15
VIGILANTES
When the _Pequod_ surfaced under the city roof, I saw what wascooking. There were twenty or more ships, either on the concrete docksor afloat in the pools. The waterfront was crowded with men in boatclothes, forming little knots and breaking up to join other groups,all milling about talking excitedly. Most of them were armed; not justknives and pistols, which is normal costume, but heavy rifles orsubmachine guns. Down to the left, there was a commotion and peoplewere getting out of the way as a dozen men come pushing through,towing a contragravity skid with a 50-mm ship's gun on it. I began notliking the looks of things, and Glenn Murell, who had come up from hisnap below, was liking it even less. He'd come to Fenris to buytallow-wax, not to fight a civil war. I didn't want any of that stuff,either. Getting rid of Ravick, Hallstock and Belsher would come underthe head of civic improvements, but towns are rarely improved byhaving battles fought in them.
Maybe I should have played dumb and waited till I'd talked to Dad faceto face, before making any statements about what had happened on the_Javelin_, I thought. Then I shrugged that off. From the minute the_Javelin_ had failed to respond to Dad's screen-call and the generalcall had gone out to the hunter-fleet, everybody had been positive ofwhat had happened. It was too much like the loss of the _Claymore_,which had made Ravick president of the Co-op.
Port Sandor had just gotten all of Steve Ravick that anybody couldtake. They weren't going to have any more of him, and that was allthere was to it.
Joe Kivelson was grumbling about his broken arm; that meant that whena fight started, he could only go in swinging with one fist, and thatwould cut the fun in half. Another reason why Joe is a wretched shotis that he doesn't like pistols. They're a little too impersonal tosuit him. They weren't for Oscar Fujisawa; he had gotten aMars-Consolidated Police Special out of the chart-table drawer and putit on, and he was loading cartridges into a couple of spare clips.Down on the main deck, the gunner was serving out small arms, andthere was an acrimonious argument because everybody wanted a chopperand there weren't enough choppers to go around. Oscar went over to theladder head and shouted down at them.
"Knock off the argument, down there; you people are all going to stayon the ship. I'm going up to the _Times_; as soon as I'm off, floather out into the inner channel and keep her afloat, and don't letanybody aboard you're not sure of."
"That where we're going?" Joe Kivelson asked.
"Sure. That's the safest place in town for Mr. Murell and I want tofind out exactly what's going on here."
"Well, here; you don't need to put me in storage," Murell protested."I can take care of myself."
Add, Famous Last Words, I thought.
"I'm sure of it, but we can't take any chances," Oscar told him."Right now, you are Fenris's Indispensable Man. If you're not aroundto buy tallow-wax, Ravick's won the war."
Oscar and Murell and Joe and Tom Kivelson and I went down into theboat; somebody opened the port and we floated out and lifted onto theSecond Level Down. There was a fringe of bars and cafes and dancehalls and outfitters and ship chandlers for a couple of blocks back,and then we ran into the warehouse district. Oscar ran up town to avehicle shaft above the Times Building, careful to avoid theneighborhood of Hunters' Hall or the Municipal Building.
There was a big crowd around the _Times_, mostly business districtpeople and quite a few women. They were mostly out on the street andinside the street-floor vehicle port. Not a disorderly crowd, but Inoticed quite a few rifles and submachine guns. As we slipped into thevehicle port, they recognized the _Pequod's_ boat, and there was arush after it. We had trouble getting down without setting it onanybody, and more trouble getting out of it. They were allfriendly--too friendly for comfort. They began cheering us as soon asthey saw us.
Oscar got Joe Kivelson, with his arm in a sling, out in front where hecould be seen, and began shouting: "Please make way; this man's beeninjured. Please don't crowd; we have an injured man here." The crowdbegan shoving back, and in the rear I could hear them taking it up:"Joe Kivelson; he's been hurt. They're carrying Joe Kivelson off."That made Joe curse a blue streak, and somebody said, "Oh, he's beenhurt real bad; just listen to him!"
When we got up to the editorial floor, Dad and Bish Ware and a fewothers were waiting at the elevator for us. Bish was dressed as healways was, in his conservative black suit, with the organic opalglowing in his neckcloth. Dad had put a coat on over his gun. Julio waswearing two pistols and a knife a foot long. There was a big crowd inthe editorial office--ships' officers, merchants, professional people. Inoticed Sigurd Ngozori, the banker, and Professor Hartzenbosch--he waswearing a pistol, too, rather self-consciously--and the Zen Buddhistpriest, who evidently had something under his kimono. They all greetedus enthusiastically and shook hands with us. I noticed that Joe Kivelsonwas something less than comfortable about shaking hands with Bish Ware.The fact that Bish had started the search for the _Javelin_ that hadsaved our lives didn't alter the opinion Joe had formed long ago thatBish was just a worthless old souse. Joe's opinions are allcollapsium-plated and impervious to outside influence.
