“Pridgeon knocked you down on purpose, you know,” he said, reminding himself it was none of his business, but unable to keep the words in check.

He’s always horsing around like that,” Werry replied carelessly. “High spirits. It doesn’t mean a thing.”

That’s where you’re wrong, Hasson thought. The symbolism meant every thing. “From what I saw…”

“I thought you didn’t see anything,” Werry cut in. “When Starr asked you, you said you hadn’t seen anything.”

“Yes, but…” Hasson was stung by Werry’s remark, mainly because there was no denying it, and he lapsed into a shamed, recriminatory silence. The car reached the business section of Tripletree and he began to study the unfamiliar design of the various stores and office buildings, retreating inwards, picking out unfamiliar elements, noting the different ways in which it was possible to combine windows, walls and doors, and nostalgically comparing what he saw to the homely architecture of English rural villages. The pavements were crowded with lunch- time shoppers, many of whom wore brightly coloured flying suits as protection against the cold. Two policemen — one of them fat and middle-aged, the other looking barely pubescent — nodded amiably at Werry as the car paused at an intersection. He gave them a parody of an official salute, then nodded and grinned, secure and comfortable again in his role, as the fat man wielded an imaginary knife and fork. Both policemen turned immediately and hurried into a hamburger bar.

“Always eating, those two,” Werry commented. “Still, it means I generally know where to find them.”

Hasson, surprised at the degree of informality in Werry’s relationship with his men, seized on it as yet another indicator that he was alone, adrift, orphaned in an alien world. He was sinking luxuriously to new depths of gloom when he became aware that the car was again entering a residential area after having traversed only three or four downtown streets.