"Oh, wonderful!" Toffee cried, delighted. "It's rather pretty the way it shines, isn't it?"

"What is it?"

"How should I know?" Toffee said blandly. "Just a gadget. There's never been one before."

"You mean you just developed it out of your mind?"

"Sure," Toffee said. "It's a thought product—like me. Now if it only works right...." Picking up the instrument, she looked at it carefully and nodded with satisfaction. "It should be simple to operate."

"But what's it for?"

"I'll show you," Toffee said. She pointed to a nearby tree. "See that?" Marc nodded. "Keep looking at it."

Turning to the tree, she held the cylinder toward it, so that one of the funnels was aimed squarely in its direction.

"Now watch," she said, and pressed the switch.

Marc, staring at the tree in rapt attention, started with surprise. Suddenly the tree was gone with no sign that it had ever been there.

"What...!"

"The next part is more important," Toffee said.

"Next part?" Marc said dazedly. "But where is it? Where...?"

"See there?" Toffee said, and this time she pointed to the center of the clearing. "Watch."

Holding the cylinder so that the opposite end was pointed to the clearing, she pressed the switch in the other direction. Instantly the tree shot into being exactly at the spot she had indicated.

Marc stared. It was the same tree—the one that had disappeared—and yet it was subtly different. It seemed greener now, more alive.

"What happened?" he asked. "What did you do to it?"

"Molecules," Toffee said, smiling. "I broke it down into molecules, then projected it again. The machine absorbed the tree in molecules, compressed them, reconstructed the faulty or destroyed ones, eliminated all harmful matter and retained the count to reestablish it in perfect balance and health. It worked fine."

"My gosh!" Marc said.

Drawing close to him, Toffee twined her arms around his neck with knowing deliberation and drew his surprised face down close to hers.

"I'm going to save your stodgy life with molecules, you skinny old, care-worn wraith," she breathed. "Then you'll be in my pay for the rest of your days. Just keep it in mind later when things begin to happen."

"Huh?" Marc said. "What things?"

"You'll see," Toffee said. "Wow!"

Marc drew himself up stiffly. "Now, look here," he said sternly, "you can just get this wow business right out of your head...."

"And if that doesn't work," Toffee said, "I've been studying hypnotism. I can transfix a snake at fifty yards." She brushed her cheek lightly against his. "Just think of that, you scaly old reptile."

"Just a second," Marc said. "If you think for one sec—"

But the sentiment was lost as Toffee renewed her hold on his neck and kissed him warmly and at considerable length on the mouth.

"That," she whispered, "is just a token payment in advance. Just wait till the mortgage comes due!"

TOFFEE

"Why, you little hussy...!" Marc wheezed. "You haven't the moral sense of a brickbat!"

He stopped short, for suddenly the forest had begun to darken and a sharp wind came alive in the trees. He glanced around, startled, as the earth began to tremble beneath them. Instinctively, he whirled about, looking for an escape from the forest, but suddenly, with a groan of dismay, the world went black, and he was only aware of Toffee's arms closing tight about his neck....

The orderly was a pale, antiseptic type. And he was resentful. Wheeling Marc along the hallway toward Surgery, he looked down at the drawn face beneath him with a twinge of pique. He strongly resented the fact that the face was not behaving at all as the face of a true corpse-elect should.

According to the orderly, a dying man had no right to twitch and flutter his eyelids the way this one was doing, let alone showing signs of coming completely to life. It made the orderly nervous and upset.

MARC PILLSWORTH

For a moment the orderly almost succumbed to an impulse to walk off and leave the patient to shift for himself. It was what he deserved if he was going to act that way. Nonetheless, he remained. Consequently, Marc's first vision, upon returning to consciousness, was of a pale, fretful face with white eyelashes and thin lips. He had expected something better.

"Who are you?" he asked weakly. "Are you the doctor?"

The orderly shook his head sullenly. "I'm the orderly. The doctor's waiting."

"They mustn't operate," Marc murmured. "I'll die...." He stopped as a pert face suddenly blurred into view just behind that of the orderly. A slender hand brushed back a wayward lock of red hair. Toffee smiled and winked.

Marc moaned. "Oh, so it's you, is it?" he sighed. "What are you so happy about? I feel awful."

"I'm not happy, sir," the orderly said, mystified. "I'm not happy at all. In fact, if you want the truth...." He paused, and the apprehensive expression of one who detects an unseen presence behind him overtook his face. Very slowly, he turned around.

It would be difficult to say what the orderly expected to find behind him: a fanged reptile might have made a good guess, a slavering fiend another. It is certain, however, judging from his reaction, that on the list of things he did not expect to find, a scantily clad redhead was number one. Toffee, her legs crossed to perfection, the cylinder-like gadget under her arm, sat jauntily on the edge of the cart, smiling a bright greeting. The young man leaped backwards and froze in a transfix of amazement.

"Auk!" he exclaimed.

Toffee turned to Marc. "Is he doing a bird imitation?" she asked. "Should I applaud?"

"Don't be funny," Marc said feebly. "I feel terrible."

"I know," Toffee said. "I got here just in time."

"For what?" Marc asked apprehensively. "What are you going to do?"

Toffee patted the cylinder. "I'm going to save your life," she said. "Don't you remember?"

Marc looked at her through heavy lids. "That's silly," he murmured. "Just go 'way and let me die in peace."

Unmindful, Toffee leaped lightly to the floor, stood back and aimed the gadget at Marc. "All set?" she said.

"Here!" the attendant said, suddenly recovering the faculty of speech. "What are you doing?"

"Advancing medical science a mile a minute," Toffee said. "Don't interrupt."

"But...!"

Toffee placed her hand menacingly on her hip and fixed the young man with a steely eye. "Am I going to have to deal with you?" she asked, "Or are you going to button your lip like a good child?"

The orderly spoke no further.

Toffee raised the cylinder, sighting the length of Marc's lean, sheet-covered body. Then she pressed the switch.

The orderly stared, wide-eyed, and repeated his bird imitation. The place where Marc had lain was suddenly as bare as a banquet board after the feast. Where a moment before there had been a long thin man, now there was only a long, thin sheet.

"Hey!" the orderly bleated. "Ho!"

"So long, phrasemaker," Toffee said, and tucking the cylinder under her arm, moved off quickly down the hall and around the corner.

It was just as the orderly observed the last flirt of Toffee's hip that the doctor appeared from the door of the operating room and looked distractedly in his direction.

"Good grief, man!" he said, "haven't you brought Pillsworth with you?"

The orderly started nervously and looked around.

"He ... he ... he...!" he gibbered. "That is, she ... she...!" He pointed in hopeless confusion down the hall.

"What are you babbling about?" the doctor enquired shortly. "Where is Pillsworth?"

"He.... He's gone, sir!" the attendant blurted.

"Gone?" the doctor said. "Where did he go?"

The orderly looked away down the hall. "There was this girl, see ... she had red hair and a can...."

"Now, just a minute, orderly," the doctor said measuredly. "If you think you can distract me with the depressing details of your sex life...."

"But you don't understand! She was holding this thing ... and she told me to shut up ... and then Mr. Pillsworth wasn't there any more. That's the truth!"

"Let me impress it upon you," the doctor said, "that this is a very serious incident. I can't imagine how a half-dead patient managed to get away from you, but you'll find him instantly and deliver him to surgery if you know what's good for you. Meanwhile, I'll have the alarm sent out to all the wards and offices. I hope you realize that your carelessness has undoubtedly cost the patient his last chance for life. Without the slightest doubt I can pronounce Marc Pillsworth dead right now."

As the doctor spoke these last words, a small gust of wind—or at least what could easily have passed for a small gust of wind—eddied around the corner at the end of the hall. It was this slight disturbance which marked the arrival of George on Earth.

At the sound of the doctor's voice, the ghost stopped, listened, then clasped his hands together in a transport of joy. He had arrived just in time to receive the happy news! Marc was dead and he, George, had at last secured his permanent residency on Earth. Out of sheer exuberance the delighted spectre let out a little moan of delight.

The orderly, who was watching the doctor gloomily out of sight, turned sharply.

"Mr. Pillsworth?" he quavered thinly. "Mr. Pillsworth, please...?"

Meanwhile Toffee had progressed busily along the corridors of the hospital in search of some private—and preferably secluded—place in which to reconstruct Marc. Finally, rounding a corner, she found herself abreast of a pair of swinging doors and started toward them. She stopped, however, and turned in retreat as the doors suddenly parted and a doctor and nurse, deep in conversation, came into view. She started back the way she had come, but was stopped again by an approaching nurse pushing an elderly female patient in a wheel chair flanked on either side by a crutch. Looking for an avenue of escape, Toffee spotted a white linen screen against the wall and darted quickly behind it to bide her time till the traffic had subsided.

This ruse, on the face of it, hadn't a flaw and should have worked like a charm. It should have that is, if Toffee, in her haste, hadn't plumped against the wall and unknowingly pressed the button of the gadget.

The result of this little accident was that the doctor and the nurse approaching from one direction, and the nurse and the patient coming from the other—all four of them suddenly found themselves confronted by a tall, thin man standing bewilderedly in the center of the hall with nothing to grace his long frame but an extremely brief linen shift loosely attached at the back. Toffee had released Marc into reality and good health, but costumed only for the operating table.

No one was more acutely aware of this deficiency than Marc himself. Looking around unhappily at his stunned beholders and taking in his slight coverage all in a single glance, he was taken with a seizure of shocked modesty. Hunkering down into a squat he clutched the hem of his gown desperately to his knees.

"My word!" the elderly patient said, leaning forward in her chair. "What in the world does that man think he's doing!"

"I don't like to think," the nurse said, looking away. "It's bound to be something disgusting."

"Here you!" the doctor called from the other end of the corridor. "You can't do that! Why are you crouched down in that obscene way?"

"I'm naked!" Marc wailed. He lowered his voice to a whisper. "I'm downright exposed!"

"There's no reason to whisper about it," the doctor said nastily. "We can all see."

"Oh, my gosh!" Marc cried. Looking around for a retreat, his frantic gaze fell on the screen. Still in a squat, he hobbled swiftly toward it.

"Look at him!" the patient cried, rising slightly in her chair. "Here, you! Stop doing that, for heaven's sake! You look like an ailing duck!"

"That's nothing to what I'd look like if I stood up," Marc panted in one last sprint for the screen. "That would be worse."

It was not until this point in the proceedings that Toffee began to realize what had happened. Listening to the voices in the hall, it had struck her that one of them had a dreadfully familiar ring to it. It was much to her dismay that, in peering around the edge of the screen, she suddenly found herself practically eyeball to eyeball with Marc. She let out a small, strangled cry.

"Oh, my gosh!" she said.

"For Pete's sake, let me in there!" Marc said.

"But how did you get out there?"

"How should I know? Never mind that, let me in. They're all looking!"

"At what?"

"I shudder to think. Please let me in!"

"But why are you all doubled up like that?"

Tired of words, Marc reached up to the screen to pull it away so he could get behind it. Unfortunately, it was at this same instant that Toffee decided to shove it open to make room. With their combined efforts, the screen buckled, folded, teetered and fell, cracking Marc solidly on the head. The next moment found him in an unconscious sprawl on the floor. The area behind the screen was starkly deserted. The observers crowded in swiftly to see what had happened.

"Good God!" the doctor cried, staring down at Marc. "It's Pillsworth, the man they're looking for in Surgery!"

"Is he dead?" the nurse asked.

The doctor shook his head. "He's breathing. Run and call an orderly to take him along instantly. Hurry!"

As the nurse hurried off, the elderly patient removed one of the crutches from the side of her chair and passed it experimentally through the vacant area beyond the screen. She shook her head in perplexity.

"By golly," she said, "I could have sworn he was talkin' to somebody back there."

While this untimely denouement was rounding out in the hallway, a mad drama of another sort was beginning to ferment in the Pharmacy.

Olliphant Gunn, the rotund and habitually foggy keeper of the dopes and drugs, had been watching it for several minutes; there was trouble brewing in the Salts and Syrups—trouble of a most mysterious and upsetting nature. The containers, for all the world as though they had suddenly been endowed with some idiotic life of their own, had begun to shift about all by themselves. Watching a jar of salts hurl itself to the floor and splash its contents out in a whitish mess, Olliphant Gunn concluded definitely that there was some sort of flimflam afoot.

This conclusion was stoutly strengthened as he witnessed the progress of his private bottle from its hiding place amongst the medicants to a position in mid-air in front of the shelves. Olliphant began to quiver about the dewlaps. He quivered even more as the bottle uncapped itself, tilted upward and emptied a noticeable portion of its contents into—into absolutely nothing at all!

Olliphant fell back in his chair, slack of jaw, and it is doubtful, had anyone been able to apprise him of the truth of the matter, that he'd have felt any better about it. To a man in his cups, as Olliphant was, the news does not come lightly that he is in the company of a thirsty ghost, with an unerring nose for whiskey, and a predisposition for celebration.

Olliphant watched in bleary disbelief as the bottle repeated the tilting and emptying process. Then his mood began to change. Regardless of what this obviously demented bottle thought it was up to, it had no right to deplete his private reserves in this callous fashion. The slack jaw of Olliphant Gunn hitched itself up and became firm.

"Stop that!" Olliphant roared. "You stop that right now, damnit!"

For a moment the bottle wavered, as though startled, then defiantly upended a third time and brought the level of the coveted liquor down still further. Quite as though to rub salt in the wound, it burped with grandiose satisfaction.

"Damnation!" Olliphant gasped. "I'll teach you, you blathering bottle!"

Heaving his considerable bulk up out of his chair, he hurled himself bodily toward the object of his wrath.

The laws of nature, however, were against Olliphant from the very beginning. As the bottle darted out of his reach, sheer momentum carried him headlong into the dim reaches of Salts and Syrups. Gravity delivered him along with a quantity of gummy liquid and gritty crystallines to the floor. Settled in a sticky puddle of wreckage, Olliphant glanced around with a reddish, enraged expression. Besides salt and syrup, there was blood in his eye.

At a distance sufficiently out of reach, yet insultingly near, the bottle was bobbing about amusedly. Indeed, Olliphant distinctly heard a soft chuckling sound coming from its direction. With a jungle roar he surged up from the floor and launched a second attack. This netted him another disastrous collision, this time with the glassware department. The Pharmacy was swiftly being transformed into a scene of chaos.

In the interval, the bottle had retreated to a position by the doorway and was humming maddeningly to itself. Suddenly it burst into full-throated song.

