Deprived of the expert assistance of the old prospector, Max and 99 started down the mountain path alone again in the darkness.
“Max. . I can’t see a thing!” 99 complained.
“I can’t either, 99. I wonder why we can’t see the town. Surely, those assassins must have at least one lantern lit.”
“Maybe they didn’t bring kerosene.”
“A candle, then.”
“Assassins just aren’t known for lighting candles in the darkness, Max.”
“I guess you’re right. But-99. . are you whispering?”
“No, Max. But I was just going to ask you the same thing. I can hardly hear you.”
“Uhhhh. . 99, do you have the feeling you’re going uphill again? I do. And if you don’t, that probably means that we’re no longer together. Or, to put it another way, that somehow we separated, and you’re still going down, while I’m going up.”
“I think we separated, Max. Turn around and come back this way. I’ll keep talking so you can follow the sound of my voice. How am I coming in? Can you hear me better now?”
“Perfectly, 99.”
“Oh! You startled me. Where are you, right next to me?”
“I’m ahead of you again, 99. Let’s go. Follow me.”
“Max. . maybe we better hold hands.”
“99, we did that all through the courting. Now that we’re married, can’t we cut out all that goopy stuff? We’ll have to sooner or later, anyway, when we have children. You know how kids hate that goopy stuff. You wouldn’t want to lose the respect of the children, would you, 99? They might switch to another channel.”
“They might do what, Max?” 99 asked, baffled.
“Uhh. . run away from home, I meant. The new generation is very TV-conscious, I understand. So, naturally, some of the television terminology gets into the everyday language. I practice bridging the generation gap every chance I get-terminology-wise, that is-in case we have children of our own some day.”
“Do you want children, Max?”
“Of course, 99.”
“Then I think we better continue holding hands every once in a while. That’s how it begins.”
“No kidding!” Max said. “My mother always told me she got me at the grocery store.”
“Max, have you ever seen any children on sale at the A amp; P?”
“Of course not, 99. But I was born in the days of the corner grocery, when you could get personal service. So, I just naturally figured that- 99, have you noticed that we’re not going downhill again any more?”
“Yes, Max. But we’re not going uphill, either. I think we must be down from the mountain. Now all we have to do is find our way back to the town again. It ought to be- Oh, sorry, Max.”
“My fault-I should have warned you I intended to stop. I want to try to get my bearings. As I recall, the mountain was back that way. So, logically, the town ought to be over that way. Is that how you remember it, 99?”
“Max, I can’t see where you’re pointing.”
“Oh. . yes. . well, let me put it another way. that puts the town to my right. Do you- Uhhhhh, you can’t see me, so you don’t know my right from my left-right?”
“Right, Max.” 99 replied. “But, may I make a suggestion?”
“Go right ahead.”
“Max, if you think the town is to the right, then-considering the various experiences we’ve had in the past-I think we better look for it on the left. I mean, you’re a great hand-holder, Max, but as a direction-finder, you leave a lot to be desired. I hope you won’t resent my frankness.”
“Of course not, 99. Two people, when they’re married, I think, should be frank with each other. Just one word of caution, though, 99. If you have anything frank to say about my breath, I think you better not do it. If you do, our marriage is going to be in big trouble.”
“Honest, Max, you have a very nice breath.”
“Oh. Well, that’s the kind of frankness I can accept. It’s the other kind that I find so objectionable. However, we’ll look for the town on the left, anyway. Because now, after all this delay, I’m so turned-around, I don’t know which was my right and which was my left. And, consequently, by going left we will probably be going right-which will prove that I was right in the first place.” He got hold of 99’s hand. “Come on.”
Again, Max and 99 struck out into the darkness.
“99,” Max said, “there’s something that puzzles me. Why is it that you were never as frank with me while we were courting as you’ve been since we got married?”
“Well, Max, you might not have been interested in marrying me if you’d realized how frank I can be sometimes. But, now that we’re married, what can you do about it? I mean, you can’t get a divorce on the grounds that I’m frank. Frankness is a very admirable trait. The court would just tell you that you ought to be happy to have a wife who was so frank.”
“The court hasn’t ever had its direction-findingness sneered at,” Max grumbled. “That wasn’t very nice of you, 99. When did you ever hear of any other wife complaining about her husband’s direction-findingness?”
