"What do you want, Sauer?" called Flock from his own cell.
"We got a lady with us! Maybe we ought to cut out this yelling so
as not to disturb the lady!" He screeched with howling, maniacal
laughter. "Anyway, if we don't cut this out, they'll get us in trouble,
Flock!"
"Oh, you think so?" shrieked Flock. "Jeez, I wish you hadn't said that,
Sauer. You got me scared! I'm so scared, I'm gonna have to yell!"
The howling started all over again.
The inside guard finished putting the new prisoners away and turned off
the tangler field once more. He licked his lips. "Say, you want to take
a turn in here for a while?"
"Uh-uh." The outside guard shook his head.
"You're yellow," the inside guard said moodily. "Ah, I don't know why I
don't quit this lousy job. Hey, you! Pipe down or I'll come in and beat
your head off!"
"Ee-ee-ee!" screamed Sauer in a shrill falsetto. "I'm scared!" Then he
grinned at the guard, all but his water-moccasin eyes. "Don't you know
you can't hurt a wipe by hitting him on the head, Boss?"
"Shut _up_!" yelled the inside guard.
Sue-Ann Bradley's weeping now was genuine. She simply could not help
it. The crazy yowling of the hard-timers, Sauer and Flock, was getting
under her skin. They weren't even--even _human_, she told herself
miserably, trying to weep silently so as not to give the guards the
satisfaction of hearing her--they were animals!
Resentment and anger, she could understand. She told herself doggedly
that resentment and anger were natural and right. They were perfectly
normal expressions of the freedom-loving citizen's rebellion against
the vile and stifling system of Categoried Classes. It was _good_ that
Sauer and Flock still had enough spirit to struggle against the vicious
system--
But did they have to scream so?
The senseless yelling was driving her crazy. She abandoned herself to
weeping and she didn't even care who heard her any more. Senseless!
It never occurred to Sue-Ann Bradley that it might not be senseless,
because noise hides noise. But then she hadn't been a prisoner very
long.