"No, thank you," Hall answered. He resumed his walk up the highway with the boy at his side. "D-do you live around here," he asked. "Just up the road a ways." The lad studied his companion for a minute. "You stutter, don't you?" "A little." "There was a boy in my class who used to stutter. The teacher said it was because he thought so far ahead of what he said he got all tangled up." The boy reached in his basket for a handful of berries and chewed them thoughtfully. "She was always after him to talk slower, but I guess it didn't do any good. He still stutters." "Is there a p-power plant around here?" Hall asked. "You know, where the electricity comes from." "You mean the place where they have the nu-nuclear fission"--the boy stumbled on the unfamiliar word, but got it out--"and they don't let you in because you get poisoned or something?" "Yes, I think that's it." "There are two places. There's one over at Red Mountain and another over at Ballarat." "Where are they?" "Well--" The boy stopped to think. "Red Mountain's straight ahead, maybe ten miles, and Ballarat's over there"--he pointed west across the orange groves--"maybe fifteen miles." "Good," Hall said. "Good." And he felt glad inside of himself. Maybe it could be done, he thought. * * * * * They walked along together. Hall sometimes listening to the chattering of the boy beside him, sometimes listening to and answering the distant voices of the seventeen. Abruptly, a few hundred yards before the house that the boy had pointed out as his father's, a small sports car whipped down the highway, coming on them almost without warning. The lad jumped sideways, and Hall, to avoid touching him, stepped off the concrete road. His leg sank into the earth up to the mid-calf. He pulled it out as quickly as he could. The boy was looking at the fast retreating rear of the sports car. "Gee," he said. "I sure didn't see them coming." Then he caught sight of the deep hole alongside the road, and he stared at it. "Gosh, you sure made a footprint there," he said wonderingly. "The ground was soft," Hall said. "C-come along." But instead of following, the boy walked over to the edge of the road and stared into the hole. He tentatively stamped on the earth around it. "This ground isn't soft," he said. "It's hard as a rock." He turned and looked at Hall with big eyes. Hall came close to the boy and took hold of his jacket. "D-don't pay any attention to it, son. I just stepped into a soft spot." The boy tried to pull away. "I know who you are," he said. "I heard about you on the teledepth." Suddenly, in the way of children, panic engulfed him and he flung his basket away and threw himself back and forth, trying to tear free. "Let me go," he screamed. "Let me go. Let me go." "Just l-listen to me, son," Hall pleaded. "Just listen to me. I won't hurt you."