reaction would have been entirely different.
“What’s all this?” Tex asked, in a calm voice. “Who’s calling me a murderer?”
“Your record is all over the newspapers. The police know you killed two men and they won’t care whether they get you alive or dead,” said M.M.M. and that viciousness was still in his voice. “Get away from her.”
“I think you must be mad, Monty.” Gillian’s voice could not have been colder. “Please put that gun away, and stop play-acting.”
“Play-acting I’ll show you who’s play-acting!” The maimed man’s eye glinted, he raised the gun a fraction, and there seemed nothing but death for the tall Texan.
“Monty!” screamed Gillian, and flung herself forward.
There was a little click; no sharp report, no flame, no bullet. The girl would have fallen had Tex not grabbed her, while Monty stood looking foolish, with the gun in his hand.
“I took the bullets out when you were poking at the safe,” explained Rollison mildly. “I wanted to make sure you didn’t do anyone any harm.”
M.M.M. didn’t speak, but all the colour drained away from his cheeks. He looked round, as if for somewhere to sit; as if he was afraid that he couldn’t stand up any longer. Then he moved to the wall and leaned against it, looked towards Gillian, and said:
“You’d even protect him with your life. Why is it? Why can’t you feel for me like you do for him ?”
The Texan was holding Gillian lightly, an arm round her shoulders.
“I just don’t know,” Gillian said, in a husky voice. “I just don’t know.” She looked up, twisting her head round so that she could see the tall man, and it seemed to Rollison that there was genuine bewilderment in her voice. “I felt exactly the same the moment I set eyes on him, although I know it doesn’t make sense.”
“It makes sense, honey,” said Tex Brandt. “It makes the kind of sense that leads to a marriage licence. Some folk wouldn’t believe it, but I felt just that way about you. I’ve been running from the police and looking for the biggest load of trouble I’ve ever known—and you were in my hair all the time, I couldn’t get you out.”
He held her more tightly.
“But he’s a killer! He’s got a reputation for killing!” M.M.M. looked and sounded desperate. “You can’t feel like that about a murderer.”
“Maybe I’m not the murderer,” the Texan said. “Maybe you know who they really are, Mome.”
“Hold it,” said Rollison. “Monty, how well do you know the man Littleton ?”
“Little what?” asked M.M.M., as if blankly.
“A man named Littleton.”
“I don’t know anyone named Littleton,” denied M.M.M. in the same taut, hopeless voice.
“You’ve been acting oddly since I came into this job,” Rollison said. “You’ve been with the Selbys nearly all the time in recent weeks, you could have been the man watching them, reporting what they were doing, keeping Littleton and his employer informed all the time.”
M.M.M. said in a husky voice: “Are you crazy? I didn’t kill anybody, and as for spying on Gillian and Alan—no, I haven’t spied on anyone. I don’t know what you’re playing at, but if you think I’m a crook, you’re wrong.”
“Someone’s been getting at Alan,” Gillian said, and turned to Rollison. “But I told you I couldn’t believe that it was Monty. I just couldn’t believe it of him.”
“Do we have to talk about it any further?” asked Tex Brandt, and he flashed a grin at Rollison; it could not have been more friendly or more likeable. “The first thing is to find out where the cache is. We can talk when we’ve found it.”
“He’s found it already,” M.M.M. declared, and Rollison saw the tension spring into Tex Brandt’s eyes. “Why don’t you make a deal? Why don’t you buy Rollison off? He’s buyable.”
“Monty,” murmured Rollison, “I don’t think anyone could buy anybody off with the contents of that safe. I don’t know for certain what is in it, but I don’t think anyone would fight the way they have done for jewels. I don’t think they would commit murder so recklessly. I don’t think the police would allow Tex Brandt to get through the cordon thrown round this farm if they really thought he was a bad man. What’s in the safe, Tex?”
Tex was grinning more broadly than ever.
“Well, I guess I’ll have to get up earlier to fool you,” he said. “You’re dead right, Mr. Rollison. That safe contains an atomic radiation unit which was stolen from research laboratories in New York a year ago. It’s a new kind of unit, much smaller than any in use yet. It’s in a special kind of radiation proof container which weighs pretty heavy but isn’t made of lead. In that safe it’s harmless, but out of that safe it would kill anyone if they were exposed to it for long. It operates like a death ray. Sure, it’s that bad,” he added, when M.M.M. gasped and Gillian gripped his arm very tightly. “Does anyone object if I go and have a look and make sure it’s the right one ?”
“Yes, I object,” Rollison declared. “Tex, you forgot to tell me about the jewels you handled for Freddie Littleton and others in the U.S.A.”
“You’re thinking of someone else,” said the Texan slowly. “There’s a man from Texas, a real bad man, who once called himself William Brandt. He posed as me in New York, and it suited me to let him get away with it.”
“Maybe,” Rollison said, hopefully, and then added to M.M.M. : “Keep our American friend covered with this gun, will you?” He took his own small automatic from his pocket, and handed it to the crippled man. “I won’t be five minutes. Gillian, don’t make Monty get careless with the gun, this time it’s loaded.”
M.M.M. looked savagely delighted.
The Texan smiled, as if he hadn’t a fear in the world.
Rollison ran up the stairs and into Littleton’s room, slicing the cords from the man’s ankles, helped him off the
