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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 79265 ***
+
+
+
+
+                              Public Enemy
+
+                       by Kendell Foster Crossen
+
+
+
+
+  At long last, Public Police Officer Brad Raynor was going to see some
+  action--perhaps he’d have some of the excitement that policemen in
+  the past experienced every day!
+
+
+
+
+Brad Raynor cruised in the one thousand level above Nyork and tried to
+suppress his boredom. Because of his training he was aware that dull
+routine was preferable, but emotionally he yearned for a little action.
+
+This was Public Police Officer Brad Raynor’s fifth day in uniform.
+It had taken him seven years to achieve that uniform; four years
+at Harvard and three years at the University of Public Protection.
+His three degrees--one in psychology, one in sociology, one in
+criminalistics--were announced to the world by the neat blue uniform
+and the badge, Number 42,151, he wore.
+
+“Car three thirty-seven,” said the voice over the audio-speaker. Brad
+Raynor tensed at the first sound of the voice, then relaxed as he heard
+the number. “Proceed to street level at two eighty-four West Seventieth
+Street. Signal eighty-three.”
+
+Signal eighty-three meant a minor domestic adjustment problem. Brad
+Raynor idly watched the swerving speck of light on the patrol screen,
+which indicated the path of Car 337, and sighed.
+
+Secretly, he was amused at himself. No one was prouder than Brad
+Raynor of the progress made by the middle of the 32nd Century, while
+all of his training had been directed toward increasing that progress.
+Still, only five days after becoming a part of the Public Police
+Administration, he found himself longing for the “good old days” he’d
+read about when the cops went after a fugitive with blazing guns.
+
+Not that he was unarmed. The police cruiser was equipped with
+everything from a lightweight atomic cannon to a tiny nerve-gun which
+could be concealed between two fingers. Nevertheless, it was a fact
+that there was seldom any need for the weapons and Brad Raynor was
+young enough to indulge occasionally in romantic fantasy. In reality,
+he knew there was nothing romantic about the “good old days.” A
+complete history of police work was, of course, a required subject at
+the university and he was well aware that in the old days most of the
+police had been incompetent, generally brutal, and for the most part
+held in contempt by the Public. A favorite subject during some of the
+bull sessions had been the old question of whether the actions of the
+police produced the public attitude or whether the attitude formed the
+police mentality. All of that, of course, had been changed by the 21st
+Century. Since then all policemen had to be adequately trained and
+the national, state, and city officials over them were elected by the
+voters.
+
+“Car two ninety-one,” droned the voice from the audio-speaker. “A
+speeding air-car is headed up toward your sector. Intercept and
+investigate the cause.”
+
+Brad Raynor glanced at the chronograph on his instrument panel and saw
+that it was eighteen hundred. He leaned back, lifted the panel behind
+his seat and removed the record film for the past hour. He inserted
+it in the projector and quickly ran it off. The film showed all the
+details of the streets and houses over which he had passed during the
+previous hour. He spotted nothing unusual and the film was put away to
+be handed in when his patrol was over.
+
+“Routine,” he muttered to himself. He grinned and reached for the
+audio-phone. “Car three hundred, on course, at eighteen hundred plus,”
+he reported. He swung the phone back into place and idly watched the
+pips of light on the patrol screen.
+
+“Car three twenty. Proceed to street level at one twenty-six East
+Fifty-third Street and arrest citizen Jon Bair. There’ll be a complete
+report on your tape by the time you get there in the event you need
+it. Bair has been under voluntary treatment at Therapy Control because
+of having trouble with his neighbor, but he has just destroyed some
+property belonging to this neighbor. Arraign him on the charge of
+destroying private property, then deliver him to Therapy Control. Watch
+your screen for a photograph of Bair.”
+
+_And that’s the way it goes_, thought Brad Raynor. Even though he
+knew it was almost impossible, he found himself wishing that someone
+would rob a bank--in his sector, naturally. It would be nice to have a
+citation on his blue uniform when he got married, an event which was
+but two weeks away.
