Chapter 4: Captain Murdoch

The new assignment was to the roughest section in all Marsport--the slum area beyond the dome, out near the rocket field. Here all the riffraff that had been unable to establish itself in better quarters had found some sort of a haven. At one time, there had been a small dome and a tiny city devoted to the rocket field. But Marsport had flourished enough to kill it off. The dome had failed from neglect, and the buildings inside had grown shabbier.

Bruce Gordon was trapped; he couldn’t break his job with the police--if he did, he’d be brought back as a criminal. Some of Mars’ laws dated from the time when law enforcement had been hampered by lack of men, rather than by the type of men.

The Stonewall gang numbered perhaps five hundred. They hired out members to other gangs, during the frequent wars. Between times, they picked up what they could by mugging and theft, with a reasonable amount of murder thrown in at a modest price.

Even derelicts and failures had to eat; there were stores and shops throughout the district which eked out some kind of a marginal living. They were safe from protection racketeers there--none bothered to come so far out. And police had been taken off the beats there after it grew unsafe even for men in pairs to patrol the area.

The shopkeepers, and some of the less unfortunate people there, had protested loud enough to reach clear back to Earth. Marsport had hired a man from Earth to come in and act as chief of the section. Captain Murdoch was an unknown factor, and now was asking for more men. The pressure was enough to get them for him.

Gordon reported for work with a sense of the bottom falling out, mixed with a vague relief.

“You’re going to be busy,” Murdoch announced shortly in the dilapidated building that had been hastily converted to a precinct house. “Damn it, you’re men, not sharks. I’ve got a free hand, and we’re going to run this the way we would on Earth. Your job is to protect the citizens here--and that means everyone not breaking the laws--whether you feel like it or not. No graft. The first man making a shakedown will get the same treatment we’re going to use on the Stonewall boys. You’ll get double pay here, and you can live on it!”

He opened up a box on his desk and pulled out six heavy wooden sticks, each thirty inches long and nearly two inches in diameter. There was a shaped grip on each, with a thong of leather to hold it over the wrist.

He picked out five of the men, including Gordon “You five will come with me. I’m going to show how we operate. The rest of you can team up any way you want tonight, pick any route that’s open. Okay, men, let’s go.”

Bruce Gordon grinned slowly as he swung the stick, and Murdoch’s eyes fell on him. “Earth cop!”

“Two years,” Gordon admitted.

“Then you should be ashamed to be in this mess. But whatever your reasons, you’ll be useful. Take those two and give them some lessons, while I do the same with these.”

For a second, Gordon cursed himself. Murdoch had fixed it so he’d be a squad leader, and that meant he’d be unable to step out of line. At double standard pay, with normal Mars expenses, he might be able to pay for passage back to Earth in three years--if Security let him. Otherwise, it would take thirty.

He began wondering about Security, then. Nobody had tried to get in touch with him. Were they waiting for him to get up on a soapbox?

There was a crude lighting system here, put up by the citizens. At the front of each building, a dim phosphor bulb glowed; when darkness fell, they would have nothing else to see by.

Murdoch bunched them together. “A good clubbing beats hanging,” he told them. “But it has to be good. Go in for business, and don’t stop just because the other guy quits. Give them hell!”

Moving in two groups of threes, at opposite sides of the street, they began their beat. They were covering an area of six blocks one way, and two the other.

They had traveled the six blocks and were turning down a side street when they found their first case; it was still daylight. Two of the Stonewall boys were working over a tall man in a newer airsuit. As the police swung around, one of the thugs casually ripped the airsuit open.

A thin screech like a whistle came from Murdoch’s Marspeaker, and the captain went forward, with Gordon at his heels. The hoodlums tossed the man aside easily, and let out a yell. From the buildings around, an assortment of toughs came at the double, swinging knives, picks, and bludgeons.

There was no chance to save the citizen, who was dying from lack of air. Gordon felt the solid pleasure of the finely turned club in his hands. It was light enough for speed, but heavy enough to break bones where it hit. A skilled man could knock a knife, or even a heavy club, out of another’s hand with a single flick of the wrist. And he’d had practice.

He saw Murdoch’s club dart in and take out two of the gang, one on the forward swing, one on the recover. Gordon’s eyes popped at that. The man was totally unlike a Martian captain, and a knot of homesickness for Earth ran through his stomach.

He swallowed the sentiment; his own club was moving now. Standing beside Murdoch, they were moving forward. The other four cops had come in reluctantly.

“Knock them out and kick them down!” Murdoch yelled. “And don’t let them get away!”

Gordon was after a thug who was attempting to run away. He brought him to the ground with a single blow across the kidneys.

It was soon over. They rounded up the men of the gang, and one of the cops started off. Murdoch called, “Where are you going?”

“To find a phone and call the wagon.”

“We’re not using wagons,” Murdoch told him. “Line them up.”

When the hoods came to, they found themselves helpless, and facing police with clubs. If they tried to run, they were hit from behind; if they stood still, they were clubbed carefully. If they fought back, the pugnaciousness was knocked out of them at once.

Murdoch indicated one who stood with his shoulders shaking and tears running down his cheeks. The captain’s face was as sick as Gordon felt. “Take him aside. Names.”