Senator Treed rapped for attention and the committee came to order. "This morning," said Treed, "we will have open discussion of the problem."
General Hayes nodded and said: "This much is known: The mice are delivered somewhere out of Manton's Better Mousetrap. I wonder if some foreign power might not have discovered even more of its powers and is using it to plague America?"
"That seems far fetched."
"Not at all. It might be likened to a bacterial warfare. Pests will vitiate a country as well as war—weakening a strong country to prepare it for easy conquest."
Tag Harris of the FBI Laboratory shook his head. "There's more than meets the eye," he said. "I've definite proof that some human agency is working at it."
"You have?" demanded Senator Treed. "Tell us."
"We tagged rats and sent 'em through one of Manton's traps. Later we used one of the old wire-cage affairs. Someone had gone to the trouble of counterfeiting some of our tags. Out of fifty-seven rats caught with tags, we found a duplicate number. Someone obviously caught a tagged one from wherever it was sent, and in an effort to confuse us, made duplicate tags and sent 'em back."
"Deliberate!"
Admiral Grayson of Intelligence nodded. "Tomlinson of Psychological Warfare says that's what he would recommend to spread confusion. You see, this Power would not stop; they would also know that we are trying to find out all about it. Therefore they would prefer to add confusion to our search. Hence the duplication of tags."
"Could you tell the real one?"