"Climb over into the back and drop down behind my seat," Templar ordered as the speedometer needle quivered around the dial once more and the noise of the wind blasting in through the holed screen rose to a scream.
"Daddy, please…" Susan began. "There are four of them and…"
"Get back there!" her father shouted. "And keep your head down!"
Meekly, Susan complied. When she was crouching in the narrow well behind him, he called over his shoulder, "Did you see their gun? Was it like mine, with a revolving chamber? Or was it an automatic with a magazine in the butt?"
"I don't know… I… I think it was like yours. Yes, it was."
He nodded and stamped the pedal flat to the floor. The needle mounted inexorably towards the 200 mark as the motor bellowed its challenge into the night. Lights flashed past them on the eastbound carriageway. They howled towards the dark bulk of a truck festooned with red position lights, roared past it, and caught the distant Volkswagen in the beams of their headlamps.
When they were a hundred yards behind the pale green car, Templar throttled back the BMW and stayed in position, swinging the coupe from side to side of the roadway as the dazzling high beams of his lamps raked the fugitive. The Volkswagen was swaying on the wet road surface, rising and falling on its swing axle suspension as the driver coaxed the last ounce of power from the robustly willing motor.
"What are you doing?" Susan called from her unsighted position on the floor.
"Trying to draw their fire," her father replied. "Too dangerous to come alongside while they have two loaded guns in there! But there are only six shots in mine – and if theirs is a revolver too, there can't be more than eight at the most in that. They already used two!"
He swerved violently out towards the center of the road as orange flame stabbed the dark again from each side of the VW. A second time – and a third – the unseen marksmen fired. Fragments of glass erupted inwards from the BMW's shattered screen. Somewhere in front, metal spanged loudly beneath the hood. Templar set his teeth and swung the car again.
A road sign swam up from the dark, flashed past, and was lost in the night. Delmenhorsi, Bremen – 5000 m. They were cutting it fine! After the sixth fusillade spat fire towards them, the colonel accelerated brusquely, sending the BMW careering forward to surge alongside the slower car. There were no more shots from the near side, but a seventh blazed towards them from the lowered rear on the off side. This time, the report was clearly audible and it was instantly drowned in a louder, sharper detonation as the coupe's right tire exploded and wrenched the steering wheel from Templar's hands. The coupe swooped out of control to the right and its fender slammed with shattering force into the side of the Volkswagen just behind the door.
With a shriek of tortured metal the two cars, locked together, slewed across the hard shoulder, spun crazily onto the grass, and came to rest halfway up an earth bank with a clang of twisted steel and the splintering of glass. Breathless with the impact which had jammed the wheel against his chest, Templar thrust open the wide door and allowed himself to fall out on to the wet ground. His gun was already in his hand.
"Keep down!" he yelled to Susan as he crawled towards the crumpled front of his car.
"Daddy!" the terrified girl screamed suddenly from behind him. "Look out…! Behind you!"
The army man flung himself around into a sitting position. The lights of the wrecked BMW had been extinguished in the collision but the Volkswagen's still canted uselessly up into the sky. In the dim back reflection from the beams, he saw the sinister figure of Heinz clambering onto the curved roof of the vehicle. The light glistened dully on the barrel of the revolver pointing straight at him over the hood of his own car. Templar's right hand flashed up gripping the tiny target pistol. Fully extending his arm, he pressed the trigger.
There was a stab of orange-blue flame, a sharp coughing explosion, and the German youth staggered back clutching his arm and fell to the ground as the heavy revolver spun away into the dark. The steel jacketed slug had caught the cylinder of the gun and torn it from his numbed hand!
The colonel scrambled to his feet. Klaus and Stefan were advancing menacingly towards him around the battered front of the coupe. Each of them held a squat, leather-covered blackjack in his upraised hand. Okay, Templar thought grimly, pocketing his gun and preparing for the next attack. When outnumbered in a rough-house, go back to first principles. Dispose of at least one adversary before the fight has really started. It gives the opposition a false sense of your strength and at the same time reduces the odds!
As the thought formed in his mind, his trained eyes spotted an opportunity. Stefan had approached a shade too close to him… Quick as an adder's tongue, his left foot snaked out to connect with the boy's kneecap, Stefan howled with pain and jack-knifed nearer as his body involuntarily doubled up. Templar elbowed the youth's jaw, judo fashion, and whirled to meet Klaus, dodging to one side as the wicked blackjack thudded agonizingly into the muscle of his shoulder. As Stefan slumped to the ground, the American's fist thudded to the bulky youth's jaw but Klaus simply shook himself and the hand holding the blackjack again.
Heinz had now reappeared with a length of bicycle chain dangling from his good hand. Templar had just time to dance out and lance three lefts to Klaus' body before the chain flailed out at him like an iron whip. Instinctively, he threw up a protective arm, which kept the murderous weapon from connecting with his head, but even so it seared across his bicep, the pain robbing him of breath and numbing the arm from shoulder to wrist. Agony flamed behind his eyes as the blackjack slammed into his neck. And then Stefan was in the fight again, hanging on to his undamaged arm, pummeling and striking against his inner thigh. As he managed with a supreme effort to wrest his arm free and jolt the elbow back against solid flesh, he saw from the corner of his eye a faint gleam of light reflected on the chain as it was flourished again.
There was another flare of pain as the blackjack struck his head – and then he gave a great upwards heave… to go abruptly limp at its zenith and plummet to the wet earth. He heard an anguished yelp as the chain found an unintended victim, and then he was hurling himself sideways against Heinz's legs, grasping them above the knees as he went. For a moment the German teetered upright, and then he came down on Templar.
When her father was hurled across the hood of the car, Susan started up, her hand flying to her mouth and it was then she saw the shadowy figure scrambling hastily up the bank with three heavy camera cases slung over its shoulder on straps. Lisa was getting away with the incriminating films!
Without another thought, the teenager shouldered open the door and dashed after her. There was a ploughed field at the top of the bank and the fleeing blonde was already some way ahead, her slender body a blur against the night. The ground was soft and full of clay, drenched by the rains of the past few days, and the sticky clods adhering to the high heels of her boots, allied to the hampering effect of the tight leather skirt, impeded Susan's progress as she squelched frenziedly in pursuit. Finally, however, her lungs bursting, the young American overtook the escaping girl and flung herself in a football tackle at her pounding legs. Lisa crashed to the wet earth with all the breath knocked from her body. Dragging herself to her hands and knees, covered with mud, Susan grappled with her but she was unprepared for the fury of the German girl's assault. Nails raked viciously across Susan's cheek. A bony knee slammed savagely into her belly.