lay aground not quite right-side-up close to the north pole of Sirene
VIII. The local sun was not in view. The squad ship's ports opened upon
the incredible brilliance of the galaxy as seen out of atmosphere. There
was no atmosphere here. It was all frozen. But there was a horizon, and
the light of the stars showed the miniature jungle of gas crystals.
Frozen gases--frozen to gas-ice--they were feathery. They were lacy.
They were infinitely delicate. They were frost in three dimensions.

"Yes, sir," said Patrolman Willis.

"The _Aldeb_'s due soon," said Sergeant Madden, "so I'll make it short.
The whole thing is that we are cops, and the Huks are soldiers. Which
means that they're after feeling important--after glamour. Every one of
'em figures it's necessary to be important. He craves it."

Patrolman Willis listened. He had a proximity detector out, which would
pick up any radiation caused by the cutting of magnetic lines of force
by any object. It made very tiny whining noises from time to time. If
anything from a Huk missile rocket to the salvage ship _Aldeb_
approached, however, the sound would be distinctive.

"Now that," said Sergeant Madden, "is the same thing that makes delinks.
A delink tries to matter in the world he lives in. It's a small world,
with only him and his close pals in it. So he struts before his pals. He
don't realize that anybody but him and his pals are human. See?"

"I know!" said Patrolman Willis with an edge to his voice. "Last month a
couple of delinks set a ground-truck running downhill, and jumped off
it, and--"

"True," said Sergeant Madden. He rumbled for a moment. "A soldier lives
in a bigger world he tries to matter in. He's protectin' that world and
being admired for it. In old, old days his world was maybe a day's march
across. Later it got to be continents. They tried to make it planets,
but it didn't work. But there've got to be enemies to protect a world
against, or a soldier isn't important. He's got no glamour. Y'see?"

"Yes, sir," said Willis.

"Then there's us cops," said Sergeant Madden wryly. "Mostly we join up
for the glamour. We think it's important to be a cop. But presently we
find we ain't admired. Then there's no more glamour--but we're still
important. A cop matters because he protects people against other people
that want to do things to 'em. Against characters that want to get
important by hurtin' 'em. Being a cop means you matter against all the
delinks a