anyone we knew.
Our glances went away from them after the first quick look.
The open door across the room grabbed our attention.
The door gave to a small room.
The room was chaos.
A small room, packed and tangled with bodies. Live bodies, seething, writhing. The room was a funnel into which men and women had been poured. They boiled noisily toward the one small window that was the funnel’s outlet. Men and women, youths and girls, screaming, struggling, squirming, fighting. Some had no clothes.
“We’ll get through and block the window!” Pat yelled in my ear.
“Like hell—” I began, but he was gone ahead into the confusion.
I went after him.
I didn’t mean to block the window. I meant to save Pat from his foolishness. No five men could have fought through that boiling turmoil of maniacs. No ten men could have turned them from the window.
Pat—big as he is—was down when I got to him. A half dressed girl—a child—was driving at his face with sharp high-heels. Hands, feet, were tearing him apart.
I cleared him with a play of gun-barrel on shins and wrists—dragged him back.
“Myra’s not there!” I yelled into his ear as I helped him up. “Elwood’s not there!”