"Goin' to Louisiana," it warbled, "for a case of good whis-kee! Goin' to Louisiana with a hussy on mah knee!"

Olliphant settled himself sadly on an untidy mound of rubble and began to brood. There was no use denying it; the thing was just too much for him. As he watched the bottle bob back and forth in time with the idiot song, a large tear trickled down his cheek. Olliphant Gunn was just a broken reed in the holocaust of Life, and his ruination had come about through a mere mad bottle. The man began to blubber hopelessly.

It was during this heart-rending climax that the nurse, a small blonde, appeared at the doorway and stared into the pharmacy with large wondering blue eyes.

The invisible George, who had been enjoying his own singing to the utmost, stopped at the sight of the newcomer in mid verse. Things, he decided, were beginning to look up. Warmed by the liquor, George was dazzled and enchanted.

Unfortunately the nurse was neither of these. Striding through the door, she stepped into a trickle of syrup and skidded dangerously toward Olliphant. George, feeling that things were moving in the wrong direction entirely, seized upon the floundering blonde with one deft swoop of his invisible arm and lifted her to dry ground. It was a moment before he was able to account for the girl's shrill screams.

A period of stupefied silence followed as the nurse glanced around suspiciously. As a girl who, in line of business, had experienced considerable traffic with men, she was disposed to know to the exact moment when she had been forcibly clutched by a masculine hand. Also, which only made matters worse, she was a girl who knew where she had been clutched and why.

In looking around for masculine hands available for clutching, a quick survey told the nurse that the room inventoried two and both of them were the exclusive property of Olliphant Gunn. Geographically it seemed impossible that either of these hands could have performed the recent clutching, but in her anger the nurse was not the one to quibble over details. Seizing up a large crystal beaker she unhesitatingly smashed it to splinters on Olliphant's skull with one smart whack. Olliphant looked up through his tears.

"What you wanna do that for, lady?" he sobbed.

"You know what for," the nurse gritted, looking around for further ammunition. "And that's only the beginning. If you ever...." She stopped as she suddenly encountered the floating bottle. Instinctively, or perhaps out of sheer surprise, she grabbed for it. At any rate, it was not until she had gotten a grip on the thing that she realized that this was a bottle not properly on the up and up. This fact was brought home to her even more clearly when the bottle refused to budge in her grasp and even showed a definite tendency to pull away.

For a long moment the nurse merely stared at the bottle with a wondering gaze. Then slowly an expression of determination came into her pretty face. Squaring her stance, she took hold of the offending container with both hands.

"It's no use," Olliphant said from the floor. "That bottle's mean."

Heedless, the nurse braced herself and tugged with all her strength. The bottle gave by a foot, then lurched drunkenly in her grasp. Down on the floor the rivulet of syrup became disturbed, as though feet were churning through it desperately seeking to regain lost traction.

Suddenly the bottle gave way and the nurse toppled backwards into Olliphant's lap. Olliphant received this new burden with resignation and a grunt. Across the room, however, there was another sound, as of a body coming in swift contact with the floor.

"Damn!" the nurse said hotly, turning to Olliphant. "Keep your big oafish hands off me! Stop reaching."

"I'm only reaching for the bottle," Olliphant said. "It's mine."

"It didn't feel like it," the nurse retorted. "It felt more like...." She hesitated as from the corner of her eye she caught a glimpse of a long body sprawled on the floor. At first glimpse it seemed that the body had no head, but as she looked more closely she saw that it did, though she had the peculiar sensation that it had just come into being. Handing Olliphant the bottle she got to her feet and approached the prone figure. Noting that it was dressed for surgery, she stood staring down at it quizzically for a moment.

"Holy smoke!" she breathed. "It's Pillsworth!" She turned to Olliphant. "Come on and help me. We've got to get him down to Surgery right away!"

Marc felt himself rising through the last shredded mists of unconsciousness. He tried to open his eyes but a glaring light made the attempt too painful.

"Give him the anaesthetic," a voice said close by.

Panic pulsed through Marc's body. They were going to operate! Necessity gave him a surge of strength and he sat up, staring wildly at the three doctors gathered over him.

"No!" he said. "Don't! I'm all right!"

"Lie down, Mr. Pillsworth," the doctor nearest advised. "Just lie down and it will all be over with in a minute."

"But I'm all right!" Marc said desperately. He glared around at the nurse holding the mask for the anaesthetic. "Get away from me!"

"Hysteria," the doctor said. "Quite understandable after what he's been through. He'll have to be restrained."

The other two nodded in agreement. Watching Marc closely, they took up positions on either side of him. The first doctor moved to a place at Marc's feet.

"When I give the signal," he whispered, "we'll all grab at once."

"I heard that!" Marc yelled. "Stay away from me, you croakers, or I'll...!"

"Okay!" the doctor cried. "Grab!"

The scene over the operating table, for a moment thereafter, was a living abstraction in flailing arms and legs. Though Marc managed at one point to insert his thumb into the eye of the first doctor and his foot into the mouth of the second, the odds were too great against him. In the end he found himself pinioned helplessly to the table.

"All right, nurse," the doctor said, "fit the mask to his face. As soon as the body's relaxed...."

"You leave that body alone," a pert feminine voice said tartly. "That body happens to belong to me, for what it's worth, and I don't want it tampered with. I particularly don't want it relaxed. I want it alert and twitching in every fibre, and if you don't leave it alone I'm going to lay into the bunch of you bare fisted!"

A tense silence overtook the group around the operating table. The doctors looked at each other, then turned to observe the dismaying redhead who had mysteriously appeared just behind them.

"How did you get in here?" the first doctor said uncertainly.

"I'm the owner of that body you are flinging about there," Toffee said hotly, shifting the gadget under her arm and placing a hand on her hip. "That body's mine right down to the last molecule and I've come to fight for it if I have to."

Marc sat up under the relaxed grips of the doctors, his face scarlet. "Why do you have to go around telling people things like that?" he asked plaintively.

"I could put it another way," Toffee said. "Dirtier. For instance...."

"No!" Marc cried. "It's dirty enough already."

The doctor turned to Marc. "Who is this woman?"

"I don't know," Marc lied quickly. "I've never seen her before in my life. Why don't you throw her out of here?"

"Why, you lying old ingrate!" Toffee flamed. "For two cents I'd climb up there on that table and perform a few operations of my own!"

"Madam!" Marc said distantly, "whoever you are, do you really think you ought to take on in public in this brazen way?"

"I'll take you on in public, no holds barred, you thin-nosed phony," Toffee gritted. "You don't know what brazen is yet!"

The doctor turned to the nurse. "Call the orderlies and have this woman removed," he said. "And have them give her a blanket or something to wear. We can't delay the operation another moment. I'll give the anaesthetic myself."

"Hey!" Marc yelled. "Toffee...."

"Go ahead, doctor," Toffee said with evil satisfaction. "Rip him open. Slit him from ear to ear and top to bottom. I won't lift a finger."

"No!" Marc cried. He turned to Toffee in panic. "It'll mean the end of both of us!"

"Pardon my girlish laughter," Toffee said. "It's worth it, dogmeat, to see you get yours after the way you've treated me. Either you fork over that lanky frame of yours, or you're going to be out of frames entirely. That's the way it stacks up."

"Do you have to be so vulgar about it all?" Marc asked weakly. "With all this talk about bodies and frames, I'm beginning to feel like just so many soup bones displayed on a counter."

"That's exactly the parallel I've been searching for," Toffee said complacently. "In fact if there's anything vulgar in all this, it is your body. Come to think of it, it suddenly strikes me as so vulgar I'm no longer interested in it."

"Please!" Marc cried as the doctors gripped him to the table. "Use that gadget of yours—anything! Please!"

"Sorry, son," Toffee said. "I guess you'll remember after this never to forget a lady's name."

Marc looked up and saw the mask bearing down toward his face. "Toffee!" he yelled. "For Pete's sake!"

The mask miraculously paused in its descent, stopped. The action around the table came to a sharp halt. Eyes swiveled toward the door. Marc turned on his side just in time to observe Olliphant Gunn lumbering into the room under the weight of George's upper quarters.

The nurse, her blonde hair in a state of dishevelment, followed bearing the feet and legs. Arriving at a position inside the door, they deposited their burden on the floor where it instantly curled over on its side and emitted a sodden snore.

"It's Mr. Pillsworth," the nurse said breathlessly, shoving back her hair. "We brought him straight down without waiting for the orderlies." She looked up into the stunned faces staring back at her from around the table. Then her gaze fell to Marc.

"My God!" she gasped.

"Good Lord!" Marc groaned, taking in the stupid, smiling face of George.

"Jesus!" breathed the doctor.

"Amen," Toffee put in glibly. "Who's taking up the collection?"

Marc turned to Toffee. "It's that gosh-awful spook again!" he breathed. "He would have to show up now!"

"Actually," Toffee said, "he could not have shown up at a better time. I really was going to help you out, but now we have George."

Marc's eyes brightened with slow realization. "Of course," he said, then turned as he felt the doctor's hand on his shoulder. "Yes?"

"Mr. Pillsworth," the doctor said tensely. "You are Mr. Pillsworth, aren't you?"

Marc smiled with hypocritical innocence. "No," he said. "That's what I've been trying to get through your thick skull." He pointed to George. "That's Pillsworth there on the floor. And if you ask me he's in a pretty critical condition. You'd better start sawing away at him right now before he pops off of natural causes and robs you of the sport."

"Oh, my word!" the doctor gasped. "How can I ever tell you...!"

"Come," Marc said grandly, turning to Toffee, "let's leave this blood-splattered slaughter house."

"I'm all for it," Toffee said gaily. "Let's flee."

"I thought you didn't know that woman," the doctor said confusedly.

"I begin to recognize her now," Marc replied urbanely. "It was my horror at the crass brutality of the medical profession that drove her tender memory from my mind."

"But, I ..." the doctor began hopelessly.

"Say no more," Toffee said airily. "You can tell your side of it in court."

The two of them, linking arms, started toward the door. They were just about to sweep out of the room when suddenly the situation hit a new snag. It was at this juncture that George opened his eyes, waggled them around woozily, then reared up in a sitting position, staring at Marc.

"You!" he said with a strangled gasp. "You're alive!" The way he said it, it sounded like a hideous accusation.

Marc stopped short, caught off guard. "Of course I'm alive," he said.

"But you can't be!" George wailed, great tears of awful disappointment welling in his eyes. "It isn't fair! You have to be dead!"

"I'm sorry," Marc said, somewhat at a loss. "I'm not."

"It's rotten," George said with drunken bitterness. "It's cruel. I'm probably the only ghost alive who's haunted by a human!"

"Well, it's a distinction," Toffee offered hopefully.

"Just a minute," the doctor put in suspiciously. "What's going on here? What are you people talking about?"

Marc nodded sadly toward George. "The poor chap's delirious," he said. "We're only trying to humor him."

"Oh, yeah?" the doctor said. His gaze moved from Marc to George and back to Marc again. "Just which one of you really is Marc Pillsworth?"

Marc and George pointed at each other in unison. "He is!" they chorused.

The doctor passed a trembling hand over his forehead and lifted his gaze to the ceiling. A tremor of frustration passed through his sturdy frame. He turned to the small blonde.

"Is Mrs. Pillsworth still in the waiting room?" he asked.

"I believe so, sir," the nurse said.

"Will you please call her in here to make an identification?"

"No!" Marc said, glancing uneasily in Toffee's direction. "Don't do that...! I mean there's no need to disturb Mrs. Pillsworth. Obviously this pitiful creature here on the floor is Pillsworth. Just by looking at him you can see he's under the weather."

At this George drew himself up sedately, stiffling a hiccough. "Nothing of the sort," he said piously. "I'm in perfectly splendid condition."

"Go ahead, nurse," the doctor said firmly. "Bring Mrs. Pillsworth."

"Yes, sir," the nurse said, and departed.

"But, you can't afford to delay the operation that long," Marc said. "You said so yourself. Anyone with half an eye can see that this poor man is getting more feeble by the second. You owe it to him to slit him open immediately...!" In speaking Marc had paused to look at George. The result was that the words froze on his lips. Never had he spoken more truly; George was not only getting more feeble but more non-existent by the second. His legs had evaporated to the knees, his arms were entirely gone. Where his eyes should have been there were now only empty sockets. Staring at this awesome demonstration, the doctor tottered slightly and braced himself against the operating table.

"Oh, good Lord!" he moaned.

"Stop that, you coward," Marc said angrily. "Stop sneaking out like that!"

In response, George merely dissolved his head to a grinning skull. "Gotta go now," he chortled hollowly. "Gotta be corking off." He turned to the others and clacked his teeth menacingly. Olliphant Gunn was the first to snap.

"There's just so much that human flesh and blood can stand," the poor man wailed, and leaping to the operating table he snatched up the anaesthetic mask and plunged it over his face.

"Come on," Toffee said urgently, tugging at Marc's sleeve. "Let's get out of here before that cheap ghost sticks us with an operation."

Marc jolted into action. Under Toffee's guidance, he lunged out the door and started down the hall.

"Let's leave this place," Toffee said. "Let's go somewhere where we can have fun."

"We can't leave like this," Marc said, indicating their brief attire. "We can't go out on the street half naked."

"We can say we're artists' models on our way to work," Toffee said. "Come on."

Marc didn't pause to debate the point as a cry from the operating room indicated that the doctors had recovered from their dismay with an urgent sense of loss.

Together, he and Toffee began to run. They proceeded swiftly around a corner and down a flight of steps to the floor below. Suddenly Marc stopped.

"What's wrong?" Toffee asked.

"Listen," Marc said. "What's that?"

Toffee listened. Descending footsteps sounded on the stairs behind them. She whirled about. The stairway was unoccupied.

"George," she said disgustedly. "He's following us."

The footsteps stopped guiltily.

"Okay," Marc said, addressing himself to the empty stairs. "It's no use pretending you're not there. You might as well show yourself."

A subdued hiccough echoed out of the emptiness, but that was the extent of George's communication.

"If you're entertaining any notion of bumping me off so you can stay here," Marc warned, "just forget it. I'm alive and I intend to stay that way."

"Just ignore him," Toffee said. "He's bound to get bored and go away if we refuse to pay any attention to him."

The discussion went no further, for suddenly there were sounds of approaching pursuit from above. Grabbing Toffee's arm, Marc raced ahead, down the hall and around another corner. A third set of footsteps continued to sound in their wake.

"He's still with us," Toffee panted.

"The vulture," Marc said. "He's just hoping they'll catch me. Run faster."

