car, Fitz and Gus warily watched the others have to physically restrain the big Greek. They finally had to pinch a nerve to get the Browning away from him. Then they all piled in and drove off at speed.
"I still think I should oughta stay out here tonight, Fitz," said Gus stubbornly from the drivers seat of Fitz's Jeep wagon. The big, familiar service pistol now was jammed under his belt and his jacket side pockets were weighed down with spare loaded magazines of the fat cartridges for it. "It ain't that I'm scared for myself, driving back; in fact, I just hope that pack of fuckers does try something with me, so I can show them furriners what kinda shooting the U.S. Army useta teach us.
"But, boy, it's five them fuckers and if they comes back, with you here all by your lonesome ..."
"Gus, you've got to go back, and the faster the better. I'm okay here. I'm well armed and not afraid to shoot, if I have to. Nobody can get over that fence, or even touch it, without lights going on and alarms and trip flares going off all over my whole perimeter, you know that. But Gus, those hoods are just mad enough now, and mean enough and frantic enough to go after your wife and try to use her to shake loose the rest of the gold from us. She needs
you there; I'm okay out here. So you get the hell going and phone me when you get there."
"Okay, okay, Superman." Gus put the wagon into gear smoothly. "You can go though solid-stone walls, but can you jump over tall buildings with a single bound, too? Okay, yeah, I'll call you up when I gets back."
It was something under an hour and a half when the telephone rang and Gus's voice said, "Okay, Fitz, boy, I'm here and everything's okay. I think I set a new land-speed record for a Jeep and I kept looking for them bastards, too, but I never seen hide nor hair of them, all the way back. Sary, she's okay. I told her mosta everthing and we both is loaded for bear here. You seen the fuckers, boy?"
Fitz hung up the phone and went back to his loading. He loaded each and every weapon that would shoot and for which he had the requisite ammunition. He thoroughly checked the fences and every window and door. Then he just waited, the house darkened. Like Gus, he too was dead sure that the gold-hungry pack would return. And since they now knew from Gus that they shortly would find themselves very deep in the shit if they were so unwise as to hang around and be apprehended for their misuses of their authority and resources, they would almost certainly make their return visit tonight or tomorrow, latest.
Fitz brewed a pot of strong coffee, dragged his chair around so that it faced the window of the smaller of the two bedrooms—which, due to its location, gave a good view of the entire front of the lot and the street beyond—and then just sat there in the darkened room, sipping coffee and thinking. The .44 magnum revolver rode in a holster at his side
and the Garand leaned against the wall beside the window, easy to hand, as too was the twelve-gauge riot gun on the other side. He was as ready as he was ever going to be, he figured.
"Why?" he thought, sitting there. "Why did I choose this particular house, on this particular lot, on this particular street, in this particular, run-down neighborhood? Was it all God's plan? Did He think I'd finally suffered enough? If so, then why did He have to let poor old Tom die, too? Was it just necessary that I lose everything, every single tie with the happy life that once had been? If that was it, then why?
"I can't think of any reasonable explanation for the sand world or how I got there and still get there. I cant conceive of any explanation for the weird time differences between that world and this one, either. Are there human beings in that world? There must be . . . somewhere, because that ship certainly wasn't built by birds and seals and sea turtles and ponies, or even by crocodiles.
"What is the sand world, for that matter, and where is it? If it's an
"I still think I should oughta stay out here tonight, Fitz," said Gus stubbornly from the drivers seat of Fitz's Jeep wagon. The big, familiar service pistol now was jammed under his belt and his jacket side pockets were weighed down with spare loaded magazines of the fat cartridges for it. "It ain't that I'm scared for myself, driving back; in fact, I just hope that pack of fuckers does try something with me, so I can show them furriners what kinda shooting the U.S. Army useta teach us.
"But, boy, it's five them fuckers and if they comes back, with you here all by your lonesome ..."
"Gus, you've got to go back, and the faster the better. I'm okay here. I'm well armed and not afraid to shoot, if I have to. Nobody can get over that fence, or even touch it, without lights going on and alarms and trip flares going off all over my whole perimeter, you know that. But Gus, those hoods are just mad enough now, and mean enough and frantic enough to go after your wife and try to use her to shake loose the rest of the gold from us. She needs
you there; I'm okay out here. So you get the hell going and phone me when you get there."
"Okay, okay, Superman." Gus put the wagon into gear smoothly. "You can go though solid-stone walls, but can you jump over tall buildings with a single bound, too? Okay, yeah, I'll call you up when I gets back."
It was something under an hour and a half when the telephone rang and Gus's voice said, "Okay, Fitz, boy, I'm here and everything's okay. I think I set a new land-speed record for a Jeep and I kept looking for them bastards, too, but I never seen hide nor hair of them, all the way back. Sary, she's okay. I told her mosta everthing and we both is loaded for bear here. You seen the fuckers, boy?"
Fitz hung up the phone and went back to his loading. He loaded each and every weapon that would shoot and for which he had the requisite ammunition. He thoroughly checked the fences and every window and door. Then he just waited, the house darkened. Like Gus, he too was dead sure that the gold-hungry pack would return. And since they now knew from Gus that they shortly would find themselves very deep in the shit if they were so unwise as to hang around and be apprehended for their misuses of their authority and resources, they would almost certainly make their return visit tonight or tomorrow, latest.
Fitz brewed a pot of strong coffee, dragged his chair around so that it faced the window of the smaller of the two bedrooms—which, due to its location, gave a good view of the entire front of the lot and the street beyond—and then just sat there in the darkened room, sipping coffee and thinking. The .44 magnum revolver rode in a holster at his side
and the Garand leaned against the wall beside the window, easy to hand, as too was the twelve-gauge riot gun on the other side. He was as ready as he was ever going to be, he figured.
"Why?" he thought, sitting there. "Why did I choose this particular house, on this particular lot, on this particular street, in this particular, run-down neighborhood? Was it all God's plan? Did He think I'd finally suffered enough? If so, then why did He have to let poor old Tom die, too? Was it just necessary that I lose everything, every single tie with the happy life that once had been? If that was it, then why?
"I can't think of any reasonable explanation for the sand world or how I got there and still get there. I cant conceive of any explanation for the weird time differences between that world and this one, either. Are there human beings in that world? There must be . . . somewhere, because that ship certainly wasn't built by birds and seals and sea turtles and ponies, or even by crocodiles.
"What is the sand world, for that matter, and where is it? If it's an
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