by Random, Alex
But he paused suddenly, turning back to the window, having caught the faint suspicion of movement somewhere below in the shadows hemming in the open stretch of lawns and flower beds. A pale shadow was moving through the deceptive gloom and he spotted it instantly, narrowing his eyes as he tried to make out details.
One of the regular guards, he told himself, and was about to turn away when he saw one of the regular guards appearing from the shadows on the opposite side of the garden and marching steadily along the path that led to the far wall. The figure that had first attracted Alston’s attention faded silently into deep shadow almost below his window.
Alston moved quickly across the room and opened the door that led into Anders’s apartment. He crossed to Ander’s bedroom and tapped at the door. When there was no reply he opened the door and peered into the room, finding it deserted, and Anders’s bed had not been slept in. Moving quickly, Alston went back to his own room and crossed to the window. He peered around, keeping back from the open window to conceal his presence.
The regular guard was still in sight, but disappeared along the path of his patrol even as Alston saw him. There was no sign of the apparent prowler, and Alston remained tensed and alert. A few moments later there was movement below and a figure moved out of cover and stood peering up at the windows. Alston eased back slowly, not wanting to give his presence away. He was tingling inside, for he sensed there was an unauthorised prowler in the gardens, and that he was probably the reason for the visit.
A moment later Alston heard the faint sounds of someone scaling the outside wall, and he risked a peep over the sill, moving slowly and carefully. The figure was climbing the drainpipe immediately to the left of the window, and Alston was certain he was the objective.
Easing back into the gloom of a nearby corner, he waited with clenched hands, his feelings mixed. If he were the target then someone had access to good information, picking the exact window that led to Alston’s room. The silence was heavy, punctuated only by the ominous sounds of soft-soled feet against the wall. The scuffling sounds drew nearer, and a moment later the head and shoulders of the interloper showed in silhouette at the open window.
Alston tensed himself to leap into action. He meant to tackle this newcomer, and if he were part of the plot against him then he intended getting some truth, some of the facts that would enable him to prove his innocence and point the guilt in the direction where it belonged. There was hope inside him, and grim determination. He had nothing to lose and everything to gain, and this was one opportunity he would not dare to miss!
CHAPTER SEVEN
Alston held his breath as the man started climbing in through the window. It had been a long time since Alston had been in a position to need the use of violence against another human. In his days as a starship captain he had been called upon many times to fight in the name of the Federation. He had been well trained for the task, but all that was in the past, and four years as an exile had taken their toll of his keen edge. He flexed his hands and tensed, ready to move forward at what would be the most opportune moment.
The figure jumped into the room from the sill and straightened slowly. There was no way of seeing his features, Alston knew, for the moonlight was at his back and the room was in darkness. The man made a jerky movement with one hand, and Alston reeled back against the wall, lifting his hands to his eyes. A Blinder was being used, its muzzle pointed at the rumpled bed, and although he was not directly in front of the projector, Alston caught some of the power. He blinked rapidly, ready to launch himself forward in attack, but the stranger had caught his involuntary movement, and Alston opened his eyes, unable to see the man but aware that his presence was discovered. He lunged forward with outstretched hands, intent upon grappling for survival. But the Blinder flashed again and Alston fell to his knees, his vision gone and his balance overpowered. The next instant a heavy object slammed against his left temple and he fell headlong into a black pit that suddenly gaped before him. He knew nothing more as he slumped inertly and without sound upon the dark carpet …
When he recovered his senses, Alston found himself lying on his back, and sunlight was filtering down in golden shafts through the dense foliage over his head. For long moments he lay looking up at the trees around him, trying to recall his scattered wits. He was in a forest, and he didn’t know how he had got there or the reason for his presence. He felt strangely lethargic, weak and disorientated, and there was a trembling inside him which he associated with the after effects of a Blinder. As he thought about the weapon his memory began to return, until he was in complete possession of the incident that had occurred in his room.
Sitting up gingerly, he stared around bleakly, finding himself in a glade of the forest that stretched for miles inland from the coast. He was dressed in his park complex uniform, which he had not been wearing at the Governor’s! The thought hit him hard and he got uneasily to his feet, staring around, wondering at the explanation for this mystifying turn of events. How had he been transported from the Governor’s Palace without arousing the guards, and picking up a change of clothes en route?
His clothes had been collected from the play complex by the police who had accompanied Graham there the previous evening! The recollection came to Alston as he peered around. Helga had told him over the communicator! Graham again! It all pointed to the Security Chief! But what was the object of abducting him from safe custody at the palace to dump him in the middle of nowhere?
Alston looked around carefully, wondering if he would be attacked and murdered on the pretext of being an escaped prisoner! His dark eyes narrowed as he considered. That sounded like a trick Graham might try. But if they intended him to die they would not have left him alive. He would have been killed out of hand the instant they had got him clear of the palace.
