'Sorry,' Grey cursed, 'bloody careless of me.' He lifted the machine and groped on the floor for the weights, but Jones and Blakely were already on their knees picking them up.
'Don't bother, Grey,' Jones said, then he barked at Blakely, 'I've told you before to put the scale in the corner.'
But Grey had already picked up a two-pound weight. He couldn't believe what he saw, and he carried the weight to the door and inspected it in the light to make certain his eyes weren't deceiving him. They weren't. In the bottom of the iron weight was a small hole packed hard with clay. He picked out the clay with a fingernail, his face chalky.
'What is it, Grey?' said Jones.
'This weight's been tampered with.' The words were an accusation.
'What? Impossible!' Jones went up to Grey. 'Let me see that.' For an eternity he studied it, then smiled.
'It's not been tampered with. This is merely a corrective hole. The particular weight was probably a fraction heavier than it was supposed to be.' He laughed weakly. 'My God, you had me worried for a moment.'
Grey walked rapidly over to the rest of the weights and picked up another one. It too had a hole in it.
'Christ! They've all been tampered with!'
'That's absurd,' Jones said. 'They're just corrective —'
'I know enough about weights and measures,' Grey said, 'to know holes aren't allowed. Not corrective holes. If the weight's wrong, it's never issued.'
He whirled on Blakely, who cringed against the door. 'What do you know about it?'
'Nothing, sir,' Blakely said, terrified.
'You'd better tell me!'
'I don't know anything, sir, honest —'
'All right, Blakely. You know what I'm going to do? I'm going to go out of the hut and I'm going to tell everyone I meet about you, everyone — and I'm going to show them this weight, and before I can report it to Colonel Smedly-Taylor you'll be torn apart.'
Grey started for the door.'
'Wait, sir,' Blakely choked out. 'I'll tell you. It wasn't me, sir, it was the colonel. He made me do it. He caught me pinching a little rice and he swore he'd turn me in if I didn't help him —'
'Shut up, you fool,' Jones said. Then, in a calmer voice, he said to Grey,
'The fool's trying to implicate me. I never knew anything —'
'Don't you listen to him, sir,' Blakely interrupted, babbling. 'He always weighs the rice himself. Always. And he has the key to the safe that he keeps the weights in. You know yourself how he does it all. And anyone who handles weights has to look at the bottom sometimes. However well the holes're camouflaged, you've got to notice them. And it's been going on for a year or more.'
'Shut up, Blakely!' Jones screamed. 'Shut up.'
Silence.
Then Grey said, 'Colonel, how long have these weights been used?'
'I don't know.'
'A year? Two years?'
'How the hell do I know? If the weights are fixed it's nothing to do with me.'
'But you have the key and you keep them locked up?'
'Yes, but that doesn't mean —'
'Have you ever looked at the bottom of the weights?'
'No, but —'
'That's somewhat strange, isn't it?' said Grey relentlessly.
'No, it isn't, and I won't be cross-questioned by —'
'You'd better be telling the truth, for your own sake.'
'Are you threatening me, Lieutenant? I'll have you court-martialed —'
'I don't know about that, Colonel. I'm here legally and the weights have been tampered with, haven't they?'
'Now, look here, Grey —'
'Haven't they?' Grey held the weight up to Jones's drained face, which was no longer boyish.
'I — suppose so,' said Jones, 'but that doesn't mean —'
'It means that either Blakely or you is responsible. Perhaps both of you.
You're the only two allowed here. The weights are short, and one or both of you has been taking the extra ration.'
'It wasn't me, sir,' Blakely whined. 'I only got a pound in every ten —'
'Liar!' shouted Jones.
