He set out after it, stopped and listened, corrected his direction toward the noise, then set on again. He expected that fairly soon Teasle would give up running and try to ambush him, but as long as he could hear Teasle running, it was safe to keep after him and make all the noise he had to. Then one time he stopped and listened, and the running up ahead was stopped as well, so he sank to the ground and began crawling quietly forward. In a minute the running up ahead continued again, and he leapt to his feet, charging after it. That was the pattern for an hour: running, stopping, listening, crawling, running. The rain kept on in a cold faint drizzle, and the belt that was cinched around his ribs loosened, and he had to tighten it to ease the pain. He was certain now that his ribs were broken and that sharp bones were lancing his insides. He would have given up, but he knew he would have Teasle soon; he doubled over in agony, but Teasle was still running up there, so he straightened, pushing himself on.
The chase went up a slope of trees, over a spine of rock and down a patch of shale to a stream, then along the bank of the stream, across the stream into more woods, across a ravine. The pain in his chest cut sharply as he jumped across, and he almost slipped down into the ravine, but he pulled himself up, listened for Teasle, heard him and chased after him. Each time his right foot hit the ground, the jolt went all the way up his right side, grating his ribs. Twice he was sick.
Up and down, the pattern of the country repeated itself. Stumbling up a slope of rocks and brush, Teasle felt like he was back on the ledge, trying to get up the rise to the woods. In the dark he couldn't see the top; he wished he knew how far it was; he couldn't keep on climbing much longer. The rain was making the rocks slippery, and he was losing his balance, falling hard. He took to crawling up, and the rocks tore at his pants, cut into his knees, while behind him, down in the trees at the bottom, he heard the kid breaking through the undergrowth.
He scrambled faster. If he could just see the top and know how far he had to go. The kid must be out of the woods now and starting up the slope, and Teasle thought of shooting blindly down to hold him back. He couldn't: the flashes from his pistol would give the kid a target, but Christ, he had to do something.
In one desperate lunge he reached the top but didn't know it was the top until he tripped and barely grabbed a rock in time to stop from rolling down the other side. Now. Now he could shoot. He stretched out and listened to where the kid was rushing up the slope, and he fired six times in a line across the noises. Then he hugged the ground in case he had missed, and a shot came from below, zinging over him. He heard the kid climbing off to the left, and he fired once more at the noise before he started racing down the other side of the slope. Again he tripped, and now he struck his shoulder solidly against a rock and couldn't keep from rolling as he grabbed his shoulder and tumbled to the bottom.
He lay there dazed. The wind was knocked out of him, and he fought to breathe but he couldn't. He gasped and pushed his stomach muscles in, but they wanted to push out, and then he managed to suck in a little air and a little more, and he was almost breathing normally again when he heard the kid clambering on the rocks above. He groped to his knees, then to his feet - and discovered that in his fall he had lost hold of his pistol. It was somewhere up on the slope. No time to go back for it. No light to find it.
He staggered through woods, circling he guessed, going nowhere, winding around and around until he'd be brought to bay. Already his knees were buckling. His direction was wobbly. He was bumping against trees, a crazy vision in his head of him in his office, bare feet on the desk, head tilted sipping hot soup. Tomato soup. No, bean with bacon. The rich expensive kind where the label said don't add water.
It was only minutes now before he'd have him. The noises ahead were slowing, more erratic, clumsy. He could hear Teasle breathing hoarsely, he was that close to him. Teasle had given him a good race, that was sure. He had figured to tag him several miles ago, and here they were still at it. But not for long. A few minutes now. That was all.
The pain in his ribs, he had to slow, but it was still a fair pace, and since Teasle had slowed too, he wasn't bothered much. His hand was over his ribs, helping the belt to press. All his right side was swollen. In the rain the belt was even looser than before, and he had to keep his hand pressing.