Renewing their efforts, they left behind another stretch of corridor, turned another corner. There they stopped abruptly. Ahead a group of orderlies loomed before them.

"That's them!" a young athletic type yelled. "That's Pillsworth!"

"To hell with Pillsworth!" a companion responded. "Get the dame! She's practically all skin, just like they said!"

Marc and Toffee darted back around the corner.

"Surrounded!" Toffee panted. "I think that sums up the situation."

"What'll we do?" Marc asked confusedly.

Toffee pointed to a door marked JANITOR'S CLOSET. "In there," she said. "Quick!"

They ran to the door, threw it open and darted inside just as their pursuers surged into view at either end of the hallway. They paused in the darkness to listen. As the sounds of the chase continued outside they turned their attention to their new surroundings. The air was close with the heady aroma of cleaning fluid, wax polish and disinfectant.

"Isn't there a light in here?" Toffee asked.

"I can't find one," Marc said. "I've looked all over."

"Well," Toffee said, "at least it's a place to relax for a bit and catch our breath. I just wish it didn't smell so oppressively clean. I was hoping for a bit of dirt tonight—of the right sort, of course."

"You stay on your side of the closet," Marc said, "and I'll stay on mine."

"We'll never get anywhere that way," Toffee said. "Suppose Romeo had taken that attitude with Juliet?"

"They'd both have lived a lot longer," Marc said.

"I suspect that George is in here with us," Toffee said. "I fancy I hear him breathing back there amongst the mops and brooms."

"I suppose he is," Marc said. There was a pause, followed by a number of rattling sounds. "What are you doing?"

"There's a whole shelf of bottles over there," Toffee said. "I'm just sniffing about to see if there's anything interesting. And there is. The janitor has strong tastes. Irish whiskey, I should judge, by the jolt of it. Have some?"

Marc paused, took note of the new vapors overriding those of the cleaning fluids.

"Well," he said, "it is a little drafty in this nightgown."

Toffee handed him the bottle in the darkness. "Bottoms," she said pleasantly.

"The expression," Marc said sedately, "is bottoms up."

"Up or down," Toffee said, "it doesn't matter. I was just tossing in bottoms at random. Assorted bottoms, so to speak. If you prefer them up, you'll get no argument out of me."

There was a smacking sound as Marc lowered the bottle from his lips. "Let's just skip the bottoms," he said, "and go on to something else."

"Sounds pretty giddy," Toffee mused, "all this leaping about over bottoms. However...."

"Look outside," Marc suggested wearily, "and see if they're still out there."

"Okay," Toffee said. A small shaft of light darted in and out of the closet as she opened the door and closed it again. "They're churning about like cattle in a loading chute," she reported. "Where are you?"

"Sitting on the floor," Marc said. "I'm beginning to find this place restful."

"You're beginning to stink of Irish whiskey," Toffee said. "Stop gulping at that bottle like a great fish and hand it back."

"I wonder if we should offer George a drink?" Marc said with growing amiability. "I definitely heard him breathing back there just now. Sounds a trifle wheezy, I'm afraid."

"I think we ought to banish George from our minds," Toffee said. "Besides, now that I've got the bottle back I don't intend to be free about handing it around for quite some time."

"All right," Marc said. "Have it your way. George is banished."

There was a prolonged period of contented silence, broken intermittently by faint gurgling sounds, first from one side of the closet then the other. It was Toffee who finally spoke.

"By the way," she said, "what was all that nonsense about your getting yourself shot?"

"Oh, that," Marc said negligently. "It's a bunch of subversives. They have a subtle plan to poison the minds of the public against the government—with the government's permission. I went on the air to expose them, but they had me shot to stop me. There was this dark fellow with a scar over his left eye in the control booth...." He paused. "Holy smoke! I forgot. This is serious business, isn't it?"

"It sounds like it," Toffee said. "How far did you get in your broadcast?"

"I didn't even get started. I suppose I ought to try to do it again."

"If they think you're dead or dying, they won't be watching for you any more."

"That's right," Marc said. "Let's get out of here."

"Okay," Toffee said. "Just take your arms away from my waist so I can get up."

"Huh?" Marc said. "I don't have my arms around your waist."

"You haven't!" Toffee said. "Didn't you take the gadget from under my arm either?"

"Of course not."

"It's that sneaky George," Toffee snorted. "And when I think of how I was enjoying it...!" She turned in the darkness. "Let go of me before I lose my temper, George. So help me, you spurious spectre, I'll twist your head off when I get ahold of you."

There was no answer but apparently the threat had taken hold; there were sounds of Toffee getting to her feet.

"That'll hold him," she said. "Look outside and see how things are. I want that gadget back."

Marc fumbled his way to the door, opened it a crack, then shoved it all the way open.

"All clear," he said and turned back to Toffee. "Can you see him back there? Is he visible?"

"I can just make him out," Toffee said, peering into the back of the closet. "He's sort of lurking."

"Okay, you rat," Marc said. "Come out of there and give it to us. Snap into it."

There were shuffling sounds from the shadows and slowly a figure emerged into the light. It was a dark, heavy figure. The face was swarthy and there was a scar over the left eye. The man leered at the two in the doorway.

"Okay," he said. "Keep your shirts on. I'm going to give it to you all right. I'm going to give it to you good."

He moved closer. In his left hand was Toffee's gadget, in his right an enormous revolver.

The swarthy man closed the door to the storeroom, locked it, and shaking his head, moved purposefully down the hallway to a door at the front of the warehouse. He stopped and knocked, and as an unintelligible grunt issued from inside, he opened the door and entered.

"I got 'em," he announced.

Across the room a portly gentleman with a white mane and great shaggy black eyebrows looked up from a sheaf of papers on the desk before him.

"Them?" he said. "I told you just to pick up Pillsworth and finish him off."

The swarthy man glanced away, embarrassed. "I couldn't finish him off, congressman. He wasn't even started. I went to the hospital, like you told me, to make sure about Pillsworth—and I was going along the hall lookin' for this place where they cut 'em up—and all of a sudden there was a racket like a lot of people runnin' around and yellin', so I ducked into this closet to keep under cover. Well, I was only in there a little bit when all of a sudden somebody yanks the door open and this guy and this dame come shaggin' in with hardly any clothes on. So I kept quiet and listened."

"I'm not interested in the sordid doings behind the scenes at the hospital," Congressman Entwerp interrupted. "Stick to the pertinent facts."

"Oh, no, it wasn't nothin' like that. I just listened and pretty soon it come up in what they were sayin' that this guy with the dame is none other than Pillsworth himself. And believe me, congressman, I can't explain it, but there ain't a thing wrong with him—physically."

"Physically?" the congressman asked. "What do you mean?"

"The guy's mentally a mess," the thug said. "So's this dame with him. She's a terrific lookin' little job, but crazy as a coot. It's a dirty shame."

"How do you know they're crazy?"

"Just ask Hank. He drove the car. All the way over from the hospital they kept talkin' to this guy who wasn't there, and bawlin' him out for followin' them everyplace. They called him George, and they carried on a regular conversation with him. It was weird, leave me tell you. But one thing, this guy George, whoever he is, is lucky he doesn't exist; the way that little dame kept tellin' him what she was going to do to him if he didn't show himself and help them out of this jam was enough to curl your hair. Pillsworth was all the time tellin' this imaginary character what a ghoul he was to be hangin' around just to see him get killed. They're both nuts, boss, an' no lie!"

"Maybe it was just an act," Congressman Entwerp suggested skeptically.

"I don't think so. You'd really have to feel mean to say some of the stuff those two was dishin' out to this George." The thug paused and withdrew Toffee's thought gadget from his pocket. "Look what I lifted off the dame in the closet." He placed it on the desk before the congressman. "She's plenty hot to get it back. You'd think it was somethin' worth somethin'."

"What is it?"

"I don't know. Some sort of two-way flashlight, I guess. Just a piece of junk."

The congressman bent his shaggy head close over the gadget and examined it minutely. He picked it up, weighed it in his hand, then shrugged and dropped it negligently into his pocket.

"Let's have a look at these two crackpots," he said, rising from his chair. "We'll have to dispose of them, of course."

"Okay," the thug said. "I just hope they've got things settled with this George before we get there."

Back in the storeroom, however, events were lurching ahead in a most uncertain manner. Things had started with an air of mild strangeness and mounted swiftly to a state of wild-eyed madness.

Finding themselves confined and in the hands of blood-thirsting murderers, Marc and Toffee had paused only momentarily to survey their musty prison, the cases of wines, brandies and whiskies stacked along the walls, before returning to the subject uppermost in their minds. Toffee, doubling her fists, addressed herself to the room at large.

"George," she said evenly, "we know you're with us. You gave yourself away in the car when you let that foot materialize, and you'll give yourself away again. And when you do, brother, I'm going to kick your teeth out one at a time and have them made into shirt studs. I'm going to...!"

"It's no use threatening him," Marc interrupted. "He's got the advantage. He's just hanging around waiting for me to be killed. And he'll probably have his way before they're done with us."

In answer, a stifled yawn echoed from somewhere in back of them. Toffee whirled about.

"Listen to him!" she fumed. "Now he's rubbing it in! That was the most put-on yawn I ever heard."

She started forward, but Marc put out a hand to stop her. He drew her toward the corner.

"Listen," he said in lowered tones, "I've just thought of something. Maybe we can trap him."

"We certainly should be able to," Toffee agreed hotly. "George is pure rat, through and through. If we only had some cheese...."

"What about whiskey?" Marc asked. "There's plenty of it here, and where George is concerned it's the best bait in the world."

"I wonder why he hasn't been at it already?" Toffee said, surveying the crates along the walls. "The place is practically seething with the stuff."

"He's too smart," Marc said. "He doesn't want to show where he is. By the time he opened a crate and got the bottle out we'd have him located. He's afraid we'd slug him."

"Of course we'd slug him," Toffee said. "I personally intend to bop the living bejesus out of him at the very first opportunity. What difference does that make?"

"He knows what we're after," Marc explained. "He knows we want him to show himself to these people so they won't know which one of us is me. And look what happened to George the last time he was knocked out."

Toffee looked up with a smile of understanding. "Of course!" she said. "He lost control of his ectoplasm and materialized."

"Exactly," Marc said, "and it might happen again. Then it would not be just a matter of confusing them with the two of us. If George materialized we could leave him to take the rap all by himself."

"Wonderful!" Toffee said. "Let's do it. It would serve everybody right. How do we trap him?"

"It's simple," Marc said. "We open the crates and get the bottles out for George. At first we pretend to forget about him; we sit around and act like we're swilling down whiskey by the gallon and having the time of our lives. This will drive George close to madness, locked in a room with two drinkers and no drop for himself. When we figure he's sufficiently worked up, we'll weaken and offer him a drink. He won't be able to resist. While one of us hands over his bottle, the other takes a fix on George's position and bashes the daylights out of him with this." Marc permitted himself a smile of pride. "You see?"

"Marvelous," Toffee said. "I particularly love that part at the end, where George gets bashed. Can I be the basher?"

"Okay," Marc agreed. "Let's go. And remember, act as though you've never enjoyed drinking anything so much in your whole life."

With tremendous nonchalance, the two moved across the room to the stacked crates.

"My, my," Marc said in a declamatory, radio announcer's tone, "what do you suppose we have here in all these interesting-looking crates?"

"I should think," Toffee said on cue, "that they contain bottles of fine old tangy whiskey. Of course that's just a random guess, but I believe it's a shrewd one. Shall we have a look?"

"Oh, let's!" Marc cried, with a false grin of eagerness. He turned slightly in what he presumed to be George's direction. "A drink of fine old tangy whiskey would certainly taste mighty good just now."

"I can think of nothing better!" Toffee said, smacking her lips loudly. "My mouth fairly waters!"

Marc reached one of the crates down and, placing it on the floor, pried up one of the slats. He reached out two bottles and handed one toward Toffee.

"Well, well," he cried with studied joviality. "Look what I found!"

Toffee clapped her hands after the manner of a witless child. "Oh, goody!" she gurgled. "Some of that wonderful fine old tangy whiskey! Just what I hoped for!" She took the bottle, opened it and took a swallow. She blanched and covered her face with her hand. "Ugh!" she rasped.

"Yes, sir!" Marc said, lifting his bottle to his mouth. "Some of the finest, oldest and tangyest fine old tangy whiskey there is." He rolled his eyes in broad anticipation. "Yes, sir, bedad!"

"It's a good thing you said that before you tasted the stuff," Toffee hissed between clenched teeth. "You'd never have the breath afterward."

The warning came too late; Marc had already downed a large swallow. He closed his eyes and gagged. Like Toffee, however, he forced a frozen smile through his tears and rubbed his stomach luxuriously. "Umm-umm," he managed to say. "It sure hits the spot."

"And leaves it in ruins," Toffee agreed. "They must cook this stuff up in old lye vats."

"Keep drinking," Marc whispered urgently. "And look happy."

"Okay," Toffee said grimly. "I'll die with a smile on my face, but it'll be the lie of the century." She lifted the bottle gamely and drank. "Oh, boy!" she rasped through drawn lips, "this whiskey is the answer to a drunkard's prayer."

Marc drank dutifully in turn. "You said it!" he announced, tears streaming from his eyes. "It's delicious!"

"I could go on drinking it forever," Toffee wheezed, taking another gulp and clutching her throat. "It's so smooth!"

"Makes you want more and more," Marc said, shaking his head to clear it after a third libation. "It gives you a real boost."

"Let's not carry it too far," Toffee whispered. "If I drink any more of this mange medicine I won't be able to hit the barnside of a broad."

"Broadside of a barn," Marc corrected her weakly. "But you're right. We'd better make the pitch while we're still conscious."

Toffee nodded and made a great show of registering happy inspiration. "Say," she cried, "you know who would just love this whiskey?"

"No," Marc replied like the second part in a minstrel skit. "Who?"

"George!" Toffee said. "You remember good old George?"

Marc nodded vigorously. "Wouldn't he be just crazy about whiskey like this?"

"He certainly would. Crazy mad, he'd be. Isn't it too bad he's not here?" Then Toffee brightened. "But perhaps he is! You never can tell about good old George."

"But when we were talking to him earlier he didn't answer."

"Perhaps he misunderstood something one of us said," Toffee suggested. "Maybe he didn't understand our type of humor and got offended. You know, like when I said I was going to gouge his eyes out? A harmless remark to most people, but perhaps not so to good old George."

