The moaner went on for thirty seconds, like a banshee mourning its
nearest and dearest. It was everywhere, Main City Level and the four
levels below. What we have in Port Sandor is a volunteer fire
organization--or disorganization, rather--of six independent
companies, each of which cherishes enmity for all the rest. It's the
best we can do, though; if we depended on the city government, we'd
have no fire protection at all. They do have a central alarm system,
though, and the _Times_ is connected with that.
Then the moaner stopped, and there were four deep whistle blasts for
Fourth Ward, and four more shrill ones for Bottom Level. There was an
instant's silence, and then a bedlam of shouts from the hunter-boat
captains. That was where the tallow-wax that was being held out from
the Co-operative was stored.
"Shut up!" Dad roared, the loudest I'd ever heard him speak. "Shut up
and listen!"
"Fourth Ward, Bottom Level," a voice from the fire-alarm speaker said.
"This is a tallow-wax fire. It is not the Co-op wax; it is wax stored
in an otherwise disused area. It is dangerously close to stored 50-mm
cannon ammunition, and it is directly under the pulpwood lumber plant,
on the Third Level Down, and if the fire spreads up to that, it will
endanger some of the growing vats at the carniculture plant on the
Second Level Down. I repeat, this is a tallow-wax fire. Do not use
water or chemical extinguishers."
About half of the Vigilantes, businessmen who belonged to one or
another of the volunteer companies had bugged out for their fire
stations already. The Buddhist priest and a couple of doctors were
also leaving. The rest, mostly hunter-ship men, were standing around
looking at one another.
Oscar Fujisawa gave a sour laugh. "That diversion idea of mine was all
right," he said. "The only trouble was that Steve Ravick thought of it
first."
"You think he started the fire?" Dad began, and then gave a sourer
laugh than Oscar's. "Am I dumb enough to ask that?"
I had started assembling equipment as soon as the feint on the
Municipal Building and the attack on Hunters' Hall had gotten into the
discussion stage. I would use a jeep that had a heavy-duty audiovisual
recording and transmitting outfit on it, and for situations where I'd
have to leave the jeep and go on foot, I had a lighter outfit like the
one Oscar had brought with him in the Pequod's boat. Then I had my
radio for two-way conversation with the office. And, because this
wasn't likely to be the sort of war in which the rights of
noncombatants like war correspondents would be taken very seriously,
I had gotten out my Sterberg 7.7-mm.
Dad saw me buckling it on, and seemed rather distressed.
"Better leave that, Walt," he said. "You don't want to get into any
shooting."
Logical, I thought. If you aren't prepared for something, it just
won't happen. There's an awful lot of that sort of thinking going on.
As I remember my Old Terran history, it was even indulged in by
governments, at one time. None of them exists now.
"You know what all crawls into the Bottom Level," I reminded him. "If
you don't, ask Mr. Murell, here. One sent him to the hospital."
Dad nodded; I had a point there. The abandoned sections of Bottom
Level are full of tread-snails and other assorted little nasties, and
the heat of the fire would stir them all up and start them moving
around. Even aside from the possibility that, having started the fire,
Steve Ravick's gang would try to take steps to keep it from being put
out too soon, a gun was going to be a comforting companion, down
there.
"Well, stay out of any fighting. Your job's to get the news, not play
hero in gun fights. I'm no hero; that's why I'm sixty years old. I
never knew many heroes that got that old."
It was my turn to nod. On that, Dad had a point. I said something
about getting the news, not making it, and checked the chamber and
magazine of the Sterberg, and then slung my radio and picked up the
audiovisual outfit.
Tom and Joe Kivelson had left already, to round up the scattered
Javelin crew for fire fighting. The attack on the Municipal Building
and on Hunters' Hall had been postponed, but it wasn't going to be
abandoned. Oscar and Professor Hartzenbosch and Dad and a couple of
others were planning some sort of an observation force of a few men
for each place, until the fire had been gotten out or under control.
Glenn Murell decided he'd go out with me, at least as far as the fire,
so we went down to the vehicle port and got the jeep out. Main City
Level Broadway was almost deserted; everybody had gone down below
where the excitement was. We started down the nearest vehicle shaft
and immediately got into a jam, above a lot of stuff that was going
into the shaft from the First Level Down, mostly manipulators and that
sort of thing. There were no police around, natch, and a lot of
volunteers were trying to direct traffic and getting in each other's
way. I got some views with the jeep camera, just to remind any of the
public who needed reminding what our city administration wasn't doing
in an emergency. A couple of pieces of apparatus, a chemical tank and
a pumper marked SALAMANDER VOLUNTEER FIRE COMPANY NO. 3 came along,
veered out of the jam, and continued uptown.
"If they know another way down, maybe we'd better follow them," Murell
suggested.
"They're not going down. They're going to the lumber plant, in case
the fire spreads upward," I said. "They wouldn't be taking that sort
of equipment to a wax fire."
"Why not?"