inhabitants vanished overnight. In the last century an
entire trainload of people, including the train, vanished while going
from one city to another a few miles away. And there have been
vanishments with reappearances, too. In England there was an old woman
who suddenly vanished before the eyes of her family. At the same instant
she reappeared in a room in London, miles away, in front of other
people. Did she know your father's theory? Did the train that vanished
know that theory?" Curt was smiling. "No. You see, it's something
unrelated to your father's theory."

Fred was nodding. "You may be right," he said. "I didn't know about
those."

"You may go now, son," Curt said. "I'll be out around eleven o'clock in
the morning."

Fred rose quickly. "Okay, Curt," he said. "I'll see you." He hurried
out. It was too much of an effort to hide the sudden trembling. He
hadn't known about other cases of vanishing. They provided data to
expand the whole thing, while not in the slightest detracting from the
validity of anything else.

And if the talk had been prolonged much more Curt would have inevitably
tumbled to his motive for telling him the theory.

* * * * *

Promptly at eleven Curt arrived. Fred's mother had already prepared the
large basket of food. There were ten minutes of last-minute bustle, then
they were off, with Curt skillfully tooling his Cadillac in and out of
traffic until they were on the open highway.

"I know just the place," he told them. "Woods, meadow, brook. Even a
couple of cows." And he did. When they arrived shortly before
twelve-thirty it was all that.

Fred relaxed as the car came to a stop. Every second of the trip he had
been ready to seize the wheel and keep the car from crashing if Curt
vanished.

"Still a little nervous?" Curt asked him as they got out.

"No. No, of course not!" Fred said.

Curt didn't pursue the subject. Instead, he became something utterly
different than he had been before, a carefree thoroughly likeable man,
full of humor.

Fred began to regret that he had chosen him as his victim. He began to
hope that the process might not be automatic, that Curt wouldn't vanish.
But he stayed close to him and listened to his every word and watched
his face as much as he dared without staring, so that if the moment came
he could get whatever there was to get of value from it.

For the first time in years his mother began to be carefree. She eve