He had no idea where he was, and looked around for a tree to climb. The green and blue foliage over his head shut out most of the sky, but sunlight was lancing down through the branches and he wondered how long he had lain unconscious. He picked a tree that looked taller than most of its companions and began to climb. He sweated almost from the beginning, and twice he was assailed by dizzy spells that almost had him dropping back to the forest floor. But he clung to the trunk and hung on for grim life until the mental gyrations ceased. Then he went on ascending, determined not to give up at any stage of this business that seemed loaded against him.
He climbed to the topmost branches and found himself peering out across an unlimited panorama of tree tops. No matter in which direction he gazed, he could make out nothing that looked like an identifiable landmark. But he could tell by the position of the sun which was north, and from that meagre information he worked out which way he would have to travel to get back to safety.
Back on the ground, he hesitated before setting out. If something unpleasant had been planned for him it would happen while he was in the forest, between this spot where he had regained his senses and the edge of the forest in the direction of the town. He would be expected to get his bearings and then make straight back to the Governor’s Palace. The thought hit him hard and he stood irresolute, wondering about the situation. He had to be right in suspecting a trap. There was no other logical reason for the way he had been brought out and left. They could have killed him with no effort or trouble before he regained his senses, but then it might have looked like murder. Now he was an exile who had escaped from custody, and his life was forfeit.
He considered for a long time, and finally was torn between the belief that a trap was waiting for him somewhere on the shortest route back to the palace or that it was intended he should be recaptured alive and as a penalty for his apparent escape, would be sent to one of the penal stars.
Again he searched for the motive behind the plot. He didn’t doubt that Captain Graham had a hand in it somewhere because his clothes had been taken by the police. He could only hope that Frank Anders would be able to uncover something significant.
He decided to make a
move towards the edge of the forest, following the shortest route. It had been a long time since he had been forced to use his survival instincts, but he had been well trained, and although he was slightly rusty in the art it was something that, when once learned, was never completely forgotten.
He sweated his way across the uneven forest floor, moving slowly at first, ready to dive into cover or fight his way out of trouble, although he was unarmed and at a great disadvantage, but he was desperate, and that made up for some of his other shortcomings.
Within the hour he was practically exhausted, and flung himself down at the foot of a tree and lay gasping for breath. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d taken so much violent physical exercise, and he was sadly out of condition. But he was satisfied with his progress, and the fact that he hadn’t been attacked by anyone obviously left in wait for him gave him a certain amount of confidence.
He guessed it was almost noon because the heat packed under the tree tops was sultry, insistent, and the shafts of brilliant light that speared down from above were almost perpendicular. He saw steam rising slowly from the moist ground, and was aware of the heavy silence that reigned about him. There was no movement amongst the bird and animal life that inhabited this area, and he was happy in the knowledge that the animals that existed were not large enough to harm an unarmed man.
He pushed on as soon as he had recovered his breath, and while he walked monotonously he wondered about the situation from other points of view. What would Frank Anders be thinking now, after discovering that Alston’s word about remaining at the palace had been broken? Had an alarm been raised for him? He pictured Carmel’s face, and wondered if she would give him up for lost after this apparent breach of faith. The girl had managed to get her father interested in his case, and now, when he had the perfect opportunity of pressing for an investigation which might disclose his innocence, he had apparently run away.
And what of Quillon Graham? Had he organised this so it would seem that his guilt was obvious by his flight? He fancied he had the right approach to Graham’s attitude. But he meant to circumvent this plot and prove Graham’s perfidy.
His thoughts were broken by the swish of a hovercar flying overhead. It was invisible because of the thick roof of foliage between him and the sky, but he halted instantly and flattened himself against the trunk of a tree. He followed the sound, turning his head slowly, and suddenly, in a small bright gap between two tree crowns, he saw briefly the shape and markings of a police vehicle.
Were they searching for him? He froze as he considered. He had expected a trap laid at ground level that would either kill him or take him prisoner, but if they were hunting for him by air it was possible they had orders to kill him on sight. But a hunt by air was less thorough than a ground patrol, and he discounted the fact while he waited for the craft’s next move.
The hovercar circled a wide area about him, and Alston did not move, aware that the police had instruments that could detect him by various methods from a considerable height. He scarcely breathed as he waited. But he drew some comfort from the fact that their instruments would be picking up the presence of forest animals, and they would be hard put to differentiate between an animal and himself, if he did not move.
The minutes passed by, and Alston was at a disadvantage because he could not hear the hovercar. It moved silently overhead, its shadow flitting intermittently through the gaps in the foliage. He fancied that they had picked up his presence by some means for they circled the area for a long time, obviously checking and rechecking.
