The Suicide Squad--Dead Or Alive

The next in line for the mayoral job was Lawrence Hall, president of
the City Council. But, for some unaccountable reason, Hall refused the
honor. In order to avoid becoming mayor, he resigned from the City
Council and left at once for Florida, taking his wife and son with
him.

It now became the duty of Judge Samuel Rotherwell, chief justice of
the Superior Court, to appoint someone to fill the unexpired term of
the mayoralty until the next election. There were a number of
substantial business men and civic leaders in Hill City whom Justice
Rotherwell might have chosen. But to the amazement and consternation
of everyone, he named--Hugo Bledd.

That was how the Era of Terror came to Hill City.

Hugo Bledd owned the Hill City Race Track. He was a disbarred lawyer
who had dipped his fingers in almost every form of shady activity. He
had been disbarred for conspiracy to help a notorious racketeer client
defraud the government of two million dollars in income taxes. And
when his racketeer client went to jail, Bledd had continued to manage
the vast sub rosa enterprises of the Big Shot. Disbarment meant
nothing to him, as long as he was able to keep out of jail.... And
this was the man whom Justice Rotherwell appointed to be mayor of Hill
City!

Naturally, there was a good deal of criticism. The editor of the
morning Journal announced that he would ask the Governor to look into
it. But that night, the editor of the Journal was accosted by a group
of thugs, who beat him with a lead pipe and left him unconscious in
the street. The same night, there where a dozen other assaults upon
citizens who might have been expected to oppose the appointment.

Hugo Bledd was sworn in the next day. He demanded the immediate
resignation of the police commissioner, as well as of all the other
commissioners who had been appointed by the preceding mayor.

He also discharged a great number of the older policemen and
detectives, claiming that the police department needed revamping.

Then there began an influx of strange and ugly looking men into Hill
City. From all parts of the country they came--men with tight lips and
killers' eyes, men with guns bulging under their armpits, men who had
done time in all the major prisons. Before the city awoke to its
peril, it was in the grip of as vicious a mob of storm troopers as had
ever taken possession of a European land.

One of these new arrivals, a man named Rory Fenn, was appointed police
commissioner. Fenn immediately swore in a hundred of the newly-arrived
thugs as policemen and detectives, raising some of them to captains'
and inspectors rank over the heads of the old-timers on the force.

The next day, at the meeting of the City Council, a contingent of
these uniformed thugs was present in the meeting room. Significantly
also, seven of the thirty-nine councilmen were absent. Two of the
seven were dead. The other five were in the hospital, so badly injured
that they would not be able to leave their beds for weeks.

Little wonder, then, that those councilmen present quickly voted to
pass all the measures submitted by Mayor Hugo Bledd. A tax was imposed
on all business transactions in the city, as well as on all pay
checks. The money derived from this tax was to be placed in a relief
fund, to be administered by the Mayor. In addition, Mayor Bledd was
given the power to create five hundred new appointive positions on the
police force and in other city departments, the salaries to be fixed
by himself.