Within minutes of the lorry moving off, my head had cleared and I was able to realize, icily, just what sort of a fool I’d been. I sat huddled in a corner of the truck, steadying myself as well as I could against the jolting and swaying; round me the merriment went on unchecked. Bottles were drained and bowled lustily over the sides of the lorry while a dozen voices bellowed the praises of the seemingly endless herd of zoological freaks to be found at the Wild West Show. I tried to talk to one of the girls again; she got out a couple of more or less coherent sentences, then her eyes glazed interestingly and she slumped back against the fellow next to her, who promptly started trying to force-feed her something from a hip flask. A few minutes later I saw her being sick over the side of the truck. It didn’t seem to bother anybody unduly. I moved forward on hands and knees, working my way over a litter of Crown corks, got to the little man in the collarless shirt, and yelled, “What the hell’s got into them, they all crazy?”
