Police Your Planet Page 9

  Chapter IX

  CONTRABAND

  Elections were over, but the few dim lights along the street showed onlyboarded-up and darkened buildings. There were sounds of stirring, but noone was trusting that the election-day brawls were completely ended yet.

  Gordon hesitated, then swung glumly toward a corner where he could finda police call box. He heard a tiny patrol car turn the corner and duckedback into another alley to wait for it to go by. But they weren'tlooking for him. Their spotlight caught a running boy, clutching a fewthin copies of the _Crusader_ under a scrawny arm.

  After the cops had dumped the unconscious kid into the back of the smallsquad car, and gone looking for more game, Gordon went over to look atthe tattered scraps left of the opposition paper.

  Randolph wasn't preaching this time, but was content to report the factshe'd seen. There had been at least ninety known killings; mobs hadfought citizens outside the main market for three hours.

  Yet in spite of all the ballot-stuffing and intimidations, Wayne hadbarely squeaked through, by a four per cent majority. It was obviousthat the current administration could never win another election.

  Bruce Gordon lifted the cradled phone from the box. "Gordon reporting,"he announced.

  A startled grunt came from the instrument, followed by the clicks ofhasty switching. In less than fifteen seconds, Trench's voice barked outof the phone. "Gordon? Where the hell you been?"

  "Up an alley between McCutcheon and Miles," Gordon told him. "With acorpse. Murdoch's corpse. Better send out the wagon."

  Trench hesitated only a fraction of a second. "Okay, _I'll_ be out inten minutes."

  Gordon clumped back to the alley and bent for a final inspection ofMurdoch's body, to make sure nothing would prove the flaws in his weaklybuilt story.

  Isaiah Trench was better than his word. He swung his gray car up to thealley in seven minutes.

  The door slammed behind him, a beam snapped out from his flashlight intothe alley, and then he was beside Murdoch's body. He threw the light toGordon and stooped to run expert hands over the corpse and through thepockets.

  Finally, he stood up, frowning. "He's dead, all right. I don't get it.If you hadn't reported in ... Gordon, did he try to make you think hewas--"

  "Security?" Gordon filled in. "Yeah. Claimed he was head of it here, andwanted me to send a message to Earth for him."

  Trench nodded, a touch of relief on his face. "Crazy!"

  Gordon grimaced faintly.

  "Crazy," Trench repeated. "He must have been to spin that story ... Bythe way, thanks for killing that sniper. You're a good shot. I'd be deadif you weren't, I guess."

  Gordon made no comment, and Trench said, "I could start a nastyinvestigation, I guess. But I heard him raving, too. Give me a hand, andI'll take care of all this ... Want me to drop you off?"

  They wangled the body into the trunk of the car. Then it was good torelax while Trench drove along the rubble-piled and nearly desertedstreets. Gordon heard a sigh from beside him; Trench must have beenunder tension, too.

  They didn't speak until Trench stopped in front of Mother Corey's place.Then the captain turned and stuck out his hand. "Congratulations, by theway. I forgot to tell you, but you won the lottery. You're a sergeantfrom now on."

  * * * * *

  Inside, a thick effluvium hit his nose, and Gordon turned to see MotherCorey's huge bulk waddling down the hall. The old man nodded. "Wethought you'd gone on the lam, cobber. But I guess, since Trench broughtyou back, you've cooled. Good, good. As a respectable man now, Icouldn't have stashed you from the cops--though I might have beentempted--mighty tempted." His face was melancholy. "Tell me, lad, didthey get Murdoch?"

  Bruce Gordon nodded, and the old man sighed. Something suspiciously likea tear glistened in his eyes.

  "I thought you were taking a bath," Gordon commented.

  The old man chuckled. "Fate's against me, cobber. With all the shooting,some punk put a bullet clean through the wall and the plastic of thetub. Fifty gallons of water, all wasted!"

  He turned back toward the end of the hall, sighing again. Gordon went upthe stairs, noticing that Izzy's door was open. The little man wasstretched out on the bunk in his clothes, filthy; one side of his faceswollen.

  "Hi, gov'nor," he called out, his voice still cheerful. "I had oddsyou'd beat the ticket, though the Mother and me were worried there for awhile. How'd you grease the fix?"

  Gordon sketched it in, without mentioning Security. "What happened toyou, Izzy?"

  "Price of being honest. But the gees who paid me protection didn't gethurt, gov'nor." He winced, then grinned. "So they pay double tomorrow.Honesty pays, gov'nor, if you squeeze it once in a while ... Funny, youmaking sergeant; I thought two other gees won the lottery."

  So the promotion _had_ come from Trench! It bothered him. When a turkeysees corn on the menu, it's time to wonder about Thanksgiving.

  * * * * *

  Collections were good all week--probably as a result of Izzy's actions.Even after he arranged to pay his income tax, and turned over his"donation" to the fund, Gordon was well ahead for the first time sincehe'd landed here.

  He had become almost superstitious about the way he was always left withno more than a hundred credits in his pockets. This time, he strippedhimself to that sum at once, depositing the rest in the First MarsportBank. Maybe it would break the jinx.

  They were one of the few teams in the Seventh Precinct to make fullquota. Trench was lavish in his praise. He was playing more than fairwith Bruce Gordon now, but there was a basic suspicion in his eyes.

  The next day, he drafted Izzy and Gordon for a trip outside the dome."It's easy enough, and you'll get plenty of credit in the fund for it. Ineed two men who can keep their mouths shut."

  They idled around the station through the morning. In the lateafternoon, they left in a big truck capable of hauling what would havebeen fifty tons on Earth. Trench drove. Outside the dome, the electricmotor carried them along at a steady twenty miles an hour, almostsilently.

