Compete or Die! — Edition Insights

There was another shot. Pieces of glass trickled down my neck. I straightened up and saw a hole in the windshield, level with my eyes.

"Hands up!" The cop had slowed down to take careful aim. He was so close now he could hardly miss.

"Don't shoot!" I shouted. "I surrender!"

I inserted the key in the ignition with desperate precision, gunning the engines so hard that the ship spun halfway around. The policeman leaped out of the way as my Cad Super roared past him and lurched into the air.

I heard a tattoo of shots from the ground and then we were out of range.

I swore as the acceleration crushed me deep into the seat. My forehead was pounding.

"Bart Sponsor, fugitive," I thought bitterly. "And only a half-hour ago I was a pillar of society. Worst thing I had to worry about was a speeding ticket...."

... I had been griping to my wife as usual about the rush-hour morning traffic above Chicago.

"Look at this. Just look at this," I said disgustedly.

Below us, the lanes were choked with ponderous, slow-moving commuter copters. Around us, flivver-jets clogged the expressway like millions of migrating birds. We couldn't make more than three hundred miles an hour.

"The stupid shlubs," I muttered resentfully. "They ought to ride the pneumatic tubes to work."

"The airlanes should be reserved for Top Competitors only," said Celia teasingly. "Like you, dear."

I ignored her sarcasm and scanned the empty lane overhead. All that blue sky set aside for outgoing traffic, and nothing in sight. A shameful waste.

I gunned our Cad Super, joyfully, defiantly, and scooted up over the assigned traffic stream at a thousand per. Celia gave me an alarmed look.

"Bart! You'll get a ticket."

I grinned and kicked our speed up an additional two hundred.

Illegal, of course, but I made terrific time crossing the Iowa-Illinois border where Chicagoland begins. I didn't squeeze back into the expressway until mighty Municipal Tower came into view through the dense industrial haze above Lake Michigan. There atop the building stood a gigantic sign revolving on a pivot with the wind. It bore the seal of Chicago and the stunning legend: I WILL COMPETE. Most inspiring motto in the world, I think.

Celia touched my hand. "We'll have to stop at the bank first."

"No time," I said. "We're due at the school at nine-thirty."

"It won't hurt to be a few minutes late. This is important, Bart."

We have a good marriage, and I don't quarrel with Celia's wishes. But this meant another delay, and I could already see half the morning shot, what with the meeting in the principal's office, and afterwards perhaps taking Freddie out for a soda or something to make him feel secure and loved. What a lot of trouble that boy was getting into lately.

I wheeled out of traffic and feathered down to the roof of the 1st National. A conveyer belt carried our ship toward the teller's window.

Celia opened her purse and withdrew a bank form. "Here, I think you'll have to sign this, darling."

I voiced my irritation. "Withdraw it in your own name. It's a joint account. Personally, I don't understand how you can need more money when I just gave you four hundred yesterday."

"This is a very large amount," said Celia softly. "Bank requires it."

"How much?" I asked suspiciously.

"Ten thousand." She was staring at me intently with her almond-shaded eyes. Her full red lips were parted in the faintest trace of a smile, as her neat brown-pencilled eyebrows arched slightly in amused defiance.

She was daring me to ask the obvious question. Hell, I thought, I can afford it. I signed the form and passed it back to her.

We were at the teller window. She scribbled on the sheet and handed it to the clerk.

"Now," I said, feeling that I'd fulfilled the code of gallantry, "may I ask what you need it for?"

"Certainly, dear. I'm giving it to the Mendelsohns as a going-away present. Tonight at their farewell party."

"What! Ten thousand credits? Are you insane! The Mendelsohns mean nothing to me." I was so upset that I kicked the degravity pedal and we started to rise from the roof. I brought us down with a thud.

"They mean a lot to me," said Celia calmly. "They used to mean a lot to you too."

"But ten thousand!" I protested. "What do you think I am, a millionaire philanthropist?"

"It is a lot of money," Celia agreed placatingly. "But the Mendelsohns are leaving tomorrow for Primus Gladus. We'll never see them again."