Moran ordered his driver to stop half a block away. He watched while Cherry and Linton got out and went into her building. But their cab waited and in a few seconds Linton appeared again and drove away.
Moran let out a relieved sigh. He paid off his cab and walked slowly along the darkened street until he came abreast of Cherry’s entrance. For a second he hesitated, wetting his lower lip uncertainly. It was stupid for him to barge in on Cherry now. It would look as if he were afraid, guilty.
But he felt he had to know what Linton had wanted. That was the only way he could release the tight, aching feeling in his stomach. He made up his mind and turned into her entrance.
She opened the door in answer to his knock, her eyes widening with surprise. “Well, it’s a small world,” she said. “I just left one of your buddies.”
“I know,” Moran said, and stepped inside. She had changed into a green robe and as she turned he saw the flash of her legs, slim, smooth and bare. But they didn’t distract him now.
“What did he want?” he said watching her closely.
“The copper?” She shrugged and went to a table for a cigarette. “What does any copper want? Information.”
He walked to her side and suddenly all the twisted feeling he had for her crystalized to hatred. She was so cool, so bored and indifferent, while he was ready to crack in pieces from the pressure inside him.
Raising his thick hand he struck the cigarette from her mouth with brutal force. She staggered, face whitening with shock and anger. But he caught her shoulders and jerked her close to him.
“Now,” he said, in a low hard voice. “You talk, baby. What did that guy want?”
“You’re hurting me,” she said, breathing angrily. “He wanted to know about you. Now let me go.”
“What did you tell him?” he asked hoarsely.
She turned from him and sat down on the couch. “I didn’t tell him anything,” she said, rubbing her bruised shoulders. “Now you can get the hell out of here. No guy pushes me around, Moran.”
“Forget that,” Moran said. “I didn’t mean to get rough. But I’m in a jam, baby. I had to shoot a guy last night and the old women in the commissioner’s office are on my tail. They’re trying to frame me, and that’s why that guy Linton was snooping around you.”
Cherry’s lean face was interested. She said, “Did you kill the guy, Moran?”
“I shot him. He went for me and I shot him, that’s all.”
“Oh,” she said. She smiled. “You wouldn’t do anything original, I guess. Nothing that might put an extra buck in your pocket.”
“I get along on my pay,” Moran said.
“And your friends have to, too,” she said. “That’s why you haven’t got any, I suppose.”
“I didn’t get anything out of shooting the guy,” Moran said. That was smart. Not talking, not bragging. Guys talked to dames, then the dames talked. That wasn’t for Moran.
Cherry grinned ruefully and leaned back against the fat pillows on the couch. There was one light in the room, a lamp on an end table that caught lights in her loose blonde hair and accentuated the soft curves of her body. Yawning, she put her legs onto the couch. The green robe parted revealing her slim calves in the soft light. She didn’t seem to notice.
She was smiling, but there was a hard light in her eyes. “Tell me, Moran,” she said, “how does it feel to kill a man?”
Moran swallowed heavily. He couldn’t wrench his eyes from her long bare legs, or stop the sudden drumming in his temples.
When he spoke, his voice was dry. “It’s like anything else you do, like smoking a cigarette or buying a paper, that’s all.”
She sighed. “You’re such a clod, Moran. You’re like a big heap of dough that’s turning sour.”
He came closer to her. “I could be different with you,” he said. “You drive me crazy, baby.”
She laughed with real amusement. “In the Casanova role you’re a riot.”
“Damn you,” he said hoarsely.
She laughed again and sat up, putting her feet on the floor. “Let’s break this up,” she said. “You’re a jerk and always will be, Moran. I might have liked you a little if you were smart, or if you had a spare buck to spend on a girl, but as you stand you’re hopeless. So beat it, will you? And stop hanging around the club.”
“Now wait,” Moran said. His anger broke, melted away. “You don’t mean that. I’ll go, but let me see you again.”