+
+“Car three hundred,” the voice said sharply. That was his number, but
+it was the tone that caused Brad Raynor to straighten up. “Citizen
+Will Howard broke into the home of Jan Laird, Mayor Of Nyork, ten
+minutes ago. He stole two hundred world credits, in cash, and a
+smallbore energy gun. Upon leaving the premises, he encountered Public
+Officer Arthur Sommers and killed him without warning.” The voice
+paused briefly, then continued. “The fugitive escaped in an air-car
+belonging to the city. He is now in your sector, at the three thousand
+level--Horizontal sixty-two, approaching Vertical ninety-one.”
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The voice droned on, giving a description of the fugitive which
+included his brain-wave pattern and a chemical analysis, but Brad
+Raynor was already in action. He still heard the voice and was
+memorizing the description, but with his left hand he touched the
+controls so that the cruiser tilted up and leaped ahead. With his right
+hand, he swung the radarscope. A minute later, he was picking up the
+echo of the returning signal. He triggered the cybernetic control and
+glanced at the tape. The fugitive was traveling at eight hundred miles
+per hour and still accelerating.
+
+Although this was his first case, Brad Raynor had been so well trained
+that all of this was already second nature to him. Even as he glanced
+at the tape-reading, he was punching the fugitive’s brain-wave pattern
+into the encephalscope and swinging it onto the fix held by the
+radarscope. A rhythmic pinging came from the tiny receiver and he knew
+that he was following the right man.
+
+“Watch your screen for the film record of the fugitive’s escape,” said
+the voice from the audio-speaker.
+
+Brad Raynor glanced up at the video-screen and a moment later saw a
+full color shot of a big, furtive-looking man hurrying into an air-car.
+It was enough for a sight identification, despite the briefness.
+Brad knew that it had been caught by the side-camera of one of the
+street-level patrol cars and he felt a surge of pride at the speed with
+which headquarters had located it, taken a videoprint and beamed it to
+him.
+
+“Warning,” said the headquarter’s voice. “The fugitive is armed and is
+obviously in an unstable condition.”
+
+Brad Raynor grinned up at the audio-speaker. This was turning into just
+the sort of assignment he’d been thinking about. “Car three hundred,”
+the voice said sharply--and it was almost as if the Assignment Officer
+were reading his mind, although actually he was merely remembering when
+he too had been a probation patrolman--“under any circumstances, bring
+this man in alive.”
+
+That was all, but Brad Raynor knew the Assignment Officer was reminding
+him of Rule 127 in the Handbook of Public Police Procedure. Like the
+other rules, it was indelibly fixed in his mind. “Public Officers must
+at all times remember that the criminal is merely a person at odds with
+his society. The Public Police Administration was not formed to preside
+at the execution of citizens. Except in those instances where a large
+segment of the population is endangered, the Officer _must always_
+deliver his prisoner alive. Insofar as it’s possible, the criminal must
+make amends for the results of his crime, and this might be called
+punishment, but the chief duty of the police is to see that he is
+brought in for therapy. A criminal cured is a citizen saved.”
+
+Brad Raynor watched the air-speed needle move past the twelve hundred
+mark and knew he was gaining on his quarry. He glanced at his other
+instruments and was surprised to see that he was already up to fifteen
+thousand feet. Since the cruiser was built to adjust its oxygen supply
+and pressure automatically, height was no problem. It might, however,
+cause another problem. Frowning, Brad leaned over and triggered the
+cybernetic control. The tape revealed that the other ship was at
+twenty-five thousand.
+
+He pulled the audio-phone to him. “Car three hundred,” he reported,
+“at fifteen thousand feet, gaining. The fugitive is now at twenty-five
+thousand feet, obviously heading out.”
+
+“Try to intercept him before he reaches the limits of Earth’s
+atmosphere,” the Assignment Officer said over the speaker. “If this is
+not possible, then your orders are to arrest him whenever possible. We
+will arrange clearance with the Space Patrol and with any planetary
+government when needed. Use your own judgement in the matter of time
+and place.”
+
+Being a normal young man who had never traveled farther than the moon,
+there was a minute when Brad Raynor thought of letting the fugitive
+escape from Earth and then catching up with him on, perhaps, Mars.
+But it lasted no more than a minute, for he took very seriously the
+responsibility which went with the neat blue uniform. He reached over
+and shoved the power full on. The cruiser surged forward.
