The other light was at a hillcrest. They had swooped down to the valley floor and up to the opposing hill — a mile and a half or two miles — on an arrow-straight paved path through the forest.
"Main Gate," said the driver, stopping.
Two men stepped forward. Dugan flashed the Cossack's card, shouting, "The Material is loose. Extraordinary Alert. Let no one through without a triple check of credentials. I'm Special Section alert officer. Notify the road ahead. Put the same thing on. Make a note of the time I pass. I'll get help back to you. They have probably cut the main telephone wires."
The cyclist, the duty officer, and the sentry all hesitated. A lurid Russian oath from Dugan scattered them about their tasks. The cycle roared on.
At the farther gates, men were waiting with flashlights. When they saw the cycle coming they stepped aside and the cyclist said importantly, "We phoned ahead. Ivanov, Special Section officer. Shut the gate tight after us."
Then they roared on.
One nice thing about this path, said Dugan to himself, is the fact that nothing but another motorcycle would overtake us. You couldn't run a car on this.
The gray dawn was showing when they came at last to an ordinary Siberian dirt road.
Dugan tugged the motorcyclist's pistol out of its holster. The man felt the pull and slowed his machine. "Comrade Colonel…" he queried. The real note of protest had not yet come into his voice.
"My name," said Dugan, "is none of your business. This is a simulated security violation, and I am taking care that it is good. How far is it to the next sentry post?"
"Less than a kilometer."
"Can you get me past?"
"Of course, Comrade Colonel—"
Dugan stopped him. "I mean, without a pass."
The man stopped his machine. He looked very unhappy. Dugan had firm possession of two guns, one in his blouse, one in his hand. Dugan did not even let the man get down from the saddle. The soldier tried to look around at him, but Dugan commanded:
"Eyes front!"
The soldier swung his face back to the forward position. "I can't do it, Comrade Colonel. They will shoot."
"Sorry, comrade," said Dugan grimly. "I'm under orders from the N.K.A.R. to make this an effective violation. To test our security all the way up. If you don't get through, I'll shoot you."
The man started to argue, but Dugan repeated his threat and the man saw that he meant it. He was one of the new Communist-reared generation trained in absolute obedience.
Dolefully he pleaded, "Our only chance, Colonel, is to go through fast. But they might hit me. Or you."
"Don't you worry about me," said Dugan. "I'm taking the same chances that you are."
This gave the cyclist heart. Dugan felt misgivings when he deduced that the man did not feel he had driven fast yet. He wished he were not so tired. If he had the strength, he could think of something better. When there was only one chance, that one was the chance to take.
The cyclist started up his machine. It raced forward with terrific acceleration. Dugan held tight. The road reeled in front of him. As they swung he saw the sentries ahead of him. They stood in the road, blocking it. The driver wobbled his machine.
They plowed into the men.
Dugan felt the motorcycle dropping sidewise. He strained with his entire will to force it back to balance. Forty or fifty feet past the sentries it slewed sidewise. Dugan received a terrific blow on the left shoulder. He absorbed as much of it as he could, and fire ran through his side and arm.
He blacked out momentarily — five seconds, a minute, he could not tell. When he opened his eyes he saw a sentry approaching him. The body of the motorcyclist was halfway over Dugan's. The approaching sentry had his gun ready. Dugan raised his pistol with a final effort of will.
His bullet and the rifle shot seemed to blaze out at the same precise instant. Dugan felt the body over his jump at the impact. The motorcyclist's blood covered them both. But the approaching soldier was not to be seen. And the second sentry?
Dugan dragged himself to his feet.
The nearer sentry was lying on his face. Dugan walked over to him, saw the man move, fired a bullet directly into him. If the second sentry had been standing there with a rifle, Dugan would not have been able to account for him. But the second sentry was not there.
Dugan limped back to the sentry box. The other man was there on the ground, groaning. Dugan, who felt bad about the two men in the road behind him, tapped this one on the head and silenced him,
He got back to the motorcycle. It took him long, long minutes to right the machine. He tried the controls half a dozen different ways before he saw the obvious ignition switch. Turning it on, he kicked the motor into action.
It could not go fast. The front fork seemed out of line, and the right handlebar was twisted. But even at slow speed it took him a kilometer or two beyond the post.
The road here ran along the edge of a wooded gorge. Taking his one last chance, Dugan turned the machine over the lip of the cliff and ran it down a steep incline which seemed to smooth out at the bottom.
He expected to crash but he did not. He slewed into heavy bushes and ended up with a jar. The machine had jammed itself and him into a very heavy fir tree. Dugan looked around to see if he could be seen from the road. He simply could not tell. He screwed up his eyelids, trying to tighten them so that he could see better. That effort was his last. He fainted and fell from the machine.
When he awakened, an undetermined time later, the day had become bright. He woke with fire burning against his naked flesh, tearing his side with its sharp flames. Full consciousness brought him the surprise that the fire was internal — the burning of his nerves. At the threshold of consciousness he had believed it real.
He got on hands and knees and unscrewed the canteen he had brought from Atomsk. Water helped wake him.
He rose to his feet.
The road was farther away and higher up than he dared hope. He wondered that he had gotten through the descent down the clifflike slope. What had looked like an incline from above looked like a perpendicular from below.
He touched his face. It felt swollen. Blood, probably his own, was on it. If Sarah could see him now … what would she give for his chances?
There was nothing to do but to fight. First, he had to think of hiding the machine. And then, sleep. And sleep again. Like an animal. That was the first price of staying alive.
XV. EVENTS WITHOUT SIGNIFICANCE
May Day was celebrated throughout the Soviet Far East. The great victory against Germany and Japan, which Russia had won all by herself despite the treachery of England and America in standing idly by, was celebrated with pomp and magnificence. Pictures of Stalin were shown in all the major cities. Important officials made speeches; that is, some important officials did. But several of the most important officials of all did not make speeches. They spent the day at the telephone.
The more-than-regional commanding officer of the police troops, whose duty it was to make sure that the workers did not revolt against Socialism, was thoroughly tired of being kept waiting. Finally the phone rang. He snatched it up.