Her voice was hard. “No. You’re all through. Beat it.”
Moran stood beside her, reached for her hand. “What would you think if I was smart, if I did have a little dough?”
“I don’t want to play twenty questions,” she said coldly.
“This is no gag,” he said. When he saw interest in her face, he slid on the couch beside her and began speaking rapidly, the words spilling out in a rush. “I got a little dough,” he said. “I got it from Dinny Nelson last night. He was the guy I shot. I blew him out like a candle, then took his bundle. It’s all yours, baby, for anything you want. But we got to play it quiet until I get a clean bill from the commissioner’s office. You see that, don’t you?”
“Are you on the stuff?” she said. “Is this story coming out of a pipe?”
“No, no it’s on the level,” he said. “I did it for you, baby. I shot hell out of him and got the dough. And I’m in the clear.”
“Let’s see the dough,” she said skeptically.
He took the roll from his pocket. He had kept it on him because there was no safer place. Now he spread it in her lap and watched her face. She fingered the money gently and gradually a little smile pulled at her lips. “I might change my ideas about you,” she said at last.
“Sure you will,” Moran said eagerly. “I’m okay, baby. You’ll see.”
“I kind of want to find out,” she said, grinning at him. “Want to excuse baby a minute?”
He watched her as she walked to the bedroom door. Something tightened in him as he saw the way her shoulders tapered gracefully to her slender waist, and the way her hips moved under the silken robe. She turned at the doorway and winked at him, and he saw the gleam of her long legs before she disappeared.
It was worth it, Moran thought exultantly. He felt happy for the first time since the murder. This was going to make it all right, and the tight ache inside him melted away and he knew it was gone for good.
He lit a cigarette and leaned back against the cushions, closing his eyes. Linton could go to hell, and so could Pickerton. They had nothing on him, now or ever.
He opened his eyes when he heard the click of the doorknob. Straightening up, he crushed out a cigarette and got to his feet, a grin on his face. The bedroom swung open and Moran’s heart lurched sickeningly. Lieutenant Pickerton walked into the room, a gun in his hand. The gun was pointed at Moran’s stomach.
“You’re all through,” he said.
Moran stood still, the grin pasted on his face, his mind frozen in the paralysis of panic. He tried to speak but no words came out, and the noise he made was like the grunt of an animal.
There was the sound of a key in the front door and then Linton came in, gun in hand.
He glanced at Pickerton. “You get it all?”
“The works,” Pickerton nodded.
Linton came to Moran’s side, deftly slipped the gun from his shoulder holster. “You’re under arrest for the murder of Dinny Nelson,” he said formally. “Anything you say may be used against you. As you know,” he added dryly.
“Yeah, I know,” Moran said numbly. Linton’s words, the old familiar words, released him from paralysis.
Cherry appeared in the bedroom doorway, stepped around Pickerton and entered the room. She picked up a cigarette and smiled. Her fingers moved to the mark on her cheek where he had struck her.
Then she looked at Moran. “They wanted me to get you to talk,” she said. “I wasn’t going to, because I’m no informer. I might have warned you that Pickerton was hiding in the bed
room, but after you hit me, I had to pay you back.”
“That was just one of the stupid things you did,” Pickerton said. He shook his head disgustedly. “What made you think you were smart enough to get away with murder? Your speed is the little stuff, Moran.”
Moran wet his lips. “What did I do wrong?” he asked. He didn’t know what was happening to him but he felt weak and drained.
Pickerton glanced at Linton. “You tell him,” he said.
“We had nothing on you,” Linton said, “except your bad record, and the fact that Dinny’s money had been taken. But you acted from the start in a suspicious manner. During our first talk you were nervous, sweating. Later you came to the Diamond Club, but when you saw me with Cherry, you turned and got out. We saw you, of course.