Then he slowly became aware of a tingling sensation at the base of his skull. At first he ignored it, thinking it stemmed from fear or anticipation. But it became more intensive, and he realised that it could be some type of weapon aboard the hovercar. He fought down his first instinctive impulse to make a run for it. That was what they wanted, to get some definite movement on their screens. He crouched and curled up into a ball at the base of the tree, drawing his knees up to his chest and clenching his hands as he waited out the critical period.
The tingling in his skull increased to pain, and he gritted his teeth. It was going to get a whole lot worse before it ended, he realised, and closed his eyes and sweated silently under the torture.
Suddenly there was a crackling sound within yards of him and he started up in fear, staring around, expecting to see policemen closing in upon him, but a deer-like animal, obviously affected by the invisible rays of the machine on the hovercar, leaped into view and started quickly through the trees, making for a clearing fifty yards away.
Alston clenched his teeth as he fought his desire to follow the animal. Anything would be preferable to the agony throbbing inside his skull. But he waited, and his narrowed eyes followed the movements of the frantic animal. It reached the clearing, and in a couple of bounds would have passed through it and vanished in the undergrowth on the far side. But it was in the open and in mid-bound when a darting beam of light stabbed down from the sky and struck it. Alston was startled, and before he could accept what happened, the deer was slithering on its side, apparently dead.
He watched while the hovercar slowly descended beneath the trees, and it hovered a couple of feet above the deer. Alston could see the occupants of the vehicle quite clearly, and he tightened his lips when he recognised one of them as Captain Graham. But the police inspected the deer, hovered for a few more tense moments, then lifted and disappeared.
Alston took a deep breath. The pain had gone from his head now and he could breathe freely. They had obviously picked up his presence on their screen, and probably the deer as well, and having got the deer they must have thought his presence signified the mate of the deer they had caught. Probably they felt that he could not be around in such close proximity to one of the cautious deer-like creatures.
Minutes passed and Alston did not move. He realised now that he could not follow his original plan. If he took the shortest route back to the palace without allowing for trouble then he would surely be caught, and it seemed as if Graham was playing for keeps. That deer hadn’t been stunned. It looked as if it were dead!
He worked it out that Graham was handling him within the letter of the law. It looked as if he had escaped from the palace and proved his guilt by running. He was now a fugitive exile, and could expect to be killed on sight. In the past when an exile had become a fugitive, posses of men had tracked him down and killed him without compunction. He realised that he was subject to the same harsh law, and for a moment he was too afraid to follow his original plan. His only chance seemed to be running from this spot and losing himself in the wilds. There were a number of exiles who had successfully eluded recapture, and they were probably living wild in the more desolate regions.
But he could not run! He had to get back to the two friends he felt he could trust — Carmel and Frank Anders. If he explained to them what had happened they might be able to help him prove that Graham was still intent upon getting rid of him. But he could not make straight for the palace. Graham would be desperate now to finish him as quickly as possible, and all available forces would be called in to help.
He was still wondering at the reasons for Graham’s enmity when the stricken deer in the clearing suddenly writhed and came back to consciousness. It leaped up, stood for a few moments in uncertain fashion, then staggered away through the trees. Alston watched it, tight-lipped and grim. At least they were not intent upon killing him on sight! That increased his chances a little.
But he did not move! He would only walk into trouble, and he felt that his best chance would come after dark. It meant lying still in the heavy atmosphere of the forest for many hours, but his life was at stake and he could not afford to take any risks. He settled down, and occupied his mind with a series of mental checks upon the situation from all angles.
Time dragged by and the heat grew even more intense during the long hours of the afternoon. Twice in that time he saw the silent shadow of a hovercar flitting across the clearing
, but there appeared to be no danger to him, and he lay sweating motionlessly.
After what seemed a lifetime he noticed shadows filtering in under the trees, and some of the pressure seemed to go out of him. He was ravenously hungry and parched right through, but he bore his discomforts stoically, knowing that he had to do exactly the opposite of what was expected of him. He could imagine that Graham was getting worried now because he hadn’t been found, and if that was any advantage to him then he meant to cling to it as long as he could.
Full darkness came and Alston forced himself to his feet. He found himself unsteady and a bit light-headed, but now was the time to move. He knew the direction he wanted to go, but felt it would be dangerous to take it. Yet he could not detour because there was a real danger of losing himself. He thinned his lips and started in the direction that was the nearest route, the one he would be expected to take, and after a few yards his stiffness vanished and he found he could push on quickly.
But his physical condition was against him, he soon discovered, and within the hour he was staggering wearily, fighting his way through more tangled undergrowth than he had previously encountered. He lurched from trunk to trunk, using his hands to maintain his balance, and occasionally he caught a glimpse of the sky and checked his direction by the stars. As an ex-starship captain he had instinctively made a study of the night sky, and knew how to plot a course from the stars. He was thankful now for the ability, and it helped keep him on the right course. But the going was difficult and his pace became slower. His nervousness had been dispelled by his discomfort, and now he no longer cared about recapture.
