"It would scare anybody. There must have been an evacuation of some
kind."
"Maybe the Russians are going to drop a bomb."
Frank shook his head. "That wouldn't explain it. I mean, the Russians
wouldn't let us know ahead of time. Besides, the army would be here.
Everybody wouldn't be gone."
"There's been a lot of talk about germ warfare. Do you suppose the
water, maybe, has been poisoned?"
He shook his head. "The same thing holds true. Even if they moved the
people out, the army would be here."
"I don't know. It just doesn't make sense."
"It happened, so it has to make sense. It was something that came up all
of a sudden. They didn't have much more than twenty-four hours." He
stopped suddenly and looked at her. "We've got to get out of here!"
Nora Spade smiled for the first time, but without humor. "How? I haven't
seen one car. The buses aren't running."
His mind was elsewhere. They had started walking again. "Funny I didn't
think of that before."
"Think of what?"
"That anybody left in this town is a dead pigeon. The only reason they'd
clear out a city would be to get away from certain death. That would
mean death is here for anybody that stays. Funny. I was so busy looking
for somebody to talk to that I never thought of that."
"I did."
"Is that what you were scared of?"
"Not particularly. I'm not afraid to die. It was something else that
scared me. The aloneness, I guess."
"We'd better start walking west--out of the city. Maybe we'll find a car
or something."
"I don't think we'll find any cars."
He drew her to a halt and looked into her face. "You aren't afraid at
all, are you?"
She thought for a moment. "No, I guess I'm not. Not of dying, that is.
Dying is a normal thing. But I was afraid of the empty streets--nobody
around. That was weird."
"It isn't weird now?"
"Not--not as much."
"I wonder how much time we've got?"