"You've got a protection against the terror beam," said the general matter-of-factly. "So have we. But ours weighs two tons. Yours can be carried without being a burden. And—" his eyes went to the unlikely cheese grater over Lockley's shoulder—"and yours detonates explosives. If we can equip the world with those, Lockley, we'll have peace!"
Lockley thought of a decisive test. He grimaced.
"You want me to risk being a traitor! All right, what's in it for me? What am I offered?"
The general shrugged, his eyes hardening. Vale spread out his hands. Sattell snorted. Jill moistened her lips. Lockley turned upon her.
"You want me to believe," he said harshly. "What do you offer if I turn over the thing to these men you say are honest men and neither spies or traitors. What do you offer?"
She stared at him. Then she said quietly, "Nothing."
Lockley hesitated once more, for a long instant. But that was the right answer. Nobody who'd been bought or bribed or frightened into being a traitor would have thought of it.
"That," said Lockley, "by a strange coincidence happens to be my price."
He ripped away a wire. He flung the queer combination of pocket radio and cheese and nutmeg graters to the general.
"I'll explain later how it works," he said wearily, "—if I haven't made a mistake."