"True," Marc said sagely. "George always was sensitive." He glanced around the room. "George?" he called. "If you're here, old man, how about having a drink with us? If we said anything to hurt your feelings we certainly didn't mean to."

He paused to listen. There was a hesitant shuffling across the room.

"Well ..." a voice said uneasily.

Marc and Toffee exchanged glances of triumph.

"You mustn't miss out on this, old man," Marc cajoled. "You really mustn't."

"And it will make such a nice friendly gesture," Toffee put in, "to show that you forgive us our thoughtless little jibes."

"Well," the voice returned, a shade less hesitant. "I am a little dry."

"Of course you are," Marc said jovially, "and we have the very thing to bring you comfort and contentment. Just step over here and I'll give you this whole bottle."

"No tricks?" George asked warily.

"George!" Toffee said, thoroughly scandalized, "how can you even entertain such a notion?"

"Just to show you," Marc said, "why don't you stay invisible? You're perfectly safe that way."

"Okay," George agreed. "Just hold out the bottle."

"Right-oh," Marc said and turned to Toffee. "Give it everything," he whispered. Toffee nodded.

As Marc held out the bottle, Toffee sighted on the area in line with his hand, on the principle that George, being a duplicate of Marc, his head would be on the same level. The best strategy, she felt, was to concentrate on this area as swiftly and violently as possible. She held the bottle in readiness and when, a moment later, the bottle jogged in Marc's hand, she was prepared. She swung as hard as she could in a wide horizontal swipe. About half way, the bottle jarred to an abrupt stop and shattered, spewing liquid and glass in all directions. This was subsequently followed by a surprised moan and a heavy thudding sound in the vicinity of the floor.

"Got him!" Toffee cried jubilantly. "Smashed him right on the button!" She dropped the jagged neck of the bottle daintily to the floor.

"He's still invisible," Marc said worriedly. "I hope there'll be developments."

Developments came almost immediately, and they were well worth watching, though hardly the sight for sore eyes. Marc's calculations had been correct. Surprised, as it were, into unconsciousness, George had completely lost control of his ectoplasm. The trouble, though, was that instead of splashing out through his body all of a piece, it trickled out in fits and starts.

What appeared on the floor, under Marc's and Toffee's watchful eyes, was not George in total, but a sort of jig-saw George in which many of the vital pieces had been omitted. While one could be grateful for George's head, there was bound to be a pang of regret for the neck which had failed to appear.

An arm lay to the left, with only a finger or two to indicate that it had once blossomed a hand. Had there ever been an expression to the effect that half a torso was better than none, George had disproved it beyond measure; a torso, apparently severed from the collar bone to the mid-riff was so much worse than no torso at all as to be positively hair-raising. A random foot here, an errant knee cap there only garnished the over-all picture of hideous human butchery. With a shudder of revulsion, Toffee turned from the awful sight.

"Leave it to George," she said, "just leave it to that monster to be as revolting as possible."

"I don't suppose it's really his fault," Marc said fairly, "but I wish he were invisible again."

It was at this moment that the congressman and his henchman, having completed their discussion in the front of the warehouse, arrived at the door of the storeroom and fitted a key to the lock.

"Duck!" Toffee said. "Get behind those crates!"

"What about you?"

"I'm going to get my invention back. Besides they can't hurt me, and the important thing is to give you a chance to escape."

"Okay," Marc nodded and faded into the dimness behind the crates.

Toffee moved to the nearest stack of boxes, boosted herself atop them and leaned back in an attitude of relaxed languor. She watched from the corner of her eye as the door swung open and the congressman and the thug advanced into the room. She lifted her gaze dreamily to the ceiling and began to hum quietly to herself.

"There she is, boss," the thug said. "There's the dame, up there."

"My word!" Congressman Entwerp said. "Where did Pillsworth ever pick her up?"

"In a Turkish bath, I guess, before they passed out the towels."

Toffee turned slowly and observed the two with heavy disdain.

"Please be quiet," she drawled, "you're disturbing my meditations."

"Where's Pillsworth?" the thug asked.

Toffee shrugged. "Somewhere around, I suppose."

"Okay, sister," the thug growled, "cut out the jazz. Where is he?"

"You're sure you want to know?"

"We insist," Congressman Entwerp said.

"Then just step nearer," Toffee said with an airy wave, "and feast your eyes. You will find Mr. Pillsworth—more or less—on the floor, just to the right of these boxes. I'm sure you'll excuse him if he doesn't rise to greet you."

Warily, the two men edged closer. Then suddenly the thug, catching sight of George in his disconnected condition, stopped short. His mouth worked soundlessly, and his eyes rolled loosely in their sockets. The congressman, not yet aware of George, looked at him.

"What's the matter with you?" he asked shortly. "Why are you standing there making faces? Stop that and...!"

The tirade ended abruptly as the congressman's gaze fell to George. He lost his breath in a thin wheeze.

For a long moment the two men simply goggled, then slowly they turned away.

"You fool!" the congressman screamed. "I only told you to finish him off, not to hack him up into cutlets!"

"But I didn't!" the thug said shakenly. "He was all right when I locked him in here."

"Then, who...!"

Together, the two of them turned and regarded Toffee with incredulous eyes. Toffee returned their stares with innocent directness.

"Yes, gentlemen?" she murmured.

"Did you...?" the congressman began, then broke off with a shudder.

"Did I what?" Toffee asked demurely.

"What the congressman means," the thug said in a whisper, "is did you ... do that?"

"Oh, that," Toffee said. She returned her gaze thoughtfully to the ceiling as though trying to remember. Finally she shook her head. "No," she said. "I'm certain that's not one of my jobs. Too messy."

The men gaped.

"Holy smoke!" the thug quavered. "What happened to him?"

"Who knows?" Toffee shrugged. "Maybe he has some horrible disease. I figure it's his business."

"Good God!" the congressman breathed. "We've got to get him off our hands. We'll have to be careful, though. The hospital has the entire police force out looking for him. It's on the radio. If we were caught with him in that condition the party wouldn't like it."

"Nobody would like it," the thug said. "Shall we dump him in the river?"

The congressman shook his head. "Too many patrolmen around. There must be...." His voice trailed off into thoughtful silence. Finally he nodded with decision. "We won't try to hide him. We'll deliver him to the police just as he is—in an automobile crash. The girl too."

"Huh?" the thug said. "How do you mean?"

"It's simple enough. Pillsworth looks like a crash victim, so why don't we just let him be one? Go get a sack or something to carry him out in." He turned and moved toward the door. "I'll have Hank fix up one of the cars."

"Good night, boss," the thug said plaintively, following after him, "you mean I've got to pick him up—with my hands!"

The moment they were gone, locking the door after them, Toffee jumped down from her perch and Marc appeared from the shadows.

"Do you know who that was?" Marc asked excitedly.

"The old bird with the sable hair-do?"

Marc nodded. "It's Congressman Entwerp. I should have known he was behind this mess. And that isn't all; those crates of cheap whiskey are just a front. Underneath there's enough bacteria culture to wipe out the whole country. These boys are planning mass murder!"

"Also individual murder," Toffee said.

"What?"

"They're going to arrange an auto crash. When the wreckage is sorted out George and I will be prominent amongst the demolished extras."

"Good grief!"

"It's nothing to worry about," Toffee said. "After all, they can't possibly kill me—or George either, for that matter. In the meantime you can contact the police and see that they're arrested. There's just one thing though; you're going to have to get the police without letting the police get you."

"Huh?"

"It seems the entire force is out scouring the city for you, and I get the impression that they're supposed to rush you along to the operating room without messing around with any conversation."

"Golly," Marc said. "How am I going to work it? Even if I get a chance to tell them about Entwerp, they'll just think I'm delirious."

"Be your own bait," Toffee suggested. "Entwerp will be busy murdering George and me. All you have to do is get the cops to chase you to the scene of the crime so they can catch him red-handed. I'll see to it that the door's left unlocked long enough for you to get out of here...." She stopped as the key sounded again in the lock. "Anyway, work it out as you go along, and I'll see you later..."

"What took so long?" the congressman demanded. He was standing by the green sedan, holding the door open.

"It was the dame," the thug said breathlessly. "When I turned to lock up the storeroom, she let out a yip and took off. I had to chase her all over the joint before I caught her."

At his side, Toffee shook her head to get the hair out of her eyes. "I just wanted a little exercise to get up the circulation," she said.

"We certainly circulated," the thug agreed sourly. "All over the place."

"You didn't leave the storeroom open?" the congressman asked.

"I went back and locked it."

"I see you got Pillsworth in the car."

"Yeah," the thug said. "But he handled awful funny, like he was all strung together with invisible wire. I had a job spreadin' him out in the seat."

The congressman looked at him sharply. "You've probably been drinking that dummy whiskey again," he said. "Anyway, let's get going. The girl will have to drive."

"I don't know how to drive," Toffee said. "Besides, I haven't got a license."

"Never mind, sister," the thug said, "that's even better." He nudged her toward the door of the car, as the congressman moved off into the night. Toffee gazed inward at the dismembered George sprawled across the seat.

"Do I have to get in there with him?" she asked.

"The boss doesn't want you to be lonesome," the thug said.

"I'd rather be lonesome," Toffee said, but she got into the car anyway.

The thug closed the door after her and leaned through the window.

"Just so you'll know," he said, "I'd better explain. This car hasn't any brakes, and the steering is fixed. It's okay now, but after a few minutes it will break and the car will be out of control. We have it timed out with the curve at the end of the speedway, the one called Dead Man's Curve. By the time you reach that the wheel will be just about as much good to you as a set of knitting needles. In other words, you're going to drive due south with your foot to the floor and crack up on the curve. No one's missed that curve yet and lived."

"There's always a first time," Toffee said brightly.

"Don't count on it, sugar. And just to make sure you do what you're told, the congressman and me will be alongside in the congressman's car. I personally will be holding a rod aimed at your head, so don't get notions. Also, we want to be around to report the accident."

Toffee nodded approvingly. "It only seems the sort of thing any good citizen would do," she said.

The gunman stared at her. "Too bad a good looking dame like you has to be so wacky."

"We all have our little flaws," Toffee said chattily. "That's life."

"Aren't you even worried?"

Toffee shook her head. "I've always wanted to learn to drive," she said, smiling.

"Oh, my God!" the thug moaned. "Maybe, it's best; you're sure to kill yourself sooner or later anyway."

"Of course," Toffee said, patting his hand. "I don't want you to blame yourself. Just consider you're doing a public service."

Meanwhile, a lanky figure had emerged warily from the warehouse and was lurking, in a twitchy sort of way, in the dimness of the alley. Obscured in shadow, Marc had watched Toffee get into the green sedan, the thug instructing her in the art of driving. He glanced anxiously down the street, praying for a police car.

A small coupe, with a man and woman inside, pulled up to the curb at the end of the block, and the man got out and disappeared into the telegraph office on the corner. But that was all.

Marc jumped as he heard the green sedan start up. He turned to see a black limousine, driven by the congressman, pull up beside it. The thug crossed and got inside and a moment later the barrel of a gun caught light from the window. Time was seeping out.

Ducking from cover, Marc raced for the coupe and the waiting woman on the corner. Reaching it, he threw the door open and jumped inside. The woman, a faded blonde, pressed back against the seat with a startled cry. Marc, however, was too relieved at finding the key in the ignition to notice.

He started the car, threw it into gear and set it in motion almost in a single action. The woman's reaction to this was a shrill, braying scream.

"Please," Marc said distractedly. "Don't." The woman screamed again. "Do you have to do that?" he asked annoyedly.

"I have to do something, don't I?" the woman enquired wretchedly. "I can't just sit here, can I?"

"I don't see why not," Marc said, peering down the street intently. "It doesn't help anything to scream like that."

"It helps me plenty," the woman retorted hotly. "When naked men come leaping into a lady's car and driving her off to God knows what, it gives her a great satisfaction to scream." As though to prove her point she paused to scream again. "Anyway, it makes her feel a hell of a lot better."

"I don't see why," Marc said with rising irritation.

"Well, put yourself in my place," the woman snapped. "What would you do if a naked man came leaping into your car?"

"Naked men don't leap into my car." Marc said self-righteously. "I wouldn't let them."

"Are you suggesting that I invite naked men to come leaping into my car?" the woman asked frigidly. "I'll have you know...."

"The way you carry on about it," Marc said, "one just automatically draws his own conclusions. One pictures a whole procession of naked men just waiting their turn to leap into your car, you're such an authority on these occasions."

For a moment the blonde fell into a sulky silence. She glanced out the window at the rapidly passing scenery.

"What I want to know," she said at length, "is what is my husband going to say."

"Not knowing your husband," Marc said, "I'm in no position to guess. If I were you I'd judge by the way he's expressed himself on other similar occasions."

"There you go again," the woman said, "insulting me. Where are you taking me?"

"I'm not taking you anywhere," Marc said. "I'm taking myself. You just happened to be here."

"Oh," the woman said, not, it seemed, without a touch of disappointment. There was another lapse of silence.

"Do you know where there's a cop?" Marc asked, after a few more blocks.

"If I did," the woman said, "I'd be with him instead of you. What do you want with a cop?"

"I've got to find one," Marc said anxiously. "It means everything."

By this time the woman had resigned herself to the unhappy fact that she was out for a spin with a raving lunatic. She nodded sagely, as though agreeing with this last remark entirely.

"Sure," she said, "sometimes I feel that way myself. Cops are everything. It just sweeps over me all of a heap."

"What sweeps over you?" Marc asked absently.

"Cops," the woman said.

"Do you think you ought to be making these little confessions to a total stranger?" Marc asked distastefully. "Or do you mean your husband is a cop?"

"Of course not," the woman said. "My husband is a butcher. What's that got to do with it? I was just saying that sometimes cops just seem to surge over me." She giggled with nervous desperation. "A sort of blue serge, you might say."

"Well," Marc said, "since you seem to know all these cops so well, you ought to be able to tell me where they hang out."

"I don't know all these cops," the woman said.

"You mean they're a bunch of total strangers?" Marc asked, thoroughly shocked. "My word!"

"Couldn't we just drop the subject?" the woman asked defeatedly. "I'm all confused somehow."

"I should think you would be confused," Marc agreed. His voice trailed away on a rising inflection as he spotted a police car parked at the curb across the street. "Cops!" he breathed. He glanced ahead. "You see that green sedan up ahead with the black limousine beside it?"

The woman nodded vaguely. "The one that just cut up over the sidewalk? What about it?"

"Keep your eye on it," Marc instructed, "while I get the cop's attention. It's a matter of life and death."

