Читать книгу The Munitions Master: A Doc Savage Adventure - Harold A. Davis - Страница 6

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Doc Savage a criminal!

Police broke into the bronze man’s offices on the eighty-sixth floor of a New York skyscraper. A constant guard was put there, even though none of Doc’s men were in the country.

Federal secret service agents investigated the mystery of the many devices that were found in those offices. Some they could not solve. They might be instruments to cause death and destruction. The Federal men did not know.

Word was sent out quietly to round up any of Doc’s aids that could be found. None could be located.

Major Thomas J. Roberts, known as “Long Tom,” the electrical wizard of the group, it was learned, had persuaded operators of a test Clipper service to Europe to permit him to make a trip in one of their planes. He was in the air, hundreds of miles away.

William Harper Littlejohn, the famous geologist and archaeologist, called “Johnny” by his friends, and Colonel John Renwick, the noted engineer, who answered as “Renny,” were in the Arctic, far from civilization, on an exploration trip of their own.

A conference of high government officials was held in Washington. All available evidence was set before them. That evidence appeared overwhelming.

“It is incredible. It is beyond belief,” a tall, gray-haired man pronounced solemnly. “But we can only go on the evidence we have. And we must act. Do you agree?”

Others at the conference nodded glumly. The order was sent out. Doc Savage must be found at all costs!

In the French Sûreté offices, where the Seine ran close by, another similar conference was held.

The orders that were issued were swift and concise. It might be better for all concerned if Doc Savage tried to resist arrest.

“Shoot to kill!” was the command, and soon it became the byword in a dozen countries.

A thin, unhealthy-appearing man sat tensely in the seat of a giant Clipper plane. He was not very tall, and seemed almost a physical weakling.

He wore a worried expression. His hands opened and closed. Facing him, a stern-visaged man in blue uniform was staring at him intently.

“It can’t be. Doc wouldn’t do anything like that. He’s been framed,” the thin man said.

His companion laughed shortly. “I’m afraid not, Major Roberts,” he said. “I wish for your sake that it was so.”

Major Thomas J. Roberts was silent for a moment. It was significant that his companion had not called him by his nickname, Long Tom. That small thing was enough to show how the other felt, for he and Long Tom had been good friends.

“I know it looks funny, Fred,” Long Tom said. “But I know Doc Savage. There is not a word of truth in what is being said about him.”

“But the broadcast, in his own words?”

Long Tom shook his head dolefully. “Doc did not make that broadcast. And that means that he must be a prisoner somewhere. How soon will we land? I’ve got to get to Paris as quickly as possible.”

The uniformed man, captain of the Clipper, shook his head slowly.

“It’s not going to do you any good for us to land, major,” he said. “We have received radio instructions from Washington to place you under arrest. When we arrive, you are to be turned over to Scotland Yard.”

Long Tom slumped deeper in his seat. The captain might think he was a prisoner. Long Tom had other ideas. He had to get to Doc Savage somehow.

The bronze man might need aid.

Monk and Ham had similar thoughts. The two wasted no time getting out of the hotel room. They realized it would soon be overrun with French police, who would hold them while they were searching for Doc.

They left Chemistry behind. Ham protested, but Monk pointed out logically that if the ape was with them, their chances of being caught were doubled.

“That girl. I saw her picture on a poster advertising a café,” Monk piped grimly.

They called a cab. Ham gave instructions.

“Of course, she won’t be there,” Ham said, “but maybe we can learn something about her, get a clue that will help.”

A long sedan was trailing the cab. As the aids’ cab drew up in front of the café, the sedan parked directly behind. The sedan’s driver jumped out, edged close to the lawyer and the chemist.

“Doc Savage sent me,” he whispered.

Neither Monk nor Ham indicated they had heard. Ham finished paying the cab driver, added a five-franc tip. Then he spun. In the same instant, Monk was on the other side of the man who had approached them.

“What’s the game?” Monk growled.

Ham’s eyes were hard. His grip on the man’s arm was almost enough to break it.

The man made no attempt to escape. He smiled slightly. “The bronze one said you would act like this, but to remind you that his offices are on the eighty-sixth floor. He wants you to help him.”

Monk’s eyes met those of Ham.

Ham spun the man around so that he faced the other way. His lips formed words noiselessly.

“A trap!” he indicated.

Monk nodded. The man had endeavored to use a code word to indicate his message was an honest one. He had used the wrong phrase.

Monk’s eyelids dropped slightly. He spoke loudly. “Yeah, I guess Doc would like to have us with him,” he said.

“We’ll go with you,” Ham agreed.

It seemed the man gave a faint sigh of relief, but he masked it instantly. “I will drive,” he said. “You two had better get in back, out of sight. The gendarmes are looking for you.”

Monk rolled down the windows in the rear of the car. “We’ll take no chance on gas,” he whispered.

Ham nodded. A gun appeared in his hand. “We’ll take this guy as soon as the car stops,” he said. “But first let him take us wherever he wants to go. I’ll bet it is where Doc is.”

They got in. Their driver reached back, slammed the door firmly behind them. A vicious grin twisted his lips.

When the door had slammed, the seat had dropped. A dark curtain had shot across and above Monk and Ham as they sprawled on the bottom of the car. They were in an almost airtight compartment. Gas overcame them at once.

The car turned, sped toward an airport on the outskirts of Paris.

In another car, at the same time, Chemistry, tied firmly and still squealing occasionally, was being taken in the same direction.

“Don’t know what anyone would want that gorilla for,” one of his captors moaned. The man’s face was battered.

“At any rate,” a companion consoled him, “Doc Savage has been left without help.”

If the man had second sight, he would have wondered if Doc needed help.

The bronze man was still in the room where he had been taken by Mary Standish and John Marsh. But he was not alone. And he was not a captive.

Five figures lay sprawled in various attitudes around the room.

When the attackers had burst in, two of the men—those armed with machine guns—had ordered Doc to raise his hands. The others had slipped around behind him, had lifted their blackjacks, ready to strike.

Those with the Tommy guns never did know just what happened.

There was a bronze flash. The guns were knocked from their hands, even as blackjacks swished through the air harmlessly.

Doc Savage whirled. The other three hit him at once. Ordinarily, Doc preferred to overcome opponents as painlessly as possible. The speed with which the others attacked was their own hard luck.

The bronze man acted fast. Huge, rugged fists at the end of steel-hard arms lashed out with a speed so fast the eye could not follow them.

The three men folded up.

Doc surveyed them calmly. One, undoubtedly, was the leader; he was better dressed, his face showed more intelligence.

The bronze man reached inside his shirt, opened the small, compact kit he always had around his body. His hand came out with a hypodermic needle.

He dissolved a white powder in water, filled the hypodermic, then injected the shot in the man’s arm. Instantly, the man sat up, his eyes opened. But he did not seem to realize where he was.

Doc replaced the powder and hypodermic. The powder was one of his own devising, one that might have won a fortune if he had sold it to prize fighters. It cleared the brain instantly of the effect of a knockout blow, but at the same time left the victim so he would do exactly as he was told, whether to answer questions or to resume fighting.

“Who sent you after me?” Doc asked quietly.

The man’s mouth opened. “It was Car——”

His words broke off. He gave a shrill scream. Then he was silent.

Doc’s low, trilling sound, filled the room.

The man would never talk again. He now lay in two parts. His body had been completely severed, directly at the waistline.

Each end of that body was seared, exactly as the stricken soldiers’ legs had been seared!