"It's all right," Locke told his drunken companion. "I've got a
taxi waiting. We'll leave Ringold where he is."
Twenty-four hours later Adelbert Higgins undertook to recall what
had happened to him after he left Muller's place on East
Fourteenth Street, but his memory was tricky. He recollected a
vaguely humorous discussion of some sort with a stranger, the
details of which were almost entirely missing. He remembered that
dawn had broken when he came out of the saloon, but beyond that he
could not go with any degree of certainty. There was a hazy memory
of an interminable ride in a closed vehicle of some sort, a dizzy
panorama of moving buildings, bleak, wind-swept trees, frosty
meadows, and land-locked lakes backed by what were either distant
mountain ranges or apartment houses. This last, however, was all
very blurred and indistinct.
As to who was with him on the ride, or what took place thereafter,
he had no memory and no opportunity of learning, owing to certain
unexpected and alarming occurrences which made it imperative for
him to terminate his connection with his college, as big Marty
Ringold had done earlier in the day, and begin to pack his
belongings. Partly out of deference to the frantic appeals of his
widowed mother, partly owing to the telephoned advice of Mr.
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