Sugardale three miles, the state highway sign said. Dexter Foote turned into the side road that the arrow indicated. He had no way of knowing it at the time, but by his action he condemned his new convertible to a fate worse than death. The side road meandered down a long slope into a wooded hollow where a breeze born of cool bowers and shaded brooks made the July afternoon heat less oppressive. A quantity of the pique that had been with him ever since setting forth from the city departed. There were worse assignments, after all, than writing up a fallen star. Abruptly he applied the brakes and brought the convertible to a screeching halt. His blue eyes started from his boyish face.

Well they might. The two Humpty Dumptyish creatures squatting in the middle of the road were as big as heavy tanks and, judging from their "skin tone," were constructed of similar material. They had arms like jointed cranes and legs like articulated girders. Their scissors-like mouths were slightly open, exposing maws the hue of an open hearth at tapping time. Either they were all body and no head, or all head and no body. Whichever was the case, they had both eyes and ears. The former had something of the aspect of peek holes in a furnace door, while the latter brought to mind lopsided Tv antennae.