The second truck had burned, was still hot, but the third was intact. He found some K-rations and an untouched thermos, opened the thermos immediately and gulped down a huge draught of pleasantly warm coffee. With the coffee in him he felt much better and began to think.
He would have to get out of here damn fast.
But where? In the least likely direction.
Which was?
In the opposite direction to the base?
No. At right angles. Better yet, at any old angle. Neither directly toward home, nor directly away. Not by any means toward the nearest town.
So just run.
But first cigarettes—and money.
He rifled the first pair of pants he found, then another. The second had belonged to an officer. In a moment of sudden clarity, realizing the uselessness in town of the overalls he now wore, he took the full uniform with him. He did not think about the man that had been in them. He was coming fully awake now, beginning to realize the jam he was in. He had as much chance of getting out of this desert alive as a crippled snail.
He started up the halftrack and drove off over the sand at an even eighteen miles an hour.