At the last second Marc grabbed the wheel from the driver and yanked at it furiously. The bus careened to one side as Julie and Mario leaped or fainted to the grass, out of the way. The bus roared on, while in the background the siren hurled its piercing tone to the sky. Somewhere in the distance a voice barked hoarsely. "Fire!" it bellowed. "Get 'em in the tires! That bus is packed with lunatics!" There was an instantaneous volley of gunfire and suddenly the bus skittered to one side, teetered precariously on two wheels, then righted itself and plunged dead-on into the substantial trunk of a weeping willow. There was a thunderous crash, a rising chorus of terrified voices and then silence. By fighting her way through the mass of struggling bodies in the aisle, Toffee managed to reach Marc's prone figure. She dropped down beside him and drew his head gently into her lap. "Are you all right?" she asked. Marc opened his eyes and looked at her mistily. "I think so," he said. "I feel so drowsy, though." Then suddenly he frowned. "What is it?" Toffee asked quickly. "Julie...." Marc said. "Julie? What about her?" "She wasn't with the nudists after all," Marc murmured. "I mean she wasn't one of them." "Well, what's so bad about that?" Marc sighed unhappily. "She's wearing pink lace underwear!" he said. "And she's never worn it before." With that, as though the thought were too much for him, he closed his eyes and went limp in her arms. Toffee, like a drifting, though shapely, cloud of smoke, faded rapidly into thin air. "Jeez!" breathed a cop who had reached the door of the bus just in time to witness this phenomenon. "This gang is even creepier than we thought!" * * * * * Judge Frennish plainly boggled at the sight that greeted his astonished eyes as he ascended the bench. The defendants had split themselves into definite factions. At one side of the court the nudists had huddled together in a tight little protective unit, while the thugs and their dolls had disdainfully withdrawn to the other side. Marc, still in a state of slumber, had been casually deposited in a chair, mid-distant between the two groups. Briefly, the judge studied these separate crime camps and turned a disillusioned gaze toward Sergeant Feeney who had reluctantly accompanied him to the bench. "Good grief, Feeney," he said, "do you mean to say you picked up this gang all in one place?" "All in one place," Sergeant Feeney nodded wearily. "Good Lord!" "Definitely, your honor," Sergeant Feeney agreed. "The ones without any clothes claim they were havin' a picnic." "I'll just bet they were," the judge said. "Though I shouldn't think they'd care to be so frank about it." He sighed tremulously. "And the others? I see many familiar and loathsome faces there." "They explained that they were botany students out for a field day. They're still quite drunk, your honor." "Isn't that Hotstuff Harold there in the middle?"