the car gang and the ranch family. Mainly, they wanted to keep the disease from spreading, keep it from destroying
their way of life. They had been totally unrealistic to think they could go on hiding indefinitely, but at the moment
Blake was on their side.
He reached the window, managed to stand up, almost pulling down the drapes in the process. The leg restraints tightened as he stood.
The moon was waning, but still bright in the clear desert air. It was possible that someone outside might be able to see him in the moon and starlight, but he hoped Eli's people had told the truth when they claimed to be able to see in the
dark. He pushed the draperies to one side and stood in plain view of anything outside. He could see hills not far distant. Before them was a shadowy jumble of huge rocks-as though there had been a slide -or perhaps merely weathering away
of soil. The rocks could provide excellent cover for anyone out there.
Off to one side was a building that might have been a barn. From the barn extended a corral. The barn looked spare and modern. The people of this ranch had not lived in the nineteenth century. It was possible that even the cuffs had been theirs. A car family would not care whether restraints were humane or not.
Scanning as carefully as he could, Blake could see no sign of anyone. Still, he stood there, at one point holding up his hands to show that they were bound. He felt foolish, but he did not sit down until he felt he had given even an intermittent watcher a chance to see him.
Finally, he hopped away from the window and let himself down quietly so that he could roll back to where the girls
were. He had not quite made it when the door opened and someone switched on a light. He found himself squinting upward into the face of a squat, burly man in an ill-fitting, new shirt and pants that were almost rags.
"Looks like you're going to live," he said to Blake. Blake rolled onto his back and sat up. "I'd say so." "Your people want you. Big surprise."
"I'm sure most of your victims have people who want them."
The man frowned at Blake as though he thought Blake might be making fun of him. Then he gave a loud, braying laugh. "Most of you walled-in types don't give a piss for each other, Doc. You don't know family like we do. But the hell with that. What I want to know is who else wants you?"
Blake sat up straighter, staring at the man. "What do you mean?"
The man pushed Blake over gently with his foot. "Those your own teeth, Doc?"
Blake writhed back into a sitting position. "Look, I'll tell you what I know. I just wanted to find out what's happened since I've been unconscious."
"Nothing. Now who else wants you?"
Blake wove a fantasy about Eli's people, made them just another rat pack with ideas no loftier than this one's. Ransom. He said nothing about the disease. There was nothing he could say to a man like this, he realized. Nothing that would not get his teeth kicked in. Or if the man believed him, he might shoot Blake and both girls, then run-on the theory that if he got away fast enough, he could escape the disease. Blake had known men like him before; confronting them with unfamiliar ideas was dangerous even in controlled, hospital surroundings.
He got absolutely no response from the man until he mentioned the mountaintop ranch. The moment he said it, he knew he was talking too much.
"Those people!" the burly man muttered. "I been planning for a long time to bury them. Maybe not bother to kill them first. Bony, stripped-down models. Shit, you're a doctor. What's the matter with those guys?"
"They never gave me a chance to find out," Blake lied. "I think they're taking something." Drugs. That was something a sewer rat could understand.
"I know they're taking something," the man said. "One time I saw a couple of them running down jack rabbits and
eating them. I mean like a coyote or a bobcat, tearing into them before they were all the way dead." Blake blinked, repelled and amazed. "You saw them do that?"
"I said I did, didn't I? What have they got, Doc, and what do you think it's worth?" "I tell you, I don't know. We were prisoners. They didn't tell us anything."
"You got eyes. What did you see?"
"Dangerous, bone-thin people, faster than average, stronger than average, and close." "What close?"
"They give a piss for each other. Listen, who are you, anyway?" "Badger. I head this family."
He looked the part. "Well, Badger, I didn't get the impression these people knew how to forgive or forget. They probably see us as their property. They probably want us back-or maybe they'll settle for a share of our ransom."
"Share? You've got too much sun, man. Or they have. What are they doing, growing something?" "I don't know!"
"I gotta know. I gotta find out! Shit, it must be good stuff."
"They look like a strong wind would blow them away, and you think they have good stuff?"
Badger kicked Blake again, this time less gently. Blake fell over. "You're a doctor," Badger said. "You ought to know! What the hell is it?" Another hard kick.
Through a haze of pain, Blake heard one of the girls scream, heard Badger say, "Get away from me, cunt!" heard a slap, another scream.
"Listen!" Blake gasped, sitting up. "Listen, they have a garden!" His head and his side throbbed. What if his ribs were
broken? Meda had said broken bones would be fatal to him now. "Those people have a big garden," he said. "They never really let us see what they grew there. Maybe if you could-"
He was cut off by the crack of a shot. The sound echoed several times into a world that had otherwise gone silent. Another shot. It hit the window near them, somewhere near ceiling level, then ricocheted with an odd whine. More bulletproof glass. A house located where this one was was probably hardened as much as possible against any form of attack.
Someone outside had perhaps seen or heard Blake. Someone outside was either a bad shot trying to kill him or a good shot trying to protect him.
"Shit!" Badger muttered. He turned and ran from the room, slamming the door behind him.
"If we could break the windows," Keira said when he was gone, "Eli's people might come in and get us." And Rane: "If bullets couldn't break them, we sure can't with our bare hands."
"But we've got to get out! That guy Badger is crazy. If he kicks Dad's ribs in, Dad will die!"
Blake lay listening to them, thinking he should say something reassuring, but now that the danger was less immediate, he could not make the effort. His side and head were competing with each other to see which could hurt more. He lay still, eyes closed, trying to breathe shallowly. He was desperately afraid one or more ribs were already broken, but he could do nothing. He felt consciousness slipping away again.
"I'm going to try something," he heard Keira say. "There's nothing to try," Rane told her.
"Shut up. Let me do something for a change." She paused, then spoke in an ordinary voice. "Eli or whoever's out there, if you can hear me, fire three more times."
There was nothing.
"What did you expect?" Rane demanded. "All that stupid talk about seeing in the dark and being able to hear better than other people-"
"Will you shut up!" Keira tried again. "Eli," she said, "maybe we can distract them. We can help you get them. You'll want them now that they've been exposed to the disease. Help us and we can help you."