"It's raining. But it hasn't been raining that long and it isn't raining that hard." "So I'm not the highway commission," Joe said. "Now get some sleep, will you?" It was this on top of what I'd thought had happened to the potatoes. Something was up, I didn't know what. Funny how sometimes a thing like that doesn't get to you at first. What had the farmer said? Something fell on his load of potatoes. Fell? I thought now. From where? And hadn't he said something about a little explosion? Ten hours on the road, I thought. Ten hours on the road or we'd have asked him sure. "Hey, Joe," I called down from the bunk. "When do we cut back West?" "Soon as there's a road." But soon a crossroad flashed by, dimly seen by the glow of distant lightning. Joe's face was set. He didn't look at me. "Joe," I said. "Stop the truck." "What's the matter now?" "I want to check the potatoes," I said. "You know the lock bar isn't what it should be. Don't want to lose the load, do you?" "I thought you said it wasn't a load of potatoes?" "Highway hypnotism," I said. "I'll take your word for it. Hell, I loaded them, didn't I?" "You loaded them," Joe said, slowing the truck. I didn't really know what I wanted to do. I'd look inside the van, sure. If it had been highway hypnotism, I'd know it now. Because the illusion wouldn't last. They never do. But after that? After that I hadn't figured yet. Joe was acting funny. Real funny. The truck stopped. I went around back in the hard, driving rain. It was an unfamiliar road, but the kind you find all up and down the East Coast near the ocean, with scrubby growths of pine on either side in sandy soil and no sign of civilization except the marching files of telephone poles. I pulled out the lock bar and swung down the tongue and opened the back doors. Just then the truck growled to life. The rear tires spun and whined and threw pebbles at me. The truck lurched forward. I lunged after it, grabbing the swinging lock-chain and pulling myself up on the tongue. My right foot scraped along the ground and for a minute I thought I was going to lose my hold and fall off. But slowly I pulled myself up while the rain beat down on me. I tried to keep it quiet. As far as I knew, Joe thought he left me back there. That crazy Joe, I told myself, climbing into the van. The rear doors swung in the wind, banging against the frame. Joe must have known I had opened them. He didn't seem to care. He was like a crazy man up there. We didn't work for any trucking company. This truck was ours. With what we made on it we hoped to buy another before long and start a fleet. Joe and Harry, trucking. But Joe was up there in the cab, acting like a crazy man, and I was back here in the van--with what? * * * * *