The green sedan, as it turned out, was eminently worth keeping an eye on. Toffee, beleaguered as she was with the mechanics of keeping the vehicle in motion, had come upon other problems. Early in the game, feeling vague stirrings at her side, she had looked around to see George's dismembered head yawn thickly and open its eyes. Then, as if this wasn't loathsome enough, a set of fingers wriggled to the edge of the seat, gripped it and boosted the halved torso around so that the disjointed feet dropped to the floor. George, rising from unconsciousness had hauled himself into a sitting position. Toffee looked on this development without favor.

"Stay down, George," she hissed. "Get back where you were."

The head swiveled around hideously, a wounded look in its eyes.

"Oh, it's you, is it?" he said sadly. "You hit me."

"And I'll hit you again," Toffee promised, "if you don't get down."

George merely looked baffled at this. "Where are we goin'?" he asked.

"To an accident," Toffee said.

George's face brightened. "Was Marc in it?" he asked.

"It hasn't happened yet," Toffee explained. "We're going to be in it, you and I. In fact, we're the whole accident."

"Huh?" George said, edging up a bit. "Us?"

"That's right," Toffee nodded. "They figure we know too much."

"Too much about what?"

"About this subversive business," Toffee said. "They think we know their plan to overthrow the government."

"So they're going to kill us in an accident?"

"Uh-huh."

"Aren't you scared?"

Toffee shrugged. "Why should I be? I'm a product of Marc's mind. I can't possibly be destroyed unless he is. And he's perfectly safe."

"He is?" George said, his voice heavy with disappointment. "Why don't these people want to kill him?"

"They think they are killing him," Toffee said. "They think you're Marc. In fact they believe you're already dead."

"What!" George cried. "You mean I'm acting as a decoy to save Marc's life?"

Toffee nodded smugly. "Some onions, eh, George?"

"Stop the car!" George shouted. "Let me out!"

"No brakes," Toffee said. She nodded toward the limousine. "Besides, they won't let me. You'd better get down in the seat or they'll think it's funny."

"I hope they do," George said sullenly. "I hope they think it's funny as hell and do something about it. It's so damned unfair." And with that he leaned across Toffee, jutted his head out the window and began baying in the direction of the limousine.

"Stop that!" Toffee said. "It sounds awful."

George swiveled his frightful head around in her direction. "It should," he said. "It's the Torment Lament. I learned it in the Moaning Chorus and it's guaranteed to drive you mad in nothing flat." He turned back to the night and the limousine and sent his voice wailing into the wind.

It was an effort that was not lost on its audience. The occupants of the limousine looked around sharply with horrified eyes.

"Jesus in Heaven!" the thug gasped.

At his side the congressman was so taken with the fearsome recital that he completely forgot he was driving. As the car careened dangerously, the thug reached out and pulled the wheel.

"Isn't it awful, boss?" he breathed.

"Awful doesn't begin to tell it," the congressman choked. "It's—it's awful!"

"Yeah. That's what I mean to say."

"How can anything sound like that?" the congressman asked hauntedly.

"If it can look like that," the thug said, "I guess it shouldn't have no trouble soundin' like that."

"And look at that girl, will you? She's actually talking to the filthy thing."

"She looks plenty hot under the collar."

"Why not? I'd be sore as hell myself."

"When do we get to the curve, boss?"

"I don't know," the congressman said. "But I can't wait. The sooner that car crashes and takes that frightful thing with it the better."

Meanwhile, as the two cars skidded and reeled toward the appointed spot of disaster, Marc continued to loiter several blocks behind. Having deliberately cut across traffic in the middle of the block, he pulled up beside the police car and leaned out the window.

"I just cut across traffic!" he called out.

The cop behind the wheel left his conversation with his companion and observed Marc dubiously.

"So what?" he asked. "You want me to give you a gold star on your driver's license?"

"I don't have a driver's license," Marc offered hopefully. "What are you going to do about it, you big, thick-headed slob?"

The cop turned back to his partner. "A kidder, we've got here," he said. He turned back to Marc. "Beat it, comedian, you and your girl friend take off."

"Aren't you going to chase me?" Marc asked. "I'm a lawbreaker."

"Move along, chum," the cop drawled, "before I sell you a ticket to the orphan's picnic."

"But you've got to chase me," Marc said urgently.

"No I don't, friend," the cop said. "I've got to sit here and listen for radio leads on this goofy Pillsworth guy."

"But that's me!" Marc said. "I'm Pillsworth!"

The cop looked at him with forced patience. "Sure, sure," he said. "And I'm Miss Atlantic City. Beat it." He turned back to his companion.

"What if I told you I knew where a murder was going to happen?" Marc ventured.

The cop looked around. "You're just full of news, aren't you?" he said, and turned away again.

For a moment Marc sat in silent indecision. Then he turned to the blonde.

"Why don't you scream?" he asked.

"Why should I?" the woman asked interestedly. "Do you really know where a murder's going to happen?"

"You said screaming made you feel good," Marc suggested.

"I feel fine," the woman said. "I always do with a lot of stuff going on. Who's going to get murdered?"

Marc glanced desperately from the woman to the cops and back again. A determined look came into his eyes. He cautiously extended two fingers to the woman's thigh. "I'm sorry," he said, and pinched as hard as he could.

The results were everything to be wished for—and more. Stiffening in her seat, the woman let out a bleat that surpassed even her previous efforts. Even George might have envied the torment in her voice as it soared, swooped, scaled the heights and dipped into soul-shattering depths. At its completion, the blonde turned and took a clawing swipe at Marc's face.

Marc ducked. "That's the stuff!" he said happily, noting from the corner of his eye that he had finally gained the undivided attention of the police force. Pinching the blonde again and nodding his satisfaction at the second chorus, he threw the coupe into gear, cut across traffic and headed down the speedway. It was only a moment before the wail of a siren mingled with the shrill vocalizations of his companion. He pushed the gas feed to the floor.

To the witnesses along the speedway, the pedestrians, the vendors, the shop owners and just plain malingerers, the events of the evening were never entirely clear. Some, judging simply by the volume of noise, settled for the notion that what had passed was nothing more than an overly exuberant wedding procession. The sticklers, however, rejected this notion flatly, pointing to the significant details of the affair.

Which, they demanded to know, was the wedding couple? Certainly it couldn't have been the redhead and the wailing man in the green sedan; certainly no bride—or at least very few—had ever used that kind of language to her groom on the wedding night. And it took the most wretched husband years to achieve the note of despair which this poor fellow was loosing on the evening air.

As for the black limousine, that was out. Though its occupants seemed locked together in some sort of mad embrace, the arrangement appeared to have its roots in terror rather than affection.

The couple in the coupe that followed was even more difficult to wedge into the picture of the young couple united. After all, wasn't she screaming her lungs out and hammering on his head with both fists?

As for the police who followed—and they probably knew the truth of the matter—they looked shocked to the core. So there simply wasn't any answer for it until the morning papers came out.

The participants in the demented chase along the speedway, however, were far too engrossed in their own problems to care for the conflict they introduced into the lives of innocent bystanders. Toffee, for one, could not have been less concerned; she was too mad at George.

"Stop that caterwauling!" she yelled. "Stop it, you idiot."

George pulled his disconnected head inside the window and eyed Toffee owlishly. His other parts adjusted themselves and the head sank into Toffee's lap. There, gazing up at her, it lazily crossed its eyes and began to whimper piteously.

"Ugh!" Toffee cried. "I'll go mad!"

The head relaxed its face obligingly into an expression of feeble-minded delight, letting its tongue loll loosely from the corner of its mouth.

"That's all!" Toffee screamed. "I'm getting out of here!"

Without further consideration for the occupants of the limousine and the approaching curve, she relinquished the wheel, threw the car door open, and with one last agonized glance at the loathsome head, which was now foaming prettily at the mouth, prepared to depart its company. In the limousine this bit of action was not unobserved.

"She's trying to get away!" the congressman yelled. "Stop her!"

The thug turned to the window and looked. "Get back!" he hollered. "Get back or I'll blast you!"

"Go ahead," Toffee cried. "It'll be a positive pleasure next to what I've just been through."

"Okay!" the thug said grimly. "You asked for it!"

His finger closed down on the trigger. It was just at that moment, however, that the green sedan, no longer benefitted by a driver, swerved toward the limousine, throwing Toffee back inside. The congressman cramped the wheel of the limousine sharply to avoid a crash. The gunman, thrown sharply against the door, fired wildly into the night. From the rear there was the sound of screeching tires and forced brakes.

"Good night!" the congressman panted, righting the limousine as the green sedan veered away again. "What did you hit?"

"I think it was that coupe back there," the thug said, peering out the window. "I must have hit a tire: it's out of control."

"Good Lord!" the congressman yelled, "the curve's right ahead! We're pinned in between them. We're going to crash. Everybody's going to crash!"

No sooner was this dire prediction out of the congressman's mouth than it became a deafening reality. Ahead, the green sedan raced headlong into the concrete embankment with a rending smash and almost literally flattened itself into two dimensions.

This was the signal for the two lesser crashes that followed. The limousine engaged its radiator forcibly into the wreckage just in time to receive a skidding broadside from the coupe.

A moment of silence followed, emphasized by the approaching scream of a siren. The police car jolted to a stop and the two cops ran forward to the scene of destruction. They reached the coupe first.

"Here!" the first cop said. "What's going on?"

The faded blonde jutted her head out of the window. "He blew out my tire!" she rasped. "Not to mention all that pinching!"

"Pinching?" the cop asked curiously. "What kind of pinching, lady? Where?"

"All kinds of pinching," the woman said evilly. "Everywhere."

The cop peered at Marc. "Why's he dressed in that nightshirt?"

"How should I know?" the woman said. "Maybe he thinks he's cute or something."

The cop leaned closer. "Here, you," he said, "why are you dressed like that?"

"I'm tired," Marc said exhaustedly, "and I want to go to bed. I had a little drink about an hour ago...."

"Stop that now," the cop barked. "No nonsense."

"But it's all perfectly true," Marc said.

The cop started to speak further, but he caught sight of the congressman and his companion climbing out of the limousine and tore himself away.

"There are people dying in that car!" the congressman shouted tragically, hurrying forward. "It's awful, officer!"

"All maimed and cut up," the thug put in. "Loose heads and legs and stuff all over the place."

"Have you seen them?" the policeman asked.

"Well, they must be," the congressman put in quickly. "How could it be otherwise? The man in the car is Marc Pillsworth. I saw him just before the crash."

The policeman did a take. "Yeah?"

"Sure," the thug said excitedly. "Only now he's all cut up—loose head and arms and...!"

"Shut up," the congressman snapped.

"They might still be alive," the cop said. "We've got to do something about it."

"Indeed we do," the congressman said. "Perhaps we can assist them."

"Come on," the cop said. "You can give a hand."

Dutifully the three turned to the sedan. They turned and then stopped with a harmonized gasp, the cop taking the bass. In the moment of their turning there had been a sudden movement in the car and the door had swung partially open. In the opening there appeared a leg of provocative shapeliness.

"A leg!" the thug shuddered. "I told you!"

"A dame's leg," the cop breathed. "And just think what the rest of her must have been like with a leg like that! Just imagine...!" He sucked in his breath as the leg began to show unexpected signs of life. It quivered, turned and was quickly joined by a mate of equal perfection. It was only a moment before Toffee appeared in total, quite unmarked. Her mood, however, was hostile. Quitting the ruined car she turned back to the door and thrust her head inside.

"Of all the beastly, rotten, evil-minded, stinking things to do to a girl!" she snapped. "Come out of there you slimy-souled son of Satan and fight like a man. I'll teach you to make foul passes at a girl when she is stuck under a clutch. I'll show you...!"

"Good gosh!" the cop said. "Who's she talking to?"

"She must be hysterical," the congressman said, thoroughly shaken. "Probably got a crack on the head and isn't accountable for what she's saying."

"That's certainly no way to talk to the dead," the cop said.

"It's no way to talk to the living," the thug said. "If she hauled off at me like that I'd rather be dead."

"The poor child's obviously insane," the congressman said firmly. "There's no question about it."

Meanwhile Toffee was still at it. "Come out of there, you hulking lout," she grated, "before I come in there and drag you out by your ears!"

"Poor little thing," the cop said sadly. "She really believes Mr. Pillsworth can come out of that car. She refuses to believe he's dead."

By now Toffee had stepped forward and yanked the door all the way open. As the three in the background stared in varying degrees of apprehension, a thin figure in a brief linen gown crawled out on its hands and knees. The congressman swayed slightly as though about to faint.

"You look more natural down on all fours, you beast," Toffee rasped. "I ought to kick you right in the slats. Get up and try to face me if you've the nerve!"

Apparently the shock of the accident had given George's ectoplasm a further jolt for now he was completely materialized. He looked up at Toffee ruefully and got to his feet.

"I was only trying to get you loose," he said.

"The way you were pawing me was enough to get any girl loose," Toffee said. "Just don't try it again."

"Gawd a'mighty!" the thug whispered. "Pillsworth!"

"Pillsworth?" the cop said. "But that's the same guy who was pinching the other dame in the coupe. My gosh! how he gets around!"

Just then the other policeman, who had retreated to the background, arrived on the scene with Marc and the blonde in custody.

"Hey," he said, "I caught this creep on the creep. He was trying to sneak out."

The cop looked quickly at Marc, then back to George. "It's the same guy!" he said. "Which one of you birds is Pillsworth?"

Marc and George went smoothly into their routine of pointing to each other in unison.

"He is!" they said.

The cop turned to Toffee. "Do you know which is which?" he asked.

"Sure," Toffee said and nodded at George. "He's Pillsworth."

"She's crazy," George retorted hotly. "She's as crazy as bedbugs in a bathtub."

"That's right," the thug put in. "She's a looney if there ever was one."

Marc moved urgently to gain the cop's attention. "You've got to arrest that man," he said, pointing at the congressman. "He's a subversive and a murderer."

The congressman whirled about. "You must be insane, sir!" he rasped in frantic denial.

"You must be," Marc said. "You must have been ripe for the hatch years ago."

"You're a fine one to talk," the blonde put in nastily. "Officer, this man is off his rocker like a busted hobby horse. He's done nothing but pinch me ever since we met."

Toffee levelled her gaze at Marc. "What were you doing pinching that tomato?" she demanded. "Just what were you getting at?"

"Oh, don't be crazy," Marc said distractedly.

"Oh, so I'm crazy, am I?" Toffee said, doubling her fists.

