Chapter VII

Marc and Toffee swung quickly out of the courtroom and started down the corridor. They were not entirely certain that they were officially allowed this break from the smothering embrace of the law, but since it was a love that was totally unrequited they felt perfectly justified in nipping it off as cleanly and quickly as possible. Besides, neither was in a mood to ask questions.

Marc frowned deeply. The future, in view of past events, was not reassuring. He wondered what night it was that he had lain awake and felt a happy anticipation at strange and wonderful things about to happen. It didn't seem possible that it could have been only night before last; it must have been years and years ago in view of all that had happened. Certainly, in a most disturbing way, the strange and wonderful things had come to pass, but the feeling of happy anticipation had been shot to hell in its very beginnings.

How could things possibly have gotten themselves into so incomprehensible a snarl in just the space of a few short hours? Only a day and a night had passed and now, here he was with a divorce, an irresponsible redhead, a criminal record and several volumes of unfavorable publicity on his hands. And to top it all off, though he was subject to the laws of gravity at the moment, he had taken to floating about in the air like a demented balloon. Also, he had the forbidding feeling that he might revert to a condition of buoyancy at any given moment.

Marc sighed heavily and cursed the day he conceived the idea of the basement laboratory. If there was any small comfort remaining to him at all it came only from a patently comfortless cliche: things couldn't possibly get any worse. He didn't see the courtroom door swing mysteriously open behind him, waver for a moment, then swing shut again.

Neither did Marc see the horrible Blemish twins following behind him and Toffee in the corridor shadows. His attention, instead, had been drawn to the two men in double-breasted suits who were shoving their way toward him through the crowd. Though Marc was certain that the two, regardless of what their business might be, could be the bearers of only bad tidings, he hadn't the will left in him to try to avoid them. One more worry, added to the multitude he already had, would hardly be noticed. Taking Toffee's hand, he stopped and waited resignedly for the two to catch up to them.

"Mr. Pillsworth?" the first man nodded.

"Could there be any doubt?" Toffee said dully.

The man glanced at Toffee, startled a little at her costume, then returned his gaze firmly and resolutely to Marc.

"We are with the Federal Government," he said. He nodded toward the courtroom from which Marc and Toffee had just departed. "I'm sorry we didn't get here sooner; we could have saved you all that trouble."

"Now it's the Feds," Toffee murmured. "More cops ... more courtrooms ... more judges ... more questions ... wurra, wurra."

No one paid any attention.

"We've been to your home, Mr. Pillsworth," the man went on. "We've gone over your laboratory very thoroughly, and it's our opinion that you've turned up something that could be of great interest to the government. In a military way. Your wife explained to us that your intention was to facilitate construction, and I suppose, in a way, you've succeeded. However, in the process, you've also discovered an explosive of most extraordinary properties."

"How was Julie when you saw her?" Marc asked.

"Mrs. Pillsworth was most cooperative," the man said, acknowledging the interruption. "However, she was quite busy while we were there. I gathered she was closing up the house, taking a trip somewhere."

"Did she say when she was leaving?" Marc asked anxiously.

"I believe she said this evening," the man said. "I supposed you knew all about it. Anyway, to get on--in our opinion you have stumbled across a new type of bomb that is so advanced as to make the A bomb completely obsolete. Briefly, it is easily possible that a bomb could be made of your formula and constructed in such a way as to be detonated by the final chemical. It could be used to wipe out whole cities, to wipe them off the face of the earth without a trace. Every stick, stone, human being and piece of mortar could be made to simply rise and disappear from the earth's surface within a matter of minutes. That's rather a terrifying secret to hold entirely in your own possession, Mr. Pillsworth."

"Yes, indeed," Marc said absently. "Terrifying."

"In other words, for the sake of national security, the government cannot possibly allow you to have your discovery all to yourself any longer. I'm sure you can understand that. We would like to talk to you and go over your formula in private. Your notes are still intact, aren't they?"

* * * * *

Marc's hand went automatically to the inner pocket of his jacket where he had secured the notebook. He nodded.

