Part 3

"Yes," Marc said. "Since this is the sportswear department, I assume you have dark glasses?"

The girl sighed again. "There are some around somewhere," she said.

"Well, find me some," Marc said, "only make them darker--dark enough that I won't be able to see through them at all. Paste cardboard inside them or something."

The girl looked at him quizzically, then shrugged. "Okay," she said. "I know when I'm licked."

"And hurry," Marc urged. "There's no time to lose."

* * * * *

The blonde departed, and Marc's attention was taken by a hurried scuffling in the aisle. He opened his eyes and cautiously peered out. A series of blue-clad legs, that, even as he watched them, turned bare and hairy, raced by. When they had passed, Marc leaned back again and gave himself over to a moment of quiet and confused contemplation.

He tried hard to find some clue to the cause of his extraordinary eye affliction, but arrived at nothing definite. There was a rustling at his side and he turned to find that the blonde had rejoined him. He closed his eyes again as the net brassiere, for a second time, began to appear from beneath the fading fabric of her dress.

"Here are the glasses," the blonde said coldly. "I put tape on the inside of the lenses." Marc held out his hand and she gave them to him. "Your eyes certainly must be sensitive."

"You'll never know," Marc said gloomily and slipped the glasses on.

"Can you see anything at all?" the blonde asked inquisitively.

"Not a thing," Marc said. "It's a great relief."

"Mister," the blonde said flatly, "I guess I just don't understand you."

There was the sound of stealthy approach from the direction of the aisle, and Marc quickly lowered the glasses to observe Toffee approaching on tip-toe. She was carrying a bottle of champagne under each arm and she looked enormously pleased.

"I think they've gone," she said. Then, seeing the blonde, suspicion flickered in her eyes. "Leave it to you; all I have to do is turn my back and you're snuggled up with some big blonde."

"I'm not snuggled up," Marc said. "I've been making a purchase."

"Of what?" Toffee said sharply.

"These glasses," Marc said. "The young lady was good enough to fix them so you can't see through them."

"Just glasses," the blonde murmured regretfully. "And that's all." She made a small sound of disillusionment. "And I thought this was going to be my lucky day, too."

"It is," Toffee said. "If anything had passed between you two besides a pair of glasses, you'd be wearing your neck off the shoulder this season."

"Where did you get the champagne?" Marc broke in. "Or is that a subject too delicate to discuss?"

"Almost," Toffee said grandly. "I ran into a salesman in Imported Liquors with foreign ideas. We indulged in a bit of hand-wrestling amongst the East Indian wines, and he lost. He's resting quietly now, however." She held out one of the bottles of champagne. "I used this to defend myself." She shoved the bottle into Marc's hand. "Let's get slightly damp."

Meanwhile the blonde had begun to edge away.

"Leaving?" Marc asked pleasantly.

"I'm going over to Imported Liquors," the blonde said.

She departed, and Marc extracted the cork from the bottle with a fruity pop and handed it back to Toffee.

"A pause for refreshment," he said, "and then we've got to do something about my eyesight. Did you say the cops have gone?"

"The last I saw of them," Toffee said, "they were lumpering through ladies' lingerie, headed for silverware and china." She paused for a deep drink from the bottle. "With the head of steam they had worked up they should be far beyond the horizon by now."

"Good," Marc said. He received the bottle from Toffee and drank thirstily. "Cops have a positive talent for being disagreeable."

"A bad lot," Toffee nodded. "They tend to weigh on the spirit. And speaking of spirits don't keep sucking at that bottle all day. Save some for me."

* * * * *

Twenty minutes later, one bottle depleted, the other tucked protectively beneath Toffee's arm, the two emerged unsteadily from behind the counter and started on an uneven course down the aisle.

"You'll have to lead me," Marc said thickly. "I can't see a thing."

Toffee took his hand. "Blind as a drunken bat," she giggled.

"You will probably lead me astray," Marc said happily.

"I shall do my best," Toffee said. "Luckily, I'm familiar with the route."

Marc held back for a moment. "I've just figured it out," he said. "It was that burp medicine that affected my eyes. We've got to go look up that druggist."

"All right," Toffee said. "But if I had X-ray eyes I would be content to stand on street corners and whistle."