"You sure are, sister," the thug put in. "You're the most hopped up dame I ever saw." He turned to the cop. "She ought to be locked up."

"Oh, yeah?" Toffee said. "At least I didn't put anyone in a busted car and send them off to get killed. Officer, I want you to arrest that killer."

"Look, officer," Marc insisted, "you've got to take this man into custody. He's a menace to the whole country."

"If you take anyone in, officer," the blonde put in harshly, "make it this skinny bimbo. Pinch him like he pinched me."

The congressman moved in aggressively toward Marc. "You're making slanderous accusations!" he blustered. "You should be committed to an institution!"

"You're crazy!" Marc raged.

"You're crazy!" the blonde screeched.

"You're crazy!" Toffee hollered at the blonde.

"You're crazy!" the thug insisted moodily.

The cop turned dizzily to his companion and held out a palsied hand. "Hurry!" he pleaded, "call the wagon, and let's take the whole bunch of them in. In another minute I'm going to be crazy!"

The morning sun poured through the high windows of the courtroom, wasting its brightness on a scene of sullen dementia. Judge Carper's heavy face had achieved a shade of dyspeptic vermillion in record time this morning. Even the flies clung to the walls in muted terror as his gavel banged on the substantial wood of the bench and set the room atremble.

"Silence!" the judge roared. "Silence, damnit! And if one more defendant makes just one more crack about the sanity of any other defendant I'll lock the whole crew of you up and melt the key down for a watch fob." He ran his shaking hand over his forehead. "Besides, so far I don't even know which ones of you are the defendants and which are the complainants." He turned to the policeman. "Do you know?"

"I'm not sure," the cop admitted uneasily. "I think they're all both."

"Both what?" the judge asked confusedly.

"Both defendants and complainants. As far as I can tell everybody's mad as hell at everybody else. It sort of goes around in a circle."

"And I'm burned up at the lot of them," the judge said malignantly. "Who are those two over there without any clothes on?"

"I think they lost their clothes in the crash," the cop said vaguely. "The guy is really two guys, so it's hard to tell."

"What?"

"There are really two guys like that," the cop said. "Dressed alike."

The judge peered across at Marc with deep speculation. "I only see one of him," he said dryly.

"The other one disappeared," the cop said, casting down his eyes. "He—well, sort of evaporated."

"Evaporated? What are you talking about?"

"It's a fact, your honor. It happened on the way in. The only way I can explain it is that one minute he was there and the next he just sort of melted away."

"Rooney," the judge said, "have you lost your wits?"

"It wouldn't surprise me, judge," the cop sighed. "Everyone else has. Why not me?"

"There's only one man there, Rooney," the judge said harshly. "And judging by those skinny legs of his, maybe not even that."

"Yes, sir."

"Are you bucking for another vacation, Rooney, is that it?"

"Well, your honor, I do feel tired. It seemed to come over me all of a sudden, after I ran into all those people."

"All right, we'll see what can be done. In the meantime let's have no more of this falderol about one man being two, only one of them evaporated."

"Yes, your honor," Rooney said, greatly saddened. "There's only one man. I guess I was mistaken."

"Or drunk," the judge murmured sourly and turned his gaze to the assortment before him. "Now what happened with this gang?"

"They were all in a wreck that involved three cars. The young lady in the underskirt was driving the first one. She claims that the dark man with the scar tried to murder her by forcing her to drive a car with a broken steering gear."

"What does he say?"

"He says the young lady is mentally unstable and of low character. It seems that he and the congressman observed her in the car for some time before the crash. They say that her behavior was most erratic, that she wailed and shrieked and at one point tried to abandon the car in full motion."

"How else can you abandon a car?" the judge said sharply. "You have to be in full motion."

"I mean the car was in full motion."

"I see. Where was this gentleman and the congressman while they were doing all this observing?"

"They were in the second car. The congressman was driving. The dark man is his body-guard. He was cleaning his gun at the time and that's how he happened to shoot the third car, although the young lady insists he was trying to shoot her."

"I think I've lost the thread," the judge said foggily. "Who was in the third car?"

"The man with the skinny legs who says he isn't Pillsworth, and a blonde woman."

"He says he isn't Pillsworth and a blonde woman?" the judge asked, his eyes loosening in their sockets. "Why should he say a thing like that?"

"No, no," the cop said earnestly, "he just says he isn't Pillsworth."

"Then he admits to being a blonde woman?" the judge gasped. "He must be mad!"

"No," the cop said, "he doesn't admit anything about being a blonde woman."

"Then he denies being a blonde woman," the judge said with relief. "I wish you'd give me this story straight. Who accused him of being a blonde woman in the first place?"

"No one," the cop said, almost tearfully. "He was only accused of being Pillsworth."

"Pillsworth? You mean the fellow the hospital's looking for? Who said he was Pillsworth?"

A look of doom came into the cop's eyes. "The—the other one, your honor," he said.

"The other what?" the judge glowered. "Stop being evasive and answer my questions."

Rooney swallowed fatefully. "The other Pillsworth," he answered. "He accused Pillsworth of being Pillsworth—that is unless he's Pillsworth himself. Only he melted away so I guess we'll never really know. The blonde woman insists she can't identify him."

There was a dreadful silence as the judge tapped the palm of his hand with the gavel. He lifted his gaze to the ceiling then levelled it slowly on Rooney.

"So we're back to the blonde woman again, are we?"

"I'm afraid so," Rooney admitted weakly. "That's her over there, looking mad."

"I had hoped we were through with the blonde woman," the judge said acidly. "I thought we'd washed the blonde woman up."

"No, your honor, I'm afraid not."

"This isn't the same blonde woman that Pillsworth denies being, is it?"

"No, sir."

"Does she deny that she's Pillsworth, is that it?"

"No, sir," Rooney sighed hopelessly. "She's just a blonde woman. She refuses to give her name because her husband's a butcher."

"Is she a defendant or a complainant?"

"A complainant," the cop said. "She said that Pillsworth stole her car and pinched her. That is if he's Pillsworth, and he denies it."

"Don't you mean he pinched her car?"

"No, sir. He stole her car, but he pinched her—on the thigh."

"My word!" the judge said.

The cop nodded. "She wants to sue someone, only since there were two of them she doesn't know which one did the pinching. She can't be sure whether it was this Pillsworth or the other one—if you follow my meaning."

The judge paled. "Are you being deliberately cryptic, Rooney, or is it simply that you can't see your way clear to be clear, if I make myself clear."

"I'm afraid I don't follow you, your honor."

"Just a taste of your own medicine, Rooney," the judge said vengefully. "How do you like it?" He turned his gaze moodily on the blonde. "About this blonde...?"

"Yes, your honor?"

"She gets everything all snarled up. Every time she enters the picture it ceases to make sense. Do you suppose this would all clear up if I just had her thrown out of court?"

"I don't think so. With or without her, things are snarled up just the same. I've never seen so much snarling in all my life; these people just don't seem to like each other."

"What about this fellow who denies he's Pillsworth?" the judge asked. "Is he the only pure defendant in the bunch?"

"Oh, no, your honor. He's the biggest complainant of the lot. And he's far from pure. He's accusing the congressman of being the head of a gang of subversives who are planning to kill the entire population with bacteria."

The judge leaned across the bench, plainly scandalized. "The congressman!" he gasped. "Why Congressman Entwerp was a classmate of mine!"

"Yes, your honor. And he's threatened suit against this fellow for slander."

"Good," the judge said. "Have this Pillsworth or whoever he is brought before the bench. Obviously, he's a low criminal type. It sticks out all over him."

The cop nodded and turned in Marc's direction. "You," he said. "The judge will hear you."

Across the room, however, Marc gave no sign of hearing. Instead, he was gazing intently at the vacant chair next to his own. On his face was an expression of anxious annoyance.

"Now, look, George," he said, "You owe it to humanity to show yourself and help get this mess cleared up. Why not be a good loser for a change?"

The empty chair shifted, just perceptibly, with an air of complacency.

"Maybe they'll hang you," George replied hopefully from thin air.

"Don't be silly," Marc said. "There's no reason why they should. Come on, now, be a good fellow and help get this over with."

"Oh, I'm going to help get it over with," George said pleasantly. "When I'm through, they'll lower the boom on you so hard you'll be the first man in history to be buried in an envelope."

Just then Toffee leaned forward and touched Marc's arm. "The judge wants to speak to you," she said. "Come on, let's go."

Marc glanced around. "Did he call you too?"

"Well, no," Toffee admitted, "but I'm an interested party. I want to see that you get fair treatment."

"Couldn't you just stay out of it?" Marc pleaded. "Couldn't I just handle this myself?"

"Nonsense," Toffee said. "You need me. Come on, the old gaffer's beginning to look apoplectic again."

"Oh, all right," Marc sighed. Getting up he followed Toffee to a position before the bench. The judge glowered down at them critically.

"So glad you finally found you could come," he said.

"Thank you," Toffee beamed. "It's nice of you to have us."

The gavel barked irritably. There was silence until the judge's eyebrows ceased to twitch.

"What are you doing here?" the judge enquired with forced composure. "Who called you forward?"

"Lots of people have called me forward," Toffee said, "but that's just talk, judge. I'm just impulsive."

"Silence!" the judge said. "Good God, girl, no one asked you for any sordid confessions. I just want to know what you're doing here?"

Toffee nodded toward Marc. "I'm with him," she said.

"Then he's the man who was with you in the green sedan?"

"Oh, no." Toffee shook her head. "He's the other one."

The judge blanched. "The other one?" he asked apprehensively.

Toffee nodded. "They're exactly alike. Only this one is nicer. That's why I switched."

The judge raised his gavel warningly, and turned to Marc. "Are you twins, sir?"

Marc opened his mouth to speak, but before he could George's voice sounded immediately behind him.

"Do I look like twins, you thick-headed joker?" the voice asked. "And if you must drink in the morning, for Godsake lay off the cheap stuff so you don't see double. I always heard justice was blind but I didn't know it was blind drunk."

There was an ominous silence in the court as the judge raked Marc with a glance of pure loathing. "Are you deliberately in contempt of court?" he asked.

Again Marc started to speak and again the voice beat him to it. "In it?" it said. "I'm fairly swimming in high octane contempt."

The blonde who had been watching these proceedings with growing agitation suddenly sprang from her chair. "That's him!" she yelled hysterically. "I'm positive!"

"Be quiet, you!" the judge barked. "I've had enough out of you!"

"But he pinched me!" the blonde cried.

"You're lucky that's all he did," the judge snapped.

"But you don't know where!"

The judge eyed her distantly. "With that lumpy figure of yours," he said, "it could scarcely matter. Now, shut up." He turned back to Marc. "I understand you've been making libelous remarks against Congressman Entwerp."

Marc looked around hopelessly, afraid to open his mouth lest George would take over again. He compressed his lips into a thin line.

"Speak up, man!"

Marc looked up unhappily. "I—I—," he murmured fearfully.

"What's the matter with you?" the judge asked. "Let's hear your accusations against my good friend the congressman."

"The congressman?" Marc ventured, then brightened as he noticed there was no interference from George. "Oh, yes. The congressman must be imprisoned at once, your honor. He's a national menace. He instigated a propaganda program to dope the public against the threat of the foreign powers. But worst of all, he has enough bacteria culture to murder the entire population."

"And what's more," Toffee broke in, "he pinched my gadget."

The judge's eyes swiveled about hauntedly. "He what?"

"Pinched my gadget," Toffee insisted. "The one with the button."

"Now just a minute," the judge said a little wildly. "Wasn't it the blonde woman who had her gadget pinched?"

"Don't be silly," Toffee said. "She hasn't a gadget to be pinched."

"She hasn't?" the judge said in a startled whisper. "What happened to her gadget?"

"I guess she just didn't have one in the first place," Toffee said. "You can't just go out and buy them, you know."

The judge turned to the cop. "Do you know anything about why this blonde woman doesn't have a gadget?" he asked interestedly.

"Search me," the cop said. "I didn't know she didn't. Maybe it's because her husband's a butcher. Maybe...."

"Don't," the judge cried, shuddering. "Don't go on! I don't even want to think about it."

"Well, who cares about her gadget anyway?" Toffee asked bewilderedly. "It's my gadget I'm trying to tell you about."

"And I don't want to hear about it," the judge said shortly. "This court is no place for examination room discussions."

"Or much of anything else," Toffee retorted angrily. "Especially justice."

"Look, judge," Marc put in desperately. "You've got to listen to me. About all this bacteria...."

"Bacteria?" the judge said, startled. "What about bacteria?"

"It's a threat," Marc said. "It's got to be stopped."

The judge nodded. "My dentist said the same thing the other day. Are you a dentist?"

"Of course I'm not a dentist," Marc said. "It's the congressman."

"That's preposterous," the judge said. "The congressman isn't a dentist, never has been. You're just trying to rattle me."

Again, as Marc started to speak, the voice from behind took over. "That's rich, that is," it slurred. "You were rattled the day you were born, you old tosspot, and you've been getting balmier ever since. If you have the brain of a gnat...."

The gavel smashed down on the bench like the crack of doom.

"Go!" the judge said. "Go and leave me alone! You're all trying to drive me out of my mind."

"With a mind like yours," Toffee said, "it would be a fast drive on a kiddy car."

"Go!" the judge screamed. "Go away!"

Defeated by sheer volume, Marc and Toffee retreated back to their chairs and sat down. The one next to Marc's scraped back a trifle of its own volition.

"You fiend!" Marc hissed at the empty chair. "That was a fine mess, wasn't it?"

"Glad you admire my work," George said complacently out of thin air. "Isn't it remarkable how exactly alike our voices sound?"

"Go to hell," Marc said sullenly.

"If I do I'll probably meet you there," George said. "The old boy has you marked down for a sanity test. I heard him say so as you left up there. Somehow, it warms me to think of you locked up with a bunch of homicidal maniacs. Who's to say what might happen to you?"

The gavel rapped on the bench again, this time more calmly.

"I'd like to speak to the congressman," the judge announced. "Not that I put any stock in the ridiculous accusations of that black-hearted nit-wit, but I would like to talk to someone rational for a change."

Across the room, the congressman rose from his chair with portly composure.

"I'm happy for the opportunity to defend myself against the ravings of this lunatic," he said smoothly, "though I'm certain the court hasn't taken them the least bit seriously."

"Of course not, congressman," the judge said grandly. "This court is always fair and impartial. Step up and have a chair. I'm sorry I can't offer you a drink during session, but perhaps we could have lunch together somewhere?"

"Good grief!" Toffee whispered. "They're carrying on like old sweet-hearts."

