Two Hawks said, “What are you talking about?”

Raske told him. It was as Two Hawks had feared. The worrywart in charge of assembly had not been reassured enough. After agonizing for a long time, he had tried again to get hold of Raske. This time, he succeeded in reaching the German, who was at a party given by the Kassandras’ wife. As soon as Raske was told about the auxiliaries, he had guessed Two Hawks’ purpose.

“I’m not going to say anything to anybody about this,” Raske said. “I like you. What’s more important, I need you. So you’re getting off easily. But you’re going to have less freedom. You’ll follow a schedule to the minute; I’ll know where you are and what you’re doing every second of the day and night.”

Raske paused. Two Hawks did not reply. With a slightly plaintive tone, the German resumed.

“Why do you want to run off? You’ve got it made here. Blodland can’t give you a thing. Besides, Blodland is doomed. It’ll be conquered by this time next year.”

“I’m just not sympatico with the Perkunishans,” Two Hawks said. “They remind me of the Germans too much.”

“You red-skinned swine!”

Raske stopped again. Two Hawks could hear him breathing heavily. Then, “One more trick, and you go to the firing squad! Or to the torture chamber! Do you understand me?”

“I get you,” Two Hawks said. “Anything else? I want to get back to bed.”

Surprisingly, Raske laughed. “You’re a cool one. I like that. Very well. You will leave your suite at exactly 6 a.m. and will report to the airfield commander as soon as you arrive. Moreover, your slave Kwasind, is to be restricted to the suite. I’ll notify your guards at once. Another thing. If you don’t behave, your little blonde playmate will be taken away. Got it?”

“Got it,” Two Hawks said. He hung up.

13

He repeated Raske’s conversation to Kwasind. The giant listened without change of expression. He said, “What now?”

“It’s now or never. We can’t go out the front way, so we’ll use the back.”

Kwasind looked puzzled. Two Hawks said, “Out the window. You try playing Hercules with the steel bars of my bedroom window. I’ll wake Ilmika.”

Five minutes later, he and Ilmika entered his bedroom. She was in the uniform of an officer of the Perkunishan Imperial Air Force. Her cap sat snugly on her head, since she had cut off her long hair.

Kwasind had torn one bar out of its stone socket and was bending another. The two watched him in awe. Slowly, the inch-thick steel curved. Kwasind, face impassive and free of strain, feet braced against the wall, pulled. Just before the separation of the bar ends from the stone, he lowered his feet to the floor. Now the lower part of his body was against the wall, and the upper part bowed outwards. Screeching, the steel tore loose. Kwasind caught himself, bent his knees, half-turned. He placed the bar on the carpet and grinned.

“We can squeeze through now.”

They cut strips from the bedsheets and knotted the ends together. They had just enough material to make a strong, double-thick rope which reached from the third-story window to about five feet from the ground. Two Hawks scanned the broad street and sidewalk below. There was no one in sight. However, he knew that a sentinel was stationed at the north exit, to their right. He was on the other side of a massive pillar. Unless he stepped out on to the great portico, he would not see the white ribbon hanging along the outer wall.

“Stick that bar in your belt,” Two Hawks said to Kwasind. “I’ll take the other. We might need them.”

He went through the window first. He slid out without hesitation, having tested the security of the knot at the upper end. This was tied to a bedpost. Hand under hand, he descended swiftly. When he dropped to the ground, he looked around. No one had appeared on the street yet. Umika followed him a minute later, then, Kwasind.

Two Hawks led them down the street, away from the guard at the north door. He wanted a car, but they walked four long blocks—over a mile—before they found one. Rather, it almost found them. A glare of headlights from a sidestreet warned them just in time. They ran into a deep doorway and pressed against the door to be as far as possible in the shadow. Two Hawks decided he would have to risk a peek. The car sounded as if it were traveling slowly enough for him to run up to it and jump upon the running board.

He looked and saw the white body of a topless car and the image of a knight in armour with raised sword on its hood. It was a police car with three men in it. He told Kwasind what to do. Both had the bars in their hands. The hood of the vehicle drew even with the doorway. Two Hawks said, “Now!” He ran out with the bar held slantwise in front of him, Kwasind even with him.

The patrolmen had been talking. They stopped, rigid and speechless for a second with surprise. Then the driver slammed on the brakes when he should have stepped on the accelerator. Two Hawks leaped up into the top of the rear door and hurled himself at the man sitting in the rear seat. He swung the steel bar as he did so. The patrolman stood up and raised his rifle to parry the blow.

There was a clung as the bar drove against the gun barrel. Both fell on the seat with Two Hawks on top.

Two Hawks, using the bar as a sword, jammed its end into the man’s mouth. A rifle exploded, almost in his ear, but if it had been aimed at him it had missed.

The patrolman’s teeth broke. Two Hawks got to a kneeling position on the man’s chest and leaned his weight on the bar. It entered the throat, and, despite the frenzied efforts of the patrolman to push it out, remained there. His eyes bulged; his face darkened. Suddenly, he quit struggling.

Two Hawks held the bar until he was certain the man was dead. He rose, took the bar out, and turned his attention to the others. Kwasind had no need of him. The driver was lying on his side on the seat, his neck was broken by a blow from Kwasind’s bar. The other, the man who had fired the rifle, had been knocked out of the car. He, too, was dead, strangled by Kwasind.

“You hit?” Two Hawks said.

“His rifle went off as I knocked it downwards,” Kwasind said. “I’m all right.”

Two Hawks looked up and down the street. If anyone had heard the gunfire, they were making no outcry about it. He dragged the corpse off the back seat and on to the pavement. While he restarted the motor and became acquainted with the controls, Kwasind dragged all three bodies into the doorway. A few minutes later, armed with revolvers and single-shot rifles, they drove off. Two Hawks followed the route taken to the airfield every morning. Twice, they passed patrol cars going the other way. The drivers tooted at them, Two Hawks tooted back, and that was all. Two Hawks asked Kwasind if he knew where the Blodlandish agents were located. He had some hope that they could be used to make a diversion, as originally planned. Kwasind replied that his contact had refused to give him that information.

“Then we’ll have to do this by ourselves—The Lonesome Three. The only trouble is, we’re way ahead of schedule. I’ll bet that worrywart officer went back to the hanger and had the auxiliary tanks removed. That means we’ll have to land once to refuel before we get to the coast. If the Blodlandish don’t have the gas ready, we’re screwed.”

“Maybe we ought to worry about getting into the air first,” Kwasind said. Two Hawks glanced at him. The panel light showed him the giant’s usual stolid expression. However, his face gleamed with sweat. Two Hawks smiled. He doubted that the perspiration was caused by exertions or nervousness from the fight with the patrolmen. Kwasind had been more than uneasy when told how they would escape. Brave and cool in combat on the ground, he was terrified at the idea of flying. He had not said so, but his questions and a rigidity whenever the subject came up betrayed him.