The falling star he had been assigned by his editor to write up had been an unusually brilliant one according to the report the paper had received. Maybe its unusualness did not stop there. Maybe it was something more than a mere meteorite. Certainly the two monsters could not be classified as local woodland creatures.
All of which was fine as far as copy was concerned. But it didn't bring his convertible back.
Presently he saw two sizable deposits of slag at the side of the road, and approaching them more closely, he discovered that they were still warm. Could they be the remains of a previously devoured automobile? he wondered. What an ignominious fate indeed to overtake a car! He looked at the two deposits once more before moving on. All he could think of were two piles of elephant dung.
A mile and half later, he emerged in a small valley that sported a handful of houses, a scattering of business places, a church or two and a goodly number of trees. A roadside sign informed him that he had reached his destination, that its population was 350, and that its speed limit was 20 mph. The population, however, was nowhere in evidence, and the speed limit seemed silly in view of the absence of cars.
A scared-looking housewife, upon whose door he knocked, told him he'd probably find the local minion of the law at the Sugardale Inn, "sucking up beer the way he always is when he should be out earning his money." The Inn turned out to be a sagging three-story structure in desperate need of a paint-job. There was a model A sedan parked in front of it, the first automobile Dexter had seen. Formerly the establishment had provided a haven for weary travelers. Now it provided a haven for contented cockroaches. Its fin de siècle bar was a collector's item, and standing at it, one foot propped on the brass bar-rail, was a lone customer. He was tall and thin, and somewhere in his sixties, and he was wearing blue denim trousers and a blue chambray shirt. There was a lackluster badge pinned on the fading shirtfront, and a beat-up sombrero sat atop the graying head.
"Sheriff Jeremiah Smith at your service," he said calmly when Dexter dashed up to him. He took a sip from the schooner of beer that sat on the bar before him. "Got troubles, have you, young man?"
"My car," Dexter said. "I was driving along the road and—"
"Got ate up, did it? Well, it's not the first one to get ate up around here." Jeremiah Smith faced the doorway that led to the lobby. "Mrs. Creasy, get this young man a beer," he called.
A plump middle-aged woman whose dark hair fell down over her eyes like a thicket came into sight behind the bar. She flicked a cockroach off the drain-board with an expert forefinger, drew Dexter a schooner and set it before him. Jeremiah Smith paid for it. "Drink her down, young man," he said. "I know how I'd feel if my car got ate up."