“Pickerton came here to Cherry’s apartment because we knew you’d come here. A smart man wouldn’t have. I took Cherry home, drove off. You immediately barged into the building and I came back and followed you up here.”
He glanced at Cherry, then back at Moran. “You were too nervous to be subtle with her, or to go easy. You pushed her around and that did what we hadn’t been able to do, convinced her to help us. She played you like a sucker. You spilled everything to her, which is the thing only a fool would have done. Fortunately for us, Moran, you’re a fool.” His face became curious. “A cop should have known better. Didn’t you stop to think at all?”
“I was thinking about the murder,” Moran said slowly. “It was on my mind. That left no room for any thinking about the smart thing to do.”
Pickerton took his arm and started him toward the door.
Linton walked over and shook hands with Cherry. “Thanks for the help,” he said. He hesitated, then smiled. “I’d like to see you some time when I’m off duty.”
Cherry pulled the robe tight around her slim waist. “Any old time—just any old time.”
Linton grinned. “I’ll call you.”
He took Moran’s other arm and the three men went out the door. Moran walked like a dead man.
THE GALAXY RAIDERS
First published in the February 1950 issue of Amazing Stories.
Before the Earth could hone to be saved, the man who defended her must learn humility . . .
CHAPTER I
THE WIDE arched corridor and the imposing doors at its end were familiar to him; and he knew the feeling that came when the four-man guard military guard snapped to attention at their approach.
His right hand moved instinctively to return the salute, and then stopped short.
The rigid respect of the guards was not for him, John Storm knew.
Hardly. It was the vice admiral at his side, who returned the salute casually and put a friendly hand on Storm’s arm as the doors swung open.
“Go right in, John. They’re expecting you, of course,” he said. “It was damn nice of you to come after—Well, bygones are bygones, I always say and a good thing too,” he finished hastily.
“Oh, sure,” John Storm said, and there only the barest sarcasm in his flat hard voice.
They walked together into a large bright room, unadorned except for floor-to-ceiling maps that covered the walls and the green and white standards of Earth Federation hanging above the conference table at the far end of the room.
Seated at the table were eight officers of the Federation, representing top authority in each world zone—men whose most casual word was considered important, and whose commands could send millions of men and thousands of fighting units into action.
They stood as Storm approached and the Controller, a slender graying man who wore the yellow epaulets of a First Marshal, came forward and extended his hand with a smile.
“It’s good to see you again, John,” he said. “It’s been eight—no—nine years, hasn’t it?’*
“Eleven,” John Storm said, and a smile flickered on his strong dark face.
“Of course. Well, you know everyone, I think.”
Storm glanced at the men behind the table and nodded*. He knew them all. Stoddard, Logistics; Malcom, Communications; Baley, Supply; Millholland, Electronics; Crestweather, Space Arm—that was good. Space Arm!
They all sat down, then and the Controller, glanced at a paper before him, and then at Storm with a slight smile.
“You know why we asked you to come here, I suppose?”
“Yes,” Storm said. He crossed his legs and settled back comfortably” in his chair. There was a controlled and deliberate sense of power in every move he made. Too thick and massive through the shoulders to be considered well built, and too dark and bitter to be considered handsome, he was nevertheless a man to be looked at twice. His eyes were a quiet gray, and his hair was black as jet and straight.
“Yes,” he said again. “I know why you want me. The threat from space is more acute than it was eleven years ago—when I was cashiered from the service for being a wide-eyed radical who wanted the Federation to build up its Space Arm.”
The Controller spread his hands in a helpless gesture. “Mistakes were made then, John,” he said. “We didn’t see what was coming. Men like Commander Griffith and yourself—you were the casualties of our blindness.”
The name of Commander Griffith brought a frown to Storm’s face, and as the Controller talked soothingly and placatingly, a flood of bitter memories swept over him.
