Meet Me in Tomorrow

Fuller turned the car into a stretch of grass beside the road and braked to a stop. "End of the line!" he announced. Then he glanced at Pearce in uneasy speculation. "Or is it? I hope it doesn't take a stiff hike to get to your boyhood Eden."

"Quit griping," Pearce said. "We're almost there now. And don't forget I promised that this is going to be worth your trouble."

"I'll bet!" Fuller muttered. Despite his skeptical tone, his blue eyes lingered on Pearce in veiled wonder.

Pearce let himself stiffly out of the car. Ellen followed, glancing about her curiously. She was a slim, graceful girl, dark, yet with a quality of glowing vividness. Her shining hair had been cut short in the current fashion, its boyish effect offset by her large, lustrous eyes and full red lips.

She stretched on tiptoe, for a moment standing motionless and statuesque. Pearce watched her with a sudden, flashing intensity. Pain touched him, and regret.

But it was too late--too late even to think of what might have been....

She turned. "This is a wild, lonely-looking place you've dragged us out to, Andy."

He nodded, his gray eyes kindling with memories. "It hasn't changed since I was a kid. Except for the road. It's got gravel on it now."

"What, no red carpet?" Fuller asked in mock surprise, as he too emerged from the coupe. "A lousy welcome for our boy Andy. No red carpet."

"Cut it out," Ellen admonished. "These aren't the surroundings for low comedy. Let's just be simple, sociable folk enjoying a picnic. Bring out the eats, and we'll get started."

Looking exaggeratedly chastened, Fuller opened the trunk at the rear of the coupe and began handing out objects. There was a basket of food, blankets, a record player, and a cardboard carton containing beer packed in dry ice. There was also a large suitcase belonging to Pearce.

Fuller hefted this exploratively. "Just a little something for the picnic," he said, glancing at Ellen. "That's what Andy told me when he put this hunk of luggage in the car. Why, it's as heavy as the national debt!"

"Nobody's asking you to carry it," Pearce said mildly.

"No--but I wish I could figure out what you're up to," Fuller returned.

Pearce shook a warning finger, "If wishes were limousines, the accident toll among joy-riding beggars would be terrific."

"Very funny." Fuller turned to Ellen again. "Do you think it's decent of Andy to worry his friends like this?"

She studied Pearce a moment, her dark eyes solemn. Then she moved her slim shoulders in a philosophical shrug. "Since we've come this far, I guess we'll just have to put up with it."

"That's the spirit!" Pearce said. "Just put your lives in my hands, little ones--and let the insurance premiums fall where they may." He bent to pick up the suitcase and the record player, hoping that he had moved quickly enough to hide the pain and unhappiness that had momentarily showed in his face. The situation was proving more difficult than he had thought it would be. He had hoped to make the picnic a light-hearted affair, to keep Fuller and Ellen from suspecting at the very outset that something unusual was taking place.

The glade proved easy enough to locate. It was smaller than Pearce remembered, but the semi-circle of large stones along one side was much the same. The trees that rose all around gave their old effect of seclusion, of shutting out the world. Beyond the enclosure they made were the shadows cast by inter-laced boughs, and through these came the plaintive cries of birds, somehow like the sound of waves on an island shore.

Pearce glanced around him slowly, relishing the familiarity of the scene, his thoughts leaping a chasm of fifteen years. One memory in particular was suddenly very vivid.