    14

    thirt

    y followers of the Guardians obsessively carried out the departure

    instructions their extra-planetary advisors had provided.  They

    memorized the passwords that would get them through saucer

    security.  ("I left my hat at home."  "What is your question?" and "I am

    my own porter.")  They took all the metal out of their clothes.  Some

    gave away their personal belongings, quit their jobs or abandoned their

    college classes.  And they got ready to say good-bye to the earthly life

    they had known.

    Neighbors and relatives did not always look kindly on these

    activities.  Dr. Armstrong's sister filed a lawsuit to have his children

    taken away.  He was fired from the college health service.  Neighbors

    and family members of his followers threatened to have the

    space-crazed believers clapped into an asylum.  But few of the

    Guardians' little flock were deterred.  After all, their very survival

    depended on faithfully following extra-terrestrial orders.

    When the day of the great flood arrived, reporters appeared to

    interview the followers.  Not anxious to share the good fortune of their

    imminent survival, the believers in The Guardians preferred to keep

    the wisdom that could save their fellow  earthlings to themselves.  So

    they turned away journalists with a simple "No comment."

    As the critical hour drew nigh, the believers shooed a cluster of

    reporters away from Dr. Armstrong's house and made ready for their

    midnight escape from this doomed earth.  They donned the slashed

    clothing from which they had ripped zippers, fasteners, eyelets, and

    every other metal device.  The men held up their pants with ropes.

    Gathered in the living room, the flock received last minute instructions

    from the Guardians through the automatic scribbling of Mrs. Keech

    and methodically drilled the use of its passwords, chanting in unison

    phrases like "I am my own porter, I am my own pointer."

    As midnight approached, the followers became silent.  They sat

    with their coats in their laps, holding themselves so still that the air

    seemed hammered by the ticking of the room's two clocks.  One

    minute before the saucer was due to arrive, Mrs. Keech exclaimed

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