He reached the top of the knoll and threw himself in the grass, lying flat, panting like a tuckered dog.
And there, not more than a hundred yards away, was the fence that closed in Metcalfe’s farm.
It marched across the rolling, broken hills, a snake of shining metal. And extending out from it was a broad swath of weeds, waist-high, silver-green in the blasting sunlight—as if the ground had been plowed around the fence for a distance of a hundred feet or so and the weeds sown in the ground as one might sow a crop. Doyle squinted his eyes to try to make out what kind of weeds they were, but he was too far away.
Far on the distant ridge was the red gleam of a rooftop among many sheltering trees and to the west of the buildings lay an orchard, ordered row on row.
Was it, Doyle wondered, only his imagination that the shapes of those orchard trees were the remembered shape of the night-seen tree in the walled garden in the rear of Metcalfe’s town-house? And was it once more only his imagination that the green of them was slightly different than the green of other leaves—the green, perhaps of mint-new currency?
He lay in the grass, with the fingers of the wind picking at his sweat-soaked shirt, and wondered about the legal aspects of money that was grown on trees. It could not be counterfeit, for it was not made but grown. And if it were identical with perfectly legal, government-printed money, could anyone prove in any court of law that it was bogus money? He didn’t know much law, but he wondered if there could be any statute upon the books that would cover a point of law like this? Probably not, he concluded, since it was so fantastic that it could not be anticipated and thus would require no rule to legislate against it.
And now, for the first time, he began really to wonder how money could be grown on trees. He had told Mabel, off-handedly and casual, so she wouldn’t argue, that a botanist could do anything. But that wasn’t entirely right, of course, because a botanist only studied plants and learned what he could about them. But there were these other fellows—these bio-something or other—who fooled around with changing plants. They bred grasses that would grow on land that would grow no more than thistles, they cross-pollinated corn to grow more and bigger ears, they developed grains that were disease-resistant, and they did a lot of other things. But developing a tree that would grow letter-perfect money in lieu of leaves seemed just a bit farfetched.
The sun beat against his back and he felt the heat of it through his drying shirt. He looked at his watch and it was almost three o’clock.
He turned his attention back to the orchard and this time he saw that many little figures moved among the trees. He strained his eyes to see them better, but he could not be sure—although they looked for all the world like a gang of rollas.
He crawled down the knoll and across the strip of grass toward the weeds. He kept low and inched along and was very careful. His only hope of making a deal, any kind of deal, with Metcalfe, was to come upon him unawares and let him know immediately what kind of hand he held.
He started worrying about how Mabel might be getting along, but he wiped the worry out. He had enough to worry about without adding to it. And, anyhow, Mabel was quite a gal and could take care of herself.
He began running through his mind alternate courses of action if he should fail to locate Metcalfe, and the most obvious, of course, was to attempt a raid upon the orchard. As he thought it over, he wasn’t even sure but what a raid upon the orchard might be the thing to do. He wished he’d brought along the sugar sack Mabel had fixed up for him.
The fence worried him a little, but he also thrust that worry to one side. It would be time enough to worry about the fence once he got to it.
He slithered through the grass and he was doing swell. He was almost to the strip of weeds and no one apparently had seen him. Once he got to the weeds, it would be easier, for they would give him cover. He could sneak right up to the fence and no one would ever notice.
He reached the weeds and wilted at what he saw.
The weeds were the healthiest and thickest patch of nettles that had ever grown outdoors!
He put out a tentative hand and the nettles stung. They were the real McCoy. Ruefully, he rubbed at the dead-white welts rising on his fingers.
He raised himself cautiously to peer above the nettles. One of the rollas was coming down the slope toward the fence and there was no doubt now that the things he’d seen up in the orchard was a gang of rollas.
He ducked behind the nettles, hoping that the rolla had not seen him. He lay flat upon the ground and the sun was hot and the place upon his hand that had touched the nettles blazed with fire, although it was hard to decide which was the worst—the nettle sting or all the mosquito lumps that had blossomed out on him.
He noticed that the nettles were beginning to wave and toss as if they were blowing in the wind and that was a funny deal, for there wasn’t that much wind.
The nettles kept on blowing and all at once they parted right in front of him, running in a straight line, making a path between him and the fence. The nettles on the right blew to the right so hard they lay flat upon the ground and those to the left blew to the left so hard they were likewise on the ground and the path was there, without a thing to stop one walking to the fence.
The rolla stood just beyond the fence and he spelled out a message in large capital letters upon his blackboard chest:
COME ON
OVER, HEEL!
Doyle hesitated, filled with dismay. It was a rotten break that he had been discovered by this little stinker. Now the cat was out the bag for sure, and all his toiling up the hollow, all his sneaking through the grass stood for absolutely nothing.
He saw that the other rollas were waddling down the slope toward the fence, while the first rolla still stood there, with the invitation on his chest.
Then the lettering on the rolla flickered out. The nettles still stayed down and the path stayed open. The rollas who had been coming down the slope reached the fence and all of them—all five of them—lined up in a solemn row. The first one’s chest lit up with words:
WE HAVE THREE
MISSING ROLLAS
And the chest of the second one:
DO YOU BRING
WORD TO US?
And the third:
WE WOULD LIKE
TO TALK TO YOU
The fourth:
ABOUT THE
MISSING ONES
The fifth:
PLEASE COME
TO US, HEEL.
Doyle raised himself from where he had been lying flat upon the ground and squatted on his toes.
It could be a trap.
What could he gain by talking with the rollas!
But there was no way to retreat without losing what little advantage he might have—there was no choice but to do his best at brazening it out.
He rose to his feet and ambled down the nettle-path with as slight a show of concern as he could manage.
He reached the fence and hunkered down so that he was almost level with the rollas.
“I know where one of the missing rollas is,” he said, “but not the other two.”
YOU KNOW
ABOUT THE
ONE WHO
WAS IN TOWN
WITH METCALFE?
“That’s right.”
YOU TELL
US WHERE
HE IS