She dug her fingers into the earth and let the soil trickle out of her hand.

“I suppose you’re right,” she said. “But you’re also right when you say I don’t like it.”

“Our likes and dislikes as decisive factors have now pretty well disappeared,” I suggested.

“Maybe, but I can’t help feeling that there must be something wrong about anything that starts with shooting.”

He shot to miss—and it’s very likely he saved fighting,” I pointed out.

The crowd had all gone now. I climbed over the wall and helped Josella down on the other side. A man at the gate opened it to let us in.

“How many of you?” he asked.

“Just the two of us. We saw your signal last night,” I told him.

“Okay. Come along, and we’ll find the Colonel,” he said, leading us across the forecourt.

The man whom he called the Colonel had set himself up in a small room not far from the entrance and intended, seemingly for the porters. He was a chubby man just turned fifty or thereabouts. His hair was plentiful but well-trimmed, and gray. His mustache matched it and looked as if no single hair would dare to break the ranks. His complexion was so pink, healthy, and fresh that it might have belonged to a much younger man; his mind, I discovered later, had never ceased to do so. He was sitting behind a table with quantities of paper arranged on it in mathematically exact blocks and an unsoiled sheet of pink blotting paper placed squarely before him.

As we came in he turned upon us, one after the other, an intense, steady look, and held it a little longer than was necessary. I recognized the technique. It is intended to convey that the user is a percipient judge accustomed to taking summarily the measure of his man; the receiver should feel that be now faces a reliable type with no nonsense about him—or, alternatively, that he has been seen through and had all his weaknesses noted. The right form of response is to return it in kind and be considered a “useful fella.” I did. The Colonel picked up his pen.

“Your names, please?”

We gave them.

“And addresses?”

“In the present circumstances I fear they won’t be very useful,” I said. “But if you really feel you must have them—” We gave them too.

He murmured something about system, organization, and relatives, and wrote them down. Age, occupation, and all the rest of it followed. He bent his searching look upon us again, scribbled a note upon each piece of paper and put them in a file.

“Need good men. Nasty business, this. Plenty to do here, though. Plenty. Mr. Beadley’ll tell you what’s wanted,”

We came out into the ball again. Josella giggled.

“He forgot to ask for references in triplicate—but I gather we’ve got the job,” she said.

Michael Beadley, when we discovered him, turned out to be in decided contrast. He was lean, tall, broad-shouldered, and slightly stooping, with something the air of an athlete run to books. In repose his face took on an expression of mild gloom from the darkness of his large eyes, but it was seldom that one had a glimpse of it in repose. The occasional streaks of gray in his hair helped very little in judging his age. He might have been anywhere between thirty-five and fifty. His obvious weariness just then made an estimate still more difficult. By his looks, he must have been up all night; nevertheless he greeted us cheerfully and waved an introductory hand toward a young woman, who took down our names again as we gave them.

“Sandra Telmont,” he explained. “Sandra is our professional remembrancer—continuity is her usual work, so we 4 regard it as particularly thoughtful of Providence to contrive her presence here just now.”

The young woman nodded to me and looked harder at Josella.

“We’ve met before,” she said thoughtfully. She glanced down at the pad on her knee. Presently a faint smile passed across her pleasant, though unexotic countenance,

“Oh yes, of course,” she said in recollection.

“What did I tell you? The thing clings like a flypaper,” Josella observed to me.

“What’s this about?” inquired Michael Beadley.

I explained. He turned a more careful scrutiny on Josella.

She sighed.

“Please forget it,” she suggested. “I’m a bit tired of living it down”

That appeared to surprise him agreeably.

“All right,” he said, and dismissed the matter with a nod.

He turned back to the table. “Now to get on with things. You’ve seen Jaques?”

“If that is the Colonel who is playing at Civil Service, we have,” I told him.

He grinned.

“Got to know how we stand. Can’t get anywhere without

knowing your ration strength,” he said, in a fair imitation of

the Colonel’s manner. “But it’s quite true, though,” he went

on. “I’d better give you just a rough idea of how things stand.

Up to the present there are about thirty-five of us. All sorts.

We hope and expect that some more will come in during the

day. Out of those here now, twenty-eight can see. The others

are wives or husbands—and there are two or three children—

who cannot. At the moment the general idea is that we move

away from here sometime tomorrow if we can be ready in

time—to be on the safe side, you understand.”

I nodded. “We’d decided to get away this evening for the

same reason, I told him.

“What have you for transport?”

I explained the present position of the station wagon. “We

were going to stock up today,” I added. “So far we’ve practically nothing except a quantity of anti-triffid gear.”

He raised his eyebrows. The girl Sandra also looked at me

curiously.

“That’s a queer thing to make your first essential,” he

remarked.

I told them the reasons. Possibly I made a bad job of it,

for neither of them looked much impressed. He nodded casually and went on:

“Well, if you’re coming in with us, here’s what I suggest

B ring in your car, dump your stuff, then drive off and swap

it for a good big truck. Then Oh, does either of you know anything about doctoring?” he broke off to ask.

We shook our heads.

He frowned a little. “That’s a pity. So far we’ve got no one

who does. It’ll surprise me if we’re not needing a doctor be-

fore long—and, anyway, we ought all of us to have inoculations… Still, it’s not much good sending you two off on a medical supplies scrounge. What about food and general stores? Suit you?”

He flipped through some pages on a clip, detached one of them and handed it to me. It was headed No. 15, and below was a typed list of canned goods, pots and pans, and some bedding.

“Not rigid,” he said, “but keep reasonably close to it and we’ll avoid too many duplications. Stick to best quality. With the food, concentrate on value for bulk—I mean, even if corn flakes are your leading passion in life, forget ‘em. I suggest you keep to warehouses and big wholesalers.” He took hack the list and scribbled two or three addresses on it.

“Cans and packets are your food line—don’t get led away by sacks of flour, for instance; there’s another part on that sort of stuff.” He looked thoughtfully at Josella. Heavyish work, I’m afraid, but it’s the most useful job we can give you at present. Do as much as you can before dark. There’ll be a general meeting and discussion here about nine-thirty this evening.”

As we turned to go:

“Got a pistol?” he asked.

“I didn’t think of it,” I admitted.

“Better—just in case. Quite effective simply fired into the air,” he said. He took two pistols from a drawer in the table and pushed them across. “Less messy than that.” he added, with a look at Josella’s handsome knife. “Good scrounging to you.”

Even by the time we set out after unloading the station wagon we found that there were still fewer people about than on the previous day. The ones that were showed an inclination to get on the sidewalks at the sound of the engine rather than to molest us.