This concluded, they tottered on to the end of the aisle and down the stairs.

"Going astray!" Marc sang vaporishly. "Going astray! I'm jus' going astray!"

With a wild lurch the two fugitives precariously left the stairs and emerged onto the first floor. As they started unsteadily down the aisle a veiled and voluminous lady in black turned from her examination of a silk blouse and observed their progress with smiling approval. She turned benignly to the sales girl who was serving her.

"Isn't that sweet?" she murmured. "Imagine a stunning girl like that sacrificing a day to take her poor old blind father shopping."

Toffee and Marc proceeded in a more or less orderly fashion to the doorway, leaving the good Sergeant to ransack a store now empty of its quarry.

* * * * *

Five minutes later and three blocks removed from the department store, the two law-evaders paused to reconnoitre. Or at least Toffee reconnoitred while Marc, still sightless behind his glasses, awaited directions. He held out his hand in readiness, waiting to be led. At his side, Toffee momentarily broke her mood of concentration.

"As I see it," she said, "our next move is to flee the city."

"But what about the druggist?" Marc said. "I've got to find out about my eyes." He stopped as he became aware of a nervous tugging at his sleeve.

"Hey, man," a voice said, "I've been lookin' for you everywheres."

Marc hastily lowered his glasses. He glanced down to find a familiar shifty-eyed, weasel-like face peering up at him.

"You!" he said.

"Yeah, man," the diminutive peddler of lewd pictures grinned. "You still got the cool stuff, huh?"

"The cool stuff?" Marc said with sudden stiffness. "If you mean that collection of disgusting pictures, no I haven't got them. At the moment, I believe they're listed as Exhibit A in the case of The People against Marcus G. Pillsworth."

"Man!" the little man wailed. "You mean somebody goofed and the cops got 'em?"

"Precisely," Marc said frigidly.

"Who's this Pillsworth cube?"

Marc drew himself up into a living tower of glowering hauteur. "I am Marcus G. Pillsworth," he said nastily.

"You!" the little man said. "You got hooked with the goods?"

"I got hooked," Marc said flatly, "with the goods just where you planted it on me."

"Jeez!" the little man cried despairingly. "You just can't rely on nobody no more." He chewed his lip for a moment, then looked up at Marc anxiously. "What about the French Elixir? Did the bulls heist that, too?"

"French Elixir?" Marc said. "I don't know anything about your French Elixir."

"The hell you don't, man," the little man said. "I faded it into your coat pocket. Did they find it?"

Marc paused. A chill of apprehension skittered up his spine. "Into my coat pocket," he said. "A small brown bottle?"

"It wasn't a big blue jug," the little man said impatiently. "You still got it?"

Marc reached into his pocket and pulled out, first one brown bottle, then another. They were almost identical except that the liquid in the one marked 'French Elixir' had been depleted by approximately one fourth.

"Good night!" Marc yelled. "I drank the wrong stuff!"

"You drank the Elixir!" the little man said. He snatched the bottle from Marc's hand. "You _drank_ it?"

"I said I drank it," Marc said distractedly.

"Then, you owe me twenty bucks, man. That bottle of genuine, hard-to-get French Elixir sells for fifty, sixty dollars." He held out his hand. "Pad my palm, friend."

"I certainly will not pad your palm," Marc said indignantly. "Do you know what that stuff's done to me?"

"Huh?" The little man paused reflectively. "How should I know what it done," he said. "They say all sorts of stuff could happen to you, according to how you're repressed." He regarded Marc interestedly. "What happened?"

"I've got X-ray eyes!" Marc said dramatically. "That's what happened."

The little man looked at him skeptically. "What's X-ray eyes?"

"When I look at people," Marc said, "I see right through their clothes. If I didn't have these glasses on everyone on this street would be stark naked."

* * * * *

The little man made a thin whistling sound, then began to chuckle. "Lord, man," he laughed, "you ain't got X-ray eyes, you just got a dirty mind!"

"What!" Marc said.

"That's all!" the little man said. "It was all explained to me. The stuff works different on different people. It lets out what you've been pluggin' up inside. Oh, man," he chortled, "and you gave me the freeze for showin' you those French postcards!"

"I do not have a dirty mind," Marc said, "and even if I did, it would hardly be any business of yours. The point is that this awful elixir of yours has made a mess of things."

