He was passing his own farm. He hadn't come through town, and yet here he was at his own farm. Could he have forgotten where town was? Could it be north of his home, not south? Could a man get so confused as to forget things he'd known all his life? He reached the Shanks' place, and passed it at a trot. Then he was beyond their boundaries and breaking regulations again. He stayed on the road. He went by a small house and saw colored folks in the yard. There'd been no colored folks here. There'd been Eli Bergen and his family and his mother, in a bigger, newer house. The colored folks heard Plum's hooves and looked up and stared. Then a man raised his voice. "Mistah, you breakin' regulations! Mistah, the police gonnah get you!" * * * * * He rode on. He came to another house, neat and white, with three children playing on a grassy lawn. They saw him and ran inside. A moment later, adult voices yelled after him: "You theah! Stop!" "Call the sheriff! He's headin' foah Piney Woods!" There was no place called Piney Woods in this county. Was this how a man's mind went? He came to another house, and another. He passed ten all told, and people shouted at him for breaking regulations, and the last three or four sounded like Easterners. And their houses looked like pictures of New England he'd seen in magazines. He rode on. He never did come to town. He came to a ten-foot fence with a three-foot barbed-wire extension. He got off Plum and ripped his clothing climbing. He walked over hard-packed sand, and then wood, and came to a low metal railing. He looked out at the ocean, gleaming in bright sunlight, surging and seething endlessly. He felt the earth sway beneath him. He staggered, and dropped to his hands and knees, and shook his head like a fighter hit too many times. Then he got up and went back to the fence and heard a sound. It was a familiar sound, yet strange too. He shaded his eyes against the climbing sun. Then he saw it--a car. _A car!_ * * * * * It was one of those tiny foreign jobs that run on practically no gas at all. It stopped beside him and two men got out. Young men with lined, tired faces; they wore policemen's uniforms. "You broke regulations, Mr. Burr. You'll have to come with us." He nodded. He wanted to. He wanted to be taken care of. He turned toward Plum. The other officer was walking around the horse. "Rode her hard," he said, and he sounded real worried. "Shouldn't have done that, Mr. Burr. We have so very few now...." The officer holding Harry's arm said, "Pete." The officer examining Plum said, "It won't make any difference in a while." Harry looked at both of them, and felt sharp, personal fear.