The Stainless Steel Rat eBook Collection Read Online Free PDF

possibilities.Consider the fact that the cretin might have woken up. So you should have coshed him or something to make certain of his sound sleep. Which is certainly water over the dam. Rememberthe lesson well but look around now and try to make the best of this rapidly disintegrating escape.’
    My options were limited. If the guards opened the trapdoor and came up to the roof they would find me. Was there any place to hide? The top of the water tank might offer a temporary refuge, but if they came this far they would certainly look there as well. But with no way to get down the sheerwalls it offered the only feeble hope. Get up there.
    It wasn’t easy. It was made of smooth metal and the top was just beyond my reach. But I had to do it. I stepped back and took a run, leaped and felt my fingers just grasp the edge. I scrabbled for a hold but they pulled loose and I dropped heavily back to the roof. Anyone below would have certainly heard that. I hoped I was over an empty celland not the hall.
    ‘Enough hoping and not enough trying, Jim,’ I said, and added a few curses in the hope of building my morale. I had to get up there!
    This time I retreated to the far edge, the backs of my knees against the parapet, taking breath after deep breath. Go!
    Run up, fast, the right spot – jump!
    My right hand slapped against the edge. I grabbed and heaved. Got my other hand up thereand pulled mightily, scraping and bruising myself on the rough metal, hauling myself up onto the top of the tank.
    To lie there breathing heavily, looking at a dead bird not a foot from my face, vacant eyes staring into mine. I started to pull away when I heard the trapdoor slam heavily back onto the roof.
    ‘Give me a push up, will you? I’m stuck!’
    By the wheezing and grunting that followed Iwas sure that this had to be one of the fat guards that I had seen on the floor below. More gasping and puffing heralded the arrival of his adipose companion.
    ‘I don’t know what we’re doing up here,’ the first arrival whined.
    ‘I do,’ his companion said quite firmly. ‘We’re obeying orders, which never did no one no harm.’
    ‘But the hatch was locked.’
    ‘So was the cell door he went through. Lookaround.’
    The heavy footsteps circled the roof, then returned.
    ‘Not here. No place to hide. Not even hanging over the edge because I looked.’
    ‘There is one place, one place we haven’t looked.’
    I could feel the eyes burning towards me through the solid metal. My heart had started the drumbeat thing again. I clutched at the rusty metal and felt only despair as the footsteps crunched close.
    ‘He could never climb up there. Too high. I can’t even reach the top.’
    ‘You can’t even reach your shoelaces when you bend over. Come on, give me a lift up. If you boost my foot I can reach up and grab on. All I got to do is take a look.’
    How right he was. Just one look. And there was nothing I could do about it. With the lethargy of defeat possessing me I lay there, hearing the scratching andthe curses, the overweight puffing and scrabbling. The scratching grew closer and not a foot before my face a large hand appeared, groping over the edge.
    My subconscious must have done it because I swear there was no logical thought involved. My hand shot out and pushed the dead bird forward, to the very edge, below the fingers – which descended and closed on it.
    The results were eminently satisfying.The bird vanished, as did the hand, followed by screams and shouts, scrabblings and two large thuds.
    ‘Why did you do that?’
    ‘I grabbed it, uggh – oww! My ankle is broke.’
    ‘See if you can stand on it. Here, hold my shoulder. Hop along on the other foot, this way …’
    There was plenty of shouting back and forth through the trapdoor while I hugged myself with relief and pleasure. They might beback soon, there was that chance, but at least the first round was mine.
    As the seconds, then the minutes, moved slowly by I realised that I