Part 26 (1/2)

”How about the people in the hotel in Denver?” she asked me pointedly.

”What good did you do there?”

#Very little, but--#

”One of the advantages of a telepath is that we can't be taken by surprise,” she informed me. ”Because no one can possibly work without plans of some kind.”

”One of the troubles of a telepath,” I told her right back, ”is that they get so confounded used to knowing what is going to happen next that it takes all the pleasant element of surprise out of their lives. That makes 'em dull and--”

The element of surprise came in through the back window, pa.s.sed between us and went _Splat!_ against the wind-s.h.i.+eld. There was the sound like someone chipping ice with a spike followed by the distant bark of a rifle. A second slug came through the back window about the time that the first one landed on the floor of the car. The second slug, not slowed by the shatter-proof gla.s.s in the rear, went through the shatter-proof gla.s.s in the front. A third slug pa.s.sed through the same tunnel.

These were warning shots. He'd missed us intentionally. He'd proved it by firing three times through the same hole, from beyond my esper range.

I wound up the machinery and we took off. Marian cried something about not being foolish, but her words were swept out through the hole in the rear window, just above the marks on the pavement caused by my tires as we spun the wheels.

XV

”Steve, stop it!” cried Marian as soon as she could get her breath.

”Nuts,” I growled. I took a long curve on the outside wheels and ironed out again. ”He isn't after our corpse, honey. He's after our hide. I don't care for any.”

The fourth shot went singing off the pavement to one side. It whined into the distance making that noise that sets the teeth on edge and makes one want to duck. I lowered the boom on the go pedal and tried to make the meter read off the far end of the scale; I had a notion that the guy behind might shoot the tires out if we were going slow enough so that a blowout wouldn't cause a bad wreck; but he probably wouldn't do it once I got the speed up. He was not after Marian. Marian could walk out of any crack-up without a bruise, but I couldn't.

We went roaring around a curve. I fought the wheel into a nasty double 's' curve to swing out and around a truck, then back on my own side of the road again to avoid an oncoming car. I could almost count the front teeth of the guy driving the car as we straightened out with a coat of varnish to spare. I scared everybody in all three vehicles, including me.

Then I pa.s.sed a couple of guys standing beside the road; one of them waved me on, the other stood there peering past me down the road. As we roared by, another group on the other side of the highway came running out hauling a big old hay wagon. They set the wagon across the road and then sloped into the ditch on either side of it.

I managed to dig the bare glimmer of firearms before I had to yank my perception away from them and slam it back on the road in front. I was none too soon, because dead ahead by a thousand feet or so, they were hauling a second road block out.

Marian, not possessed of esper, cried out as soon as she read this new menace in my mind. I rode the brakes easily and came to a stop long before we hit it. In back sounded a crackle of rifle fire; in front, three men came out waving their rifles at us.

I whipped the car back, spun it in a seesaw, and took off back towards the first road block. Half way back I whirled my car into a rough sideroad just as the left hand rear tire went out with a roar. The car sagged and dragged me to a stop with my nose in a little ditch. The heap hadn't stopped rocking yet before I was out and on the run.

”Steve!” cried Marian. ”Come back!”

#To heck with it.# I kept right on running. Before me by a couple of hundred yards was a thicket of trees; I headed that way fast. I managed to sling a dig back; Marian was joining the others; pointing in my direction. One of them raised the rifle but she knocked it down.

I went on running. It looked as though I'd be all right so long as I didn't get in the way of an accidental shot. My life was once more charmed with the fact that no one wanted me dead.

The thicket of woods was not as thick as I'd have liked. From a distance they'd seemed almost impenetrable, but when I was running through them towards the center, they looked pitifully thin. I could see light from any direction and the floor of the woods was trimmed, the underbrush cleaned out, and a lot of it was tramped down.

Ahead of me I perceived a few of them coming towards the woods warily, behind me there was another gang closing in. I began to feel like the caterpillar on the blade of gra.s.s in front of the lawn mower.

I tried to hide under a deadfall, knowing that it was poor protection against rifle fire. I hauled out the Bonanza and checked the cylinder. I didn't know which side I was going to shoot at, but that didn't bother me. I was going to shoot at the first side that got close.

A couple of shots whipped by over my head, making noises like someone snapping a bullwhip. I couldn't tell which direction they came from; I was too busy trying to stuff my feet into a gopher hole under my deadfall.

I cast around the thicket with my sense of perception and caught the layout. Both sides were spread out, stalking forward like infantry advancing through disputed ground. Now and then one of them would raise his rifle and fire at some unexpected motion. This, I gathered, was more nervousness than fighting skill because no group of telepaths and/or perceptives would be so jittery on the trigger if they weren't basically nervous. They should, as I did, have the absolute position of both the enemy and their own side.