“Most wives don’t have any cause to complain about that, Max,” 99 replied. “After they’re married, they don’t have to worry about finding directions because their husbands never take them anywhere.”
“Oh. Well, you can’t say that about our marriage,” Max commented. “Remember last month when I took you to that mass poisoning planned by KAOS for the meeting of the International Brotherhood for Non-Violent Peace Negotiations Association delegates? And the week after that when I took you to that trap that KAOS had planned for us and we nearly lost our heads in that pair of matching guillotines? And now, here we are again, out on the town, wandering around in the dark, surrounded by KAOS assassins.”
“You’re right, Max,” 99 admitted. “We have something most married couples don’t have. Not once since we’ve been married have I had cause to complain that you don’t take me anywhere. But, frankly, Max-”
“Forget it, 99. If you want to continue to be invited along to mass poisonings, you’ll lay off that frankness.”
“All right, Max. Max. . isn’t it getting a little lighter?”
“I noticed that, too, 99. It’s my guess that one of those KAOS assassins decided to turn over a new leaf. He’s probably celebrating by lighting a candle in the darkness.”
“Either that, Max, or dawn is breaking.”
“Yes. . I suppose it could be that,” Max said. “As a matter of fact, isn’t that the sun over there? That orange glow on the horizon, I mean.”
“Yes! And I can see you again, Max!”
“And I can see you, too, 99. And I can also see- 99, look where we are.”
99 looked around. She and Max were standing in the middle of a dusty street, smack-dab in the center of town. “Oh, Max!” she said disgustedly. “There’s the saloon over there. We’re only about fifty yards from it. All this time we’ve been wandering around in the darkness, we could have been searching for the Coolidge-head penny in the saloon! We’ve wasted so much time!”
“Let’s just not waste any more,” Max said. And he headed hurriedly toward the saloon, which was on the other side of the hotel.
As Max and 99 were passing the entrance to the hotel, however, Arbuthnot suddenly appeared from the doorway. He was dressed in a gray sweatsuit and was trotting. The instant he spotted Max and 99 he drew a pistol from inside his sweatshirt, where, apparently, he had a shoulder holster, pointed it at them and ordered them to halt.
“And face the other direction-you’re breathing your germs on me!” Arbuthnot said irritably. “What’s the world coming to, anyway! A man gets up at the crack of dawn and goes out for a little jogging, and what does he meet right outside his door? Germ-spreaders!”
“Anybody who can jog at the crack of dawn deserves anything terrible that happens to him,” Max answered. “Nice people can’t even crawl to the breakfast table at the crack of dawn, let alone make it to the street to go jogging.”
“Turn around!” Arbuthnot snapped.
“Aren’t you worried about our germs?”
“That’s why I want you to turn around. I just tested, and the breeze is blowing from that direction. I want you to turn around and change places with me. That will put you downwind. Come on-snap it up!”
Max and 99 and Arbuthnot changed places. Arbuthnot moved to the street, and Max and 99 took his place on the porch of the hotel.
“Now, we’ll jog,” Arbuthnot informed them. He pointed. “We’ll go that way with the wind. You lead and I’ll follow. Not too fast, though. Too fast is running, not jogging. Ready?”
“Just a minute,” Max objected. “I think, according to the rules, you’re allowed to lock us up again or assassinate us. But jogging is out. That’s an indignity that I insist on being spared. Suppose somebody I know saw me jogging around town at the crack of dawn? It’s all right with me if you want to be known as a nut, Arbuthnot, but I refuse to let you force me to get myself into the same situation. The answer is no. An unqualified no.”
Arbuthnot shrugged. “Well, I always jog at this time in the morning,” he said, “and I have no intention of disrupting my routine. So,” he said, raising his pistol, “I guess I’ll just have to assassinate you.”
“I’ll jog,” Max decided.
“That-a-way!” Arbuthnot said, pointing downwind.
Max and 99 jogged down the steps from the porch, then jogged up the street, with Arbuthnot a few steps behind them.
“Right at the bank,” Arbuthnot ordered. “Then left at the jail, right again at the bakery, another right at the blacksmith’s shop, left at the cafe, left, right, left at the watering trough, general store and saloon, then right again at the stable. Got that?”