The congressman smiled pityingly at Marc. "Actually, I have the greatest compassion for our poor friend here," he said magnanimously. "Who knows what dreadful experience drove him out of his senses?"

"Why the old foghorn!" Marc hissed between clenched teeth. "He's got enough gall to float a fleet."

"As for his fantastic charges," the congressman continued, "they're almost too silly to refute." He beamed on the judge. "I think you know just about how subversive I am, your honor."

The judge smiled broadly. "Call me Ralph," he said.

"Okay, Ralph," the congressman smiled. "And about that bacteria business; the only bacteria culture I have is home in the refrigerator. I just happened to let some cheese go mouldy."

The judge laughed immoderately. "Oh, Congressman!" he gasped, wiping his eyes. "You always were a wit!"

Toffee frowned her disapproval. "This is worse than television," she said.

"What am I going to do?" Marc said. "I can't let him get away with it. I'll wind up in an asylum while he sells the whole country down the river."

Toffee nodded morosely. "We've got to think of something," she said. "If they won't listen to sense, I guess the only thing to do is resort to madness."

"How do you mean?"

"Trade seats with me," Toffee said. "I want to talk to George."

"It won't do any good. He won't listen to sense any more than the rest of them."

"That's all right," Toffee said. "What I have in mind is more nonsense—and a little hypnotism."

"Hypnotism?"

"Uh-huh. I told you I've been studying. Come on, trade."

As unobtrusively as possible they changed seats. Toffee settled herself, crossed her legs with care, and turned to the vacant seat at her side. When she spoke her voice was husky and confidential.

"Look, George," she said, "I've been thinking...."

The chair quivered interestedly. "Yes?" George's voice said out of emptiness. "What about?"

"You and me," Toffee said. "I've just been going over things in my mind, and you know, George, I've really been sort of foolish."

"How do you mean?"

"Well take the way I always favor Marc against you. Suddenly it just occurred to me that there's no logical reason for it. After all you're just alike—except for a few little differences, of course."

"Oh?" George said, a note of interest creeping into his voice. "What differences?"

"Well, for instance, you're more aggressive, George. You have a more active, dynamic personality. You're the sort who knows what he wants and goes out after it."

"I suppose you could say that," George admitted. "What else?"

"You're cleverer, too. Look at the way you've got Marc bottled up right now, for example. He's a dead duck. In fact, to tell you the truth, George, you make Marc look pretty sick. I'm beginning to think a girl would be much better off with you."

George cleared his throat. "You're sure you mean it?" he asked.

"Of course I do," Toffee said. "Why wouldn't I, George? It's not just that you're cleverer and more dominant than Marc, there are other little things too, things only a woman would notice. Your eyes, for instance."

"My eyes?"

Toffee nodded. "Uh-huh. Your eyes are ever so much more exciting than Marc's. I don't know what it is, but there's a subtle difference. I guess it's personality. I've always noticed it."

"Oh, my eyes aren't all that good," George demurred. "Pleasant and friendly, perhaps, but...."

"Oh, much more than that," Toffee insisted. "Flashing and roguish."

"You really think so?"

"Certainly. That and more." Toffee paused for a moment, appeared hesitant. "George...?"

"Yes, Toffee?"

"Would you show me your eyes? Just materialize them for a moment so I can gaze into them?"

"Do you really like them that much?"

"Please, George...."

"Well ... all right."

And so it was that the congressman, long distracted by a view of Toffee fawning on a vacant chair, suddenly found himself staring across the room at two disembodied eyes which lolled in mid-air, swiveling and rolling about in a delirious attempt to be flashing and roguish. He coughed in a strangled way and glanced around at the judge.

The judge, had the congressman been astute enough to notice, had suddenly gone white about the gills and showed a shifty disinclination to meet his gaze. The truth of the matter was that the judge, similarly baffled by Toffee's seductive attitude toward the chair, had also been subjected to the nasty sight of George's grotesque eye exercises. He, like the congressman, had experienced a feeling of giddiness at the nape of the neck and decided against mentioning the incident. After gazing upon a pair of air-borne eyes which have just crossed themselves in their zeal to convey the charm of the rake, one is generally loath to bring the subject up with anyone save the local psychiatrist. However, had either gentleman had the least inkling of the mad delights yet to come, they might have well bolted the room, shouting the news to the world.

The fact was that Toffee, in her endeavor to hypnotize George, was meeting with extraordinary success. Having gazed into George's eyes with his full cooperation it was only the matter of a moment before the hapless shade was completely mesmerized. The eyes, under Toffee's steady gaze, grew heavy, drooped, closed altogether, then reopened with a slightly dazed appearance. It was not a pleasant sight, but Toffee appeared to find satisfaction in it.

Not so, however, the judge and the congressman. Watching these developments with sidelong anxiety, they were sore put to it to continue with the business at hand.

"Yes, yes," the judge said vaguely, "you were telling me about this blackguard who's been saying all these filthy things about you...?"

"Eh?" the congressman said, starting. "Oh! Oh, yes. This fellow, the blackguard. I was saying that if he was half a man...!"

The congressman got no further for it was precisely in this moment that Toffee commanded George to materialize. There must have been, however, a lack of authority in her tone, for the results fell short of perfection. In fact, they fell short by exactly fifty percent. George, starting at the top of his head, blossomed rapidly into being down to the waist and there, quite devoid of his lower quarters, stopped. In effect, no sooner did the congressman speak of half a man than the order was filled to exact specifications. The congressman not only stopped speaking, but stopped breathing as well.

A nervous hush fell over the courtroom, for by now several others had begun to notice the half-portion George and were just as reticent to mention the matter as either the congressman or the judge. The judge clutched grimly to the bench for support and forced himself to look away. He laughed a dry, cackling laugh.

"Well, well," he said with feeble heartiness, "we mustn't fall into a reverie, must we? You haven't half—I mean you haven't really begun to tell me about these slurs against you, congressman."

There was something markedly distraught in the congressman's expression as he turned back to the bench. He fiddled with his tie, reached into his pocket, took something out and began to finger it nervously. It was Toffee's gadget.

"Well," he babbled. "I was only saying that anyone with half—I mean any mind at all would be able to see ... uh ... see...."

As he spoke, the congressman turned the gadget absently in his hand. It was on the fifth turn, when it was pointing directly at the judge, that his finger inadvertently snagged against the button and shoved it to one side. Instantly, as though the judge had never been there at all, the bench was starkly and dramatically deserted, with only the gavel left to mark its recent occupancy. The congressman gaped unbelievingly, shook his head, closed his eyes, then opened them again. The judge was still absent.

The congressman turned to the others and found himself and the bench the focal points for a sea of shocked eyes. He shuddered, pressed the gadget self-consciously in a fit of nerves. The button snapped in the opposite direction. In the next instant there was a shrill scream from the faded blonde.

Those in court turned in unison to find that the judge, just as suddenly as he had departed, had reappeared. This time, however, he was comfortably ensconced in the lap of the distraught blonde. In a courtroom where many odd things had recently taken place, it was the general concensus that when the judge of that court sneaks from the bench, creeps up on the nearest blonde and hurls himself into her lap, some sort of climax has been reached. A murmur of indignation rose through the room.

The blonde, for her part, agreed with the concensus, but did not stop at an indignant protest. Doubling up her fist she belted the judge a nasty blow in the eye.

"You mangey old goat!" she shrieked.

The congressman, by now in a veritable frenzy of nervousness, pressed the button again. This time it was Toffee who disappeared. The murmur in the court became still more disturbed. The congressman twiddled the button in the opposite direction.

Miraculously, Toffee appeared behind the bench in the judge's position. She picked up the gavel and banged for attention.

"The court will come to order!" she shrilled happily. "Knock it off, everybody!"

A new kind of hush fell over the room. The congressman, slack-mouthed, looked up at Toffee with the fearful look of a man who has finally been backed to the wall on the question of his own sanity. The judge, nursing a blow on the left ear as another was being addressed to the right, looked up in horror.

"Here!" he yelled. "Get off that bench!"

"Get off that blonde!" Toffee shot back. "You ought to be ashamed of yourself." She whirled about on the trembling congressman. "As for you, you big fat traitor, I want a clean confession and no nonsense."

"I don't have to talk to you," the congressman said uncertainly. "You can't make me say anything."

"Maybe not," Toffee said, "but what about your conscience?"

"Conscience?" the congressman said uncertainly.

"The term is unfamiliar to you?" Toffee said. "I'm not surprised. Let me try to explain it to you. A guilty conscience can play awful tricks on people." She eyed the congressman closely. "It can even make you think you're seeing things, for instance."

The congressman's eyes widened with an awful fear. "See—see things?" he quavered. "What kind of things do you mean?"

"Well," Toffee said reflectively, "say a man is responsible for another man's murder. If his conscience gets ahold of him he may begin to see that man as still alive. He may even see two such men, just alike. In really bad cases the subject is likely to imagine one of the men in a state of mutilation, say cut in half. Of course, that's pretty extreme."

The congressman glanced compulsively in George's direction and turned ashen. George, still at half mast, stared back at him with fixed blankness. The congressman groaned.

"Then there's the very worst sort of conscience," Toffee went on. "That's when everything gets mixed up. Through a close study of recorded cases, we find that the first attack commonly occurs when the criminal is confronted with his crimes, usually publicly, as in a court of law."

"H—how do you mean?" the congressman whispered. "Whu—what happens?"

"Well, everything begins to appear to be just the opposite of what it really is. There is a famous English case in which the victim was so far gone that he actually believed that the magistrate on the bench had become a beautiful girl. He described the illusion, I believe, as a gorgeous redhead with an exquisite figure and legs too perfect to be true." Toffee laughed gaily. "Can you imagine anyone getting themselves looped up to that extent?"

The congressman forced a laugh that had all the light-hearted spontaneity of a coffin lid being pried up at midnight. "That boy was really gone, wasn't he—your honor?"

"Call me Ralph, old man," Toffee said.

"Of course, Ralph, old boy," the congressman said, blinking.

Experimatically, Toffee opened a drawer under the bench and withdrew a large black cigar. Inserting this into her month, she leaned forward toward the congressman. "Gotta light, friend?" she enquired.

The congressman started back sharply at this new incongruity. It was a moment before he recovered.

"Sure," he said, taking out a lighter and waggling it beneath the cigar. "Sure thing."

Taking a healthy puff on the cigar, Toffee leaned back luxuriously and blew out a cloud of smoke. "What say we adjourn?" she suggested. "We can slip around to the club and cut up a few touches with the boys."

"Well, all right," the congressman said, attempting a wan smile. "But...."

Toffee took the cigar from her mouth and leaned forward. "Yes, old man?"

"About these cases," the congressman said. "That fellow in England...."

"Oh, the one who thought the magistrate was a beautiful girl? It's hard to believe, of course, but you must remember it was an extreme case. The most severe ever recorded, I believe. The funeral was only a formality, of course, since there wasn't even a scrap of him recovered. Exploded, you know."

"Exploded!"

"That's right. The only thing of its kind in medical history. Poor devil went right off. With a great whopping roar, they said. The doctors said it was caused by repressed emotion."

"Oh, Mona!" the congressman groaned.

"Didn't mean to upset you, old friend," Toffee said. "It's an unpleasant thing to talk about."

"But couldn't they have saved him?" the congressman asked. "Suppose they had gotten him to a psychiatrist or something before it happened?"

"Actually it was much simpler than that," Toffee said ponderously. "The fellow could have saved himself merely by confessing. Confession, you know, is the only thing for a bad conscience. Highly recommended by all the best authorities. Those church people are doing it all the time—can't stop church people from confessing—and you never heard of one of them exploding, did you?"

"That's right," the congressman said hopefully. His gaze travelled out the window, a clouded look of inner turmoil on his face.

"It was just one of those things," Toffee put in. "One minute this chap was standing there in court just as hail and hearty as beans and the next—boom!—and the spectators were whisking him off their coat sleeves and passing round the cleaning fluid!"

The congressman whirled about in a convulsion of anguish. "I confess!" he blurted. "I confess everything!"

"Not everything," Toffee said. "Leave the racy personal stuff for another time."

The congressman reached out the gadget and dropped it on the bench. Toffee picked it up as he followed that contribution with a key.

"There's the key to the storeroom," the congressman said, "and the one to the private files. And here's a list of the members of the organization." He started as Rooney stepped forward and took him by the arm.

"Take him away," Toffee said blithely. "Find him a cell with lots of padding. And take his body-guard too."

As the congressman and the thug disappeared in the custody of Rooney, Toffee mashed out her cigar, quitted the bench and proceeded across the court where the blonde was still throttling the judge.

"Better let him up, honey," she advised gently. "He's turning a very nasty blue."

The blonde stopped to consider the judge's complexion and let him drop to the floor.

"Loathsome old bore!" she hissed as he sat up and rubbed his neck, then got to his feet and tottered off toward the bench. "That'll teach you next time."

Toffee moved on to Marc. "Well, don't just sit there," she said, "Let's get at it."

Marc looked up apprehensively. "At what?" he asked.

"Everything." Toffee said spaciously. "On the town."

"Haven't you had enough excitement?" Marc asked wearily.

"Not of the right sort," Toffee said. "What I crave is soft lights and wine and all that sort of elegant truck. Come on."

"What about George?"

"Oh, yes," Toffee reflected, "there is George, isn't there?" She regarded the transfixed half-spirit thoughtfully. "It would serve him right if we just left him here, cut off at the pockets. Still I don't suppose it's the thing to do...." A look of inspiration came to her face. "I know."

Taking her gadget from beneath her arm, she levelled it at George and pressed the button. Instantly George disappeared entirely. Toffee replaced the instrument and turned to Marc.

"There," she said brightly. "George in the handy pocket size, where he can't do any harm. Now we're all set for a life of gin and sin, and no interruptions."

"Now, wait a minute!" Marc said. "We're not set for anything, much less a life of gin and sin as you so pungently put it. Do I have to remind you that I have a wife to think of?"

"I don't care if you have a whole regiment of wives to think of," Toffee said testily. "I've protected and preserved you and, by gum, you're mine. At least right now. Your wife can just take her chances on what's left."

"If you continue with this scandalous talk," Marc said, shocked into primness, "I'm going to be forced to get up and walk right out of here."

"You take one step without me," Toffee warned, "and I'll break both your legs."

"Oh, well...." Marc sighed.

"That's better," Toffee nodded. "Of course I'll need some clothes, something terribly expensive and revealing...."

