Page:Astounding Science Fiction (1950-01).djvu/38

 played with, anyhow. The kind grown-ups used when they wanted to kill other grown-ups. Not the kind of weapon he'd ever seen, or heard of. But, somehow, the assembly he visualized wasn't designed by any kind of grown-ups he'd ever heard of, either.

He and Edith would be having children, some day, and—

From the time he picked up that stamping until he found himself in a ten-foot room was just a little over three years.

Edith left him at the end of the first year.

Not just like that. Not just like that at all. She didn't get up one day, surprised him, said she'd had enough and later walked out.

There had been almost a year of things she had to take. Of disappearances on his part, of unexplained trips, of secrecies she couldn't understand. There were long periods, when he was at home, of moodiness and thought, and inattention to her. She really had been forced to imagine almost everything, at one time or another, and he never had an excuse to offer, just asking her to trust him.

She had trusted him. Trusted him more than she should have, much longer than he had a right to expect. Then—Well, she had been right, it was just no life for a married woman. If he ever—Well, she gave him enough hope. If it hadn't become such an obsession with him, he could have stopped his pursuit any time in the next two years, gone to her and asked to start over. He would never have had to explain the past. But he hadn't been able to stop.

From the very first he had somehow sensed that there would be no evidence. That is, nothing concrete he could seize upon to give him an immediate, clear-cut answer. Even then he had known he was working with intangibles. He would have to lean heavily upon half-seen suspicions, upon intuitions that were only vague feelings. That would be all he would have to go on. Another man would have had less.

Triesting did manufacture toys. Nothing but toys. A certain number of people reported for work each day, put in a certain number of hours, and returned the next day for more. As a result, there was a certain flow of finished toys from the factory.

The first real blow came when he found one of their toys used the stamping which he held in question. He almost gave up, then. Did give up, telling himself he was strictly a fool. He went back to his own business, to living his own life. Yet, it kept nagging at his mind. Time after time he tried to put the thoughts away. One should never be a fool more than once over the same subject.

Then he went out and bought one of their Mystery Ray Pistols. He took it apart, studied it, redesigned it to his own satisfaction. He made 38