KEVIN AND NATE were asleep in the back of the van. Our driver, Head Moonie of the State of New Hampshire, was regaling Dave and me with bawdy tales of his geopolitical adventures with the Reverend Moon.

"So me and the Rev were having a few beers with some Eastern leaders--you know, those rulers are really pretty laid back--and we figure that the Moonies of Manchuria will eventually rise up against Korea..." Dave was still nodding attentively, but I, no longer afraid that this ride would turn into some bizarre and violent Moonie conversion, was letting my memory wander back over the series of disasters which had brought us to our loquacious Moonie chauffeur...

We were on our way home from Montreal after a weekend of bilingual debauchery when the muffler--possibly out of mechanical outrage at my amateur outrage at my amateur treatment of the clutch--slammed onto the pavement, leaving the car sounding somewhat like a Cuisinart trying to eat gravel: "Rrrr--KKKKK--ponkataponkata--WhaP!"

To save our ears from being deafened by the noise, we sensibly turned the Clash up to full volume. The metallic choking of the tailpipe mixed and smashed against Joe Strummer's anarchic screams, producing shock waves that sent chunks of ice splintering off our frost-crusted windows.

Yet if it hadn't been for that painful cacophony, we never would have met the Moonies. And we also wouldn't have met, before the Moonies, the New Hampshire state cop who took a malevolent interest in the noise we were producing.

The sight of his red and blue lights directly in front of a neon "BEER" sign didn't improve my amateur handling of the clutch. I was stone sober but starting to feel woozy as I desperately wobbled our growling vehicle toward the exit ramp. Dave, Kevin, and Nate--still under the effects of Montreal's 18-year-old bar scene--were too drunk to notice the hovering patrol car, until his red and blues started flashing.

Frantic sounds of beverage concealment rose from the backseat. Kevin, speaking from his extensive high school experience with the Montana State Police, announced, "It's okay, you're sober. Just roll down the window He can't touch us."

IT WAS not okay. Looming into the hazy atmosphere of our car was a square-jawed Bad Ass State Cop: sunglasses on (it was night), blue Mounty hat, pearly sledgehammer teeth, and a rabid German Shepard at his side screaming "KILL KILL KILL" at the top of its canine lungs.

I stepped out of the car to maximize the distance between Kevin and the cop and handed over my ID. Cars swooshed through the nighttime slush, shining their headlights on the patrolman's gargoyle-like face and splattering my ankles with freezing rain. The German Shepard was still barking, and my bowels were contracting convulsively.

Eying my Harvard ID, he growled, "Y'all's law students, ain'tchyus?" He was practically drooling at the opportunity to squash uppity academia with some good ol', hands-on law'n'order. "Why no officer, we're undergraduates."

"UNDERgrads hey. Well, y'all must be under 21. Any alcohol in the car?" My brain swirled. Dave, Kevin and Nate--sitting safely behind the fogged up, frosted windows--had finished drinking in Montreal. But I had no idea what might be sloshing around on the car floor.

"Well, I don't think so officer...." Three seconds later, we were all spread-eagle against the patrol car, the german shepard slavering at us through a thin wall of glass. Paper bags, Coke cans, Doritos and other trash flew onto the highway as Officer Redneck searched our car, finally producing one, sole, empty can of beer.

RELIEF RIPPLED momentarily, and Kevin's drunken smirk eased back on his face. But we hadn't counted on Officer Redneck's legal creativity. Putting on his best Defender of the Law face, he informed us of a new state Constitutional code that allowed him to hold minors until our parents personally came to release us.

Then, graciously deciding to "think it over," he combed through our registration papers, searching for damning technicalities. He didn't have far to look. It seemed our registration had expired, which meant officer Redneck could confiscate our car The prospect seemed to please him greatly.

Ante, whose uncle owned the car, protested, "We're registered in Boston. Can't you check?"

"Nope. The, aah, computer's down. Yup, whole state's blanked out." Legal creativity was flexing again. We were trapped.

Then, perhaps sensing that he was stretching legality too far, our minion of New Hampshire law offered us a choice. "Well, boys, I can either take y'all in for underage drankin', maynin you'd spend some time in jail and have a criminal felony on your record, or...I can tow y'alls car and let ya go."

Spittle sprayed and adrenaline soared as we unanimously and instantaneously decided, "Tow truck!" Tow truck!" Twenty minutes later our car and Officer Redneck disappeared into the night.

We had escaped the law, but were still trapped in New Hampshire. It was then, sitting in a hotel lobby squabbling about how the hell to get back to Boston, that we met the Moonies.

"You guys stuck here, huh? Want to get back to Taxachusetts? We got a van. Give you a ride." Apprehensively, not yet aware of our savior's religious affiliation, we climbed into their vehicle. Rapid us vs. homocidalslashers calculations spun through my head as the doors clicked shut. Soon, however, I realized that it was my soul, and not my body, that was in danger.

"You guys have heard of Reverend Moon, haven't you?"--and the Moonie monologue began. Two hours later, after an intensive course in geopolitical religious propaganda, Dave, Nate, Kevin and I were safely back in Mother Harvard's peaceful atmosphere of suspended legality and religious isolation.

The muffler and the Moonies are still in New Hampshire.