She broke off as the doors of the courtroom burst open and Julie, followed by the three doctors from the hospital, charged down the aisle.

"My God!" Marc cried. "Julie!" He swung around to Toffee. "Go away! Vanish!"

"I'm darned if I will," Toffee said. "I've stuck by you through all the thin and now I want some of the thick of it."

"Don't worry," Marc said miserably. "Just wait till Julie sees us; things will get thick in a hurry."

Even as Marc spoke the atmosphere began to congeal swiftly. Julie, having caught sight of the curious tableau formed by Marc and the scantily clad Toffee, jarred to a stop, digging her heels into the floor. A sharp, enraged sound came from her lips.

Julie, after her experience of the night before had recovered her physical faculties, but her emotional condition was still skittish. A wife, summoned to identify her dying husband, rather sets her mind on a scene of tearful sighs and murmured remembrances, with perhaps a touch of violin music in the background. When she finds her waning spouse looking perfectly alive and perky and in close proximity to a dangerous looking redhead, her bubble has a tendency to burst with a considerable bang.

"Marc Pillsworth!" Julie screamed. "Who is that woman!" And raising her handbag aloft she proceeded forward with mayhem unmistakably number one on her agenda.

Groaning, Marc rose from his chair. "She's going to kill me!"

Meanwhile, the doctors had also caught sight of Marc.

"There he is!" the first doctor said. "We'd better close in on him fast."

"It's amazing," the second doctor mused. "The man must be living sheerly on the energy of hysteria. He should have been dead hours ago." He turned to the third doctor. "Do you have the chloroform ready?"

The doctor nodded and exhibited a can and a large sponge. "Wait till the Medical Association hears about this," he said excitedly. "They'll never believe it!"

Thus armed, the men in white pressed forward close in the wake of Julie.

Marc retreated in confusion toward the bench. "They're all after me!" he cried. "I can't stand much more of this. If just one more character tries to kill me...!"

The doors of the court swung open and a tall, grim-lipped man barged into the room and down the aisle. He was carrying a large meat axe. Across the room the blonde leaped joyously from her chair.

"Darling!" she yelled and ran to meet him. They came together in a tight clinch just inside the gate. "How did you find me, honey?"

"Bureau of Missing Persons," the man said cryptically. "Where is he?"

"Who, sweet?"

"This creep who kidnapped you. Point him out."

The blonde glanced around. "That's him," she said, pointing, "the one with all those people following him."

The man observed Marc's retreating figure with a professional eye. "Not much meat on him," he judged, "especially around the shank." He shoved the blonde aside. "This'll only take a second."

"Mother in heaven!" Toffee cried, "the whole population is out to get you." She pulled Marc out of reach of Julie's bag as it made a broad swipe at his head. "Come on, let's join the judge!"

Together, they raced around the bench and started to mount to the chair.

"Get away!" the judge screamed, taking in the ranks of Marc's attackers. "Don't come up here!"

"Sorry," Toffee said, leaping lightly up beside him and snatching up the gavel. "This is total war!"

Marc gaining the bench, turned his attention to Julie. "Please, dear!" he cried. "There's nothing to be sore about!"

"Oh, isn't there?" Julie gritted. "What about that naked little trull you're with?" She hefted the bag anew.

"Let me at him!" the enraged butcher bellowed from the flank. "I'll get him if I have to hack that bench away around him!"

In answer, Toffee brandished the gavel in a wide gesture of defiance which terminated solidly on the side of the judge's nose.

"Ouch!" the judge roared, grabbing his face with both hands. "Clear the court!"

"Hell!" the butcher yelled. "I'm going to smear the court with that lousy kidnapper!"

The siege of the bench raged, and it will always be a sterling testimony to Julie's physical prowess that as she scaled the bench, the lethal handbag never once ceased to twirl over her head; if it happened to strike the judge more often than anyone else it was only because her aim was deflected by her overwrought emotions. To Marc and Toffee, however, the real menace lay in the butcher and his cleaver. Only by the most adroit maneuverings with the gavel was Toffee able to delay his murderous progress with a few strategic licks on the shins.

The doctors, on the other hand, gave themselves over more to calculated strategy. While two of them tried to close in on Marc from the sides, the chloroformist, can and sponge held ready, crept up from the rear. They might have succeeded in this maneuver except for Toffee. The redhead, seeing that time and speed were of the essence, abandoned her attack on the butcher and sailed forward, the gavel raised in one hand, the gadget in the other. Her plan was to dispatch the flankers with a single action, then sweep on to overcome the third doctor with all dispatch. The strategy, however, was too hastily conceived to be really successful.

Marc in an effort to avoid Julie's bag, leaped forward at just the wrong moment. Throwing himself toward Toffee, he received the full impact of both the gavel and the gadget, one to the ear. He reeled to one side, stumbled and sprawled to the floor, shaking his head.

"Oh, no!" he wailed, looking back reproachfully at Toffee. "Not you too!"

But Toffee didn't answer; she was far too surprised and pleased at the sudden results of this little accident. In banging Marc over the head with the gadget, she had inadvertently sprung the switch and introduced George, completely restored to the last molecule, into the very center of the proceedings. She only regretted she hadn't thought of it sooner as she saw the attackers, in the confusion, turn on George in force.

"Stay down," she hissed and dropped down lightly beside Marc. "While George is standing in for you, let's get out of this."

Marc rose to his knees, took in the new development and nodded. "This way," he said, indicating a door behind the bench. "I saw the judge crawling out this way a minute ago."

Together they scuttled on their hands and knees to the door. Marc edged it open, let Toffee through, then followed after. Safe, they turned back to see how the battle was developing around the bench.

George appeared to be finding himself at rather a rude disadvantage. And it is entirely conceivable that the besieged spook might well have been confused in that his last conscious moment had been the one of promised amour just before Toffee hypnotized him. Now, suddenly restored to awareness, instead of a fawning redhead, he found himself confronted by what appeared to be a select group of the worst fiends of hell.

George's gaze grew more and more terrified as he took in the swinging handbag, the slashing meat axe and the intense, determined faces of the doctors. With a single shriek of despair, as the meat axe made a swipe at his ear, he staggered backwards and vanished into thin air.

"Poor George," Toffee giggled. "I've got a feeling he checked out for good just then. He looked like a ghost who's just remembered a previous engagement."

Marc got up, closed the door and flicked the latch. He stopped, glanced around at the room. It was some sort of inner chamber, resplendent of leather and polished wood, a place of durability and hard surfaces, lighted by a large brass lamp standing on an enormous oak desk. At the far end of the room a door stood ajar, opening onto a hallway which pointed the direction of the judge's recent escape. Marc crossed to it and closed and locked it.

"Well," Toffee said, perching herself lightly on the corner of the desk. "This is more like it. Private."

Marc turned wearily from the door. "Just leave me alone," he sighed. "Just let me sit down somewhere and relax. This is the first time in almost twenty-four hours that I haven't had someone at my heels trying to kill me."

"Poor Marc," Toffee said. "You do need a rest."

Marc started across the room toward a large leather-covered chair. He was nearly there when he caught his foot in the lamp cord and fell.

Even as he struck the floor he was aware of the crazy see-saw flashes of light traveling up and down the wall. It wasn't until he rolled over, however, that he saw the lamp teetering precariously on the edge of the desk just above his head. He started to cry out, but before he could force the sound to his lips the lamp slipped beyond the edge and plunged downward. It seemed to explode in his face....

It grew out of the darkness, a place of familiar beauty. The light came slowly like the first faint tracings of dawn, etching the gentle slopes, the intricate, clustered outline of the forest.

Marc looked around at Toffee who was sitting beside him on the rise of the knoll. In the glowing half-light she was beautiful beyond words.

"I ought to break your thick skull," she said. "Will you never learn to pick up those huge feet of yours?"

"Huh?" Marc said.

"Tripping over that damned cord just when we'd gotten away from them all. Big-footed oaf."

"Oh, golly, that's right," Marc said. "We're back in the valley."

"You're darned tootin' we're back in the valley," Toffee said fretfully. "And that means it's all over. No high-life, no snaky-dressed, and no...."

"There wouldn't have been any of that anyway," Marc put in hastily. "It's just as well."

"Don't be too sure," Toffee said with a sidelong glance. "All I needed was a few more minutes and...."

"What happened to your gadget?" Marc asked, changing the subject.

Toffee picked up the instrument from the grass beside her and shook it. It made a loose rattling sound.

"I broke it when I hit you over the head with it." She tossed it away from her and it rolled down the slope and out of view. "It's served its purpose." She turned to Marc. "That is if you'll just stop making people want to kill you."

"I feel all dented and scratched," Marc said. "But I guess I'm all right."

"You'd feel more dented and scratched if I'd gotten ahold of you," Toffee said. "For instance...."

Suddenly she twined her arms around his neck and kissed him. For a moment Marc felt that he must have gotten mixed up with a metal clamp.

"Gee whiz!" he said as she released him.

"That's just the beginning," Toffee said. "I like to ease into these things. After that...." She stopped as the light of the valley began to dwindle. "Oh, damn!"

Marc looked around at the valley in the rapidly diminishing light. A small pang of regret flickered deep inside him. He felt himself drifting off into the growing darkness.

"Goodbye, Toffee," he whispered. "Goodbye."

He felt the light caress of her hand on his cheek.

"So long, you lovely old reprobate," Toffee said. "Don't you dare forget me...."

And then the darkness was complete and Toffee and the valley were gone in a swirling haze.

Marc stirred and there was a small thud beside him. He opened his eyes and looked around; the thud had been the lamp rolling off his chest. He forced himself to sit up.

There was just enough light from a small skylight above to see that Toffee was no longer there. He hadn't really expected that she would be. He shook his head briefly to clear it. The memory of Julie and the others in the courtroom came to him.

He had to get out of there. He had to get home. He could wait there and explain things to Julie—somehow—when she returned. He got to his feet and gazed bleakly down the long, unshapely stretch of his own bare legs.

It wouldn't do to go wandering around on the streets like that. Remembering that he had noticed a closet when he'd first entered the room, he made his way to it now and opened the door.

The only thing in the closet was the judge's discarded black robe. Marc regarded it for a moment but nonetheless took it off the hanger. It was much better than nothing. He slipped the robe on and crossed to the door leading into the hallway.

He unlocked the door and opened it. The hallway was deserted. It led toward the back of the building and outside. Marc quitted the room and quickly traced the hall to a set of outdoor steps leading down to a parking area. He started forward, then drew back as a figure appeared from around the far corner and made for one of the cars. Then suddenly he stopped as he realized that the figure was Julie and she was on her way to their blue convertible.

"Julie...?" he called.

Julie, whirling about, caught sight of him and screamed at the top of her lungs. Having expressed herself thusly she leaped for the car, tore the door open and threw herself inside. Then, slamming the door and snapping the catch, she started fumbling feverishly in her bag for the keys.

Marc hastened down the steps and across the lot. He banged on the car door.

"Julie!" he cried. "Listen to me! I can explain about the girl. She was only helping me trap the congressman. She's gone now. Julie, are you listening?"

Julie paused in her frenzied gropings and looked out at him. She lowered the window just a crack with an unnerved hand.

"Beat it, you—you apparition!" she quavered. "I can't see you, I really can't! So it's no good your pretending you're there. You're not, and I know it. Go away!"

"Apparition?" Marc said. "I'm no apparition. Julie, it's me—Marc!"

Julie's gaze steadied a trifle. "You're sure?" she asked. "You're really there?"

"Of course I am. Let me in the car, please, dear."

She hesitated, but in the end she opened the door, reached out gingerly and touched him. Then, with a smile of reassurance, she slid over to make room for him beside her.

"Oh, Marc!" she cried. "I'm so glad it's you. I thought I saw you just sort of fade away in there and ... I guess I've been out of my mind with worry."

Marc reached out an arm and drew her close to him. "It's all right, dear," he said. "It's all over now."

"But the doctors said you had to be operated on. They said you were dying."

"Oh, that," Marc said hedging. "Well—that was just a gag, a trick to make the congressman expose himself. Where are the doctors now?"

"Asleep," Julie said.

"Asleep?"

"Yes. It seems that one of them got excited and spilled a big can of chloroform on all three of them. They looked very relaxed when I left."

"Probably needed the rest," Marc said. "They seemed quite energetic." He patted her shoulder. "So do we. Shall we go home?"

Julie nodded. Marc started the car.

"Marc...?"

"Yes, dear?"

"About that girl, the one with red hair. That was very silly of me, wasn't it?"

"Silly?" Marc asked.

"The way I got it into my head that there was something between you two. That was silly, wasn't it?"

"Very silly," Marc said. "I don't know how you ever thought of such a thing." He turned and smiled at her. "But I forgive you."

Julie moved closer. "Thank you, dear," she murmured. "You're very kind and understanding. Besides, if I'd just stopped to think about it I'd have realized she wasn't the kind you'd ever give a second thought."

Marc backed up the car and headed out of the lot. "Of course not, dear," he said. A smile played at the corner of his lips as he gazed off into the distance. "Never a second thought...."

George approached through the mists, his ectoplasm disheveled and drooping. As he moved toward the sentry station it was all too apparent that here was a shade in low spirits.

"George Pillsworth, spiritual part of the mortal Marc Pillsworth reporting in from leave," he announced listlessly.

The sentry, a gross spectre of the lower sort, jutted his head out of the opening. "Hot dawg!" he said. "Wait'll the Council gets a load of you!"

George looked up wearily. "What do you mean by that?" he asked.

"Just after you took off, word came through that Pillsworth was as hail and hearty as health biscuits. They've been waiting up for you ever since. Boy, are you in for a welcome!"

George shrugged and sighed heavily. "Back to the Moaning Chorus, I suppose?" he said.

"You know it, brother," the sentry nodded, and leaning forward he swung the gates open in a wide gesture. "Pass on, George Pillsworth, spiritual part of the mortal Marc Pillsworth. Come and get it, kid."

George drifted disconsolately through the gates and toward the Council Chambers which loomed large and formidable through the swirling mists ahead. Slowly, softly he began to hum to himself, a tune of great melancholy and gentle discord. He paused, hummed the tune again.

"Not bad," he mused, "not bad at all. With a little arranging it might go over big."

Humming the tune again, he resumed toward the chambers. He shrugged, dusted his ectoplasm and smoothed it down.

Now that he stopped to think about it he was sort of relieved to be back. Certainly the Moaning Chorus couldn't be any more exhausting than what he'd just gone through on Earth. And, coming right down to it, those humans down there were beginning to get a little spooky lately....

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