  It was Gordon's first look at the real Mars. He saw small villages wherecrop prospectors and hydroponic farmers lived, with a few smallindustrial sections scattered over the desert. As they moved out, he sawthe slow change from the beaten appearance of Marsport to something thatseemed no worse than would be found among the share-croppers back onEarth. It was obvious that Marsport was the poison center here.

  Some of the younger children were running around without helmets,confirming Praeger's claim that third-generation Martians somehowlearned to adapt to the atmosphere.

  Darkness fell sharply, as it always did in Mars' thin air, but they wenton, heading out into the dunes of the desert. When they finally stopped,they were beside a small, battered space ship. Boxes were piled allaround it, and others were being tossed out. Trent leaped from thetruck, motioning them to follow, and they began loading the crateshastily. It took about an hour of hard work to load the last of them,and Trench was working harder than they were. Finished, he went up toone of the men from the ship, handed over an envelope, and came back tostart the truck back toward Marsport. As the dunes dwindled behind them,Gordon could see the brief flare of the little rocket taking off.

  They drove back through the night as rapidly as the truck could manage.Finally, they rolled into City Hall, down a ramp, and onto an elevatorthat took them three levels down. Trench climbed out and nodded insatisfaction. "That's it. Take tomorrow off, if you want, and I'll fixcredit for you. But just remember you haven't seen anything. You don'tknow any more than our old friend Murdoch!"

  He led them to another elevator, then swung back to the truck.

  "Guns," Gordon said slowly. "Guns and contraband ammunition for theadministration from Earth. And they must have paid half the graftthey've taken for that. What the hell do they want it for?"

  Izzy jerked a shoulder upwards and a twist ran across his pock-markedface. "War, what else? Gov'nor, Earth must
be boiling about theelection. Maybe Security's getting set to spring."

  The idea of Marsport rebelling against Earth seemed ridiculous. Evenwith guns, they wouldn't have a chance if Earth sent a force of anystrength to back Security. But it was the only explanation.

  Gordon took the next day off to look for Sheila Corey, but nobody wouldadmit having seen her.

  He had seen crowds beginning to assemble all afternoon, but had paid noattention to them. Now he found the way back to Corey's blocked by amob. Then he saw that the object of it all was the First Marsport Bank.It was only toward that that the shaking fists were raised. Gordonmanaged to get onto a pile of rubble where he could see over the crowd.The doors of the bank were locked shut, but men were attacking it withan improvised battering ram. As he watched, a pompous little man came tothe upper window over the door and began motioning for attention. Thecrowd quieted almost at once, except for a single yell. "When do we getour money?"

  "Please. Please." The voice reached back thinly as the bank presidentgot his silence. "Please. It won't do you any good. Not a bit. We'rebroke. Not a cent left! And don't go blaming me. _I_ didn't start therush. Your friends did that. They took all the money, and now we'recleaned out. You can't--"

  A rope rose from the crowd and settled around him. In a second, he waspulled down, and the crowd surged forward.

  Gordon dropped from the rubble, staring at the bank. He'd played it safethis time--he'd put his money away, to make sure he'd have it!

  A heavy hand fell on his shoulder, and he turned to see Mother Corey."That's the way a panic is, cobber," the man said. "There's a run, theneverything is ruined. I tried to get you when I first heard the rumor,but you were gone. And when this starts, a man has to get there first."He patted his side, where a bulge showed. "And I just made it, too."

  The mob was beginning to break up now, but it was still in an ugly mood."But what started it?"

  "Rumors that Mayor Wayne got a big loan from the bank--and why not,seeing it was his bank! Nobody had to guess that he'd never pay it back,so--"

  Gordon found Izzy organizing the bouncers from the joints and some ofthe citizens into a squad. Every joint was closed down tightly already.Gordon began organizing his own squad.

  Izzy slipped over as he began to get them organized. "If we hold pastmidnight, we'll be set, gov'nor," he said. "They go crazy for a while,but give 'em a few hours and they stop most of it. I figure you knowwhere all the scratch went?"

  "Sure--guns from Earth! The damned fools!"

  "Yeah. But not fools. Just bloody well-informed, gov'nor. Earth'ssending a fleet--got official word of it. No way of telling how big, butit's coming."

  It gave Gordon something to think about while they patrolled the beat.But he had enough for a time without that. The mobs left the sectionalone, apparently scared off by the organized group ready and waitingfor them. But every street and alley had to be kept under constantsurveillance to drive out the angry, desperate men who were trying toget something to hang onto before everything collapsed. He saw storesbeing broken into, beyond his beat; and brawls as one drunken, crazedcrowd met another. But he kept to his own territory, knowing that therewas nothing he could do beyond it.

  By midnight, as Izzy had promised, the people had begun to quiet down,however. The anger and hysteria were giving way to a sullen, beatenhopelessness.

  Honest Izzy finally seemed satisfied to turn things over to the regularnight men. Gordon waited around a while longer, but finally headed backto Mother Corey's place.

  Mother Corey put a cup of steaming coffee into his hands. "You lookworse than I do, cobber. Worse than even that granddaughter of mine. Shewas looking for you!"

  "Sheila?" Gordon jerked the word out.

  "Yeah. She left a note for you. I put it up in your room." Mother Coreychuckled. "Why don't you two get married and make your fighting legal?"

  "Thanks for the coffee," Gordon threw back at him. He was alreadymounting the stairs.

  He tossed his door open and found the letter on his bed.

  "I'd rather go to Wayne," it said, "but I need money. If you want therest of this, you've got until three tonight to make an offer. If youcan find me, maybe I'll listen."

  The torn-off front cover of the notebook accompanied the letter. But itwas a quarter after three already, he was practically broke--and he hadno idea where she could be found.