Читать книгу Land of Long Juju: A Doc Savage Adventure - Lawrence Donovan - Страница 4

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Only Souho and Mapanda had remained with Renny. The big engineer ordered them behind the tents. A faint moaning came from the jungle bush.

Renny judged this must be one of his carrier boys. He was about to investigate, when Souho interfered.

“Masai make some trick, b’wana,” he warned. “Him be Juju voice. Most good stay now.”

Renny, always ready for an open scrap, was somewhat bewildered. He listened carefully. Souho’s warning had been well judged. The moaning voice was not that of a man in pain.

Renny started to pull away the body of the dead carrier closest to the fire. A whistling wind fanned his head. A long spear, ornamented with red-dyed ostrich feathers, jammed its blade into the ground.

Around the haft of the spear a white paper was tied. Renny unrolled the white paper. There was a note printed in English:

COLONEL RENWICK MUST LEAVE THIS LAND AT ONCE. THE RAILROAD WILL NEVER BE BUILT. THIS WILL BE THE ONLY WARNING.

“So there is a white man mixed up in this,” growled Renny. “That poor devil they got was right. This is something Doc must know at once!”

Renny whipped back toward his tent. He twisted the dials of the radio transmitter.

Possible the leader of the natives concealed in the jungle had never seen a radio broadcast from so small an instrument. Renny started speaking. Almost at once, a low but penetrating voice replied.

“Doc speaking, Renny. I can hear you clearly.”

The voice of Doc Savage never was raised. It had a peculiar timbre, a great carrying quality.

“Doc, there’s trouble breaking over here!” boomed Renny. “The richest region in Central Africa is about to be invaded. King Udu of Kokoland sent six runners to me. Only one arrived, and he was dying.”

Souho gripped Renny’s arm. The hunter raised the heavy express rifle. He was pointing it at the thick foliage beyond the fire. More than leaves had suddenly appeared. Red ostrich plumes suddenly marked the green wall.

“Don’t shoot!” snapped Renny, catching Souho’s arm.

“Doc—I’ve gotta talk fast—I’ve been ordered out—this King Udu has a son, Prince Zaban, in New York—the kingdom is about to be overthrown!”

Guttural, snarling cries came from the bush. A fantastic figure dressed in the hide and the mane of a lion, leaped into the circle of the fire. Souho’s rifle exploded.

One of the red blotches came from the wall. A huge warrior with a red ostrich headdress slammed on his face.

“They’re on top of us, Doc!” roared Renny. “King Udu has sent men to guard his son in New York—one of his former subjects lives there—he is called Logo—King Udu has sent him a—”

Spears hissed across the fire. Renny paused to pull the transmitter out of immediate range of the spears.

“What did King Udu send?” came Doc’s clear voice.

“King Udu has sent the kingdom’s royal—”

Souho roared with pain. The haft of a spear had struck him over one ear. Two luridly painted warriors sprang from between the tents. They were dragging Mapanda between them.

“Holy cow, Doc!” shouted Renny. “See Prince Zaban—he’ll know—the Long Juju has—”

Renny was completely ringed by the attackers. In the language of the Masai, a white man’s voice emanated from the lion’s head.

“Seize him! Break up that box!”

Half a dozen warriors hurled themselves back of the tents.

Renny heaved to his feet. He was suddenly facing a ring of long-bladed spears.

“If you are wise,” said the lion-clad man in English, “you will not resist. We want only that you should forget this crazy railroad and leave the country.”

“Not in a thousand years!” bellowed the enraged engineer.

He sprang between two of the spear blades. One fist, many pounds in weight, mangled the headdress of the nearest warrior into his skull.

Renny hurled himself straight toward the English-speaking leader. He saw only what looked like the shadow of some flying object. A war club covered with painted knobs cracked across the back of Renny’s thick neck. As he fell, Renny let out one thunderous roar. He was close to the radio transmitter.

Renny’s yell traveled a few thousand miles. It roared from the loud-speaker of a radio board on the wall of Doc Savage’s laboratory in the heart of Manhattan.

The man before the radio was bigger than the huge Renny. He did not appear to be as big, due to the symmetry of his massive figure. The skin of his face and of his hands and bared forearms was of the smoothest golden bronze. His hair fitted closely to his skull. Its color seemed almost a continuation of his skin.

At Renny’s yell, a childlike voice spoke anxiously.

“Howlin’ calamities, Doc! Now Renny’s gone an’ got himself into some sure enough trouble!”

The speaker could easily have been mistaken for a dressed gorilla. Red, furry hair covered all of his visible parts.

“Looks that way, Monk,” stated Doc quietly. “Undoubtedly we have just been listening to an attack of warriors in the heart of an African jungle.”

“African jungle?” crackled a dry, sarcastic voice. “Now, that’s right up Monk’s alley. Maybe if we go to Africa, we’ll succeed in leaving him with his kinfolks!”

This speaker was an elegantly clad, waspish-waisted man. His face was thin and his eyes were keen.