I got Bish off to one side as we were going into the editorial room.
"How did you get onto it?" I asked.
He chuckled deprecatingly. "No trick at all," he said. "I justcirculated and bought drinks for people. The trouble with Ravick'sgang, it's an army of mercenaries. They'll do anything for the priceof a drink, and as long as my rich uncle stays solvent, I always havethe price of a drink. In the five years I've spent in this Garden Spotof the Galaxy, I've learned some pretty surprising things about SteveRavick's operations."
"Well, surely, nobody was going around places like Martian Joe's orOne Eye Swanson's boasting that they'd put a time bomb aboard the_Javelin_," I said.
"It came to pretty nearly that," Bish said. "You'd be amazed at howcareless people who've had their own way for a long time can get. Forinstance, I've known for some time that Ravick has spies among thecrews of a lot of hunter-ships. I tried, a few times, to warn some ofthese captains, but except for Oscar Fujisawa and Corkscrew Finnegan,none of them would listen to me. It wasn't that they had any doubtthat Ravick would do that; they just wouldn't believe that any oftheir crew were traitors.
"I've suspected this Devis for a long time, and I've spoken to RamonLlewellyn about him, but he just let it go in one ear and out theother. For one thing, Devis always has more money to spend than hisshare of the _Javelin_ take would justify. He's the showoff type;always buying drinks for everybody and playing the big shot. Claims towin it gambling, but all the times I've ever seen him gambling, he'sbeen losing.
"I knew about this hoard of wax we saw the day Murell came in for sometime. I always thought it was being held out to squeeze a better priceout of Belsher and Ravick. Then this friend of mine with whom I wastalking aboard the _Peenemuende_ mentioned that Murell seemed to knowmore about the tallow-wax business than about literary matters, andafter what happened at the meeting and afterward, I began putting twoand two together. When I crashed that party at Hunters' Hall, I hearda few things, and they all added up.
"And then, about thirty hours after the Javelin left port, I was inthe Happy Haven, and who should I see, buying drinks for the house,but Al Devis. I let him buy me one, and he told me he'd strained hisback hand-lifting a power-unit cartridge. A square dance got started alittle later, and he got into it. His back didn't look very strainedto me. And then I heard a couple of characters in One Eye Swanson'sbetting that the _Javelin_ would never make port again."
I knew what had happened from then on. If it hadn't been for BishWare, we'd still be squatting around a fire down on the coast ofHermann Reuch's Land till it got too cold to cut wood, and then we'dfreeze. I mentioned that, but Bish just shrugged it off and suggestedwe go on in and see what was happening inside.
"Where is Al Devis?" I asked. "A lot of people want to talk to him."
"I know they do. I want to get to him first, while he's still incondition to do some talki
ng of his own. But he just dropped out ofsight, about the time your father started calling the _Javelin_."
"Ah!" I drew a finger across under my chin, and mentioned the class ofpeople who tell no tales. Bish shook his head slowly.
"I doubt it," he said. "Not unless it was absolutely necessary. Thatsort of thing would have a discouraging effect the next time Ravickwanted a special job done. I'm pretty sure he isn't at Hunters' Hall,but he's hiding somewhere."
Joe Kivelson had finished telling what had happened aboard the_Javelin_ when we joined the main crowd, and everybody was talkingabout what ought to be done with Steve Ravick. Oddly enough, the mostbloodthirsty were the banker and the professor. Well, maybe it wasn'tso odd. They were smart enough to know what Steve Ravick was reallydoing to Port Sandor, and it hurt them as much as it did the hunters.Dad and Bish seemed to be the only ones present who weren't in favorof going down to Hunters' Hall right away and massacring everybody init, and then doing the same at the Municipal Building.
"That's what I say!" Joe Kivelson was shouting. "Let's go clean outboth rats' nests. Why, there must be a thousand hunter-ship men at thewaterfront, and look how many people in town who want to help. We gotenough men to eat Hunters' Hall whole."