"Oh, yes," he murmured.

"Good. Then suppose we go to one of the...."

"I'd like to go home first, if I may," Marc broke in. "I have to see my wife before she leaves. It's very important. And there are a few extra notes in my room at the house. I could get them all together...."

The man hesitated for a moment, then finally nodded. "All right," he said. "After all we're the only ones who know about this. Only let me caution you not to talk to anyone."

"I won't say a word," Marc said, and nodded toward Toffee. "She couldn't say anything; she doesn't understand any of it."

"Fine," the man said. "Then will it be all right if we come to your house this evening?"

"That'll be fine," Marc said quickly, anxious to be free of them. "I'll see you then."

Marc and Toffee watched the two men disappear down the corridor and up a stairway.

"Terribly morbid pair, aren't they?" Toffee said. "It's enough to make your flesh crawl, all this talk about wiping out cities and people and things."

"It's their business," Marc said.

Toffee glanced behind her. "I don't like to mention it," she said in an undertone, "but there are a pair of perfectly loathsome little men back there, and I think they're following us. For my money they look exactly like spies. They seem to skulk, if you know what I mean."

"I know what you mean," Marc said. "I saw them in the courtroom. Probably they're perfectly harmless. Anyone who looked like that would have to be. Anyway, I haven't time to worry about any skulking; I've got to get home. Let's get out of here."

"Am I going with you?" Toffee asked.

Marc nodded. "I've decided it's the best way. We'll just sit down and tell Julie all about you."

"She'll never believe it," Toffee said. "If she does, she's a lot crazier than I think she is."

"She'll have to believe it," Marc said earnestly. "If worst comes to worst, I'll knock myself out and she can see you vanish and reappear for herself."

"We could ask the neighbors in too," Toffee observed wryly. "We could serve punch and do it as a sort of parlor entertainment."

"Don't be silly," Marc said. "Come on."

"I'm game," Toffee murmured. "I just wonder if Julie's up to it, that's all."

"Maybe I should call her first," Marc said, catching sight of a row of phone booths at the end of the corridor. "Just to make sure she's there."

"You might check on the condition of her heart, too," Toffee said. "Just as a precaution."

They started forward and had nearly reached the booths when Marc suddenly stopped short.

"Now what?" Toffee asked.

Marc inclined his head to listen. "Do you keep hearing footsteps?" he asked.

"Sure," Toffee said. "All over the place. With these marble floors...."

"No, not those," Marc said. "Right behind us. I keep hearing someone walking right behind me, but there's no one there."

"Well," Toffee said slowly, "I didn't want to be the first to mention it, but...."

* * * * *

Suddenly, they were both silent, their eyes intent on the floor and a cigarette stub that had begun to behave with shocking abnormality. Still alight, as it had been dropped, it suddenly crushed itself out flat against the floor and ceased to smoke. It was for all the world as though someone had stepped on it to put it out, and yet there wasn't a human foot within yards of the thing.

"Oh, my gosh!" Toffee breathed. "Do you suppose that thing realizes what it can do to a nervous system with a trick like that?"

"What do you suppose it is?" Marc asked.

"It's a cigarette stub," Toffee said. "And it's gone mad. It's completely out of its head. Let's just pay it no mind, treat it with complete contempt. Maybe it'll crawl away and do its odious little stunt for someone who likes that sort of thing."

"You may be right," Marc said without the slightest tone of belief. He turned away, but his gaze remained furtively on the flattened stub. Since there was no further disturbance, he pulled himself together and started toward one of the phone booths. Toffee watched after him with careful intensity.

But if either of them thought they'd had the last of madness from inanimate objects, they were woefully mistaken. The phone booth was next to become possessed. It was as though the hulking enclosure had been waiting in prey for Marc. No sooner did Marc stick his head inside the booth than the doors, without any visible guidance, snapped shut, caught him by the neck, and held him fast. Toffee started back with a cry of pure surprise.

"Help!" Marc wheezed from inside the booth. "Help!"