“Dag-gonit, Ham!” squeaked the hairy one. “Renny’s in a jam, an’ you go makin’ shyster jokes that don’t mean nothin’!”

“Renny’s probably having the time of his life,” observed Ham.

“Ham,” Theodore Marley Brooks, was the legal luminary of Doc Savage’s group. He was one of the country’s smartest lawyers.

“Monk” was Andrew Blodgett Mayfair, noted industrial chemist. Monk was still glaring at Ham. Doc ignored their dispute.

“It is to be regretted Renny was unable to inform us what King Udu has probably sent to New York,” said the bronze man. “First, we shall have to make contact with this Prince Zaban, if he happens to be in Manhattan.”

“Renny said this African potentate has sent men to New York,” said Ham. “An’ that fellow he called Logo? Maybe we could find him. The only trouble is, he’s likely living over in Harlem under the name of Brown or Smith or something.”

“You are possibly correct,” said Doc Savage. “However, I believe we shall learn something of Prince Zaban in a very short time. This King Udu is old, but he is a remarkably well-informed ruler. He is king over nearly forty different tribes, some of them wild, but his own race seems to have sprung from an early invasion of the Kilimanjaro country by the ancient Romans.”

Doc Savage and his men were to hear news of Prince Zaban very soon. For, as the man of bronze discovered all further effort to contact Renny was useless, two groups of strange, dark-skinned men were approaching the towering skyscraper.

Brilliant morning sunshine afforded an unusual atmosphere for the grim tragedy which was closely impending.

A uniformed messenger was hurrying along one of the narrow streets. This thoroughfare converged with another at the intersection above which the glittering skyscraper reared its tower.

On this intersecting street was another messenger. This was not unusual, but each of these messengers was swarthy of skin, and each had a thinly boned, arching nose. Each hurrying man carried a package wrapped in heavy manila paper.

A short distance behind each messenger, half a dozen or more men threaded their way through the dense crowds. They, too, were of dark skin. These men wore the turbans of native Hindus of India. Yet any observer would have noted these men were not Hindus.

The noses of all these men were flat and very broad. Their turbans were tightly wrapped. The folds of cloth concealed their ears.

One messenger carried his package under his arm. He had nearly reached the street intersection. Turbaned men suddenly shoved other pedestrians aside and sprang toward the messenger.

A woman emitted a scream. One of the turbaned men had torn the package from under the messenger’s arm. Another clamped his hands on the messenger’s throat.

Four or five wearing the turbans had blocked off others on the sidewalk. Smart pedestrians sprang away. A husky, Irish traffic policeman let out a shrill alarm from his whistle. He had seen the beginning of the attack.

The copper had his gun in his hand. He yelled, “Hey! Get ’em up, you devils, before I blast yuh!”

Perhaps the traffic officer saw an opportunity to cover himself with glory. No weapons showed in the hands of any of the turbaned men.

The turbaned men ignored the policeman’s order. The one who had seized the package, ripped off the manila covering. The object inside looked like a solid block of polished wood.

The turbaned man let out a yell of triumph. The man in the messenger’s uniform had ceased to resist. A queer smile played suddenly over his face.

That smile was his last. It was a sardonic grin. Possibly it should have warned the men who had seized him.

The man holding the strange block fumbled his fingers along one edge. This man was almost completely obliterated. The block exploded with a terrific impact. The blast ripped open a small crater in the sidewalk.

The traffic policeman’s revolver exploded in the grip of a hand that probably was already dead. A score of persons were hurled onto the sidewalk and into the building where plate glass was shattered.

In the intersecting street, the attack of turbaned men upon the other messenger had been almost simultaneous with the terrible explosion. This messenger put up a fierce fight.

No weapons were used. But two of the turbaned men were knocked down before one wrested the package from their victim. Then one of the attackers struck the messenger with what appeared to be a small, pointed dart.

The messenger’s nostrils dilated. He emitted a strange, terrible laugh. The heavy paper was being torn from another object that was apparently only a block of solid wood.

The polished oblong gave forth a hissing. The turbaned man holding it crumpled to the sidewalk. The block struck and burst into flames.

Five men wearing the peculiar turbans fell down. One clawed madly at his eyes. It pulled the turban loose. Parts of his ears seemed to fall away. But they were still attached. They were the lobes of the ears, horribly distorted into great rings of flesh.

All of the men who fell died almost instantly. Close to the ashes of the oblong block lay the messenger who had carried it. Across his lips was a sardonic grin. A small dart protruded from his neck.

Radio police cars and ambulances screamed into the two blocks. Nothing remained of either of the oblong packages. It was plainly evident one had been packed with high explosive.

It was equally evident the other had been the container of some deadly, instantly effective gas.

A captain of detectives found a small piece of manila paper intact. He stared at it.

“You might have known he would have something to do with this!” he growled. “Joe, have headquarters get in touch with Doc Savage!”

On the salvaged bit of heavy paper was the name CLARK SAVAGE JR. The package had been sealed with a blue wax. Where this had been broken appeared the imprint of a curious seal.

The small figure in this seal was grotesquely ugly.