+
+The police cruiser was within a thousand feet of the fleeing air-car by
+the time they were twenty miles above the surface of the earth. Brad
+Raynor switched on his sighting screen, turned the nose-cannon over to
+_Manual_ and fired a shot which would explode well ahead of the other
+ship. He pulled over the audio-phone and thumbed the button on its side.
+
+“Public Officer Brad Raynor calling Nyork city car, registration 12Z,”
+he said. He knew the occupant of the car would hear him whether his
+receiver was on or not. Every air-car built contained a panel which
+would automatically pickup police calls sent out on a tight beam
+limited to police work. “City car 12Z, pull up and surrender.”
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+For a moment, the air-car continued at the same speed. Then it began
+to slow up, finally becoming stationary at an altitude of twenty-five
+miles. The police cruiser approached cautiously, Brad holding himself
+in readiness to send it flashing away if the other ship tried to ram
+him. When the two craft were a mere hundred feet apart, he stopped the
+cruiser and stabilized it. He was sure that city air-cars were not
+normally armed and the appearance of the ship in the forward viewing
+screen revealed nothing that looked like armament. With that, Brad
+Raynor leaned over and pressed a button on the control panel projecting
+a tractor beam.
+
+But even as the beam reached for the other ship, it moved. Straight
+down it flashed, the backwash of power rocking the police cruiser.
+The tractor beam gyrated in empty space and dissipated itself. Brad
+switched off the beam, savagely jammed the power on and brought the
+cruiser around in a whirling dive. But even so the ruse had given the
+other a start. As the radarscope lined up on the fleeing ship, it was
+already thirty miles away and accelerating madly. Brad shot the cruiser
+in pursuit.
+
+It was a wild race earthward. But the fugitive’s craft had gained just
+enough of a lead by the maneuver to stay in front, and it pulled out
+of the dive only a few hundred feet above the ground. So quickly did
+the dive end, there was a moment when Brad thought his stomach wouldn’t
+make it.
+
+They had come down over a small town which Brad recognized as one of
+the suburbs lying north of Nyork. The ship ahead of him darted down to
+within a few feet of the street and began zooming among the buildings.
+Brad Raynor followed. As he did so, he thrust his left foot down on a
+button on the floor and held it there. The grilled nose of the cruiser
+began broadcasting supersonic waves, out and around the ship ahead, to
+be picked up by an oncoming craft so that they could get out of the
+way. At the same time, he flipped another switch which automatically
+sent out a police identification signal which would be picked up by any
+other police car in the neighborhood.
+
+Once more the police cruiser slowly gained on the car ahead. Brad
+was strained forward in his seat, squeezing every bit of speed out
+of the cruiser that was possible as they zigzagged around buildings.
+He watched as the nose of the cruiser reached the tail of the other
+car, then crept up along the side. He was holding a slight elevation
+advantage of the other and now he began nosing it to the side and down.
+It was a delicate operation, with both ships traveling at well over a
+hundred miles per hour, where one slip might crash both of them.
+
+Then, suddenly, the fleeing car heeled over and flashed into a narrow
+alley. Brad saw it scrape the side of the building as he flashed by
+and he winced. Crushing, he threw the cruiser up in a tight top loop,
+cutting speed at the same time. Even so, he lost several minutes
+getting back to the alley.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The city air-car was parked inside the alley, on the ground. There was
+a long dent on one side where it had scraped the wall, but otherwise
+it seemed undamaged. Brad grounded his cruiser behind it. He swung the
+encephalscope on the ship, but there was no answering _peep_. It meant
+that the fugitive had already left the car.
+
+He opened the emergency panel in the cruiser and took out a smaller,
+portable encephalscope. He hesitated, then took from the rack over his
+head the tiny nerve-gun. A moment later, he stepped out into the alley.
+He slowly swung the encephalscope around until it emitted a slight
+sound. It was pointed toward the solid wall rising beside him.
+
+Brad walked out of the alley and to the front of the building. It was a
+large apartment house and the faint _peep_ from the encephalscope told
+him that the fugitive was somewhere inside.
