Shouts and footsteps rang in the corridors outside the dungeon. The chateau intercom crackled, and then Dr. Maunchaun's voice rattled through it.
Neither Solo nor Illya bothered to listen. They knew that they were on camera, but this no longer mattered.
Solo went all the way through the window. Then he turned, hooked his toe over the outer sill and sprawled inward, reaching out his arms as far as they would go.
Inside the dungeon, Illya stood on his toes, stretching his arms upward tautly.
Solo's hands struck hard against his, fingers clasped around his wrists. Then Illya scrambled upward, using his ties against the rough wall while Solo wriggled himself through the window, drawing Illya after him.
The chateau grounds were black in the dark hour before dawn. But as Illya and Solo sprang from the wall shrubbery dozens of flood lights erupted from everywhere, blasting the lawn with light.
They heard the dungeon door thrown open as Illya wriggled free. Men shouted from the yard, from parapets. Distantly dogs yowled. Somewhere in the darkness a gun fired. A man swore, and the shooting ceased.
Solo and Illya crouched in the concealment of the shrubbery. Solo pointed toward a car in the drive. "Run for it!"
He did not wait to see if Illya heard. Bent low, he sprinted to ward the drive. He took fifteen giant steps and then sprawled face down in the grass at the precise moment guns fired from the parapets.
He glanced over his shoulder, crawling frantically in the grass. Illya was not with him.
Gunfire sounded and bullets splatted into the sod around him. He had to keep moving.
Something flickered, and from the corner of his eye he saw Illya racing toward one of the red midget helicopters roosting on the lawn.
He came up on his knee, ran, fell forward, rolled over, came up to his feet and threw himself in against a Fiat as the rifles barked, snapping at his heels.
He rolled under the car, the gravel biting into him. Armed men ran from the house. He heard Illya yell, saw the men turn, racing toward the copters.
He reached up, opened the door on the side away from the house. He pulled himself up into the car, let the door close quietly.
There was no key in the switch. He was not disappointed or even delayed, because he had not expected one.
Using a strip of metal, he reached under the dash, shorted the ignition, pressing the starter. The little car shook itself, coming alive.
Solo already had the car in gear before he pulled himself up under the steering wheel.
He saw men racing from the house. They fired with their small arms, the bullets shattering windows, embedding in the metal. The car lurched forward into the drive. He stepped down hard on the gas.
Other and larger cars were already in pursuit before he reached the opened gate and turned out on the highway, headed toward Paris.
He could hear the gunfire back there. But he felt empty, knowing they were no longer shooting at him. They were shooting at Illya. And he knew something else. Illya had run toward those parked copters in order to give him a chance of escape.
He glanced in the rear-view mirror. Other cars came racing out of the driveway. They skidded almost off the shoulders, righting them selves.
With a sense of frustration, Solo pressed the accelerator to the floor. Ahead he saw the faint lights of Paris.
He came around a wide curve, banking. Car horns blared and he skidded past a truck. His pursuers had to slow, and one of them went careening off the roadway.
Solo gripped the wheel, silently begging five more miles of speed from the Fiat.
Checking his rear-view mirror, he found the cars on his trail again.
He saw side roads whirled past on the wind in transit, knowing that he could lose the larger cars only by hitting these side roads.
It was too risky. He saw a truck pulling out of a cross-road ahead.
Timing it exactly, holding his breath, he whipped the little car to the left, directly in front of the horrified driver.
He pressed down on the gas going in front of the truck with only inches to spare.
As he'd hoped, the truck driver panicked, stalled the truck. When he looked back, a crowd was gathering in the avenue, but his pursuers were unable to get past.
By the time the truck was moved, he had gained a precious mile on the men back there. As he neared the market places of Paris, the traffic increased.
But they were back there. He whipped around a corner, climbed a steep, cobbled hill, plunged downward, horns yapping at him.
When he checked his mirror, the larger cars were still trailing him.
He jerked the car around a corner, slammed on the brakes. He was already out of it as it rolled to stop in a no-parking zone.
He ran across the walk, plunged into a kiosk, going downward, racing toward a slowing Metro on the underground tracks.
FOUR
ILLYA SAW he was not going to make it to the midget choppers.
Men with attack hounds came running from beyond the small helicopters in the early morning. Their shadows lunged in the flood lights, ravenous upon the grass.
Marksmen fired from the chateau parapets.
Illya hit the ground, rolling toward the sorry protection of a lilac bush. He lay a moment, panting like a fox. Sounds battered inside his skull. He heard the yowling of the dogs, the raging of men, the gunfire, the sound of cars coughing to life, racing on the drive.
He grinned faintly, knowing that Solo had made it that far at least.
He saw the dogs running toward him. They were still beyond the copters. Other men came from the driveway, and more from the veranda at the front of the chateau.
He made up his mind. The nearest protection was the window in the dungeon. He had accomplished most of his objective. He had caused enough diversion to enable Solo to get into a car and off the grounds.
He came lithely up to his knees. He faked toward the 'copters. When the gunmen wheeled their guns that way, he reversed himself; crouching low, he raced back to the shrubbery at the dungeon window.
He drew a long breath and at the last possible moment dove the remaining few feet into the shrubbery. He stuck his head into the blasted window space and almost bumped heads with a startled guard on a ladder inside the dungeon.
In an instinctive reflex action, Illya thrust out his hand in a stiff-arm motion, catching the man under the chin. He shoved as hard as he could.
He was already scrambling back into the shrubbery, scrambling through it along the wall.
The dogs were nearer; the shouting of the men sounded as if they were in the hedge growth with him. He freed a friction-bomb pellet, set himself and threw it with all his strength at the window. More stones shattered and sprayed in fragments.
For the space of three breaths, everything ceased on the yard.
Illya did not wait to enjoy his small victory. He crawled as fast as he could on all fours along the inside of the shrubbery.
Ahead were gunmen on a small veranda. Setting himself, Illya tossed a small pellet. The explosion rocked the yard, knocked the sentries off their feet.
Illya was over the low wall almost before the debris settled.