Escaped prisoners -- Fiction; Science fiction; Short stories; United States -- Fiction
"None yet. We got some inside dope from one of the men in the prison
that he has an outside escape route, and that he's been digging up all
the information he could find in the past three months or so about the
Roads. But I wanted to warn you." The policeman's voice sounded distant
and unreal. "He promised to get you, Jerry. I'm ordering you and your
home heavily guarded--"
"Guards won't do any good," said Markson, heavily. "Krenner will get me
if you don't get him first. Do everything you can."
The policeman's voice sounded more cheerful. "At any rate, he's in the
eastern part of the state now. He has four hundred miles to travel
before he can get to you. Unless he has a 'copter, or somehow gets on
the Roads, he can't get to you for a day or so. We're doing everything
we can."
Markson hung up the receiver heavily. Twenty-seven years of peace since
that devil had finally murdered his way out of his life. And now he was
back again. A terrible mistake for a partner, a man with no reason, a
man who could not understand the difference between right and wrong. A
man with ruthless ambition, who turned on his partner when honesty got
in his way, and murdered his partner's wife in rage when his own way of
business was blocked. A man so twisted with rage that he threatened on
the brink of capital punishment to tear Markson's heart out, yet Markson
had saved him from the chair. An appeal, some money, some influence, had
snatched him from death's sure grasp, so he could come back to kill
again. And a man with such diabolical good fortune that he could now
come safely to Markson, and hunt him out, and carry out the fancied
revenge that his twisted mind demanded.
Markson took the visiphone in hand again and dialed a number. The face
of a young girl appeared. "Hi, dad. Did you see the news report?"
"Yes, I saw it. I want you to round up Jerry and Mike and take the
'copter out to the summer place on Nantucket. Wait for me there. I don't
know how soon I can make it, but I don't want you here now. Leave
immediately."
The girl knew better than to argue with her father. "Dad, is there any
chance--?"
"There's lots of chance. That's why I want you away from here."
He flipped off the connection, and sighed apprehensively. Now to wait.
The furnaces had to keep going, the steel had to be turned out, one way
or another. He'd have to stay. And hope. Perhaps the police _would_ get
him--
* * * * *
The elderly lady sat on the edge of the kitchen chair, shivering. "We'll
be glad to help you, but you won't hurt us, will you?"
"Shut up," said Krenner. The gray plastic of his pistol gleamed dully in
the poor light of the farm kitchen. "Get that foot dressed, with tight
pressure and plenty of 'mycin. I don't want it to bleed, and I don't
want an infection." The woman hurried her movements, swiftly wrapping
the swollen foot.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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