The bus honked at a car pulling from a parking slot. All had become normal.
Experiments, he thought. Suppose I had fallen through to the street? With fear he thought, Suppose I had ceased to exist, too?
_Is this what Ragle saw?_
seven
When he got home, there was not a soul in the house.
For an instant he was overcome by panic. No, he thought.
"Margo!" he called.
All the rooms were deserted. He wandered about, trying to keep control of himself.
And then he noticed that the back door was open. Going out into the back yard he looked around. Still no sign of them. Ragle or Margo or Sammy; none of them.
He walked down the path, past the clothesline, past the rose arbor, to Sammy's clubhouse built against the back fence.
As soon as he rapped on the door a peep-slot slid open and his son's eye appeared. "Oh, hello, Dad," Sammy said. At once the door was unbolted and held open for him.
Inside the clubhouse, Ragle sat at the table, the earphones on his head. Margo sat beside him, at a great sheaf of paper. Both of them had been writing; sheet after sheet was covered with rapid jottings.
"What's going on?" Vic said.
Margo said, "We're monitoring."
"So I see," he said. "But what are you bringing in?"
Ragle, with the earphones still on his head, turned and with a gleam in his eye said, "We're picking them up."
"Who?" Vic said. "Who's 'them'?"
"Ragle says it may take years to find out," Margo said, her face animated, her eyes bright. Sammy stood stock-still, in a trance of ecstasy; the three of them were in a state he had never witnessed before. "But we have a way of overhearing them," she said. "And we've already started keeping notes. Look." She pushed the sheaf of paper at him. "Everything they say; we're writing it all down."
"Ham operators?" Vic said.
"That," Ragle said. "And communication between ships and their field; evidently there's a field very close to here."
"Ships," Vic echoed. "You mean ocean ships?"
Ragle pointed up.
Christ, Vic thought. And he felt, then, the same tension and wildness. The frenzy.
"When they go over," Margo said, "they come in strong and clear. For about a minute. Then they fade out. We can hear them talking, not just signals but conversation. They kid a lot."
"Great kidders," Ragle said. "Jokes all the time."
"Let me listen," Vic said.
When he had seated himself at the table, Ragle passed the earphones to him and fitted them over his head. "You want me to tune it?" Ragle said. "I'll tune, and you just listen. When a signal comes in good and clear, tell me. I'll leave the bead at that point."
A signal came in presently. Some man giving information about some industrial process. He listened, and then he said, "Tell me what you've figured out." He felt too impatient to listen; the voice droned on. "What can you tell?"
"Nothing yet," Ragle said, with no loss of satisfaction. "But don't you see? _We know they're there_."
"We knew that already," Vic said. "Every time they flew over."
Both Ragle and Margo -- and Sammy, too -- seemed a little taken aback. After a pause, Margo glanced at her brother. Ragle said, "It's a hard concept to explain."
From outside the clubhouse a voice called, "...hayfeloz. Whirya."
Margo raised her hand warningly. They listened.
Someone, in the yard, was looking for them. Vic heard footsteps on the path. And then the voice again, this time closer:
"People?"
Softly, Margo said, "It's Bill Black."
Sammy slid back a peep-slot. "Yeah," he whispered. "It's Mr. Black."
Lifting his son aside, Vic got down and peeped through the peep-slot. Bill Black stood in the center of the walk, obviously searching for them. On his face was an expression of aggravation and puzzlement. No doubt he had gone inside the house, finding it unlocked and nobody there.
"I wonder what he wants," Margo said. "Maybe if we keep quiet he'll go away. Probably wants us all to have dinner with them, or go out somewhere."
They waited.
Bill Black strolled about aimlessly, kicking at the grass. "Hey fellows!" he called. "Where the heck are you?"
Silence.
"I'd sure feel silly if he caught us hiding in here," Margo said, with a nervous laugh. "It's as if we were children or something. He certainly looks funny, craning his neck like that, trying to spot us. As if he thought we were hiding in the tall grass."
Mounted on the wall of the clubhouse was a toy gun that Vic had given his son one Christmas. It had fins and coils sticking up from it, and the box had described it as a "Robot Rocket Blaster from the 23rd Century, Capable of Destroying Mountains." Sammy had scampered about clicking it for a few weeks, and then the spring had broken and the gun had gone up on the wall, trophy-like, to scare by its presence alone.
Vic lifted the gun down. He unlocked the clubhouse door, pushed it open, and stepped out.
Standing with his back to him, Bill Black called. "Hey, people! Where are you?"
Vic crouched down and held the gun up, pointed at Black. "You're a dead man," he said.
Spinning to face him, Black saw the gun. He blanched and half-raised his arms. Then he noticed the clubhouse, Ragle and Margo and Sammy peeping out, and the fins and coils and bright enamel of the gun. His hands dropped and he said, "Haha."
"Ha-ha," Vic said.
"What were you doing?" Black said. From inside the Nielsons' house, Junie Black appeared. She descended the porch steps, slowly, to join her husband; both she and Bill frowned and drew together. She put her arm around his waist. Black said nothing, then.
"Hi," Junie said.
Margo stepped from the clubhouse. "What were you doing?" she asked Junie in a voice that any woman would shrink at. "Just making yourself at home in our house?"
The Blacks gazed at them.
"Oh come on," Margo said, standing with her arms folded. "Just make yourself at home."
"Take it easy," Vic said.
To him, his wife said, "Yes, they just walked right in. Into every room, I imagine. How did you find it?" she asked Junie. "Beds made properly? Any dust on the curtains? Find anything you liked?"
Ragle and Sammy came out of the clubhouse and joined Vic and his wife. The four of them faced Bill and Junie Black.
At last Black said, "I apologize for trespassing on your property. We wondered if you'd like to go bowling with us tonight."
Beside her husband, Junie smiled idiotically. Vic felt a little sorry for her. She had clearly no idea that she would offend anyone; probably she had not even been conscious of a transgression. In her sweater and blue cotton trousers, her hair tied up with a ribbon, she looked very cute and childlike.
"I'm sorry," Margo said. "But you shouldn't barge into other people's houses; you know that, Junie."
Junie drew back, flinching and unhinged. "I--" she murmured.
"I said I apologize," Black said. "What do you want, for Christ's sake?" He seemed equally perturbed.
Vic put out his hand and they shook hands. All was over.
"You stay if you want," Vic said to Ragle, indicating the clubhouse. "We'll go on inside and see about dinner."
"What do you have in there?" Black said. "I mean, if it's none of my business, tell me. But you're sure in a serious mood."
Sammy spoke up, "You can't come in the clubhouse."
"Why not?" Junie said.
"You're not members," Sammy said.
"Can we join?" Junie asked.
"No," Sammy said.
"Why not?"
"You just can't," Sammy said, glancing at his father.
"That's right," Vic said. "I'm sorry."
He and Margo and the Blacks walked up the steps, onto the back porch of the house. "We haven't had dinner," Margo said, still tense with hostility.