"At least," Toffee put in, "it's given us a devil of a handicap."

The little man looked at Toffee directly for the first time and obviously was struck by what he saw. "Who's the cool chunk of stuff?" he asked. He moved in close to Toffee and put a hand casually on her shoulder. "Just call me Hotstuff Harold, honey," he murmured. "That's how I'm referred to by all my intimate friends."

"If you don't keep your grimy little paws to yourself," Toffee said evenly, "they'll soon be referring to you as 'the deceased.'"

"It's nice that you two are acquainted," Marc said sourly, "but that still doesn't solve my problem." Peering over the top of his glasses, he fixed Hotstuff Harold with a beady eye. "How do I get rid of the effects of this awful elixir of yours?"

"As far as I know," Hotstuff said, "all you can do is wait for it to wear off."

"And how long will that take?"

"Who knows?" Hotstuff shrugged. "I ain't never messed with the stuff. Maybe I been repressin' a better nature and it would come out and ruin my life's work."

"I doubt it," Marc said. "But there must be something I can do about this."

"If I was you, man, I'd go sit in a Marilyn Monroe picture until they kicked me out." Hotstuff put his hand to Marc's sleeve. "You still owe me some bucks, boy. Twenty for the pictures and twenty more for the shot of elixir."

"Now, look here," Marc said sternly, "if you think...."

He stopped, for Hotstuff, a businessman of some agility, already had Marc's wallet in his hand and was counting out the money. Marc snatched it back from him.

"Here, now!" he said.

Harold grinned modestly. "Mother taught me how to take up public collections while I was still in rompers. They say I was the cutest little dip that ever worked the Stem."

"Well, this is one stem you're not clipping," Marc said hotly. "Keep your hands to yourself."

"I ain't goin' to leave till I get paid," Hotstuff said without animosity.

"Just a minute." Toffee broke in. "While you two are arguing, time is running down the drain. If we're going to the country we'd better get started."

Marc turned to her with a sigh. "I thought I explained to you that...."

"But I've got it all figured out," Toffee said complacently. "While you've been wasting your time with this grifter, I've been working out a plan."

"I'm sorry," Marc said wearily, "but I don't think I could stand another one of your plans. Not today."

"But this will work," Toffee said brightly. "Now the problem, to put it succinctly, is for me to go to the country, but not to be noticed by Julie. Well, actually, that's the easiest thing in the world."

"Oh?" Marc said. "If you imagine that Julie is likely to overlook a half-naked redhead...."

"Now, look at it this way," Toffee interrupted, "if you wanted to hide yourself where would be the best place?"

"Me," Hotstuff interjected, "I always go out and mix with the crowds when I'm on the dodge."

"Exactly!" Toffee said. She looked on Hotstuff with new respect, then, glancing back to Marc, pointed across the street. "See that bus?"

* * * * *

Tilting his glasses, Marc followed the direction of her pointing finger. Diagonally across the street was parked a large yellow sight-seeing bus of a vintage so distant as to defy memory. At the front of the bus stood a tall, cadaverous looking individual in shirt sleeves, about whom was an atmosphere of listless resignation. Inside the bus, the seats were starkly uninhabited.

"What we do," Toffee went on enthusiastically, "is hire that bus and fill it up with a lot of people. Then we drive out to the country, and when Julie sees this great gang knocking about the place she'll never pay any special attention to anyone in particular. She'll never notice me."

"That's ridiculous," Marc said. "In the first place I doubt I'd ever be able to hire the bus privately."

"From the looks of business," Hotstuff said, "you could probably have it for a song."

"Even so," Marc said doggedly, "we are not a crowd. We are only two people, and I'm positive Julie is quite capable of picking a strange young lady out of a group of two."

"I'd be very happy to accompany you," Hotstuff said. "In fact I insist on it, so's I can protect my investment."

"There!" Toffee said. "We're forming a crowd already. All we need are about twenty more."

"And where are we going to get them?" Marc asked serenely.

"I could have a number of my business acquaintances and their--uh--molls--out here on the corner in a flash," Hotstuff offered obligingly. "I know a number of personalities who are quite hot to get out of town for various reasons."

"Go get them!" Toffee said. "We'll hire the bus while you're gone."