“I don’t think so,” Max replied, continuing to jog. “Maybe you better come up here and lead and we’ll go back there and hold the gun.”
“Don’t get smart, Smart!”
Max and 99 turned right at the bank, then a few minutes later, took a left at the jail.
Keeping his voice low, Max said, “I think I know how to get out of this, 99. If we play it right, we can lose Arbuthnot. Remember the instructions he gave us? Well, where he told us to jog, instead, we’ll jag.”
“I don’t think I quite understand that, Max.”
“When we get to the bakery, where he told us to turn right, we’ll turn left, instead,” Max explained. “Then left at the blacksmith’s shop, and right at the cafe, right, left, right at the watering trough, general store and saloon, then-”
“Max,” 99 broke in, “when we get to the saloon, rather than turning right, why don’t we go in?”
“That would disrupt the routine, 99. If jogging is going to do you any good at all, you have to establish a regimen for yourself and stick to it. Consistency is the secret to-”
“Max! It’s Arbuthnot who’s interested in jogging, not us. We’re interested in the Coolidge-head penny. And the penny is in the saloon.”
“All right, then,” Max said, “instead of a left at the blacksmith’s shop, we’ll take- Better yet, 99, just follow me. When we reach the bakery, I’m going to take a left. After that, I’ll play it by ear, always keeping firmly in mind, of course, that our ultimate destination should be the saloon.”
“I’ll be right behind you, Max.”
A few seconds later, they reached the bakery. Max cut sharply to the left, and 99 stayed right behind him.
“Stop!” they heard Arbuthnot shout angrily. “You’re disrupting the routine!”
“This way!” Max called, racing around a corner. “Are you still with me, 99?”
“I’m here, Max!”
“Now, through the blacksmith shop!” Max said. “Then around the watering trough, past the general store, through the jail, and into the saloon!”
“I’m right with you, Max!”
Running as fast as he could move, Max led the way around the blacksmith shop, then through the watering trough-which, fortunately, was dry-then around the general store, then into the jail and into a cell.
“Max, that window has bars on it,” 99 pointed out.
“You’re right, 99. Back the other way.”
They whipped around and ran in the other direction. But not far. Two feet later they crashed into the closed and locked cell door. On the other side, facing them, was Arbuthnot.
“Max! What happened!” 99 wailed.
“Evidently we took a left when we should have taken a right,” Max replied. “It could happen to anybody, 99. I’ve never jogged in this town before.” He looked puzzledly at Arbuthnot. “But how did you know you’d find us here?” he asked.
“It had to happen,” Arbuthnot replied. “When I saw you jogging through the watering trough, I said to myself, ‘Anybody with a brain like that, he’s going to trap himself in a cell over in the jail house.’ So, I just trotted over here, and here you were.”
“You have a very frank way of putting things,” Max told him. “You’d make somebody a terrible wife.”
“I’m sorry I can’t stay,” Arbuthnot said, leaving. “But old jails are usually crawling with germs.” He went out the doorway, then closed the door behind him.
“Locked in with all these germs,” Max muttered.
99 went back to the window. “I can see the hotel from here, Max,” she reported. “There’s Arbuthnot. He’s going inside.”
“99. .”
She turned toward him. “Yes, Max?”
Max pointed to the cot, the only item of furniture in the cell. “It just moved,” he said.
“Max. . you’re imagining. .”
“I tell you, it just- See that! It did it again!”
“Yes! I saw it, too!” 99 said, staring wide-eyed at the cot. “Max, do you think the cell is haunt-” She suddenly brightened. “Max, of course! It’s probably the old prospector! We can’t see him because he’s disappeared! But he’s here! He’s here with us!”
“A lot of good that does,” Max said.
“I guess you’re right,” 99 agreed gloomily. She went back to the window. “Look, Max,” she said. “One of the KAOS assassins just came out of the hotel and he’s carrying a tray of food and heading this way.”
Max joined her at the window. “Arbuthnot probably sent him to feed us,” he said. “We wouldn’t be very valuable as hostages if we starved to death. Listen, 99, when that assassin gets here, let’s try to lure him into the cell. Then we can overpower him and escape.”
“We can try,” 99 said. “He probably won’t even speak to us, though.”
