Water continues to rush over the numerous outdoor tiers, staggered and stacked one atop another. Its uninterrupted flow through the massive formations of carved stone at the very bottom makes any other activity seem frivolous. The calls from inside the house are washed over by the gush of waterfalls, until they sound like the static-filled fragments of a radio serial. The driver imagines the party’s guests gathered around a shiny Motorola cabinet, idly taking in the broadcast as it unfolds through large, over-heated vacuum tubes. A figure comes lurching through the entryway, bottle in hand, and the driver’s daydream is irretrievably broken.

He doesn’t have to wait for the face to come into the light to know it is the hitchhiker. There is nowhere to go except off to the side, over the railing, and into an enormous shrub. The spines running along the edge of its thick leaves makes it seem none-too-comfortable, while its broomstick-thin branches speak doubts as to its sturdiness.

The driver doesn’t have time to weigh his options, whatever they may be. The hitchhiker has spotted the driver and yelled out for him to follow. The driver needs no better an example of the point where bravery and stupidity become two names for the same act, than to watch the hitchhiker dive over the railing and into the bush, without so much as a peek at what might be waiting below.

The driver is less daring, but doesn’t wait for the crowd to catch up before leaping from the platform and into the waiting arms of the giant hemlock. Behind him grows the angry baritone of Tilly and the excited “oooohs” of Heather, or any other of the interchangeable beauties adorning the party.

Tilly peers down to where the base of the shrub meets the hillside in shadow. The hitchhiker and the driver hit the dirt and roll. Tilly won’t take the plunge and risk ruining his custom-made suit. The two escapees have a few seconds jump on the mob gathered at the rear veranda, peering over its balcony into the dark hillside below, before it rematerializes at the front of the house.