His last words before putting the truck in gear and driving away were: “If any of you even have a thought about coming after us, know that it will cost Dr. Comely her life.”
Storm waited until the truck had disappeared down into the valley of the dune, then sprung to his feet.
He ran over to the corner of one of the remaining trucks, using its sharp edge to hack into the rope that bound him, not caring that when he missed he was gouging his arms.
“Jesus, Storm. Slow down. What’s your hurry?” Strike asked.
“I’ve got an Egyptologist to rescue.”
“Just let her go. You didn’t let me take the shot when I had the shot. Why endanger her now?”
“Didn’t you notice?” Storm asked, with the rope already fraying.
“Notice what?”
“That revolver of his. It’s a Colt Pocket Police. The Pocket Police was unusual for mass production revolvers in that it had four cylinders. That, plus one in the chamber means he only has five shots. He used four of them to shoot the trucks. He’s only got one left.”
“So?”
“So if he uses it to shoot Katie, he’d essentially be inviting me to kill him. And I can think of ten ways off the top of my head I could do it.”
“Yeah, but what if he uses that one bullet to shoot you?”
“I’ll take my chances,” Storm said, the ropes now loose enough that he could slip free of them.
“Storm, seriously, you’ll never be able to catch them.”
Storm dashed over to pick up Dirty Harry, which he holstered. Then he ran to Antony and leapt up on the camel.
“Wanna bet?” Storm said, removing the riding crop from his pack and holding it aloft. “Hyah!”
Storm did not even have to hit the beast. As soon as Antony saw the crop’s cruel whiplike end out of the corner of his eye, he let out a mighty bellow.
And then he began to run.
Like the wind — on a blustery day.
Like a Pegasus taking flight.
Like no camel ever has.
IT TOOK ALL OF STORM’S STRENGTH just to hold on at first. He never knew that a camel was capable of exerting such extreme g-forces on its rider.
But soon he was able to get hunched down in his saddle and lean forward as Antony, his ears pinned against his head, reached top speed.
“Hyah, hyah!” Storm said, keeping the crop in his hand and outstretched — where Antony could see it — but not using it.
The cargo truck, which soon came into view, had perhaps a half-mile head start. Relieved of having to pretend there were precious artifacts in the back, Raynes was pushing the ungainly vehicle across the rugged terrain as fast as it could go, which was about thirty miles an hour.
Unfortunately for him, a champion racing camel can hit forty. And unlike a truck, the camel was bred to run in the desert.
Antony closed the gap fast. After a minute, he had cut the distance between himself and the truck down by a third. Two minutes in, he was less than a thousand feet away. After three minutes, he was within ten feet.
Raynes had started making an effort at performing evasive maneuvers, to little effect. In addition to being faster than the truck, Antony was also significantly more agile. Storm had no trouble countering Raynes’s futile efforts as he drew even with the back of the trailer.
This, of course, was around exactly the time Antony decided he was getting less interested in chasing this silly truck. Storm could feel the animal slowing.
“Come on, Antony, hyah! Hyah!”
Storm reached forward so the crop was in the animal’s face. Antony responded with one last burst of speed. Storm jumped from the camel to the truck just as Antony quit for good. The camel went from sprinting to walking to sitting down within a few short yards.
Raynes responded to the presence of another passenger by swerving a few times, trying to shake Storm off the top of the trailer. But Storm hung on easily. His days of urban surfing had started long ago in suburban Washington, D.C. There was nothing this truck could throw at him that Storm and his daredevil friends hadn’t conquered long ago.
Once he was sure of his purchase on the truck, Storm began crawling toward the cab. He was just starting to make progress when Raynes slammed on the brakes.
Storm gripped his fingers into the metal to avoid being tossed over the front of the truck and run over — if that was, in fact, Raynes’s intention.
But, no, the professor had a different plan. As soon as the truck came to a stop, Katie spilled out of the truck’s passenger side as if kicked. Raynes dove out after her and resumed a position he was rapidly perfecting: using Dr. Comely as a shield.
Storm had already drawn his weapon and was lying prone atop the truck, which meant he was also not within range of his enemy’s gun.
“I told you not to come after us,” Raynes screamed. Storm could hear him panting. Katie squealed, but he couldn’t see what the cause of it was.
“Yes, and then you used four of your five bullets to shoot out our tires,” Storm said, his voice steady. “Leaving you with just one and an interesting dilemma. If you use it to shoot Katie, I’ll have you dead before she even hits the ground. But if you try to use it on me, you might miss. Or you might hit me but, with that little peashooter, not fully incapacitate me. And I assure you, neither of those outcomes will end well for you.”
“Ah, yes, but you also have a dilemma, Mr. Talbot. As long as I’m holding this gun to Katie’s head, you can’t dare make a move on me. Because if you do, her death will be on your conscience.”
“True,” Storm said. “So we are at something of an impasse, then. Are we not?”
“We are.”
“In that case, I propose a deal.”
“I’m listening.”
“It’s really quite simple, professor,” Storm said. “You’re going to leave Katie with me, and I’m going to let you go. You’ll never be able to work in academia again, of course. And the Egyptian authorities might have quite a beef with you if they can ever catch you. It might be in your best interests to leave the country immediately and go to some place that doesn’t have an extradition treaty with Egypt, because you had better believe I’m going to tell them you’ve been stealing antiquities and illegally mining promethium. I’m also going to see to it they keep a close eye on this area, because I know otherwise you’re going to try to come back here and mine more. So you’re through here. Trust me when I tell you, you’re through.
“But, on the positive side, you get to keep your life and all that promethium in the back of that truck. That was, what, about three hundred pounds back there? Four hundred? You can’t get top dollar for it dealing on the black market, but I’m betting you’re still able to command at least a thousand dollars an ounce. So that’s something in the neighborhood of five or six million dollars I’m giving you as a retirement plan. You should be able to live quite comfortably on that for the rest of your miserable life.”
“How do I know if I let her go you won’t just come after me again?”
“Because she and I are going to walk away. You’ve got the truck. We can’t catch you on foot.”
“Balderdash. You can just get on that speed-demon camel of yours anytime you want.”
Storm laughed. “Do you see my speed-demon camel back there in the distance?”
“I do.”
“Then you’ll see he’s sitting down. If you know anything about camels in general, or mine in particular, you’ll know they only sit down when they’re horny or when they’ve decided they’re just not going anywhere for a while. Either way, you should have plenty of time to escape.”
“And if I refuse your deal?”
Storm crept forward slightly on the roof of the truck, enough that Raynes could see Dirty Harry and little else. “Then we remain at an impasse. I will be holding you at gunpoint. And you will be holding Dr. Comely at gunpoint. But time is on my side, professor. It won’t take long for my colleague, Ms. Sullivan, to get back to civilization and form a major search operation for us. We are not with the International Art Protection League, because there’s no such thing. But we are with an organization that has all the resources needed to track down this truck in a desert and apprehend it.”