from side to side like a sack of flour. A bloody sack of flour. Jon could see a spreading pool of red on Marty's trouser leg, but Marty grinned feebly and said in a shaky voice, "I'm all right, Jon."
"Get a towel," Jon called back, "fold it and press it hard against the wound. If the bleeding doesn't stop soon, yell out."
He needed to stay in the cab where he could use Peter's Enfield if any of the attackers cut them off.
Peter was too busy to use a weapon as he turned the wheel with a vise grip, his pale eyes cool. The unwieldy vehicle bounced off the road through the trees and brush, miraculously hitting nothing as Peter guided it with the precision of an astronaut docking at a space station. Twice he plunged the massive vehicle through streams, kicking up sheets of water and tilting dangerously on rocks hidden beneath the surfaces.
On the road, two men ran with rifles trying to get a clear shot at the RV, but the bone-jarring, unpredictable lurches and bounces of the vehicle frustrated them. They dodged branches and leaped over rocks. Behind them, a gray SUV battled to turn on the narrow road so it could join the pursuit.
As the runners fell farther behind, Jon spotted a deep ravine looming straight ahead. "Peter! Careful!"
"Got it!" Peter slammed the brakes and pivoted in a half J-turn. The top-heavy vehicle threatened to flip over as it skidded sideways, sideswiped two giant boulders, and finally came to a shuddering stop barely feet from the chasm.
On the road, the runners were far back but closing in again. In the distance, the SUV had almost succeeded in turning.
Tension in the RV was thick. Jon stared down at the deep ravine and wiped sweat from his face.
"Here we go." Peter gunned the engine, and the big vehicle leaped ahead parallel to the ravine and straight toward the road.
Jon watched the two pursuing attackers, who were trying to shortcut the road by sprinting among the trees. "They're getting close!"
Peter gave the running men a quick glance. The ravine made a sudden sharp turn away, and he angled the RV out of the trees and onto the road once more. With a relieved grin, he jerked the clumsy vehicle around and roared away down the dirt road, kicking up clouds of dust.
A final fusillade rang out, and bullets slashed through the trees around the fleeing vehicle. Jon forced himself to take a long breath and relax his hands on his weapon. He checked the side-view mirror: The two men had been joined by a third, and they stood angry and frustrated, their weapons dangling at their sides, in the center of the dusty road.
Jon recognized the short, burly man who had joined the first two.
"It's them," he said angrily. "The people who've been trying to kill me." He looked at Peter. "There'll be more of them somewhere."
"Of course." Peter studied the rough road as the vehicle continued to shake and bounce. "Evasive strategy, I should say. Knowledge of the terrain. Trust the enemy to overrate the element of surprise."
Jon climbed back to Marty, hanging on to anything he could hold. But this time Marty was right--- the flesh wound in his left leg was superficial. Jon applied antibiotic and a bandage. One of the RV's windows had been shot out and the outer shell ripped with bullet holes in three places, but nothing had penetrated, and nothing important was damaged, especially not the computer that was part of Peter's standard equipment.
He rejoined Peter up front, and five minutes later heard the sound of traffic.
"What do you think?" He scrutinized the dirt road ahead as it wound down among the trees. "Will they be waiting where we join the highway?"
"Or sooner. Let's disappoint them." Peter smiled his almost dreamy smile.
Ahead was a track that led off from the road to the left. Even narrower than the road they traveled, even more deeply rutted, it was only inches wider than the RV. But it was a road, not a trail.
Peter explained, "Fire road. Forest's full of them. Unmarked on any maps but the forestry service's and the fire district's."
"We're taking it?" Jon asked.
"The scenic route." With a short smile, Peter swung the RV onto it.
Pine branches brushed and scraped against the RV's metal sides. The noise was endless and unnerving, like fingers on a chalkboard. Fifteen minutes later, just as Jon was beginning to think he was going to lose his mind,