It was a moment before Toffee was capable of action, but she did her best to make up for lost time. She started forward to the attack with a vengeance. But no sooner had she come within reaching distance of the booth and the door than she was mysteriously and invisibly thrust back. She renewed her efforts but was only repelled for a second time. She paused to consider the door, the booth and her own emotions, rapidly approaching a state of blind rage.

It was just as she had braced herself and hunched angrily forward for the third attack that the woman came out of the booth next to the one in which Marc was trapped. She took one look at the determined redhead and drew her own conclusions.

"Hold off, honey!" she screamed. "You can have the booth! I'm through!"

But Toffee had already hurled herself forward in a headlong, firm-jawed lunge. The woman screamed shrilly and departed the booth and the vicinity with the speed of a deer in season. In the next split second Toffee collided with Marc's invisible captor. There was a dull thud, a small skirmishing, and then Toffee, apparently bearing her opponent to the floor with her, went down in tangled triumph. The door of the telephone booth flew open and Marc dropped to his knees, gasping for air.

George, thoroughly humiliated at having been bested by a mere whisp of a girl, became emotionally confused, lost control, as before in the courtroom, and completely materialized. He looked up at Toffee sprawled untidily across his chest, and flushed.

"You didn't have to knock me down," he murmured woundedly.

Toffee glanced down at her defeated adversary and started with amazement.

"Marc!" she cried. "How did you get down there?"

At the phone booth Marc was still panting for breath. "Did you expect me to come out of there dancing a rhumba?" he asked peevishly.

Toffee whirled about. "Marc!" she yelled.

"Stop screaming my name at me," Marc said. "All I want is...!"

* * * * *

His voice retreated down his throat with a gurgle of surprise as he caught sight of George.

"Wha...!"

Toffee turned from one to the other. "Which one of you is which?" she gasped confusedly.

"I'm me," Marc murmured vaguely. "Who's he?"

Toffee sprang away from her perch on George's chest.

"Oh, mother!" she cried.

"Well," George said resignedly, getting to his feet. "I suppose that I might as well admit it, now that you've found me out." He turned to Marc. "I'm your ghost."

"_Ghost!_" Marc and Toffee sang it out together. As Marc sprang to his feet, they both closed in on George, crowded him back defensively into one of the phone booths.

During all this, the incident had attracted several innocent bystanders who were now looking on with baffled interest.

"What have they got in there?" one official-looking gentleman asked another. "Did you see?"

The other shook his head. "I think they said it was a goat."

"A goat? What on earth are they doing with a goat in there? Do you suppose they have the beast talking to someone on the phone?"

"If they have," the second replied, "it had better yell for help. They were crowding the poor thing something awful. On the other hand, maybe they just wanted to milk it. If it's a modest goat it might be reluctant about being milked right out here in the middle of the hall."

"I know I would," the first gentleman said, "if I were a goat. I wouldn't blame it a bit. It's shocking, just the thought of it."

"They're doing the best they can," the second gentleman reminded. "I can see where a reluctant goat wouldn't be the easiest thing in the world to get along with."

"Just the same, I don't approve," the first man said. "Not even a little bit. If the goat is shy, they shouldn't bring it out in public to milk it like this."

"Maybe they're trying to teach it social poise," the second man suggested.

"I don't care," the first said. "Livestock should be left at home. Someone should speak to the Health Commissioner about this!"

The second man shook his head with mild amusement. "That shouldn't be difficult for you," he said. "You are the Health Commissioner. Or did they get you in the last clean-up?"

The first man looked at him sharply. "The devil you say!" he exclaimed. He thought about it for a moment. "By heaven, you're right. Sometimes I forget. I thought I was the Water Commissioner. Haven't been to my office for weeks to see what it says on the door." He started away, then turned back. "Why don't you come in and complain to me about this goat? It wouldn't look right if I complained to myself, would it? My secretary would think it was odd."

Meanwhile Marc and Toffee had wedged themselves into the doorway of the telephone booth and were staring incredulously at George.

