This mental reminder that in seizing the car he had also acquired a police radio caused Mowry to switch it on. At once it came to life.
“Car Ten. Suspect claims he was examining parked cars because he’s completely forgotten where he’s left his own. He is unsteady, his speech is slurred and he smells of zith-but he may be putting on an act.”
“Bring him in, Car Ten,” ordered Alapertane H.Q.
Soon afterward Car Nineteen asked for help in ringing a waterfront warehouse, reason not stated. Three cars were ordered to rush there at once.
Mowry turned the two-way switch to get the other channel. It was silent a long time before it said, “K-car. Waltagan calling. A seventh has now entered house.”
A voice rasped back, “You’d better wait. The other two may turn up yet.”
That sounded as if some unfortunate household was going to suffer a late-night raid by the Kaitempi. The motive was anyone’s guess but it did not necessarily have anything to do with the finding of Sagramatholou’s dyno. The Kaitempi could and would snatch anyone for reasons known only to themselves; they could draft any citizen into the ranks of D.A.G. merely by declaring him in. The Kaitempi could do anything they pleased—except smack down a wasp, push away a Spakum space-fleet or win a war.
He switched back to the police channel because over that would come the howl of fury about a missing cruizer. The radio continued to mutter about suspects, fugitives, this, that or the other car, go here, go there and soforth. Mowry ignored the gab while he gave his full attention to driving at the best speed he could make.
When twenty-five den from Alapertane the radio yelped as the big long-range transmitter in Pertane itself let go with a powerful bellow.
“General call. Car Four stolen from Alapertane police. Last seen racing south on main road to Valapan. May now be passing through area P6-P7.”
Replies came promptly from all cruizers within or near the designated area. There were eleven. The Pertane transmitter started moving them around like pieces on a chess-board, using coded map-references that meant nothing to the listener. One thing seemed certain: if he kept to the main Valapan road it wouldn’t be long before a cruizer spotted him and caused every car within range to converge upon him. To take to minor roads and tracks wouldn’t help any; they’d expect a trick like that and perhaps even now were taking steps to counter it.
He could dump the car on the other side of a field, all its lights out, and take to foot—in which case they would not find it before daylight tomorrow. But unless he could grab another car he’d be faced with a walk that would last all night and all next day, perhaps longer if he was forced to take cover frequently.
Listening to the calls still coming over the air, and irritated by the mysterious map-references, it struck him that this systematic concentration of the search was based on the supposition that if a suspect flees in a given direction at a given average speed he must be within a given area at a given time. This area had a radius plenty large enough to allow for turnoffs and detours. All they needed to do was bottle all the exits and then run along every road within the trap.
Suppose they did just that and found nothing? Ten to one they’d jump to a couple of alternative conclusions: the fugitive had never entered the area because he had reversed direction and now was racing northward, or else he had made far better speed than expected, had got right through the district before the trap closed and now was southward of it. Either way they’d remove the local pressure, switch the chase nearer to Valapan or northward of Alapertane.
He whizzed past a sideroad before he saw it, braked, reversed, went forward into it. A faint glow strengthened above a rise farther along the road he’d just left. Tearing along the badly rutted sideroad while the distant glow sharpened in brilliance, he waited until the last moment before stopping and switching off his own lights.
In total darkness he sat there while a pair of blazing head-lamps came over the hill. Automatically his hand opened the door and he made ready to bolt if the lamps should slow down and enter his own road.
The oncomer approached the junction, stopped.
Mowry got out, stood by his car with gun held ready and legs tensed. The next moment the other car surged forward along its own road, dimmed into the distance and was gone. There was no way of telling whether it had been a hesitant civilian or a police patrol on the rampage. If the latter, they must have looked up the gloom-wrapped sideroad and seen nothing to tempt them into it. They’d get round to that in due time. Finding nothing on the major roads they’d eventually take to the minor ones.
Breathing heavily, Mowry got back behind the wheel, switched on his lights, made good pace onward. Before long he reached a farm, paused to look it over. Its yard and out-buildings adjoined the farmhouse in which thin gleams of light showed the occupants to be still awake. Leaving the place, he pushed on.
He checked two more farms before finding one suitable for his purpose. The house stood in complete darkness and its barn was some distance from it. With dimmed lights, moving slowly and quietly, he drove through the muddy yard, along a narrow lane, stopped under the open end of the barn. Leaving the car he climbed atop the hay and lay there.
Over the next four hours the shine of distant headlights swept repeatedly all around. Twice a car rocked and plunged along the sideroad, passed the farm without stopping. Both times he sat up in the hay, took out his gun. Evidently it did not occur to the hunters that he might park within the trap. On Jaimec fugitives from the police or Kaitempi did—not behave like that—given a headstart they kept running good and hard.
Gradually surrounding activity died down and ceased. Mowry got back into the cruizer, resumed his run. It was now three hours to dawn. If all went well he’d make it to the rim of the forest before daybreak.
The Pertane transmitter was still broadcasting orders made incomprehensible by use of symbols but responses from various cruizers now came through with much less strength. He couldn’t decide whether or not this fading of radio signals was an encouraging sign. It was certain that the transmitting cars were a good distance away but there was no knowing how many might be nearer and maintaining silence. Knowing full well that he was able to listen-in to their calls, the enemy was crafty enough to let some cars play possum.
Whether or not some cruizers were hanging around and saying nothing, he managed to get undetected to within nine den of his destination before the car gave up. It was tearing through a cutting that led to the last, dangerous stretch of main road when the green telltale light amid the instruments faded and went out. At the same time the headlamps extinguished and the radio died. The car rolled a short distance under its own momentum and stopped.
Examining the switch, he could find nothing wrong with it. The emergency switch on the floorboard didn’t work either. After a good deal of fumbling in the dark he managed to detach one of the intake leads and tried shorting it to the earth terminal. This should have produced a thin thread of blue light. It didn’t.
It signified only one thing: the power broadcast from the capital had been cut off. Every car within considerable radius of Pertane had been halted, police and Kaitempi cruizers included. Only vehicles within potency range of other, faraway power transmitters could continue running—unless those also had ceased to radiate.
Leaving the car, he started to trudge the rest of the way. He reached the main road; moved along it at fast pace while keeping his eyes skinned for armed figures waiting ahead to challenge any walker in the night.
After half an hour a string of lights bloomed far behind him and to his ears came the muffled whine of many motors. Scrambling off the road, he fell into an unseen ditch, climbed out of it, sought refuge amid a bunch of low but thick bushes. The lights came nearer, shot past.