Toffee nudged Marc excitedly. "Look," she whispered. "He's going to help us."
Together they watched breathlessly as the gun moved furtively upward. Then they started with surprise and horror as it righted itself and pointed its muzzle purposefully in Marc's direction.
"No, George!" Toffee cried. "Don't shoot! It's those two you want! They're planning to blow up the city and float it away. Liquor and all, George!"
The gun faltered, then started to turn uncertainly toward Cecil. But not fast enough. Cecil suddenly reached out and slapped it free of George's invisible grasp. The gun described a small arc into the back seat and landed in Toffee's lap. Marc, Toffee, Cecil and presumably, though there was no way of proving it, also George, all reached for the gun at once. The result was a writhing snarl of reaching arms and clutching hands. Toffee giggled dementedly.
"Stop that!" she screamed. "I'm ticklish!"
"This is no time to indulge in mad laughter," Marc grunted sharply. "Our lives are at stake."
"I know!" Toffee trilled light-heartedly. "I'm frightened sick! Only get your hands out of my ribs!"
As three sets of madly working hands rose, twined together, the gun danced wildly from the fleeting grasp of one to that of the other.
"Good grief!" Toffee said. "Even if I got hold of the thing I'd never know it; I can't tell which hands are mine!"
The hands and the gun traveled higher in the air, then suddenly one of the hands rose above the others and reached viciously for the errant fire-arm. It struck it, without catching hold of it, and sent it crashing to the back of Gerald's unsuspecting head. Gerald instantly let go of the wheel and slumped down in his seat. The car swerved dangerously to the wrong side of the street. Momentarily the warring factions in the back seat, now concerned with more immediate matter of navigation, disengaged their hands and forgot the gun as it fell to the floor at Toffee's feet.