“Any duplicates?”
“Not of the files you want.”
Paul nodded to Towne’s men. “Take these thugs down and revive them,” he told Marino. “And get the files. Then turn the boys over to Roberts. Tell him that they’re to be held in maximum security until this is over.” He turned back to Ben Towne. “As for you, you’re taking a little ride.”
“When this hits the papers, it’ll be the end of the road for you freaks,” Towne snarled. “You can’t stop it now.”
“Well see,” said Faircloth. “Now shut up and get moving.”
They left the cane in the room. Paul helped Marino load the man aboard the jet scooter. “Take him up to Eagle Rock. Keep him there. Dismantle the engine, if you have to, but keep him there. I’ll join you in a few hours.”
Marino nodded. “Should I report to Roberts?”
“Don’t bother. Roberts would have a stroke. I trapped Towne into coming over here by using a dummy visiphone tape of Roberts, which will put him in enough hot water as it is.”
“And where are you going?”
“West, for a few hours. I’ve got a visit to make. I’ve got to see a man about a dog.”
The farmer blinked across the table at him, red-eyed and suspicious. “I don’t know what you want,” he was saying, querulously. “I didn’t ask for no trouble with your Federal men. They asked me all them questions, and I told them—”
“That’s right,” said Faircloth. “I’m just rechecking. You were the first human being the alien contacted, as far as we can tell. The ship landed on your property, didn’t it?”
The farmer nodded. “Over by the river. Scrub oak and elms standing over there, on the bluff. Haven’t never cleared it because it’d be too rocky to farm.”
“All right, all right,” said Faircloth sharply. “I want you to tell me what happened that night.”
The farmer’s eyes flitted to Faircloth’s face, and back down to the table. “I already told you twenty times,” he whined. “Why pick on me? I couldn’t help it he happened to stop here. Heard him on the porch about ten o’clock at night. I was just gettin’ ready for bed. And he said he was travelin’ through and wanted something to eat. We don’t see strangers around here very often, mister—” He looked up at Faircloth fearfully. “I—I looked at him, and he seemed all right to me. My eyes was tired, like I said, I couldn’t see him too well, but he come in, and ate. Didn’t want to bed him down, but he said he had to make on for Des Moines anyway.”
Faircloth watched the man’s eyes. “Details, Mr. Bettendorf. You’ve skipped a few things, haven’t you? I have your original statement here, filed by our field agent” He pulled out a sheaf of papers and scanned them in the dim kitchen light “Says something about your dog barking—”
The farmer’s face went white. “Anything wrong with that? I reckon the dog did bark. I don’t remember.”
“And you went to open the door, and the stranger was there on the porch, eh?”
The farmer nodded his head eagerly. “I told you everything.”
“And you brought him in, and fed him, and then sent him on his way?”
“That’s right, just like I said.”
“You’re a liar,” said Faircloth. He eyed the man coldly. “Try the story over again.”
The farmer jolted to his feet, his eyes feverish. “I done just like I said, you can’t call me no liar! I heard the dog barking—”
“And you opened the door, and saw the stranger there.” Faircloth’s voice was sharp. “So then what? Step by step. Minute by minute. I mean it, mister, I want the truth.”
“I—I looked at him—”
“With just the porch light on?”
“That’s right, just like I just showed you—”
“And what did the stranger say?”
“He said, ‘I’m a traveler, and I’d like something to eat.’ ”
“And what did his voice sound like?”
The farmer faltered. “It was funny-like gravel in a tin can. A funny kind of a voice—”
“And where was the dog all this time?”
The farmer blanched. “He—he was somewhere outside. He saw it was all right—”
“Where’s the dog now?”
“I sold him. I mean he ran away. You can’t keep a dog forever, mister.”
Faircloth’s face was very close to the old man’s. “The stranger was out on the porch, and you talked to him, and let him come in. And then what happened?”
“I—he sat down at the table, I think—I—I—”
“You went over to get some food from the stove, didn’t you?”
“Yes, yes, that’s right—”
“And then you saw blood on his pants, didn’t you? And you remembered hearing your dog give a yelp, out there in the yard, didn’t you? And that stranger had blood all over his pants and boots, didn’t he?”
The farmer’s eyes were wide with fear, and he was shaking his head helplessly. “No—no—”
And so you took that shotgun off the rack over there and you shot him, didn’t you?”
And then the old man’s face was in his hands, and he was bending over the table, crying like a baby—huge, fearful sobs racking his bony shoulders. “He killed my dog,” he choked out. “He killed my Brownie, gave him a kick that split his head wide open. He didn’t have to do that to poor old Brownie, did he? I knew he was a bad one when he did that. Yes, I shot him, right through the chest. Buried him down by the river, what was left of him.”
The news broke to the nation that night, and the country went into a panic unequalled since the days of the Chinese Confrontation. Paul Faircloth spent an hour on the visiphone from Des Moines, talking to Robert Roberts, going over the whole business, from beginning to end, while the Security chief stared at him as though he were demented. Finally Roberts put a call through to the President. Half an hour later, while Faircloth was making his way back to Washington, Roberts was in top-secret conference with the Senate leaders and the Cabinet and finally with the President himself. At last the carefully prepared news broke. It was an official White House news conference, and it was barely over when the radios and TVs were carrying the announcement.
Faircloth brought his plane down in Washington. He saw the crowd swarming across the landing strip before he could get unstrapped. A dozen flashbulbs popped, and between him and the Security limousine was a tight circle of reporters.
“How long has the alien been at large, Mr. Faircloth?” one of them asked.
“Sorry. The chief will have to answer that.”
“Is there any doubt that he’s telepathic?”
“No doubt whatsoever. I know that from personal experience. It’s the only way he could move freely in the population.”
“How was he first detected?”
Paul smiled to himself. “The President told you that, didn’t he? A Psi-High citizen spotted him in Des Moines. The Psi-Highs have been on his trail ever since.”
One of the reporters was tugging at his arm. “There’s been a lot of rumor about some kind of—well, conspiracy between the alien invader and the Psi-Highs in this country.”
Paul frowned. “If that were true, would we be working twenty-four hours a day to trap him? Use your head, man.
I know the rumors, but I can speak for the Psi-Highs, and I think Commissioner Roberts will back me up on this: the alien is menacing our very civilization. He’s struck out against one of our most beloved public servants, Secretary Ben Towne, in an attempt to undermine our government and prepare our planet for a full-scale invasion. There isn’t a Psi-High citizen in the country who will rest until the monster is caught, and until Secretary Towne has been returned safely to Washington.”