found it
serviceable. They took it with them, but they did not search the weeds
along the road.

When they had disappeared toward the west, the young man came back to
the road and began walking east, in toward the city.

Complete destruction in two days?

Preposterous.

The young man smiled.

* * * * *

The girl was afraid. For hours she had walked the streets of the empty
city and the fear, strengthened by weariness, was now mounting toward
terror. "One face," she whispered. "Just one person coming out of a
house or walking across the street. That's all I ask. Somebody to tell
me what this is all about. If I can find one person, I won't be afraid
any more."

And the irony of it struck her. A few hours previously she had attempted
suicide. Sick of herself and of all people, she had tried to end her own
life. Therefore, by acknowledging death as the answer, she should now
have no fear whatever of anything. Reconciled to crossing the bridge
into death, no facet of life should have held terror for her.

But the empty city did hold terror. One face--one moving form was all
she asked for.

Then, a second irony. When she saw the man at the corner of Washington
and Wells, her terror increased. They saw each other at almost the same
moment. Both stopped and stared. Fingers of panic ran up the girl's
spine. The man raised a hand and the spell was broken. The girl turned
and ran, and there was more terror in her than there had been before.

[Illustration]

She knew how absurd this was, but still she ran blindly. What had she to
fear? She knew all about men; all the things men could do they had
already done to her. Murder was the ultimate, but she was fresh from a
suicide attempt. Death should hold no terrors for her.

She thought of these things as the man's footsteps sounded behind her
and she turned into a narrow alley seeking a hiding place. She found
none and the man turned in after her.

She found a passageway, entered with the same blindness which had
brought her into the alley. There was a steel door at the end and a
brick lying by the sill. The door was locked. She picked up the brick
and turned. The man skidded on the filthy alley surface as he turned
into the areaway.

The girl raised the brick over her head. "Keep away! Stay away from me!"

"Wait a minute! Take it easy. I'm not going to hurt you!"

"Get away!"

Her arm moved downward. The man rushed in and caught he