Pursuit Page 7

door behind it. "Stay there! Youcan't risk it outside now! We've got to--"

  Hawkes hit the figure with his shoulder, in the best football fashionhe could muster. It could try--but it couldn't keep him and Ellen hereto be burned in their heat-ray bath, or treated to whatever alientorture they had in mind. He felt his shoulder hit. And he knew he'dmissed. It was an arm that he struck against, and the arm brought himupright, while a second arm drew back and came forward with a savageright to his jaw.

  He went out with a dull plopping sound in his brain. Then, slowly, anache came out of the blackness, and the beginning of sound. He wasfighting out of the unconsciousness, fighting against time and themonster who'd try to steal Ellen.

  But Ellen's hands were on his head, and an ice-cold towel was wetagainst his forehead. "Will! Will!"

  * * * * *

  He groaned and sat up. The other--alien or human--was gone.

  "Where--?" he began.

  She was trying to help him to his feet, and he got up groggily, withhis head beginning to clear.

  "He just ran out, Will." Ellen was crying, this time almost silently,with the words coming out between shakes of her shoulders. "Will,we've got to get out. We've got to. The men are coming for you.They'll be here any minute. And it's wrong--it won't work! Oh, Will,hurry!"

  "Men? Men are coming?" He'd almost forgotten that it could be men whowere after him.

  "I called them, Will. I thought I had to. But it won't work. Will, doanything you like, but _get_ out! They are fools. They...."

  He opened the door and peered out the doorway into the hall, whichseemed quiet. He'd been a fool again. He'd trusted her for somereason, as if a body and loyalty had to go together. They'd beensmart, picking a virgin for the job. It must have cost them plenty,unless they'd twisted her mind somehow. Maybe they could do it.

  But he knew that whatever they looked like, it couldn't be real menwho'd meet him out there.

  "Why?" he asked, and was surprised at the flatness of his voice.

  She shook her head. "Because I'm a fool, Will. Because I thought theycould help you--until _he_ came! And because I'm still in love withyou, even if you'd forgotten me."

  But the fear inside him was drowning out her words, and the goldenhaze was faint in the air again.

  "Okay," he said finally. "Okay, don't burn her, too, now that she'sdone your dirty work. I'm coming."

  The haze disappeared slowly, and he started down the stairs, stillholding her hand.

  VI

  There were men with guns in the street. He'd heard two shots as hecame down the stairs, and had shoved Ellen behind him. But it wassilent now. People with dazed, frightened faces were still dartinginto the houses, leaving the street to the men with the guns.

  Hawkes marched forward grimly, perversely stripped of fear, eventhough he was sure some of the men out there were monsters and otherswere their dupes. He tapped one of the men on the shoulder.

  "Okay, here I am. The girl goes free!"

  The man spun around as if mounted on a ball bearing and pulled bystrings. The gun fell from his hands. His emotion-taut face loosenedsuddenly, seemed to run like melted wax, and congealed again in anexpression of utter idiocy. He gargled frothily, and thenscreamed--high and shrill, like a tortured woman.

  Suddenly he was a lunging maniac, tearing up the street.

  Now the others were running--some toward cars, and some toward thecorners, running flat and desperately on the flat of their feet,without any spring to their motions.

  Hawkes jerked his eyes down toward the big gas-storage tanks wheremost of them had been, and the glow that had been in the corner of hisvision was gone. Men seemed to be coming out of a trance. They werebreaking away, forgetting about their guns and fleeing.

  Three men alone were left.

  Hawkes ducked back into the hall of the apartment, dragging Ellen withhim. The glass of the door was somewhat dirty, but it made a dimmirror. He could see the slim young man and two others still there.The two men darted into a waiting car, and the leader turned up thestreet, running smoothly toward the apartment house.

  Hawkes could make no sense of it--unless it was another of the seemingtricks designed to drive him out of his mind. He had decided he wasone of the rats in the maze that didn't go crazy--the pressure coulddrive him somewhat mad, but it couldn't keep him that way.

