The Last Place on Earth | Page 7

he was headed.
Up above he saw the shelter of shadows from a cluster of half-finished buildings. He drove into them and parked.
Collins sat still for a moment, then threw open the door and ran around to the back of the truck, jerking open the handles.
Nancy fell out into his arms.
"What kind of ambulance is this?" she demanded. "It doesn't look like an ambulance. It doesn't smell like an ambulance. It looks like--looks like--"
Collins said, "Shut up. Get out of there. We've got to hide."
"Why?"
"They think I murdered you."
"Murdered me? But I'm alive. Can't they see I'm alive?"
Collins shook his head. "I doubt it. I don't know why, but I don't think it would be that simple. Come with me."
The blood on her breast had dried, and he could see it was only a shallow groove dug by the bullet. But she flinched in pain as she began to walk, pulling the muscles.
They stopped and leaned against a half-finished metallic shed.
"Where are we? Where are you taking me?"
"This is the spaceport. Now shut up."
"Let me go."
"No."
"I'm not dead," Nancy insisted. "You know I'm not dead. I won't press charges against you--just let me go free."
"I told you it wasn't that simple. He wants them to think you're dead, and that's what they'll think."
Nancy passed fingers across her eyes. "Who? Who are you talking about?"
"Doc Candle. He won't let them know you're alive."
Nancy rubbed her forehead with both hands. "Sam, you don't know what you're doing. You don't--know what you're getting yourself into. Just let me show myself to someone. They'll know I'm not dead. Really they will."
"Okay," he said. "Let's find somebody."
He led her toward a more nearly completed building, showing rectangles of light. They looked through the windows to see several men in uniforms bending over blueprints on a desk jury-rigged of sawhorses and planks.
"Sam," Nancy said, "one of those men is Terry Elston. He's a Waraxe boy. I went to school with him. He'll know me. Let's go in...."
"No," Collins said. "We don't go in."
"But--" Nancy started to protest, but stopped. "Wait. He's coming out."
Collins slid along the wall and stood behind the door. "Tell him who you are when he comes out. I'll stay here."
They waited. After a few seconds, the door opened.
Nancy stepped into the rectangle of light thrown on the concrete from the window.
"Terry," she said. "Terry, it's me--Nancy Comstock."
The blue-jawed young man in uniform frowned. "Who did you say you were? Have you got clearance from this area?"
"It's me, Terry. Nancy. Nancy Comstock."
Terry Elston stepped front and center. "That's not a very good joke. I knew Nancy. Hell of a way to die, killed by some maniac."
"Terry, I'm Nancy. Don't you recognize me?"
Elston squinted. "You look familiar. You look a little like Nancy. But you can't be her, because she's dead."
"I'm here, and I tell you I'm not dead."
"Nancy's dead," Elston repeated mechanically. "Say, what are you trying to pull?"
"Terry, behind you. A maniac!"
"Sure," Elston said. "Sure. There's a maniac behind me."
Collins stepped forward and hit Elston behind the ear. He fell silently.
Nancy stared down at him.
"He refused to recognize me. He acted like I was crazy, pretending to be Nancy Comstock."
"Come on along," Collins urged. "They'll probably shoot us on sight as trespassers."
She looked around herself without comprehension.
"Which way?"
"This way."
Collins did not say those words.
They were said by the man with the gun in the uniform like the one worn by Elston. He motioned impatiently.
"This way, this way."
* * * * *
"No priority," Colonel Smith-Boerke said as he paced back and forth, gun in hand.
From time to time he waved it threateningly at Collins and Nancy who sat on the couch in Smith-Boerke's office. They had been sitting for close to two hours. Collins now knew the Colonel did not intend to turn him over to the authorities. They were being held for reasons of Smith-Boerke's own.
"They sneak the ship in here, plan for an unscheduled hop from an uncompleted base--the strictest security we've used in ten or fifteen years--and now they cancel it. This is bound to get leaked by somebody! They'll call it off. It'll never fly now."
Collins sat quietly. He had been listening to this all evening. Smith-Boerke had been drinking, although it wasn't very obvious.
Smith-Boerke turned to Collins.
"I've been waiting for somebody like you. Just waiting for you to come along. And here you are, a wanted fugitive, completely in my power! Perfect, perfect."
Collins nodded to himself. Of course, Colonel Smith-Boerke had been waiting for him. And Doc Candle had driven him right to him. It was inescapable. He had been intended to escape and turn up right here all along.
"What do you want with me?"
Smith-Boerke's flushed face brightened. "You want to become a hero? A hero so big that all these trumped-up charges against you will be dropped? It'll