When I asked him what, if anything, I could do about it, he surprised me by referring me to the director of the hall.

Was I sure, he asked, that I knew what I was applying for??

I asked Rawlins.

`` Why '', he went on, `` when Rob asked me if he could make his dive on this trip, I didn't think twice about it.

I have just asked these questions in the Pentagon, in the White House, in offices of key scientists across the country and aboard the submarines that prowl for months underwater, with neat rows of green launch tubes which contain Polaris missiles and which are affectionately known as `` Sherwood Forest ''.

I asked the same questions inside the launch-control rooms of an Atlas missile base in Wyoming, where officers who wear sidearms are manning the `` commit buttons '' that could start a war -- accidentally or by design -- and in the command centers where other pistol-packing men could give orders to push such buttons.

I asked.

How, I asked, could chaos be admitted to chaos??

I asked about the battle between life and death in his plays.

Given a theological lead, I asked what he thinks about those who find a religious significance to his plays.

At a party an English intellectual -- so-called -- asked me why I write always about distress.

I was having lunch not long ago ( apologies to N. V. Peale ) with three distinguished historians ( one specializing in the European Middle Ages, one in American history, and one in the Far East ), and I asked them if they could name instances where the general mores had been radically changed with `` deliberate speed, majestic instancy '' ( Francis Thompson's words for the Hound Of Heaven's Pursuit ) by judicial fiat.

Just as I was about to enlarge upon my discovery of the underside of the leaf of love, memory, displeased at being asked to yield its unsavory secrets, dashed ahead of me, calling back over its shoulder: `` Skip it.

The waspish man stopped me three paces from the bicycle barricade, and asked me in French if I had papers to leave France.

I asked him.

I asked.

One of the girl students, sitting by while I ate the thick soup, asked me if I had a sleeping bag.

I asked him.

Once or twice my father asked me if I wasn't overdoing a bit in my churchgoing.

It's not much of a meal, but it's what I eat ''.

`` I made you what you are '', Gavin whispered.

As I dug in behind one of the bales we were using as protection, I grudgingly found myself agreeing with Oso's logic, especially when I imagined what would have happened to Missy if Old Knife's large party of screeching warriors had overrun our company.

Now under me I could see him for what he really was, a boy dressed up in streaks of paint.

I meant what I said about that fire.

I don't know what goes on around here, and I don't care.

I don't know what makes you think you can get away with this kind of business, and I don't care about that, either.

Later I would remember what this pompous little man had told me about the worth of a ticket.

I knew that three or four of them were almost always present in the hall, but what they were doing, and exactly where, I could not tell.

My future lay solely with the hall, yet what did I know about the hall at this point??

I wished to prepare myself but did not even know what sort of clothes I ought to be wearing.

I was at once disappointed, although just what I had expected him to look like I could not have explained.

As he lowered himself on the chair behind his desk I wondered what this dapper, slightly ridiculous man could possibly have to do with the workings of the hall.

I remember being told it would happen so fast people would think it took place overnight.

`` That quirt -- I ought to use it on you, where it would do the most good.

I would turn away from my writing in the hope of getting a good look at them but I never quite succeeded.

He pointed out the switch to me and for a moment I foolishly believed that he would let deed follow words.

By counting the number of stalls and urinals I attempted to form a loose estimate of how many men the hall would hold at one time.

No sooner would I turn my head away from the counter before he would address me, at times quite sharply, in order to bring back my attention.

As I had expected, he insisted that my visits to the hall would do nothing to further the process of my application.

What sort of men I would come into contact with, at the hall??

Though I doubted that he would understand me, I told the director my motives for applying.

Donald Kruger would like nothing better than to hold him as hostage, and I wouldn't entrust a snake to his tender care.

`` What else would I mean, anyways ''??

`` A body would swear I floated right up here on a cloud ''!!

Forced to realize that this was the end of a very short line I scanned a road marker and discovered what the end of a slightly longer line would be for the old Mexican: Moriarty, New Mexico.

I would have foregone my romantic chances rather than leave a friend sweltering and dusty and -- Well, at least I wouldn't have shouted back a taunt.

I let up on the accelerator, only to gradually reach again the 60 m.p.h. which would, I hoped, overhaul Herry and the blonde, and as there were cars whose drivers apparently had something more important to catch than had I, Mrs. Major Roebuck settled down to practicing on Corporal Johnson the kittenish wiles she would need when making her duty call on Colonel and Mrs. Somebody in Sante Fe.