Bruce? I heard you tossing around."

"I'm fine," he told her mechanically. "Just making plans for tomorrow."

He watched her turn back slowly, then lay quietly, trying not to disturb
her again. Tomorrow, he thought. Tomorrow he'd find some kind of an
answer; and it wouldn't be Randolph's charity.

Chapter XV

MURDOCH'S MANTLE

There were three men, each with a white circle painted on chest and left
arm, talking to Mother Corey when Bruce Gordon came down the rickety
steps. He stopped for a second, but there was no sign of trouble. Then
the words of the thin man below reached him.

"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. There was hunger and
strain on his face, but an odd authority and pride now. "I'll be
doggoned. Whyn't you say he was with Murdoch?"

"They want someone to locate Ed Praeger and see about getting some food
shipped in from outside, cobber," Mother Corey told him. "They got some
money scraped together, but the hicks are doing no business with
Marsport. You know Ed--just tell him I sent you. I'd go myself, but I'm
getting too old to go chasing men out there."

"What's in it?" Gordon asked, reaching for his helmet.

There was a surprised exchange of glances from the others, but Mother
Corey chuckled. "Heart like a steel trap, cobber," he said, almost
approvingly. "Well, you'll be earning your keep here--yours and that
granddaughter's, too. Here--you'll need directions for finding Praeger."

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. "All right," Gordon said, "what
goes on?"

The other began explaining as he picked a way through the ruin and
rubble. Murdoch had done better than Gordon had suspected; he'd laid out
a program for a citizens' vigilante committee, and had drilled enough in
the ruthless use of the club to keep the gangs down. Once the police
were