If the soldiers there saw that he had been
permitted to pass through the first they doubtless would not hinder
his further passage. That they were watching him Barney could see.
He had passed the officer now. There was no necessity for
dalliance. He pressed the accelerator down a trifle. The car moved
forward at increased speed. A final angry shout broke from the
officer behind him, followed by a quick command. Barney did not have
to wait long to learn the tenor of the order, for almost immediately
a shot sounded from behind and a bullet whirred above his head.
Another shot and another followed.
Barney was pressing the accelerator downward to the limit. The car
responded nobly--there was no sputtering, no choking. Just a rapid
rush of increasing momentum as the machine gained headway by leaps
and bounds.
The bullets were ripping the air all about him. Just ahead the
second outpost stood directly in the center of the road. There were
three soldiers and they were taking deliberate aim, as carefully as
though upon the rifle range. It seemed to Barney that they couldn't
miss him. He swerved the car suddenly from one side of the road to
the other. At the rate that it was going the move was fraught with
but little less danger than the supine facing of the leveled guns
ahead.
The three rifles spoke almost simultaneously. The glass of the
windshield shattered in Barney's face.
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