Tom parked in his usual spot.  The stranger kept his hand in his pocket, still covering Tom but glancing around cautiously.  The sprawling experimental station was a vast four-mile-square area with a cluster of gleaming modern laboratory buildings and workshops.  In the distance, a tall glassed-in control tower overlooked Enterprises’ long runways for jet planes.

Suddenly the stranger stiffened.  A paunchy, bowlegged figure, topped by a white Texas sombrero, was coming straight toward them.

Tom’s heart gave a leap of hope.  The man was Chow Winkler, formerly a chuck-wagon cook and now head chef for the Swifts’ expeditions.

“Hi, boss!” Chow bellowed in his foghorn voice.  As usual he was wearing a gaudy cowboy shirt.  “Who’s the new buckaroo?” the cook added, squinting at the stranger with open but friendly curiosity.

“Why—­actually I don’t know his name yet, but he’s looking for a job,” Tom replied.  Turning to the stranger, he added, “What is your name, mister?”

The stranger glared from Tom to Chow, as if not certain what to answer.

Chow’s eyes narrowed.  He had detected something strange in the way Tom addressed the fellow as “mister,” and had also noticed how the man kept one hand hidden in his pocket.  Looking to Tom for a lead, Chow suddenly noticed the young inventor make a quick “thumbs down” gesture.

“My name is...”  The man’s voice fell to a mumble, obscuring the syllables.  “Frankly I am not yet sure I desire a job here, but being an engineer, I thought perhaps—­”

  [Illustration (Tom and Chow fight the intruder)]

The man’s gaze switched back to Tom, and in that instant Chow jumped the intruder.  With surprising agility for his rotund bulk, the cook bore down on him and let fly a gnarled fist at the stranger’s jaw.  Tom followed up like lightning, grabbing the man’s wrist and yanking his hand out of his pocket.

He was clutching a snub-nosed automatic.  Tom twisted it from his grasp as the man landed, writhing on the hard ground.  Chow quickly pinned his other arm and drove a knee into the man’s solar plexus.

“Jest lie quiet now, you varmint, or you may git yourself roughed up a bit,” Chow warned, then added, “Who is he, Tom?”

“Search me.  He stopped my car on the road and forced me to drive him in through the private gate.  Boy, was I ever glad to see you, old-timer!”

Tom emptied out the clip of shells.  Then he searched the stranger while Chow continued holding him down.  The man carried no wallet, papers, or other means of identification.

“Brand my tumbleweed salad,” Chow grumbled, “he sure wasn’t takin’ no chances on people findin’ out who he is!  Which proves he’s some sort o’ crooked cowpoke!  Honest ones ain’t afeared o’ showin’ their own brand!”

The man muttered something angrily in a foreign tongue.  Chow merely pressed down harder with his knee.  “What’ll we do with him, boss?”