The bullet whizzed past like a heat-maddened insect. Steve leapt back,
and I flattened myself.
The attack was no great surprise. When people take up a new way of
life, when they pull up stakes and go striding into the sunrise, strife
paces after like a ravenous hound, red tongue lolling. When the first
colonists from Earth swarmed into the crumbling Martian cities a good
third of them ended up in stony desolation with their hearts drilled
through.
They danced to riotous tunes, calling for louder music and stronger
wine, and they fought savagely to set up little kingdoms of tyranny
eighty feet square.
Everywhere anarchy reigned, and haggard-eyed, desperate men crouched
behind smoke-blackened ruins and held off other men as greedy as
themselves. They fought and died by dozens, by hundreds, their minds
inflamed by the quickly-made discovery that the Martian cities were
vast treasure troves.
You had to go prospecting, you had to search, and when you found your
own shining treasure you didn't want to share it with any man alive.
Steve had his gun trained on the wall ahead when he ducked down at my
side.
"Yes, sir," I whispered, half to myself. "This is going to be rough!"
"They asked for it!" Steve said.
His gun roared twice.
From the wall ahead came a burst of gunfire in reply.
"If they think they're going to get this mirror away from me--"
I looked at his grim, sweat-beaded face. "I'll help you fight for it,"
I said.
"So nice of you," he grunted.
"Then maybe you'll have sense enough to bury it face down in the sand."
* * * * *
Guns went off thirty feet directly in front of us. Red sand geysered
up, granite cracked and splintered. You could feel the awful heat of
the blazing exchange of bullets.
I could see faces between the chinks. Malignant faces moving from
peep-hole to peep-hole like scavenger birds hopping about in the desert.
I was aiming at one of the peep-holes when Steve groaned and sagged
against me. His gun arm sagged, and I could see that a bullet had
pierced his shoulder high up.
"I'm sorry, Tom," he whispered, hoarsely. "I was careless, damn it!"
"Never mind, Steve," I said.
"Now they'll close in and get you. Better take my gun. You can use two
guns."
"I won't need two guns, Steve," I said. "I'm walking into the open with
my hands raised."
"You're crazy!" he breathed, his eyes on my face. "We're outnumbered
five to one. They'll drop you the instant you step out from behind this
wall."
My gun was hot and smoking. I smiled and tossed it to the sand.
"I'll be back in a minute and fix up that shoulder," I said.
"You'll be walking to your death," he said. "They've been trailing us
for days, hoping we'd stumble on something. They must have seen me pick
up that mirror."
"They trailed us because they thought we looked experienced, rugged,"
I said. "They thought we were following a map. They just haven't got
what it takes to go prospecting for themselves. They're hyenas of the
desert, Steve."
"All right--hyenas. That means they won't respect a white flag. If you
walk out with your hands raised they'll burn you down before you've
taken five steps."
I steadied my helmet and unloosed my collar so that I wouldn't feel
cramped.
"Don't worry, Steve," I said.