  He didn't wait to see what had happened, or whether the sirens thatwere sounding now were reinforcements for the men with guns or thepolice. He didn't bother with the slim young man any more. They'dapparently used their dupes to frighten out the people, and then hadscared off the dupes--the poor humans who didn't know what it was allabout. Now two of the three were gone, and the third monster wascoming for him.

  He'd escaped before. But sooner or later, they'd catch him--once theywere sure he wouldn't be driven insane.

  Or was this the beginning of insanity--a delusion of power, a feelingthat he could escape? He could never know, if it was. He had to assumethat he was sane.

  * * * * *

  He crouched back behind the stairs, while the young man in the graytweeds dashed up them. Then he headed out into the street. The sirenwas near now--and tardily, he realized that the siren might herald thecoming of the real monsters. It was as easy to look like a cop as anyother human!

  He jerked open the door of the nearest car, pulled Ellen in, andkicked the motor to life. He gunned away from the curb, tossed it intosecond, and twisted around the corner, straight toward the siren thatwas nearest. At the last minute, he jerked to the side of the street,to let the police car shoot by. "Never run from a tiger--run towardit. It sometimes works, and it's no worse."

  The car was a big one, and the motor purred smoothly. He glanced downat the dash, and frowned. There was no key in the switch. For asecond, he stared at it, and then grinned. He'd picked a monster'scar, apparently--they'd done a neat job of duplicating, but theydidn't need all the safeguards that humans used, and the switch hadobviously been a dummy.

  He looked at the buttons on the dash, wondering which would make itlevitate. But he had no desire to test it, nor to stay in an autowhich could probably be traced so easily.

  He braked to a halt outside the subway and led Ellen down.

  "We're down to the last hole," he told her as the train pulled out ofthe station. "How much money do you have?"

  She shook her head, and held up her arm. "I left it, Will."

  They were beyond the last hole, then. He realized now that as long asthey'd been in a crowded apartment house, filled with other humans, ithad proved a tough nut to crack for the aliens. But on the move....

  "Maybe we have a chance," he told her. "If humans were after me, it'dbe tough--but these things have to avoid the police."

  She looked at him, misery on her face. "There are no aliens, Will.Those men you saw were F. B. I. men. That's where I reported you."

  "You...."

  He stared at her, but she was serious.

  "But there was nothing about me in the papers, Ellen."

  She pointed across the aisle. Spread over two columns on the frontpage, an older picture of him showed plainly. And even at thedistance, the heading was boldly legible.

  $100,000 REWARD FOR THIS MAN!

  He stared at the figure twice, unbelieving. He was no longer aloneagainst a small group of humans or aliens. Now every living human onthe face of the planet would be looking for him!

  * * * * *

  He could feel their hot breath on his neck, feel eyes staring at himthrough the papers. Fear began to rise in him, to be halted as thetrain ground to a new station. Ellen jerked him out, and he moved withher. It wasn't safe to be too long with one group, until they began towonder and compare faces!

  "But what--"

  She shook her head. "Nothing, Will. I don't know. What can we do?"

  He'd been wondering, while they moved quietly through the groups ofpeople, an
d up the stairs. There was no place left. He had about adollar in change, and that would be of no use to them. They'd have todig a hole in the ground and pull it over them....

  It joggled his memory, and he grabbed her hand and jerked open thedoor of a cab that was waiting for the light. He barked out anaddress----the corner of Tenth Avenue and one of the streets belowTwentieth. The driver got into motion, not bothering to look back. Theaddress was near enough to where Hawkes wanted to be--an oldwarehouse, with a loading platform. He'd played there as a kid,climbing back under it and digging holes down into the damp, softearth, as kids have always done. He'd been by there since, and it hadremained unchanged.

  Sooner or later, the aliens would locate them. But it would give Ellenand him a chance to