He thought about Pendleton’s telegram: "Urgent I see you." What if the urgency of the situation owed, not to some breakthrough discovery, but a threat to the Outpost’s security? Dodge contemplated trying to find a policeman, but quickly discarded that idea; they would have their hands full with the hurricane. The headlights continued to illuminate the taxi from behind.
He leaned over the back of the driver's seat. "Just take me to the museum. I'll handle it from there."
"I'll take care of him," the driver grunted and punched the accelerator.
The sudden burst of speed threw Dodge back into his seat momentarily. "Hold your horses!" he shouted. "I don't need any heroics from you. Just take me to the museum…"
His voice trailed off as he realized the taxi was now moving south — downtown, away from their destination. Over the driver's shoulder he could see the speedometer needle quivering at fifty miles an hour. With virtually no traffic to evade, the taxi raced away like a meteor into the unknown. A chill crept up Dodge's back that had nothing to do with the storm raging outside.
He didn't waste breath inquiring about the driver's intentions; it was clear enough that this was no ordinary taxi ride. That this abduction should occur on the heels of an urgent summons from Prof. Pendleton could not be a coincidence.
So what about the car following us? Friend or foe?
He considered trying to assault the driver or wrestle control of the car, but discarded both courses of action as too dangerous given their present speed. Nevertheless, he had to do something to take control of the situation and quickly; the taxi driver would certainly have confederates waiting at the end of the line. Dodge gripped the door handle waiting for circumstance to force the driver to reduce speed enough that a desperate leap from the moving vehicle might be survivable. A traffic signal loomed ahead flashing a red stoplight, but the taxi did not slow. The Checker cab blew through the intersection heedless of cross traffic. The pursuing vehicle was matching their speed and likewise ignoring the signals.
"Okay, time for plan B," Dodge muttered. "Whatever that is."
The taxi whipped hard to the left, making a sharp turn without slowing and Dodge was thrown against the passenger side door. The vehicle fishtailed and nearly spun around, but the driver calmly regained control and steered and accelerated out of the skid. When Dodge lifted his head, he saw that the cab was now charging onto the Brooklyn Bridge.
In desperation, he snatched up the discarded newspaper. He made a tight roll with the damp pulp — tight enough to simulate the barrel of a gun, he hoped — and jabbed it forcefully into the back of the driver's head. "Pull it over friend or I'll blow your head off."
The driver seemed completely oblivious to the threat; he did not flinch or start, did not even glance in the mirror to see if the object pressed against his skull was indeed a weapon. Dodge pushed the rolled newspaper forward again, hoping to elicit some kind of reaction.
The driver abruptly stomped on the brake pedal and Dodge was hurled forward. His shoulder struck the back of the cabby's head, but the man was as rigid and unyielding as a tree trunk. Dodge's momentum pitched him over the seat and headlong into the windshield.
His next memory was one of pain; half his body slammed into the dashboard, delivering what felt like a head-to-toe bruise, while the rest smashed through the thin windshield, stabbing splinters of glass through his suit pants and jacket. He clutched ineffectively for a handhold as he bounced up and onto the hood of the cab. Before he could shoot forward onto the rain swept bridge deck, however, a powerful hand closed around his biceps.
The cab lurched forward again and Dodge was hauled unceremoniously back inside to lie in a heap in the floor well beside the driver. After a few seconds of pure agony, Dodge managed to raise his head and gaze up at the other man. The driver's expression was as impassive as a dead man's, but there was something familiar about the face that stared unblinkingly forward as the vehicle accelerated into the driving rain.
"Hey! You're—"
Dodge didn't get a chance to put his revelation into words. The cab driver, almost without looking, drove a fist into Dodge's upturned face. Dodge twisted his head at the last instant, taking only a glancing strike on the cheek that nonetheless rang through his head like a bell. This time however, he was ready.
He didn't attempt to fight the driver. Recognizing the man had been indication enough that such a course of action would be a waste of effort. His only priority was getting out of the car and to do that, he had to slow it down. Even as he recoiled from the man's punch, Dodge jammed his right hand against the gearshift stick. There was a shriek of metal grinding at high speed and then the engine revved loudly.
A perplexed look crossed the ersatz cabby's face as he tried to comprehend what had happened. In the two seconds it took for him to realize that the car was no longer in gear, Dodge scrambled away from any further retaliation and gripped the door handle. When the driver dropped his free hand to the stick shift, Dodge bought both feet up and stomped his heels into the man's face.
To his credit, the driver did not even flinch. One of Dodge's shoes gouged a bloody weal along his cheek, but the assault was equivalent to scraping the bark off an oak tree. Nevertheless, it did have an effect; the driver's attention was distracted for one moment more, long enough for the speedometer needle to creep down to thirty-five miles an hour. Dodge knew he wouldn't get a better chance. He turned the lever.
The driver saw it and reacted immediately, but not as Dodge expected. Instead of trying to get the vehicle in gear and resume accelerating, the man suddenly cranked the steering wheel and the cab swerved to the right. Still coasting at more than thirty miles an hour, the Checker plowed through the river of water streaming down the gutter, then jolted into the curb.
The door latch clicked, but even as Dodge started to push it open, something slammed against the exterior of the vehicle, crushing the metal back into its frame. The car crashed through the guardrail, sacrificing the last of its momentum, then the front end dropped with a lurch as the cab bottomed out on the edge and ground to a complete halt.
For just a moment, Dodge thought the peril was past. The impact had tossed him alternately into the dash then up against the headliner and back again, but he had fared better than the driver. The man groggily raised his head, blood streaming from his brow, unable to move his lower extremities. The steering wheel had snapped off in his hands and a piece of it had driven through his abdomen, pinning him to the seat. Yet, despite what surely had to be a mortal injury, the man remained inhumanly focused on keeping his passenger from escaping. A beefy hand stabbed out for Dodge's throat.
Wincing, Dodge pulled back and the fingers closed only on the fabric of his jacket, still much too close for comfort. Dodge tried to wrestle free of the grip but there was nowhere to go; the door was jammed shut. Unable to get out of the front of the car, he shifted his weight, planted a foot against the floor and tried to propel himself over the back of the seat.
In the instant that he thrust down with his legs, Dodge got a glimpse of what lay beyond the front of the taxi — or rather, the nothingness beyond the shattered windshield. The Checker protruded from the breach in the guardrail of the Brooklyn Bridge more than a hundred feet above the turbulent, storm-tossed surface of the East River. Then, with a noise that sounded more like a rusty hinge than a harbinger of doom, the cab began to tilt forward.
CHAPTER 2 — A SUMMONS TO DANGER
The East River splashed over its banks like water in a bucket carried by a running man, generating enormous waves that washed across the surface of the Chrystie-Forsyth Parkway. The incessant storm surge had left more than a foot of water on the road, making travel on the scenic highway overlooking the river a precarious prospect for the low slung Auburn Speedster as it crept south toward the New York University and Bellevue Medical College Hospital building. The red sports car finally steered away from the river, turning onto Thirtieth Street to seek the relative shelter between the college buildings lining First Avenue. Its pace quickened as it approached the hospital and then swung into the drive designated "For Ambulance Only." Although the driver’s actions did not seem especially frantic, his reasons for making the perilous journey out into the storm seemed to qualify as an emergency.