"You'll find it slightly inedible, Joe," Bish told him. "Ravick hasabout thirty men of his own and fifteen to twenty city police. He hasat least four 50-mm's on the landing stage above, and he has half adozen heavy machine guns and twice that many light 7-mm's."
"Bish is right," somebody else said. "They have the vehicle port onthe street level barricaded, and they have the two floors on the levelbelow sealed off. We got men all around it and nobody can get out, butif we try to blast our way in, it's going to cost us like Nifflheim."
"You mean you're just going to sit here and talk about it and not doanything?" Joe demanded.
"We're going to do something, Joe," Dad told him. "But we've got totalk about what we're going to do, and how we're going to do it, orit'll be us who'll get wiped out."
"Well, we'll have to decide on what it'll be, pretty quick," MohandasGandhi Feinberg said.
"What are things like at the Municipal Building?" Oscar Fujisawaasked. "You say Ravick has fifteen to twenty city cops at Hunters'Hall. Where are the rest of them? That would only be five to ten."
"At the Municipal Building," Bish said. "Hallstock's holed up there,trying to pretend that nothing out of the ordinary is happening."
"Good. Let's go to the Municipal Building, first," Oscar said. "Take acouple of hundred men, make a lot of noise, shoot out a few windowsand all yell, 'Hang Mort Hallstock!' loud enough, and he'll recall thecops he has at Hunters' Hall to save his own neck. Then the rest of uscan make a quick rush and take Hunters' Hall."
"We'll have to keep our main force around Hunters' Hall while we'redemonstrating at the Municipal Building," Corkscrew Finnegan said. "Wecan't take a chance on Ravick's getting away."
"I couldn't care less whether he gets away or not," Oscar said. "Idon't want Steve Ravick's blood. I just want him out of theCo-operative, and if he runs out from it now, he'll never get backin."
"You want him, and you want him alive," Bish Ware said. "Ravick hasclose to four million sols banked on Terra. Every millisol of that'smoney he's stolen from the monster-hunters of this planet, through theCo-operative. If you just take him out and string him up, you'll havethe Nifflheim of a time getting hold of any of it."
That made sense to all the ship captains, even Joe Kivelson, after Dadreminded him of how much the salvage job on the _Javelin_ was going tocost. It took Sigurd Ngozori a couple of minutes to see the point, butthen, hanging Steve Ravick wasn't going to cost the Fidelity & TrustCompany anything.
"Well, this isn't my party," Glenn Murell said, "but I'm too much of abusinessman to see how watching somebody kick on the end of a rope isworth four million sols."
"Four million sols," Bish said, "and wondering, the rest of yourlives, whether it was justice or just murder."
The Buddhist priest looked at him, a trifle startled. After all, hewas the only clergyman in the crowd; he ought to have thought of that,instead of this outrageous mock-bishop.
"I think it's a good scheme," Dad said. "Don't mass any more menaround Hunters' Hall than necessary. You don't want the police to beafraid to leave when Hallstock calls them in to help him at MunicipalBuilding."
Bish Ware rose. "I think I'll see what I can do at Hunters' Hall, inthe meantime," he said. "I'm going to see if there's some way in fromthe First or Second Level Down. Walt, do you still have that sleep-gasgadget of yours?"
I nodded. It was, ostensibly, nothing but an oversized pocket lighter,just the sort of a thing a gadget-happy kid would carry around. Itworked perfectly as a lighter, too, till you pushed in on a littlegismo on the side. Then, instead of producing a flame, it squirtedout a small jet of sleep gas. It would knock out a man; it wouldalmost knock out a Zarathustra veldtbeest. I'd bought it from aspaceman on the _Cape Canaveral_. I'd always suspected that he'dstolen it on Terra, because it was an expensive little piece of work,but was I going to ride a bicycle six hundred and fifty light-years tofind out who it belonged to? One of the chemists' shops at Port Sandormade me up some fills for it, and while I had never had to use it, itwas a handy thing to have in some of the places I had to followstories into, and it wouldn't do anybody any permanent damage, the waya gun would.
"Yes; it's down in my room. I'll get it for you," I said.
"Be careful, Bish," Dad said. "That gang would kill you sooner thanlook at you."
