CONVALESCENCE Four mornings later we were aboard the stage, riding down the main street, on the way out of Linrock.

The whole town turned out to bid us farewell.

The cheering, the clamor, the almost passionate fervor of the populace irritated me, and I could not see the incident from their point of view.

Never in my life had I been so eager to get out of a place.

But then I was morbid, and the whole world hinged on one thing.