 Why does Shannon reach for his gun when Beamish introduces himself?
The Blue Behemoth By LEIGH BRACKETT Shannon's Imperial Circus was a jinxed space-carny leased for a mysterious tour of the inner worlds. It made a one-night pitch on a Venusian swamp-town—to find that death stalked it from the jungle in a tiny ball of flame. [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Planet Stories May 1943. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] Not hard enough to jar the ribs clean loose, just enough to spring them. Shannon put his elbows on the table and peered at me through a curtain of very blond hair that was trying hard to be red. With Shannon's Imperial Circus, the Greatest Show in Space, plastered so thick with attachments...." I've wet-nursed Shannon's Imperial Circus around the Triangle for eleven years, and I know. It's lousy, it's mangy, it's broken-down! Nobody insults Buckhalter Shannon's Imperial Circus to Buckhalter Shannon's face unless he's tired and wants a long rest in a comfy fracture-frame. I had plenty of time to see his grey-green eyes get sleepy, and hear the quarter-Earth-blood Martian girl wailing about love over by the battered piano, and watch the slanting cat-eyes of the little dark people at the tables swing round toward us, pleased and kind of hungry. I had plenty of time to think how I only weigh one-thirty-seven to Shannon's one-seventy-five, and how I'm not as young as I used to be. Is one of you Mister Buckhalter Shannon?" He closed his eyes and smiled pleasantly and said, very gently: "Would you be collecting for the feed bill, or the fuel?" Bucky Shannon settled his shoulders and hips like a dancer. The little guy looked at Shannon with pale blue eyes like a baby, and his voice was softer than Bucky's. Bucky Shannon sighed, and let his fist start traveling, a long, deceptive arc.
 Shannon is prone to suspicion after being hunted down by people they owe money to, and thinks Beamish is one of them.
 The sound of the chair being pulled back sets him on high alert.  He sees that Beamish has something in his hands.  Shannon is prone to suspicion after being hunted down by people they owe money to, and thinks Beamish is one of them.  Beamish tells them he's there to collect money from them.