COMMANDER GRIFFITH had made the first long Space flight of history in the late Seventies. To Jupiter. Storm had been in his crew. It was not a military flight; there were no funds for that. Griffith, a dedicated, fearless and brilliant scientist paid for the trip from his own pocket. Accompanying him were his wife Grace and his daughter Karen. They had stayed on Jupiter for three months, and then had received a trans-space message from Earth ordering them to return. There had been a vicious public reaction to the trip from influential ignoramuses who said the mysteries of space were not for man to unravel, and now these fools had forced the Federation to order Griffith’s ship the Astra Star, to return at once to Earth.
Griffith had refused and the Federation sent its entire fleet of; four ships to Jupiter to enforce the order. They; had arrested the crew, but
Griffith, his wife and daughter and a man named Thatcher had escaped into the wilds of mountainous volcanic ash that dotted the planet, and were deserted, left behind when the Federation crafts returned to Earth.
This was regarded as poetic justice by those who had fought the trip in the first place. But Storm had begun then to wage a campaign for the rescue of Commander Griffith and for an immediate development of the Federation’s air arm. For even then Galaxy X was causing concern among the enlightened members of the command.
But John Storm was not tactful or diplomatic, or politic. He raged at his superiors, he conducted experiments of his own without official sanction and he talked—to newspapermen radio reporters, to every agent of communication he could get to listen. The result was that he became a thorn in the sides of the top brass of the Federation, a stern logician, who went directly to the people instead of clearing things with his superiors and so he was arrested, court-martialed, and thrown out of the service . . .
“. . . AND SO,” the Controller said, “that’s what we are hoping you’ll do for us. Take a ship to Jupiter, not to look for Commander Griffith, since that I fear would be futile, but to establish an outer defense post there in case our worst fears of Galaxy X are realized.”
“How many ships?” Storm asked.
The Controller looked embarrassed. “One,” he said.
Storm stood up and dropped his cigarette on the floor, then ground it out with his heel. “You’re still fools,” he said bitterly. “You want me to establish an outpost to give you warning against any raiders from Galaxy
X—and be in the first line of defense against them. Yet you talk of one ship!”
“Appropriations,* the Controller said, with a helpless shrug. “We’re not politicians, Storm. We have to trim our sails to their commands.*
Storm lo
oked over their heads to the bright green-and-white standards of the Federation and his thoughts went slowly back across the years of his bitter fight for a Space Arm and he knew that now, as then, he’d have to take any chance that was offered* But one ship I He rubbed his forehead and grinned bitterly. “All right,” he said. “What rank do I take?”
“Commander. We couldn’t do any better.”
“Okay,” Storm said impatiently. “Send me my orders as fast as you can.”
He turned and without another word strode from the silent chamber.
THE ship was a shining tube of deadly beauty, four hundred yards long and towering a hundred yards in the air. From the tapering nose with its multiple banks of visi-screens, to the flaring fins and blast nacelles, the giant space craft was a tribute to the men whose dream had made it live.
Storm stood at the foot of the ramp leading to the amidships entrance and let his eyes travel over his ship. His ship! Far above him he saw the name gleaming blackly on the soaring curve of the prow—Astro Star II.
He drew a deep breath and walked up the incline to the ship, returned the salute of the cadet on duty and went forward to his combination office and sleeping quarters.
Inside, Storm closed the door and sat down at his desk. He lit a cigar and began the laborious process of reading through the reports prepared for him on each man in his crew. He studied their firing records, their communication reports, their physical conditions and even glanced at their clothing allowance and innoculation charts.
Finishing, he pushed the neat stack of papers aside and slumped deeper into his chair. He smoked thoughtfully for several minutes, enjoying the heavy fragrance of tobacco and savoring the thought that the routine details of flight preparation were over and done with.
They were ready to go now. Six weeks had been spent in training. The men were as ready as they’d ever be. There were good men aboard, good officers too. But it would take the gruelling job ahead to test them. How they’d stand up was anybody’s guess.
Collected Fiction (1940-1963) Page 250
