Lucifer's Hammer - Larry Niven [178]
Would their gas hold? They had plenty so far. Harvey thought of the extra gas he'd stored, and of thieves and killers in a blue van. Wherever they hid, someday he would track them down. But they hadn't taken this road. He'd have noticed. So far they'd had the road almost to themselves.
Dawn found them north and east of Bakersfield. They'd made effective progress. Thirty miles an hour, and now they were on high ground, skirting the eastern edge of the San Joaquin, with nothing to stop them.
Harvey realized where they were heading. Their route would take them right past the Jellison ranch.
The Tule River was too deep, way too deep. Nobody had dared to use the road that ran alongside. By the time Harvey realized this, it was too late. He could see the dam ahead.
Water streamed around one side and all along the top. He could just tell where the spillway was: a surging current in the river that poured over the face of the dam. He sounded the horn and waved Mark ahead. He clenched his fist and moved it vigorously up and down, the Army signal for double time. He pointed at the dam.
Mark got the message; he gunned the bike. Harvey slammed down the accelerator and roared after him. They were almost to the dam, then—
A river of mud submerged the road. A dozen people and half that many cars were mired in the mud. They'd tried to get past the slide and got stuck.
Harvey levered the TravelAll into four-wheel drive and went on without stopping. One man stepped forth to bar their way with spread arms. Harvey came close enough to see wide eyes and bared teeth, a rictus of terror and determination … and he saw Harvey's face. The TravelAll's headlight ticked his heel as he leaped away.
The mud was sliding and the TravelAll slid with it. Harvey turned hard, gunned the engine and fought a frantic race between his traction on the mud and the mud's adherence to the road. Rocks in the road tipped the TravelAll sickeningly. Then there was road under them again. Harvey heard Marie's gasp of relief.
There was a bridge ahead. It crossed an arm of the lake … and it was under water. Harvey couldn't tell how deep. He slowed.
Suddenly there were other sounds embedded in the sounds of river and rain and thunder. Screams. Joanna looked back. "Jesus!" she shouted.
Harvey stopped the TravelAll.
The dam was going. One whole side of it crumbled, all in a moment, and the lake went forth in a wall of water. The screams were drowned in its thunder.
"Our timing was s-superb," Joanna said.
"All those people," Harvey muttered. All the travelers in cars not as good as the TravelAll. All the farmers who thought they'd wait it out. People on foot, people already marooned on roofs and high points in the new shallow lakes, would look up to see the wall of water marching toward them.
It would be worse when the other dams went. The whole valley would be flooded. No dam would hold against this relentless rain. Harvey took a deep breath.
"Okay, it's over. We made it. Quaking Aspen is only thirty miles from here. Gordie'll bring them out there." He summoned up a mental picture of the road north of Springville. It crossed many streams, and the map showed small power stations and dams on some of them. Dams above the road.
Had they failed? Would they fail? It would be foolish, even insane, to charge up the road just in time to be washed down again.
"Let's go," Marie said.
Harvey drove on. There was no water above the bridge now. That water was on its way into the San Joaquin Valley. He drove across the bridge, and was surprised to see a big truck coming toward him. It stopped just at the far end of the bridge. Two big men got out. They stared as Harvey drove past them. One started to shout something, then shrugged.
Up ahead there was another bridge out. That decided it: Harvey had to detour past the entrance to Senator Jellison's place.
And where better to learn what was happening in the mountains?