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So he's helping Schulberg make agreements with the sections the volunteers don't handle. Place is lousy with people now. Heard about Mayor Wayne?" Gordon shook his head, not caring, but the man went on. "He must have had his supply of drugs lifted somehow. He holed up one day, until it really hit him that he couldn't get any more.
"So we figured when we found the stiffs maybe you'd come back, Mother. Damn good thing we were right. We can sure use that ammunition you found. Now, where's this Gordon fellow?" "Here!" Gordon told the man. He'd recognized him finally as Schulberg, the little grocer from the Nineteenth Precinct. The man swung suspiciously, then grinned weakly.
Sheila frowned, staring at him, and began sliding from her side, reaching for her robe. She followed him down the creaking stairs, and to the room where Schulberg, Mother Corey, and a few others were still arguing some detail. They looked up, and he moved forward, dragging a badge from his pouch. He slapped it down on the table in front of them. "I'm declaring myself in!" he told them coldly.
They passed a crowd around a crude gallows, and Schulberg stopped. A man was already dead and dangling. "Should turn 'em over to us cops," Schulberg said. "What's he hanged for?" "Hoarding," a voice answered, and others supplied the few details. The dead man had been caught with a half bag of flour and part of a case of beans.
Then he went on until they came to a spur of the little electric monorail system, with three abandoned service engines parked at the end. "Extra air inside, and the best we could do for food. Was gonna try myself, but I don't know Praeger," Schulberg said. He handed over a key, and nodded toward the first service engine. "Good luck, Gordon and damn it, we're we gotta eat, don't we?
To Gordon's surprise, the publicity Randolph wrote about his being a Security Prime seemed to bring the other sections of Outer Marsport under the volunteer police control even faster. But he was too busy to worry about it. He left general co-ordination in the hands of Mother Corey, while Izzy and Schulberg ran the expanding of the police force.
The dome had exploded outwards, with only bits of it falling back; and the buildings had come through the outward explosion of the pressure with little damage. Gordon grinned wryly. Schulberg's volunteers were official, now. Izzy was acting as chief of police, Schulberg was head of the reconstruction corps, and Mother Corey was temporary Mayor of all Marsport.
Schulberg shrugged. "After your deal with Praeger, we'd probably follow you anyhow. I don't cotton to Security, Gordon but those devils in there are making our kids starve!" Mother Corey heaved his bulk up slowly, wheezing, and indicated his chair at the head of the table. But Gordon shook his head. He'd made his decision.
He handed the paper with his scrawled notes on it over to Gordon and went shuffling back. Gordon stuck it into his pouch, and followed the three. Outside, they had a truck waiting; Rusty and Corey's two henchmen were busy loading it with ammunition from the cellar. Schulberg motioned him into the cab of the truck, and the other two climbed into the closed rear section.
Schulberg found a scrap of something and penciled the crime on it, together with a circle signature, and pinned it to the body. "All food should be turned in," he explained to Gordon as they climbed back into the truck. "We figure community kitchens can stretch things a bit more. And we give a half extra ration to the guys who can find anything useful to do.
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