"Cut that out," Joe rapped. "Duck your head. Let me train this gun over you. I've got to keep those jokers from shooting off our tail before I can get to the marshal."
"The marshal!" Freddy yelled. "You can't get to him anyway. I told you I threw away your semaphore flags, your blinker—everything. This country's hilly. You can't get your message to him anyway. Listen, Joe, you've still got time. You can stunt these things better than those two can."
"Duck!" Joe snarled. He let loose a burst at the pursuing gliders over the smaller man's head, and just missing his own tail section.
They sped down almost to tree level at fantastic speed for a glider. The two enemy craft were hot after them, their guns flac, flac, flacing in continuous excitement, trying to catch Joe in sights, as he kicked rudder, right, left, right, in evasive maneuver.
He guess had been correct. The swashbuckling Jack Altshuler had know his many times commander even better than Cogswell had realized. Instead of three alternative maneuvers open to the wily cavalryman, he'd ferreted out a fourth and his full force, hauling mountain guns on mule back with them, were trailing over a supposedly impossible mountain path which originally could not have been more then a deer track.
Freddy Soligen, in back, was holding his head in his hands in surrender. He could have focused on the troops below, but the desire wasn't in him. Not one fracas buff in a hundred could comprehend the complications of combat, the need for adequate reconnaissance—the need for Joe to get through.
He made one last plea. "Joe, we've put everything into this. Every share of stock you've accumulated. All I have, too. Don't you realize what you're doing, so far as the buffs are concerned? Those two half-trained pilots behind have you on the run."
Joe growled, "And twenty thousands lads down below are depending on me to report on Altshuler's horse."
"But you can't win, anyway. You can't get your message to Cogswell!"
Joe shot him a wolfish grin. "Wanta bet? Ever heard of a crash landing, Freddy? Hang on!"