_The Fugitives_
It was near the dawn of May 21 when Drake and I, with Dianne and Ahlma,
crouched in our boathouse at King's Cove. Giants seemed everywhere
outside, towering figures in the moonlight, tramping about the cove.
I think that our best chance to escape from the Togarite territory was
offered us there at the beginning--those first minutes just before
dawn. We had the drugs. We might have plunged into the channel,
swimming out, expanding our size and taking the chance that we would
not be discovered too soon.
How easy to look back on what one might have done! But instead of that
we crept from the boathouse and turned inland. Ran back from the cove.
Past our house; Togarites in our normal size were thronging it.
We were confused. Behind us, giants were rising everywhere. People were
pouring from the boathouse.
"If we can get to Elton--" Drake panted. We found the road and dashed
along it. The moon was momentarily under a cloud. The concealing
darkness was helpful.
A giant went past us. We ducked off the road. He did not see us--he
strode toward Elton.
We started again. Then the moon came out. We did not dare use the open
road. We skulked through the fields. Then the moon was paling with the
coming dawn. We had not escaped. Giants were ahead of us, and to the
sides.
We crouched by a fence and argued. If we got large, we might in a few
moments dash out of this captured territory. But we would be seen at
once--pounced upon.
If we got smaller, we would be safe from discovery.
But Drake was vehement against it. "Damn it, Frank, I've had enough of
that! It'd be a journey of a hundred miles just to Elton, when we're
smaller! I tell you we've got to get out of here quickly! Frank, these
drugs are vital to the world."
It seemed that our best chance was in our normal size. The dawn came.
We found a dilapidated barn on a side road halfway to Elton. We hid in
it.
We were, with the daylight upon us, hopelessly caught within the
Togarite lines. It was soon obvious that getting to Elton would not
help us. Giants were already there. We thought, if we could head
inland, but then south, toward Portland, we might get past them.
So many things we might have dared to do are apparent, looking
back upon it now! We struggled--all those days in May--to get to
civilization somewhere, to find transportation south to New York. We
had the vital weapon--the one thing the world could successfully use
against this enemy. Because it was so important, we were afraid to
chance anything. If Togaro caught us, the world was doomed. Terrible
responsibility! An excess of caution was upon us.
We skulked and hid by day, and traveled at night. But there were always
giants around us. Patrolling watchfully in the daylight, and at night
with their lights and torches. It seemed that we could never escape
those widening lines. Within a day or two we realized that we should
have headed north; but it was too late now to change.
We tried to get to the coast. It was too dangerous; there were more
giants that way than anywhere else. We had a hundred narrow escapes
from capture. It was a problem to find food and water as we went. But
there were deserted houses into which we slid by night.
Once we found an abandoned automobile. We ran it southward, all one
night, dashing forward, stopping with lights out and silent motor when
a giant approached. Then on again--until at last we barely were able
to fling ourselves from it and take the diminishing drug, when a giant
came up, stooped and tossed the car into the air. We lay in the bushes
by the roadside and dwindled in size until the danger was past.
We lost count of the days on this strange flight. And we lost our
way--wandered, following what roads we dared, working southward by
what devious routes I have no idea. It seemed a hopeless journey. The
country was now a torn mass of wreckage. Littered, burning towns. Roads
obstructed. No storm of nature could ever devastate a countryside like
this!
After more than a week of wandering, it seemed that we were still as
far inside the spreading Togarite lines as ever. We had stolen garments
to disguise the girls. We had several times tried getting larger. One
dark night, when it chanced that the lights of the giants were not
too near us, we traveled in a fifty-foot size for hours. It gained
us so much distance that we tried it again several times. We passed
inland from Boston, crossing into the desolation of what had been Rhode
Island, then into Connecticut.
There came a night which, though we did not know it, was the evening
of the 1st of June. We lay in the wreckage of a farmhouse which had
been demolished. The girls were too exhausted to travel farther, and we
all needed a rest. It had been the most fearful day of our trip. That
morning we had been driven out of our hiding place where we intended to
spend the daylight hours. It was an abandoned house near the edge of a
town. What town I do not know.
Marauding giants had come and burned the town. We had escaped into
smallness. It was night when after desperate efforts, we again emerged
to find ourselves barely a hundred feet away from where we had been
before.
