At first he couldn't believe his eyes.471Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡyojZ0S64fn
Kirk stopped still, staring. The road didn't go away.
Not much of a road, but the damn thing was real! A paved road, built by human hands, cutting across the desert.
And down that road, not more than 1/4 mile away, was----a gas station! A run-down, once-white, old wreck of a gas station, and the first building he'd seen since he left the downed jet such a crazy long time ago.
With considerable effort, he could make his body run----a lopsided imitation of running, but it got him off the hot sand and onto that road, taking him, some painful minutes later, to the gas station.
"Hello!" he shouted in his croak of a voice. "Hell-O!"
Only a dry, hot silence.
The sole gas pump was dented, rusty. Kirk caught hold of it, to keep himself from falling over. "I---I need help! Please! Somebody!"
Spider webs all over the dirty windows and the weather wooden door of the clapboard station building.
"Just my luck! The first real building I come to and it's got to be abandoned!"
Kirk forced himself to walk to the door. He got hold of the knob, turned it. The door was locked.
He stayed, leaning against the door, for a long time. Then he backed off and lunged at it, backed and lunged again. The ancient door gave way as its rusty hinges screeched. The whole door fell into the station office, with Kirk on top of it."
"Come on, come on," he urged himself. "Dumb to quit now."
He got up, caught hold of a counter, and surveyed the room. There were some cans of oil in a rack against the wall, one tire leaning in a corner. And on the wall was a telephone.
"Probably disconnected years ago," Kirk muttered.
Or was it? Maybe the station's owner had only just now left. Maybe he was even planning to come back.
Kirk spotted the cash register. Sitting at the counter's far end. He worked his way over to it, pushed at its various buttons with his battered fingers.
"Calm," he said. "Push the damn No Sale tab."
He did. Nothing happened. The money drawer stayed tightly shut.
"Gotta be some tools around this dump. Find 'em an..."
Crash!
In turning away, his elbow had slammed into the cash register, sent it sailing off the counter to the plank floor. With a thumping, jingling sound, the drawer popped open.
Two dirty and crumpled dollar bills fell out.
Kirk dropped to his knees. "Look, I can't get change for these around here, dammit!"
He poked a finger into the compartments. Hit something. It felt like a dime. Yes! It was a dime!"
Very carefully he extracted the coin, placed it in the middle of his blistered palm and rose. He went tottering to the phone wall.
Holding his breath, he dropped the coin into the slot. He had the receiver pressed to his ear. "Come on, please. Gimme a goddam dial tone!"471Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSvorpK6Gnl
Nothing happened. Ten seconds past. Then the phone began to hum at him.471Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTdV3hJ6fER
Kirk made a rumbling sound that was supposed to be a laugh, and dial 0 for the operator."471Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4MvifyNNFb
"Operator," said a female voice.471Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8CTpIIqN6D
"Thank God, thank God," said Kirk.471Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSVwmpqsNPA
"I'm sorry sir, I can't hear you very well. Can you speak up?"471Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYYUTfWVlfC
He did the best shouting he was capable of. "Operator, I need to make a collect call to Janice L. Kirk in Houston Texas," he said.471Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ33TJjuDM7A
Cox was dividing his time between ignoring the stomach-turning quality of the flight and staring down at the forbidding desert below, for some trace of the astronauts he expected to find.471Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡr8VJPG4dVn
"Imagine giving this up to be a lawyer!" Connelly shouted back at him, as the ancient biplane lurched.471Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmWQQjWr4TW
"Dumb," he replied through cupped hands.471Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡuztXMrjPir
They were flying a few hundred feet over the desert, and had been in the air for nearly one hour. Thus far they'd spotted only a dead coyote. Cox wasn't sure what he was looking for. He was sure that at least Kirk had been at the hangar until recently. But where he and the other two astronauts were at the moment, Cox had no clear idea. They'd been in this area, so maybe they still were. Or at least some sign of them.471Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3lPmArVTCx
"This friend, what the hell's he doing out here, anyway?" inquired the baldheaded pilot, as he banked the craft.471Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡq8lmyL8Yyg
"Lost."471Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡlbJIFnATfe
"He rob a bank or something? Hijack a plane?"471Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzQehYVPiOy
"Worse."471Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtxXTNhhNnZ
"I get a third!"471Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡkl7oJNdv8w
"Huh?"471Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvZlx9hup6S
"We find him, I get a third of the loot!"471Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNkDXs6zI2h
The venerable biplane lurched again.
Cox clutched at his stomach, nodding. "Whatever you say, pardner."
ns 172.71.223.161da2
