"We were on the San Andreas Rift," he said softly. "Madson, that wasn't the bombs at all. That wasn't Technology or Man." A smile trembled on his lips. "That was Nature. An earthquake." Madson was the first to comment. "All right," he said, "it was Nature--Nature showing her disgust for Man." "An idea like that is the sheerest animism," Ellenby reacted automatically. "Now if you try analyzing--" "Analyzing!" Madson snorted with a touch of the old fire. "You scientists are always--" "Whoa, boys," Rickie Vickson interrupted. "If it hadn't been for that little quake to confuse things, Vera-Ellen couldn't have snatched you out no matter how pretty she tried. And I'm in no mood for arguments now. I'm not the arty type and all the science I know is what my psychic counselor tells me. Widgie, quit pounding your heart; it's all over now." Ellenby touched her arm. "Do I understand," he asked, "that Vera-Ellen made you turn back just to save us?" "Of course not," Rickie assured him. "Her father and his pals tried to stop us a couple of miles back. They'd been radioed by a farmer in a copter and had the road blocked. George wanted to hand you all over to Vera-Ellen's father, but we conked George--he's such a weakling--and got away. Picking you up was an afterthought." Vera-Ellen flashed a wicked smile over her shoulder. Ellenby realized he was feeling vastly contented. He started to lift his feet off George, then settled them more comfortably. He looked at the violet-topped new chauffeur handling the Lunar as if she'd never done anything else, and she picked that moment to flash him another half friendly, half insulting grin. He nudged Madson and said, "We'll continue our argument later--_all_ our argument." Madson looked at him sharply and almost grinned too. Ellenby wondered idly what jobs they had for poets and physicists in 3D and handie studios. Rickie Vickson's eyes widened. "Say," she said, "if they were just warning us about that little old earthquake, then Old Angeles isn't radioactive--I mean any _more_ radioactive than it's ever been." "Oh boy," Vera-Ellen crowed as the car topped the hill and the blue spires came back in sight, "New Angeles, here we come."