"Now, just a second...." Marc yelled, but Hotstuff had already scurried off down the street toward the corner poolhall.

* * * * *

The deal for the bus was concluded in almost the same instant that Marc approached the gangling individual on the sidewalk.

"Sure, mister," the man said sadly. "Why not? A day in the country would suit me fine. You can have the bus and me for whatever you want to offer, and you can bring along all the friends you want."

Marc fatefully handed over a couple of bills and glanced, not without apprehension, down the street. "The others should be along any moment now," he said. He turned to Toffee. "Just how are we going to explain all these people to Julie. We can't just say I asked them out for dinner."

"Well, then," Toffee said, "we'll just say you're a group of botany students on a field trip." As though that satisfactorily explained everything she started into the bus. "Heigh, ho! Oh, for a day of biology in the open air!"

"I thought you said botany," Marc said, uneasily.

"One can always hope," she said grandly.

True to his word, Hotstuff was back almost instantly, trailing after him a cast of characters the likes of which is rarely seen on the streets before sundown. The men, five of them in all, were heavy-browed and flashily dressed. Their female counterparts--or molls, as Hotstuff had described them--were so unanimous in their endorsement of low necklines, high heels, dyed hair and ankle bracelets that they seemed almost to be in uniform.

At the approach of this strange swarming, Marc lowered his glasses only to replace them even a bit more quickly than was entirely necessary.

"Good Lord!" he groaned. "It looks like Saturday night at the police lineup."

At that moment, however, Hotstuff arrived at the front of the bus, his questionable companions crowding close behind him.

"These is some of my best chums," he announced with beaming pride. "I would introduce you to them only they don't like their names mentioned." He drew forward a crimson-lipped creature who had crossed the street close to his side.

"This is Floss, my mouse," he said.

Floss, whose hair ran the gamut of colors from jet at the roots to orange-red at the ends--with blond, brown and platinum intervening--gazed at Marc from beneath mascara-encrusted eyelashes.

"Hi, tallstuff," she said in a smoky tone, "ain't I seen you somewheres before?"

"Knock it off, Floss," Hotstuff said. "Today's vacation. Besides, the gent can't see you through those glasses, so don't waste your wattage." He grinned at Marc. "She likes you, man."

"I always like to improve public relations," Floss said delicately.

"I'm much obliged," Marc said, edging away. "Well, I suppose we ought to be on our way."

"Okay, everybody!" Hotstuff yelled. "Climb aboard! We're off to mingle with nature!" He took Marc's arm and guided him to the steps. "Everybody brought a couple of bottles," he said. "All you have to do is supply the grub. Boy! is this going to be some party!"

"Yes," Marc said fatefully, "it probably is."

* * * * *

It was not until the bus left the city and was churning its way into the fresh-budding atmosphere of the country that the little assemblage began to get into the true spirit of the trip.

Until then they had been content to sit quietly drinking from their bottles, but now, with the green fields and trees unfolding before them they were moved to song. Lifting their voices in shattering discord, they howled out a little number about an unfortunate heroine called Underslung Fannie whose amorous exploits, according to the lyrics, were distressingly uncanny. At the rear of the bus, Marc slunk in his seat and turned to Toffee.

"Leave it to you," he moaned. "How am I ever going to palm off this tight little segment of the underworld as a bunch of fun-loving botanists?"

"Oh, they're not so bad," Toffee said. "At least you don't have to worry about whether they're bad or not. You know they're bad right from the beginning."

"And so are you," Marc said dryly. "However, I suppose everyone seeks his own level. I might have expected this."

Toffee generously patted his cheek. "You're just overwrought," she said. "You need a drink." Reaching under her seat, she brought out the bottle of champagne. "Take some of this and you will see everything in a happy glow."

"Behind these glasses?" Marc asked.

"You may even find the nerve to take them off," Toffee said.

"In this crowd?" Marc said. "Heaven forbid!"

Nevertheless, after several lengthy drafts from the bottle, Marc did begin to see things more brightly, and he did remove his glasses. It gave the congregation before him a strange, bare-shouldered look, but the effect, since everyone was seated, was hardly shocking. He was careful, however, to keep his gaze averted from the passing landscape, particularly after a startling view of a pink-skinned, full-formed farmgirl scattering feed to a flock of hideously defeathered chickens. After a time he began to look on his new-found companions a bit more fondly.