"Who, me?" Bish staggered into a table and caught hold of it. "Who'dwanna hurt me? I'm just good ol' Bish Ware. _Good_ ol' Bish! nobodyhurt him; he'sh everybody's friend." He let go of the table andstaggered into a chair, upsetting it. Then he began to sing:
"_Come all ye hardy spacemen, and harken while I tell Of fluorine-tainted Nifflheim, the Planetary Hell._"
Involuntarily, I began clapping my hands. It was a superb piece ofacting--Bish Ware sober playing Bish Ware drunk, and that's not aneasy role for anybody to play. Then he picked up the chair and satdown on it.
"Who do you have around Hunters' Hall, and how do I get past them?"he asked. "I don't want a clipful from somebody on my own side."
Nip Spazoni got a pencil and a pad of paper and began drawing a plan.
"This is Second Level Down," he said. "We have a car here, with acouple of men in it. It's watching this approach here. And we have aship's boat, over here, with three men in it, and a 7-mm machine gun.And another car--no, a jeep, here. Now, up on the First Level Down, wehave two ships' boats, one here, and one here. The password is'Exotic,' and the countersign is 'Organics.'" He grinned at Murell."Compliment to your company."
"Good enough. I'll want a bottle of liquor. My breath needs a littletouching up, and I may want to offer somebody a drink. If I could getinside that place, there's no telling what I might be able to do. Ifone man can get in and put a couple of guards to sleep, an army canget in after him."
Brother, I thought, if he pulls this one off, he's in. Nobody aroundPort Sandor will ever look down on Bish Ware again, not even JoeKivelson. I began thinking about the detective agency idea again, andwondered if he'd want a junior partner. Ware & Boyd, PlanetwideDetective Agency.
I went down to the floor below with him and got him my lightergas-projector and a couple of spare fills for it, and found the bottleof Baldur honey-rum that Dad had been sure was around somewhere. I waskind of doubtful about that, and he noticed my hesitation in giving itto him and laughed.
"Don't worry, Walt," he said. "This is strictly for protectivecoloration--and odoration. I shall be quite sparing with it, I assureyou."
I shook hands with him, trying not to be too solemn about it, and hewent down in the elevator and I went up the stairs to the floor above.By this time, the Port Sandor Vigilance Committee had gotten itselfsorted out. The rank-and-file Vigilantes were standing around yackingat one another, and a smaller group--Dad and Sigurd Ngozori and theReverend Su
gitsuma and Oscar and Joe and Corkscrew and Nip and theMahatma--were in a huddle around Dad's editorial table, discussingstrategy and tactics.
"Well, we'd better get back to the docks before it starts," Corkscrewwas saying. "No hunter crew will follow anybody but their own ships'officers."
"We'll have to have somebody the uptown people will follow," Oscarsaid. "These people won't take orders from a woolly-pants huntercaptain. How about you, Sigurd?"
The banker shook his head. "Ralph Boyd's the man for that," he said.
"Ralph's needed right here; this is G.H.Q.," Oscar said. "This is ajob that's going to have to be run from one central command. We've gotto make sure the demonstration against Hallstock and the operationagainst Hunters' Hall are synchronized."
"I have about a hundred and fifty workmen, and they all have or canget something to shoot with," another man said. I looked around, andsaw that it was Casmir Oughourlian, of Rodriguez & OughourlianShipyards. "They'll follow me, but I'm not too well known uptown."
"Hey, Professor Hartzenbosch," Mohandas Feinberg said. "You're arespectable-looking duck; you ever have any experience leading alynch mob?"
Everybody laughed. So, to his credit, did the professor.
"I've had a lot of experience with children," the professor said."Children are all savages. So are lynch mobs. Things that are equal tothe same thing are equal to one another. Yes, I'd say so."
"All right," Dad said. "Say I'm Chief of Staff, or something. Oscar,you and Joe and Corkscrew and the rest of you decide who's going totake over-all command of the hunters. Casmir, you'll command yourworkmen, and anybody else from the shipyards and engine works andrepair shops and so on. Sigurd, you and the Reverend, here, andProfessor Hartzenbosch gather up all the uptown people you can. Now,we'll have to decide on how much force we need to scare MortHallstock, and how we're going to place the main force that willattack Hunters' Hall."
"I think we ought to wait till we see what Bish Ware can do," Oscarsaid. "Get our gangs together, and find out where we're going to putwho, but hold off the attack for a while. If he can get insideHunters' Hall, we may not even need this demonstration at theMunicipal Building."
Joe Kivelson started to say something. The rest of his fellow shipcaptains looked at him severely, and he shut up. Dad kept on jottingdown figures of men and 50-mm guns and vehicles and auto weapons wehad available.
He was still doing it when the fire alarm started.