A Matter of Importance
the first time, mostlikely. Not delinks. Not pirates. You said Huks." He looked around,estimatingly. "The rockets had to be brought here from somewhere elsewhere they'd been landed. I'm betting the tracks were covered prettycareful. But rockets are heavy. Manhandlin' them, whoever was doin' itwould take the easiest way. Hm-m-m. There's water close by over yonder.Sort of a sound in there--too narrow to be a bay. Let's have a look. Andthe slopes are easiest that way, too."
He led off to the eastward. He thought of Timmy's girl. He'd never seenher, but Timmy was going to marry her. She was on the _Cerberus_. It wasthe job of the cops to take care of whatever dilemma that ship might bein. As of here and now, it was Sergeant Madden's job. But besides that,he thought of the way Timmy would feel if anything happened to the girlhe meant to marry. As Timmy's father, the sergeant had to do something.He wanted to do it fast. But it had to be done the right way.
* * * * *
The route he chose was rocky, but it was nearly the only practicableroute away from the burned-dead landing place. He climbed toward what onthis planet was the east. There were pinnacles and small precipices.There were small, fleshy-leaved bushes growing out of such tinycollections of soil as had formed in cracks and crevices in the rock.
Sergeant Madden noted that one such bush was wilted. He stopped. He bentover and carefully felt of the stones about it. A small rock came out.The bush had been out of the ground before. It had carefully beenreplaced. By someone.
"The rockets came this way," said the sergeant, with finality. "Hauledover this pass to the _Cerberus_. Somebody must've knocked this bushloose while workin' at getting 'em along. So he replanted it. Only notgood enough. It wilted."
"Who did it?" demanded Patrolman Willis.
"Who we want to know about," growled Sergeant Madden. "Maybe Huks. Comeon!"
He scrambled ahead. He wheezed as he climbed and descended. After half amile, Patrolman Willis said abruptly:
"You figure they all left, before anybody tried to find 'em?"
The sergeant grunted affirmatively. A quarter mile still farther, therocky ground fell away. There was the gleam of water below them. Rockycliffs enclosed an arm of the sea that came deep into the land, here. Inthe cliffs rock-strata tilted insanely. There were red and yellow andblack layers--mostly yellow and black. They showed in startlingly clearcontrast.
"Right!" said Sergeant Madden in morose satisfaction. "I thought theremight've been a boat. But this's it!"
He went down a steep descent to the very edge of the sound--it was evenmore like a fjord--where the waters of the ocean came in among theisland's hills. On the far side, a little cascade leaped and bubbleddown to join the sea.
"You go that way," commanded Sergeant Madden, "and I'll go this. We'vegot two things to look for--a shallow place in the water coming right upto shore. And look for signs of traffic from the cliffs to the water. Bythe color of those rocks, we'd ought to find both."
He lumbered away along the water's edge. There were no creatures whichsang or chirped. The only sounds were wind and the lapping of wavesagainst the shore. It was very, very lonely.
Half a mile from the point of his first descent, the sergeant found ashoal. It was a flat space of shallow water--discoverable by the colorof the bottom. The water was not over four feet deep. It was aremarkably level shoal place.
He whistled on his fingers. When Patrolman Willis reached him, hepointed to the cliffs directly across the beach from the shallow water.Lurid yellow tints stained the cliff walls. Odd masses of fallen stonedotted the cliff foot. At one place they were piled high. That pilelooked quite natural--except that it was at the very center of the shoreline next the shoal.
"This rock's yellow," said Sergeant Madden, rumbling a little. "It'smineral. If we had a Geiger, it'd be raising hell, here. There's a minein there. Uranium. If a ship came down on rockets, an' landed in thatshoal place yonder ... why ... it wouldn't leave a burned spot comin'down or takin' off, either. Y'see?"
Patrolman Willis said: "Look here, sergeant--"
"I'm in command here," growled Sergeant Madden. "Huks didn't booby trap.Proud as hell, and touchy as all get-out, but not killers. Not crazykillers, anyhow. You go get up yonder. Up where we started down. Then goon away. Back to the squad ship. If I don't come along, anyhow you'llknow what's what when the _Aldeb_ comes."