"Well," George said uneasily, "haven't you ever seen a ghost before?"

"I should hope to tell you I haven't," Toffee said fervently. She looked at George with suspicion. "How do we know you're a ghost? Can you prove it?"

"Do I have to?" George said unhappily.

"It would help clear things up considerably," Marc said. "Personally, I don't believe a word of it."

George stared at them for a long moment, then sighed. "Oh, all right," he murmured. "If you insist. Of course this is terribly corny, and you probably won't like it, but it should give you an idea."

* * * * *

As Marc and Toffee watched, George carefully controlled his ectoplasm, dissolved his head down to a grinning skull, and issued a low moaning sound.

"Mother in heaven!" Toffee said, closing her eyes. "Stop doing that!"

George, only too happy to do so, quickly rematerialized his head. "I told you you wouldn't like it," he said.

"But how could you be my ghost?" Marc said shakenly. "I'm not dead."

"Are you sure?" Toffee said. "Personally, I feel quite dead and gone to hell after looking at that."

"But you're supposed to be dead," George said with sudden self-righteousness. "If you were any good at all, you'd be mouldering in your grave at this very moment. You were supposed to have been blown to bits in an explosion. That's why they sent me."

"Who sent you?" Marc asked.

"I'd rather not discuss them, if it's all the same to you," George said.

"Well," Marc said, "I'm alive. So you can just go back to them, whoever they are, and tell them they're mistaken."

"But I don't want to go back," George said unhappily. He looked at Marc speculatively. "Couldn't you just sort of kick off?"

"I beg your pardon?" Marc asked incredulously. "Do I understand you right? Are you asking me to kill myself just to accommodate you?"

"Oh, you wouldn't have to do it all yourself," George said. "I'd be very happy to assist you."

"So!" Toffee cried. "So that's what you were up to! You were trying to strangle him with that phone booth!"

George shrugged sheepishly. "I didn't think I should pass up any opportunity. I'll admit it's not a very fancy way to die...."

"You fiend!" Marc said. "You horror!"

"Oh, please, no!" George objected woundedly. "You just aren't looking at the thing right, that's all. Fair's fair, you know. After all, I've been waiting years for you to pop off, and...."

"And you're going to wait a great many more years as far as I'm concerned!" Marc said.

"I was afraid you'd be narrow about it," George said dejectedly. Tears came to his eyes. "I've always had to take your left-overs. Your second name, even. I couldn't call myself Marc, because that was the name you wanted. I had to take George. It's unjust."

"Well, don't go on about it," Toffee said. "There's no use blubbering."

"You might just as well go away," Marc said firmly. "I'll be damned if I'm going to pop off, as you so picturesquely put it, just to please a spook with criminal tendencies." He glanced heavenward. "This, on top of everything else!"

The tears welled larger in George's unhappy eyes. He looked at Toffee and Marc and flushed at making such an open display of his emotions. To hide his feelings he sadly dissolved his head. The thin air above his shoulders echoed with a moist snuffle.

"Oh, Lord!" Toffee moaned. "He's up to his tricks again! Would you listen to that?"

"I wouldn't if I could help it," Marc said.

"Let's get away from this snivelling shade before he drives us crazy," Toffee said urgently. "I'm so upset I wouldn't be surprised if I walked out of here on my hands."

"The way he is right now," Marc agreed, "he's the most haunting ghost I've ever seen. I'll certainly never forget him."

Together, they turned and moved away from the phone booth and quickly down the corridor.

"He'll have to shift for himself," Marc said. "I've got other things to worry about."

As they moved away, out of the entrance of the building, several of the more curious spectators converged on the phone booth and glanced cautiously inside.

It was empty.

Outside, an officer showed Marc and Toffee to the green convertible which had been delivered there by the government men. Marc helped Toffee in, then crossed around and slid in under the wheel. With a look of determination, he shifted the gears and directed the car into traffic.

The sound of the shifting gears obscured the muffled snuffling sound that emanated briefly from the back seat.