“99, don’t judge all KAOS assassins by Arbuthnot,” Max said reprovingly. “That’s not fair. Frankly, in general, I’ve found most KAOS assassins to be genial, friendly, polite and genuinely interested in other people’s welfare-assuming, of course, that those other people aren’t marked for assassination.”
“Maybe so, Max, but-”
At that moment, the jail door opened, and the KAOS assassin, a young, blond, smiling young man, entered, carrying a tray of food. “Hi y’all,” he grinned, moving to the cell door. “The boss man told me to tote you over some victuals. He figures you must have a powerful hunger by now.” He frowned, looking into the cell. “Why, that’s a terrible place in there,” he said. “You got no carpet on the floor, the whole shebang needs a new coat of paint, that window hasn’t got nary a curtain on it, and that-” He shook his head in sorrow. “It’s too terrible even to talk about. Say, how’d you like to have some new furnishings? Maybe a couple nice comfy overstuffed chairs and some nice reading lamps and-” He got a key from his pocket. “Hold it a minute-I’ll come in there, and we’ll plan on what we can do to redecorate the place.”
“See how nice they can be,” Max said to 99, as the KAOS assassin opened the door and then entered the cell. “Now, aren’t you ashamed of yourself for thinking what you were thinking?”
“I suppose so, Max,” 99 nodded. Then she whispered, “Don’t forget. . we’re going to over-”
“If you’ll just step aside there, ma’am,” the assassin said to 99, interrupting her, “I’ll put this tray down on that cot, then we can put our minds to what we’re going to do to dandy this li’l ol’ cell up a bit.” He pointed to the area behind Max. “Now, that whole wall has just got to come out!” he said. “Why, there’s not enough room in here to thread a needle. We’ll join that cell next door with this cell, and then we’ll build both up and down. I mean, the roof is just crying out for a couple dormers. We can get two bedrooms up there. And a recreation room in the basement, of course.” He pointed in another direction. “That window is almost down on its knees, pleading for organdy,” he said. “Can’t you just see it?”
“Now, just a minute!” Max said crisply. “I’ll go along with the two bedrooms and the rec room. But you’ll put organdy on that window over my dead body!”
The young KAOS assassin drew a pistol. “Now, you’re talking my language,” he said.
“Organdy on the window.”
“Max!” 99 whispered. “Overpower!”
“99 is right,” Max said to the KAOS assassin, “organdy would be too overpowering. Even if you doubled the space by knocking out that wall and joining the two cells. But, what we could do-” He motioned to 99. “99, will you step back, please- What we could do,” he continued, addressing the young man again, “is knock out this front wall, too, and add what is now the jail house office to the cell. That would give us depth, you see, in addition to width.”
The young man was shaking his head. “Guests would walk right into the cell,” he said. “You don’t want that. Did you see all that dust out there? What do you think it turns to when it rains?” He shuddered. “Mud! A sea of mud! You want that gooey, slimy, dirty old mud tracked in here?”
“You’re right,” Max said, pained.
“With organdy curtains, though, nobody might notice the mud,” the young man said. “That’s the choice, as I see it-it’s either bare windows with, or organdy windows without, or a combination of the both. You think about it. And when I come back with your lunch, you tell me what you decided.”
“Fine, line, that sounds fair,” Max said. “I only hope-”
“Max!” 99 said grimly. “The plan!”
“It’s too soon for a plan, 99. We don’t know yet whether we want the windows bare or with- Oh! Oh, that plan!” He turned back to the young KAOS assassin. “Don’t rush off,” he said. “Why don’t you put down your pistol and rest a while. That’s hard work carrying that tray across the street from the hotel. Stay and have breakfast with us.”
“Say, that’s neighborly of you,” the young man smiled. “I already et once, but I guess another-” He was staring baffledly at the tray. “Where’d the food go?” he asked.
Max and 99 peered at the tray, too. The dishes were now completely empty.
“We must have mice,” Max said.
“No mice et all that!” the young man said. He looked around suspiciously. “Who else is in here? You got a stowaway in this cell?”
“Now, does that make sense?” Max replied. “Why would anybody stow away in this cell? It isn’t going anyplace.”