Patrolman Willis expostulated. Sergeant Madden was firm. In the end,Patrolman Willis went away. And Sergeant Madden sat at ease and resteduntil he had time enough to get back to the squad ship. It was true thatthe Huks didn't booby trap. They hadn't had the practice, anyhow, eightyyears ago. But this was a very important matter. Maybe they consideredit so important that they'd changed their policy concerning this.
Wheezing a little, Sergeant Madden pulled away large stones and smallones. An opening appeared behind them. He grunted and continued hislabor. Nothing happened. The mouth of a mine shaft appeared, goinghorizontally into the cliff.
Puffing from his exertions, Sergeant Madden went in. It was necessary ifhe were to make a routine examination.
* * * * *
The _Aldeb_ came in a full day later. It descended, following the spacebeacon the squad ship sent up from its resting place. The _Aldeb_ wasnot an impressive sight, of course. It was a medium-sized police salvageship. It had a crew of fifteen, and it was powerfully engined, and itcontained a respectable amount of engineering experience and ability,plus some spare parts and, much more important, the tools with which tomake others. It came down in a highly matter-of-fact fashion, andSergeant Madden and Patrolman Willis went over to it to explain thesituation.
"The _Cerberus_ came in on rockets," rumbled the sergeant, in thesalvage ship's skipper's cabin. "She landed. We found signs that some ofher people came out an' strolled around lookin' for souvenirs and such.I make a guess that there was a minin' man among them, but it's only aguess. Anyhow somebody went over to where there's some parti-coloredcliffs, where the sea comes away inland. And when they got to thatplace ... why ... there was a ship there. Then."
He paused, frowning.
"It would've been standing on an artificial shoal place, about thirtyyards from a shaft that was the mouth of a mine. Uranium. And there'sbeen a lot of uranium taken outta there! It was hauled right outta themine shaft across the beach to the ship that was waitin'. And there'sfresh work in that mine, but not a tool or a scrap of paper to tell whowas workin' it. It must've been cleaned up like that every time a shipleft after loadin' up. Humans wouldn't've done it. They wouldn't care.Huks would. There's not supposed to be any of them left in these parts,but I'm guessing the mine was dug by Huks, and the _Cerberus_ was takenaway by them because the humans on the _Cerberus_ found out there wasHuks around."
Patrolman Willis said: "The sergeant took a chance on the mine beingbooby-trapped and went in, after sending me out of range."
The sergeant scowled at him and went on.
"How it happened don't matter. Maybe somebody spotted the ship from the_Cerberus_ as it was comin' down. Maybe anything. But whoever run themine found out somebody knew they were there, so they rushed the_Cerberus_--there prob'ly wasn't even a stun-pistol on board to fightwith--and they put new rockets on her."
* * * * *
The skipper of the salvage ship _Aldeb_ nodded wisely.
"A ship comin' to load up minerals where there wasn't any spaceport," heobserved, "would have a set of rockets to land on, empty, and a doubleset to take off on, loaded. Yeah."
"They must've figured," said Sergeant Madden, "that we just couldn'tmake any sense out of what we found. And if we hadn't turned up thatmine, maybe never would. But anyhow they sent the _Cerberus_ off andcovered everything up and went off to stay, themselves, until we gave upand went home."
"I wonder," said the skipper of the _Aldeb_, "where they took the_Cerberus_? That's my job!"
"Not far," grunted Sergeant Madden. "They had to be taking the_Cerberus_ somewhere. If they jus
t wanted to wipe it out, after theyrushed it, they coulda just set off its fuel like it'd happened in a badlanding. And that landing was bad! If there'd been a fuel-explosioncrater at the end of that burnt line on the ground, nobody'd ever'velooked further. But there wasn't. So there's a place they're takin' the_Cerberus_ to. But it's got a brokedown drive. It can only hobble along.They can't try to get but so far! What's the nearest sol-type star?"
The _Aldeb_'s skipper pushed a button and the Precinct