The thing to do was to stall, not let them know he suspected anything.
"I tell you," he said casually, "do you have some place I could bed
down here? Save me a trip into town and back."
Was it his imagination, or did Brown relax slightly?
"Why, yes, we do have a spare cot in Mr. Smith's room," Brown said.
"Would that be good enough?"
"Sounds fine," Dolan said. He snapped the lid of his tool-box shut.
"Let's go see what it looks like."
* * * * *
The two male gun runners held a council of war while Dolan was eating
his breakfast.
"Subject's attention diverted," the senior gun runner said. "Unknown
factor. Annoying."
Smith clucked his tongue in sympathy. He thought for a moment. "Raise
threshold to override?" he suggested.
"Must. Moirta."
Smith nodded and went out. He returned in a moment with the female gun
runner. Brown explained the problem to her in the same few words he had
used to Smith.
She shrugged. She did not bother to practise her specialty on her
colleagues--they were, for one thing, almost immune, they had grown up
in a civilization where her specialty was over-crowded. For another, in
the nature of her specialty, she found it hard to concentrate on more
than one subject at a time. "Doing best," she said indifferently.
Brown studied her shrewdly. "Supplies short," he said mildly. "One-half
larger than one-third. Each must pay way."
His voice was mild, but Moirta understood the threat quite clearly.
"Suggestions?" she asked coldly.
Brown nodded equably--he was used to temperament in this member of his
team--and told her what he wanted her to do. She would obey, he knew.
She would also double-cross him, if the occasion offered; but he did
not intend that the occasion _should_ offer.
* * * * *
There was a foot-path leading up the ridge back of the cabin. Dolan did
not ordinarily feel the need of an after-breakfast stroll, but today he
was looking for something. He was not quite sure what it would be, but
he thought he would recognize it if he saw it. He walked slowly up the
foot-path, letting his eyes roam. Perhaps fifty yards from the cottage,
the grass was trampled and the brush bent where someone had left the
path.
This might be it.
He followed the trampled trail off the path, searching carefully
now. Three or four steps along it, he found what he had been looking
for--two empty .45 caliber cartridges lying in the grass.
He picked them up and juggled them in his hand, looking speculatively
about. Angling off to the left was an opening in the undergrowth.
He walked that way and found himself standing on the lip of a sharply
eroded gully. Someone or something had kicked the bank down recently,
there was a great pile of new earth in the bottom of the gully. He
kicked around in the leaves and mold at his feet. There was a dark
crusted substance on the leaves.
The door of the cottage slammed. He slipped the empty cartridges in his
pocket and stepped hastily back to the path, listening.
Were those footsteps hurrying toward him?
He began to stroll slowly back toward the cottage. Around the first
turn he met Moirta.
The girl now, he thought, where does she really fit? Possible ally?
Enemy? Or neutral?
She came up to him a little breathless and took his hand. "Were you
going back to the house?" she asked.
"Not specially. Just walking around."
"Let's not go back just yet, then," she said. They turned and walked
slowly back up the path, hand-in-hand. After a while they came out on
an open shoulder from which they could look down, catching glimpses of
the path they had climbed here and there, and at its end the cottage.
They sat down close together, leaning back against a large tree, not
speaking at first.
After a while the girl sighed. "I shall feel very sorry when we leave
this time," she said.
"Me, too." He kissed her.
After a moment she pulled away and looked at him searchingly. "There is
something bothering you?" she asked. She flushed a little. "That was
not very ... ardent."
Dolan looked away, feeling foolish. "I guess not," he said.
She took his hand and squeezed it. "Poor George. It must be very
confusing for you. Can I help?"
Perhaps she could, he thought.
"Look here," he said cautiously, "what happens when I get this thing
fixed, if I do? You folks go on back to your own time, I suppose, but
what happens to me?"
She hesitated. "I don't think I understand," she said. "Mr. Brown pays
you for your work, I suppose, and you stay here, that's all. Should
there be more?"