“Yeah. . I guess you’re right about that,” the young assassin said. “Well. . maybe it was a mice that et that food. I don’t know. . I don’t like the looks of it, though.”
“All right, then, sit down and we’ll talk it out and try to find an explanation that suits you,” Max said. “Sit right there on the edge of the cot with your back to us and-”
The young man backed toward the cell door. “No, I got to be going,” he said. “We’re having our seminar meeting over to the bank today, and I don’t want to miss any of it. Arbuthnot’s going to coach us on combining safe-cracking and assassinating all in one. If you don’t know just how, you can get yourself into some bad trouble. We had a fellow in KAOS once who tried it and what he did was, he locked his victim in the safe instead of assassinating him and then he couldn’t crack the safe to get in and get at him. He got so frustrated they finally had to send him to a rest farm.”
“That’s terrible,” Max said sympathetically.
“You think that’s bad? The victim ended up even worse. He’s still locked in the safe. And that was back in the winter of ’61.”
“That was a big winter for strange occurrences,” Max said.
The young man saluted with the pistol. “Well, you think about what you want to do with that window, and I’ll be back-”
He did not finish the statement. All of a sudden, he shot straight up into the air. His head cracked against the ceiling of the cell, then he became limp, unconscious. Looking under the young man, Max and 99 saw the cause of his sudden accident. Madame DuBarry, the mule, had materialized beneath him, thrusting him suddenly upward. The young man, knocked senseless, was now seated on the mule’s back.
“What timing!” Max said admiringly. “If you’d been ten seconds later, he’d have got away.” He picked up the pistol that had dropped to the floor when the young man had abruptly lost consciousness. “I even forgive you for eating all the food,” he said to Madame DuBarry. “Or was that you who ate it? Is your master, the old prospector, around anywhere?”
“Max, you’ll never get anything out of that mule,” 99 said. “Forget about him. Let’s get out of here. Since the KAOS assassins will be at the bank, that will give us time to search the saloon and find the Coolidge-head penny.”
“You’re right, 99! Let’s go!”
“Max. . what about the young man?”
“He’s very nice, 99. He has a lot of personality. But I really don’t think he’ll help us find that penny. Once a KAOS assassin, always a KAOS assassin. He’s on the other side.”
“I mean we can’t just leave him here like this-sitting on a mule. He’ll regain consciousness and get down off the mule and tell Arbuthnot that we’ve escaped.”
“Right!”
Max pulled the young man down off the mule’s back and put him on the cot. Then he took the key from him. “Outside,” he said to 99 and Madame DuBarry. When they were all on the other side of the cell door, Max locked it. “Anything else?” he said to 99.
She shook her head. “Perfect, Max.”
“Good. Now, up on the mule, 99.”
“Up on the mule, Max?”
“Trust me, 99.”
“Max, I do trust you. But it seems to me that if I can trust you, then you ought to be just as willing to explain to me.”
“I can see the fairness of that,” Max nodded. “What I have in mind, you see, 99, is the possibility that Arbuthnot will miss this young assassin when he doesn’t return. If that happens, he’ll probably send somebody to look for him. And the somebody he sends will find out that we’ve escaped. Well, the first thing he’ll do is look for tracks. And he’ll find our tracks in the dusty street and he’ll know that we’re in the saloon. But, if we leave here on the mule, all he’ll find is the mule’s tracks. He’ll never guess that there were two Control agents on top of the mule.”
“Max, that’s brilliant!”
“Thank you for being so frank, 99. Now. . up on the mule.”
99 got aboard Madame DuBarry. Then Max climbed up and sat behind her.
“Mush!” Max commanded, speaking to the mule.
Madame DuBarry did not move.
“That’s for sled dogs, I think, Max,” 99 said.
“I know that, 99. What I don’t know is the command for mules. So, I used the command that seemed most appropriate. And there’s no need, 99, for you to be frank and tell me there’s no connection between sled dogs and mules.”
“This doesn’t seem to be working, Max. He’s just standing.”
“Giddyap!” Max ordered.
The mule remained immobile.
“I hate to resort to violence,” Max said, “but-” He reached back and gave the mule a sound slap on the hindquarters.
Madame DuBarry snorted indignantly, then switched his tail-and disappeared.
Max and 99, deprived of their mount, crashed to the floor.