The night came. We could not travel farther. One of us had always
to be awake on guard. The girls were bravely standing the hardships,
but they were both in miserable plight. They lay now, huddled in this
shattered farmhouse. The broken roof was like a tent over us. We
had had a meal, of food picked up along the way. We decided not to
travel until the next night. The girls wrapped themselves in the men's
overcoats we had found for them. They were soon asleep, huddled amid
the litter of plaster and lath strewn around us.
Drake and I sat whispering. Drake wore now a single automatic. The
girls and I were unarmed. The automatic was a futile weapon--a thousand
times Drake cursed its futility; never once had we found any rational
use for it.
"Where do you suppose we are, Frank?"
We had but the vaguest idea. But it was not far from the coast--Long
Island Sound lay a mile or so off there.
"Not far from New York," I said. "This might be near Norwalk."
We had often been able to locate ourselves by broken street signs in
the wrecked towns. At night sometimes, when we were in the fifty-foot
size, we would poke about to find a railroad station which would have
its name upon it.
It seemed now that the outposts of the captured territory must be close
ahead of us. A line of standing giants had been visible down there.
They had not yet entered New York City, we felt sure.
"We'd better try and get to the coast," Drake said. "If it weren't for
the girls--" He shot a glance toward where they were sleeping. "Frank,
I wish we'd been able to find a plane, take a chance on getting out of
here with one dash--"
"Well, we haven't found one," I retorted. There had been many, but
they were all wrecked. "Besides, Drake, we decided that would be too
dangerous. You remember those Canadian war planes."
We had seen that episode. We saw, indeed, so many strange things which
I have no space here to mention!
I added: "If we had a plane we'd no more than get it into the air
before we'd be struck. You know that."
He paused, then reached a sudden decision. "Frank, we'll rest here.
But tomorrow night I'm going to make a break for it. You stay with the
girls. They can't travel much farther."
He shot another glance at them. Was Dianne awake and listening to us
now? I think so. I seem to recall that she stirred. But at the time we
did not notice.
Drake went on vehemently. "We've got to do something--get the drugs to
Washington. Why, Frank, in a few days New York City will be gone."
"What do you mean, make a break for it?"
"You stay with the girls. Keep hidden. No use to try to travel. Get
yourself food and water and dig in somewhere and wait. And I'll get
out--I can do it, Frank, alone."
"How?"
"Get large. We'll get over by the coast. I'll make a dash for it,
swimming. They won't see me until I'm large enough to put up a fight.
Frank, it should have been done long ago."
He was my older brother, I could not talk him out of it. And it did
seem the only thing left for us to do.
"You go to sleep, Frank. I'll stand guard for awhile."
"You're not going to try it tonight?" I demanded, with anxious
suspicion.
"No."
"You promise?"
"Yes, of course. I'm tired as hell. Go to sleep. We'll stay here all
tomorrow."
Sleep came always to us the instant we relaxed. But this time, as
though fate would have it so, I awakened within a few hours.
"Drake?"
"Yes."
He was sitting beside me; the girls were still asleep.
"Take your turn, Drake. I'm wide awake." He needed no urging. He rolled
up near me without a word.
I sat motionless. We were half outdoors; the tilting fallen roof only
partially covered us. I could see the stars.
I presently went outside. A starlit, moonless night, a few hours before
dawn. No giants seemed in sight. A deserted, desolate, shattered
countryside, wan and pitiful in the starlight. The thought flashed to
me: might we not make a break for it now? No giants were near here at
the moment.
But we had often tried that before, and there always was a giant within
sight of us when we dared get larger.
I went back under the broken roof. Out of its other side, where the
shattered wall had left a jagged opening, a small dark form was running.
Dianne! I caught a glimpse of her golden robe beneath the flap of the
dark overcoat.
I stopped for nothing, but ran. Outside I called softly, "Dianne! Where
are you going? Come back!"
There was a dim road. She was running along it.
I called again, but she did not stop, so I dashed after her.
I was overtaking her at first; then her strides lengthened and she drew
away from me.
I gasped with horror, and fumbled at my belt. She had taken the drug;
her running figure on the starlit road was growing larger!