"At least," he yawned, mellowed by the champagne and the warm sun, "they're a happy bunch of criminals."

As though to prove his words correct, the company suddenly roared with laughter, and Marc, content that things were going well, put his head back against the seat and dozed off.

The burst of laughter, however, had Marc listened more closely to it, was more a cause for alarm than complacency. In its gleeful, boisterous tones was the announcement that the drunken little band of miscreants had found still a new outlet for their antisocial tendencies.

A blowsy blonde named Dora, spotting a cop lounging against his motorcycle along the highway, had observed the prescribed amenities between the law and the underworld by leaning out the window and making a series of rude and meaningful gestures. Admiring Dora's finesse in this affair, her escort, a blue-jawed second-story artist named Moose, leaned out beside her and dispatched a depleted whiskey bottle at the cop's head, scoring a solid hit along side the ear. Their friends and companions, as a result, had fairly collapsed in their seats with helpless laughter.

* * * * *

In this sordid incident were the beginnings of a well-routined game. The criminals, seeing no end of fun in this little sport, organized themselves into a team so that it might be pursued with the greatest efficiency and dispatch. Splitting themselves into cop-watchers, cop-insulters and cop-smackers, they became a yelling, yowling menace to every patrolman and peace-enforcer along the highway. As Marc continued to slumber, a chorus of sirens began to wail and shriek in the wake of the lumbering bus. Of those involved in this not-so-innocent diversion, only the bus driver was distressed.

"Now, cut it out, you!" he yelled back at his cop-assaulting passengers. "Lay off before you get me into serious trouble!"

"Step on the gas, you hacky!" Moose roared. "Give it the gun!" And having delivered this command, he snatched up another bottle and sent it sizzling through the window toward the head of an unsuspecting sheriff's deputy.

"Got him!" Floss shrieked with childish glee and collapsed to the aisle in a fit of giggles.

The sirens following the bus had reached a many-throated scream before Marc finally awoke. Opening his eyes with a start, he gazed about, firmly convinced that the world had gone mad. A glance toward the front of the bus and another out the rear, however, swiftly told him the frightful truth of the matter.

"Stop that!" he yelled. "Stop it this instant!"

"Look, mister!" the bus driver hollered. "Either you quiet down those maniacs or I'm going to drive this bus right off a cliff somewhere!"

Marc looked ahead down the highway. Mercifully, deliverance, of a sort, was at hand.

"Just around the next bend!" he yelled. "Take the drive to the left!"

"Golly!" Toffee cried happily, "isn't this exciting!"

Marc cast her a brief, scathing glance and concentrated on the road ahead. The bus, traveling at maximum speed, was rattling and creaking in every joint. Tires squealing, the driver took the turn ahead, then cut sharply to the left and through the gateway that bore the sign, 'Pillsworth Acres.'

The bus careened up the circle of the drive, spitting gravel and dirt from beneath its tires. A rambling, stone-faced house loomed rapidly ahead. Green, tree-studded lawns stretched away on all sides. Down the rise to the west a swimming pool flashed by, studding the greenness like a glimmering, intermittent sapphire. With a scream of the brakes, the bus ground to a terrifying stop at the entrance to the house. In the distance, back on the highway, the avenging sirens grew louder, then faded swiftly away into the distance. The driver at the front of the bus went limp in his seat.

"All out!" he gritted. "Get the hell out of here before I go nuts!"

Marc whirled about to Toffee. "Why didn't you wake me up?" he demanded.

"What for?" Toffee asked blithely. "You'd only have worried. And everything turned out fine, didn't it?"

As the company of undesirables staggered, reeled and toppled from the bus onto the lawn, Marc and Toffee followed after. Marc refitted his glasses to his nose and paused before the driver's extended hand.

"Yes?" he asked.

"Look, buddy," the driver said, "where can I hide this hack? Those cops may be comin' back here any minute."

"Seems a shame to hide it," Marc said acidly, "when we've spent so many happy hours together in it."

"I gotta hide it, mister," the driver said. "I don't want to get into any trouble. You see, this ain't my bus."

"What?" Marc said.

* * * * *