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opened it, he was checking his wrist watch.
    “Heard you unlocking the gate,” he said. “That’s why I didn’t come out.”
    “Uh-huh. How’s everything?”
    He shrugged, went over and sat down at a small table. There was a goose-necked lamp on the table, a small pad of paper, a clock and a pencil. Beneath the table on the floor were some battered magazines. As he sat down, he acted as if he’d decided to spend the night: It gave me a creepy, isolated feeling and I began to sweat. A lot of things came into my head, like Sam telling him to hang around, stuff like that.
    “Can’t understand it,” he said.
    “Understand what?” I was wearing a light slicker. I peeled it off and hung it on the coat-rack just inside the door.
    “Why you have to stand guard here? I mean, with your agency and all—why not hire somebody?”
    I walked over by the table. “We always work it this way. It’s our biggest account. One of us always stands the midnight to eight when Halquist has a big payroll—you know that. It’s my turn tonight. We just don’t want to take any chances.”
    “Chances,” he said. “Hell.”
    “Well—you never know.”
    “You guys are making enough. Why don’t you let the other guy make a little? Playing nightwatchman—what the hell you trying to prove?”
    “Not trying to prove anything.” His voice had been nasty. He was hungry for a buck. I felt a little sorry for him. At the same time, he was playing with dangerous ground and didn’t know it. I had to get him out of here. He hadn’t looked at me all the time he spoke.
    He was staring at the table top.
    “You in a tight, Hornell?”
    “Hell of a lot that is to you. I could have stood guard on this lousy place the rest of the night. I’m no sleeper.”
    Gunnison was supposed to come by in fifteen minutes after the time I left the car. It would be grand if he sailed in through the open gate now. I kept thinking, This is a warning. Drop the whole thing.
    That’s the way my mind began to work.
    “Well,” I said. “Give me the gun. You may as well take off. I’ll make the rounds.”
    He leaned back in the chair and looked at me now. The truth of it was, if he stuck around, I’d have to do something. The minutes were flying. I felt trapped.
    He stood up, still looking at me, and unbuckled the belt and holstered .38. He tossed it with a slam on the table.
    “You guys,” he said. “Grab every damned thing.”
    “I can let you have a little if you’re pressed,” I said.
    “The hell with you, Morgan. Grab, grab, grab—that’s all some guys think of.”
    All right. The hell with him. He was a sorehead.
    “Think for hell’s sake you were guarding a bank vault,” he said. “I was in there looking at that safe. A cracker-box, Morgan. Kick it and it’ll fall open.”
    I didn’t say anything, watching him.
    He turned on his heel and walked across the room and out of the door. He slammed the door. I went out after him and stood just outside the door.
    “Take it easy, Hornell,” I called.
    He didn’t say anything. He went on out to the gate and opened it and stepped outside, and fixed the padlock and chain and locked it. Then he walked on down the street, tossing the key in the palm of his hand. I watched him until he was out of sight. The rain had not yet started up again. There were no cars on the street, no nothing. I went back inside.
    I left the gun on the table and walked down the hall past the mimeograph room and stopped in front of the office. At the far end of the hall in dim shadow, you could see the beginnings of the bottling works. There were echoes from the vaulted ceilings, and bits of light flickered on curling metal pipes and machinery. It was an immense plant. You could smell the damned soda pop, the way it impregnated the air. I turned and went into the office.
    They hadn’t just asked me in with them because I had the key and could relieve the. guard, either. It was a lucky stroke that this wasn’t Sam’s night