Gordon Randall Garrett's "Thin Edge" (novelette, murder mystery, free)

Two interdependent political entities that are also constantly in minor conflict:

1. Earth, a welfare state, &
2. "Belt Cities", peopled by hardy human pioneers in asteroid belt.

Belt Cities have a manufacturing process to make very tough cables - cables that can be used to tug good sized asteroids over some distances! A corporation on earth, in collusion with local government, wants the secret. So when a commercial representative from Belt Cities visits earth, he's tortured & killed when trying to extract the secret of cable.

This story is of unraveling the murder mystery by a Belt Cities investigator, who'll make sure the culprits pay for the crime.

Fact sheet.

First published: Analog, December 1963.
Download full text from Project Gutenberg, Manybooks, Feedbooks.
Rating: A.
Among the stories from Astounding/Analog issues edited by John Campbell.
Related: Stories of Randall Garrett.