"Okay. You've got me with the goods. What are you going to do?"

"The first thing we are going to do is confiscate the stuff. You can give us a hand loading them into our van."

"Do I get a receipt?"

"Damn it, Red! Don't you know the seriousness of what you're doing?"

"Yep." "Admitted, nothing will happen to us if you can pull

it off. You will create another branch in the Road, though. Or another exit."

"What's wrong with that—really?"

"Who knows who might start traveling it from that point."

"A lot of weird fish travel it already. Tony. Look at us."

"But you're a devil we know. Everybody knows you. Why do you want that other goddamned branch anyway?"

"Because it was that way once before, but that sideroad is now blocked. I am trying to re-create a set of circumstances."

"I don't remember it."

"You're young. Tony."

"I don't understand you. Red. Come on, give me a hand with these weapons."

"Okay."

They began transferring the pieces.

"You know you have to stop this sort of thing."

"I know that watching for it is a part of your job, yes."

"But you don't give a damn. Supposing you were to open the route to some really rotten place, full of dangerous, vicious creatures with the ability to move along the Road? We'd all be in trouble then. Why not lay off this business?"

"I'm looking for something I haven't been able to find any other way."

"Mind telling me what?"

"Yes, I do. It's personal."

"You'd foul up the whole traffic pattern just for some selfish little whim?"

"Yep."

"Don't know why I asked. I've known you for about forty years. What's that come to for you?"

"Five or six years. Thirty, maybe. I don't know. You doing a lot of office work in between?"