+
+The front door was locked and there were a number of push-buttons along
+the wall, each one with a tiny two-way video-screen above it. But Brad
+went directly to the door. He pulled an electronic pick from his pocket
+and bent over the lock. The door swung open.
+
+Inside, Brad paced along the hall, swinging the encephalscope from door
+to door. He did the same thing on the second and then on the third
+floor. It was on the third floor that he finally pointed the instrument
+to a door and was rewarded with a strong, steady chatter from it.
+
+Again, he used the electronic pick. Then, holding the nerve-gun
+concealed in his hand, he kicked the door open.
+
+Directly inside, energy gun gripped in shaking hand, stood the large
+man who had been pictured in the film strip flashed on Brad’s screen.
+For what seemed like several long minutes the two men stared at each
+other, while the encephalscope fairly purred.
+
+“Drop it,” Brad said finally. “It’ll do you no good to fight. Even
+if you get the best of me, you can’t escape. There’ll be a thousand
+encephalscopes searching you out the minute my next report fails to
+come in. So, drop it.”
+
+There was another wait, while the hand that held the energy gun
+trembled more violently. Then, slowly, reluctantly, the fingers spread
+and the gun dropped to the floor. “Damn you to hell,” the man said
+bitterly. “Damn all science!”
+
+“You’re wrong,” Brad said, leaning over to pick up the gun. “Now
+you feel that you wouldn’t have been caught if it hadn’t been for
+science--but the truth is that if it weren’t for science you would
+have been killed while trying to escape. Come along.” He followed the
+prisoner from the building.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Twenty-four hours later Brad Raynor landed his cruiser in the space on
+the roof of the Justice Building in the 22nd Sector of Nyork. Herding
+his prisoner ahead of him, he entered an elevator and they were carried
+down to the hearing rooms.
+
+The Public Justice Administrator looked up as they entered. Then he
+glanced back for a moment at his desk. “You must be Public Officer
+Raynor,” he said with a smile. “I see that your assignment is the only
+thing open in this Sector.”
+
+“Yes sir,” Brad said, saluting. “This is my prisoner.”
+
+“Will you charge him, Officer Raynor?”
+
+“Yes, sir. As an officer of the Public Police Administration, I charge
+this man--Jan Laird, Mayor of Nyork--with the crime of negligence
+in his responsibility to the people of this city. A citizen, one
+Will Howard, was permitted to go unemployed. As a result of the
+unemployment, Will Howard committed robbery and in leaving the premises
+shot and killed a public officer.”
+
+“How do you plead, Mayor Laird?” the Administrator asked.
+
+There was a moment of silence. Then, “Guilty,” the mayor said huskily.
+
+The Administrator glanced at the papers on his desk. “Your crime,
+Mayor Laird,” he said, “is doubly serious because of the high position
+to which you were elected by the people. We have already discovered
+a number of other citizens who have become slightly unstable because
+of feeling that they are in a hostile environment. Fortunately, Will
+Howard was the only one who had reached the point of direct action. I
+have a report from Therapy Control stating that he will need five or
+six months of therapy before once again being a smoothly-functioning
+individual.
+
+“I notice, Mayor Laird, that you have done well in private enterprise
+and possess considerable surplus wealth. Therefore, it is the judgement
+of this Administration that you be appointed the guardian of the wife
+and children of the slain Public Officer Arthur Sommers, responsible
+for their economic security. This responsibility will continue for
+the life of the widow and will include the children until they have
+finished university training. You are also removed as mayor of this
+city. This is the extent of this Administration’s concern with you. You
+will now be turned over to Therapy Control for proper treatment.”
+
+With bowed head, the former mayor turned away.
+
+“Good work, Officer Raynor,” the Administrator called after them. Brad
+Raynor followed the prisoner out, feeling every inch a cop and no
+longer wishing for the “good old days.”
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber’s note:
+
+
+  This etext was produced from Dynamic Science Fiction, December 1952
+  (Vol. 1, No. 1). Extensive research did not uncover any evidence
+  that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.
+
+  Obvious errors have been silently corrected in this version, but
+  minor inconsistencies have been retained as printed.
+
+
+
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 79265 ***