w was an attractive woman, it was
because I hadn't really paid attention to her looks. But now I went
along and ogled, realizing in the dimmer and more obscure recesses of my
mind that if I ogled in a loudly lewd perceptive manner, I'd not be
thinking of what she was doing.

So while I was pleasantly occupied in ogling, Farrow slipped two more
hypos out from under her clothing. She slipped her hands out sidewise on
the backs of their seats, put her face between them and said, "Anybody
got a cigarette, fellows?"

The next that took place happened, in order of occurrence, as follows:

The driver grunted and turned his head to look at her. The other guy
fumbled for a cigarette. Driver poked at the lighter on the dash, still
dividing his attention between the road and Nurse Farrow. The man beside
him reached for the lighter when it popped out and he held it for her
while she puffed it into action. Farrow fingered the triggers on the
skin-blast hypos. The man beside the driver replaced the lighter in its
socket on the dash. The driver slid aside and to the floor, a second
before the other hospital orderly flopped down like a deflated balloon.

The ambulance took a swoop to the right, nosed down into a shallow ditch
and leaped like a shot deer out on the other side.

Farrow went over the back of the seat in a flurry and I rolled off of my
stretcher into the angle of the floor and the sidewall. There was a
rumble and then a series of crashes before we came to a shuddering halt.
I came up from beneath a pile of assorted medical supplies, braced
myself against the canted deck, and looked out the wind-shield. The
trunk of a tree split the field of view as close to dead center as it
could be.

"Out, Steve," said Farrow, untangling herself from the steering wheel
and the two attendants. "Out!"

"What next?" I asked her.

"We've made enough racket to wake the statue of Lincoln. Out and run for
it."

"Which way?"

"Follow me!" she snapped, and took off. Even in nurse's shoes with those
semi-heels, Farrow made time in a phenomenal way. I lost ground
steadily. Luckily it was still early in the afternoon, so I used my
perception to keep track of her once she got out of sight. She was
following the gently rolling ground, keeping to the lower hollows and
gradually heading toward a group of buildings off in the near-distance.

I caught up with her just as we hit a tiny patch of dead area; just
inside the area she stopped and