The white street lamps seemed to twinkle as the trailer-truck rumbled on.  A single long line of them appeared to welcome the big vehicle.  It went on into the town.  It reached the business district.  There were side streets, utterly empty, and then the main street divided.  The truck bore to the right.  There were three and four-story buildings.  Every window was blank and empty, reflecting only the white street lamps.  No living thing anywhere.  There had been no destruction, but the town was dead.  Its lights shone on streets so empty that it would have seemed better to leave them to the kindly dark.

Jill exclaimed, “Look!  That window!”

And ahead, in the dead and lifeless town, a single window glowed from electric light inside it, and it looked lonelier than anything else in the world.

“I’m gonna look into that!” said the driver.  “Nobody’s supposed to be here.”

The truck came to a stop.  The driver got out.  There was a stirring, behind, and the small man who’d given his place to Jill and Lockley popped out of the trailer body.  Lockley saw the name of a local telephone company silhouetted on the lighted windowpane.  He opened the door.  Jill followed him instantly.  The four of them—­driver, helper, Lockley and Jill—­crowded into the building hallway to investigate the one lighted room in a town where twenty thousand people were supposed to live.

There was a door with a frosted glass top through which light showed.  The driver turned the door-knob and marched in.  The room had an alcoholic smell.  A man with sunken cheeks slept heavily in a chair, his head forward on his chest.

The driver shook him.

“Wake up, guy!” he said sternly.  “Orders are for all civilians to clear outa this town.  You wanna soldier to come by an’ take you for a looter an’ bump you off?”

He shook again.  The cadaverous man blinked his eyes open.  The smell of alcohol was distinct.  He was drunk.  He gazed ferociously up at the driver of the truck.

“Who the hell are you?” he demanded belligerently.

The driver spoke sternly, repeating what he’d said before.  The drunk assumed an air of outraged dignity.

“If I wanna stay here, that’s my business!  Who th’ hell are you anyways, disturbin’ a citizen tax-payer on his lawful occasions?  Are you Martians?  I wouldn’t put it pasht you!”

He sat down and went back to sleep.

The driver said fretfully, “He oughtn’t to be here!  But we ain’t got room to carry him.  I’m gonna use the truck radio an’ ask what to do.  Maybe they’ll send a Army truck to get him outa here.  He could set the whole town on fire!”

He went out.  The small man who was his helper followed him.  He hadn’t spoken a word.  Lockley growled.  Then Jill said breathlessly, “The switch-board has some long distance lines.  I know how to connect them.  Shall I try?”

Lockley agreed emphatically.  Jill slipped into the operator’s chair and donned the headset.  She inserted a plug and pressed a switch.