all the
plantations and in all the towns along the river. The reserve had only
been turned out twice; both times, outlaw attacks had been stopped
dead--literally. The Home Guard, it appeared, was not given to making
arrests or taking prisoners. Finally, he parted from them, strolling
on along the row of stores and business places, many vacant, under the
south edge of the Mall, until he saw a fluorolite sign, WADE
LUCAS, M. D. He entered.

Lucas wasn't busy. They went into his consultation office, and Conn
took off his gun-belt and hung it up; Lucas offered cigarettes, and
they lighted and sat down.

"I see you've started carrying one," he said, nodding to the pistol
Conn had laid aside.

"Civic obligation. I'm going to be too busy for Home Guard duty, but
if I can protect myself, it'll save somebody else the job of
protecting me."

"Maybe if there weren't so many guns around, there wouldn't be so much
trouble."

He felt his good opinion of Wade Lucas start to slip. The Liberals on
Terra had been full of that kind of talk, which was why only four out
of ten of last year's graduating class at Armed Forces Academy had
been able to get active commissions. The last war had been a disaster,
so don't prepare for another one; when it comes, let it be a worse
disaster.

"Guns don't make trouble; people make trouble. If the troublemakers
are armed, you have to be armed too. When did you last see an Air
Patrol boat around here, or even a Constabulary trooper? All we have
here is the Home Guard and Tom Brangwyn and three deputies, and his
pay and theirs is always six months in arrears."

Lucas nodded. "A bankrupt government, an unemployment rate that rises
every year, currency that buys less every month. And do-it-yourself
justice." The doctor blew a smoke ring and watched it float toward the
ventilator-intake. "You said you're going to be busy. This company
your father's talking about organizing?"

"That's right. You're going to be at the meeting at the Academy this
afternoon, aren't you?"

"Yes. Just what are you going to do, after you get it organized?"

"Well, I brought back information on a great deal of undiscovered
equipment and stores that the Third Force left behind...." He talked
on for some time, keeping to safe generalities. "It's too big for my
father and me to handle alone, even if we didn't feel morally
obligated to take in the people who contributed toward sending me to
school on Terra. You ought to