Edward Llewellyn - Prelude to Chaos

I still hated the man. I would still kill him if I could. But not at the cost of my own life—or Judith’s. I looked around, snatched up my body-belt and buckled it on. In it were my badge and my money. “We’ve got to get out of here. Together. But we’ll have to wait till it’s dark.”

“We can’t wait! Futrell recognized you. They’re coming after you now.”

There were heavy steps on the stairs and the door was flung open. In the doorway stood two of Anslinger’s cronies; both Elders and both armed. Men who had previously shown me respect. Their attitude held no respect for me now.

But they were still uncertain. One stepped forward to glare at Judith. “What are you doing in the Bachelor Cloister, woman?”

“Let her go, Jason!” said the other. “Mister Knox, Deacon Anslinger wants to see you at once. Come with Us!” He looked at Judith. “You’d better get out of this buHding quickly. A woman can get into bad trouble for being found in bachelor quarters.”

She glanced at me and I caught her quick nod. We were back in unison. I shrugged and started down the stairs, the two Elders behind me. Judith came last, sobbing for the benefit of Jason.

At the foot of the stairs I swung around, grabbed Jason’s shirt, and pitched him forward, adding a neck-chop as he fell. Judith had thrown her arms round the second Elder, preventing him from drawing his gun. I hit him twice and flung him on top of Jason. Then I glanced out of the front door. The agents who had been in the limousine with Futrell were standing around it, waiting for us.

“Out back!” I called to Judith. We went through the ground-floor lounge, out of the window, and away into the maze of narrow streets among the boxlike married quarters.

There I stopped, recovering my full sanity. There was now no hope of my getting close enough to Futrell to shoot him. He must have recognized me. Anslinger had sent his thugs after me. What was going on between Sherando and the Attorney General? And how was I going to get Judith out of the mess I’d landed her in? The Elders hadn’t come for her. But if she was caught with me she’d suffer with me.

She tugged my arm. “Gav—wait here! Trust me.” And she darted away up the alley.

There was nothing else I could do. The whole Settlement would soon be isolated and searched. There was nowhere we could hide. And what the hell was Judy up to?

The lane was strewn with bags of garbage waiting collection. A biker appeared round the comer and came weaving among them like a skier running the gates in a grand slalom. I jumped back into, the shelter of a yard as it skidded to a halt. The visor went up. It was Judith.

A black jacket, full helmet, and opaque visor had made her as anonymous and menacing as any other biker. She reached back to unhook another dark-visored helmet and thrust it at me. “Ram this on!”

I stared at the bike. “What’s this thing?”

“A Yama Five Hundred. Hide your face in that pot!”

I got the helmet over my head and tried to unbend my ears. “Can you drive it?”

“No—but I can ride it! Put on those leathers. Fasten your chin strap. Now go split-assed behind me. Feet on the pegs. Clamp on to me. Tight! I don’t want to dump you balls-up on the Plaza. Haven’t you ever been on a bike?”

“When I was a kid.” This was oscillating between nightmare and farce.

“Thank Christ for that!” Judy had adopted a speech-mode to match her rig. “Now—hang on. I may have to take evasive action.”

The prospect of being aboard a motorcycle taking evasive action froze me. I clutched Judy’s waist as she swerved down the lane, across an open lot, and onto a side road. She was riding with skill if not with caution as she raced through a narrow gap between houses and shot out onto the plaza. A bike can go where a car cannot.

And provided a disguise. Who would expect Doctor Judith Grenfell to be riding a motorcycle? Bikers are the best-disguised creatures on the highway. When the weather is cool one cannot tell the girls from the boys. With visors down we circled the plaza, then drove past the Council Chamber and the waiting limousine. The agents, who were starting to walk toward the Bachelor Cloister, hardly glanced at us.

We roared through the main gates of the Settlement as shouts rose from behind us. I glanced back and saw the agents running for the limousine. I clutched Judy tighter and yelled, “They’re after us!”

“I’ll drop ’em. Don’t worry!” She swerved to avoid a truck coming toward Sherando and I glimpsed the open mouth of the cursing driver. Then the road plunged down the hill and into the trees. We skidded around a curve and skidded again so we were broadside across the road. For a moment I thought Judy had lost control, then I realized it was her way of making a right-angled turn. We shot forward off the hardtop and down a horse trail among the trees.

The limousine roared past, brakes screeched, I heard it backing up at full throttle, and then we were deep in the woods, skidding and slewing in showers of mud and leaves.

“For God’s sake—take it easy!” I yelled. “They’re way back but they’ll catch up if you dump us.”

She slowed somewhat but we still had a breathtaking ride until we reached a dirt road running beside the river. “With luck we may make it!” said Judy as she turned in the direction of Waynesboro.

I started to breath easier and Judy started to drive more sensibly when we reached the outskirts of the town. There were more motorcyles weaving through the traffic than I remembered from the past and when we stopped for gas I realized this was one effect of the fuel restrictions. Hydrides for some unknown reason were becoming short and gasoline was back in fashion. And bikes had always used gasoline.

She parked among a bunch of bikes at a shopping center, and we dismounted. Judy in black biking gear and helmet was a different person from the earlier Judiths I had got to know. She was letting her suppressed delight in theatrics have full rein. “I knew they wouldn’t let me out of that place. Anslinger’s turning it into a Jonesville-in-Virginia! So I got hold of this Yama and loaded the panniers, ready for takeoff.”

“Where are you going now?”

“Sutton Cove.”

“You plan to go to Maine on that thing? Disguised as a biker?”

“That’s how I’ve always gone. Part-way at least. That’s why nobody ever trailed me. But not disguised—I am a biker. It’s the fastest, most exciting, and least obvious way to travel.” She laughed, as though delighted at my expression. “Want to come along?”

“Riding pillion? For a thousand kilometers?”

“I’d rather have a sore ass than a sore back! Let me give you a lift to somewhere safe anyway.”

“Nowhere’s safe for me now!”

She snapped down her visor, as though irritated by my pessimism. “I know one place where we can merge with the natives. If it’s still going. You said you were a biker once?”

“I had a trail bike as a kid.”

“Good enough. Climb aboard!”

“Where are we going?” I asked as she took off with a roar, leaving a plume of dust astern.

“Like I said. To merge with some of the native fauna. If it’s not been destroyed by the new austerity. Now hang on!” By the time we reached the thruway I had no breath left to ask anything, and once we were on it Judy began riding too fast for conversation. She headed north and I rode pressed tightly against her for the next hour, enjoying the body contact too much to be concerned about the speed. She slowed as we approached the outskirts of Frederick, and turned off the thruway onto a secondary road where there were more motorcycles than automobiles, then onto a dirt road, joining a stream of bikers, riding singly or paired like ourselves. The road wound through vacant lots, wrecking yards, and dilapidated factories until it finally spewed us out onto a wasteland of disused sandpits; a breeding ground for mosquitoes and bikers.