Читать книгу Land of Long Juju: A Doc Savage Adventure - Lawrence Donovan - Страница 6

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Monk and Ham knew nothing of the assassination of Prince Zaban. At the time they arrived at Pat Savage’s establishment, Doc Savage was returning to his headquarters.

Count Cardoti had convinced the police of his genuine grief over the death of the prince. He readily accepted Doc’s suggestion that he accompany him. Apparently Count Cardoti knew something of the bronze man’s reputation.

“If any person on earth can run these assassins to earth, you can do it,” he stated to Doc.

About this time Ham and Monk were interviewing Margaret, Pat’s assistant at the beauty shop. She could furnish only one lead.

“Miss Savage got into a car with Señorita Moncarid,” she told Ham and Monk. “The señorita was here getting a facial. Then four Negroes came here and she was terrified. She asked Miss Savage to take her to a hotel. The four men followed them in a big car, although Miss Savage had the señorita disguised in a blond wig and a different coat.”

“Anything else?” prompted Ham.

“Well, this señorita—” exclaimed the assistant, “I don’t think she’s Spanish. She had funny ears, and a little thing like a scorpion tattooed on her shoulder. She said something in an odd language when she saw the Negroes.”

“Dag-gonit!” complained Monk. “I’ll bet Pat’s got herself into a real jam!”

“Yeah,” drawled Ham, “and she probably thinks she’s having the time of her life. I’m calling this señorita’s hotel.”

“I hope Pat went there,” said Monk.

Ham’s face clouded. He was on the phone. He said, “Yes, all right,” and hung up.

“It seems Pat must be all right,” he said in a relieved voice. “She is with this Señorita Moncarid. The señorita had called her hotel. She left an address if any one called inquiring for Pat. It’s on the upper East Side.”

Ham and Monk drove rapidly to the East Side address. They surveyed the gloomy warehouse and loft building.

“Betcha the whole thing’s a trap!” complained Monk. “Maybe we oughta call up Doc!”

Ham vetoed wasting any time. Descending from the car, he walked toward the partly open door of the deserted warehouse.

“But there’ve been a couple of cars here not long ago,” said Ham, pointing to the tire marks in the dust. “They’ve been inside.”

The lean lawyer flourished his smooth black cane and stepped inside the doorway. Monk lumbered after him. The interior of the warehouse was too dark to give a view more than a few feet.

Ham kicked around disgustedly. He was careful not to soil his trousers and coat.

Tracks showed many feet had trampled in the dust.

Ham poked his black cane into the dust. That cane was a dangerous weapon. It sheathed the finest steel blade with a tip drugged to put an enemy out of business.

Monk let out a yell and dropped to his hands and knees. He scurried around like some furry gorilla.

“I thought you’d go that way some time,” drawled Ham sarcastically. “Now what do you think you’re looking for?”

“Pat was here!” shouted Monk. “I’d know her feet in a million! Hey! Look at this!”

Monk heaved to his feet. He was clutching Pat’s small automatic pistol.

“Dag-gonnit!” he yelped. “She’s put up a fight! Maybe she’s still upstairs somewhere!”

They listened for a few seconds. The only sound was a rat gnawing wood. The place was ghostly.

Ham found a door leading to a stairway. The narrow entrance was opaque. He preceded Monk through the door. Then he yelled out a rare oath.

“Hey, you danged shyster!” squealed Monk. “Where’d you think you’re goin’?”

Ham had seemed to perform a queer, acrobatic feat. He had leaped straight up. One of his flying heels rapped Monk’s ugly chin.

“Dag-gone you!” exploded Monk, making a grab for the foot.

Monk’s long arm remained extended. His short legs were jerked from under him. He made a short, breath-taking flight that ended in a jouncing jolt.

“Hey, lemme go!” he yelled.

Ham’s body banged against him in the darkness. Monk slapped out with one fist. Ham kicked at him.

The feet of both men dangled several feet from the floor. They were being bounced gently up and down. Loops tightened around their bodies.

Near-by sounded a rush of feet. Monk let out a whoop and produced his superfire pistol. The warehouse seemed suddenly to be filled with a million bees.

Monk sprayed mercy bullets at random. Hoarse voices squawked. Ham had loosened his sword blade. He punched at shadows. Then a light flashed. Monk and Ham were ringed in by dark faces. They saw dancing heads with grotesque ears. A dozen short swords slashed at their feet.

Ham flicked back with his long blade. Two attackers suddenly fell, knocked out by Ham’s sword.

Monk got four or five men with mercy bullets. These would keep them asleep for a couple of hours.

Ham attempted to loosen the thing that had caught them. It was a device such as might have been found in the jungle. Pieces of steel had been bent and fitted with slipnooses. Ham and Monk had walked into these loops.

They were held off the floor as wild animals might have been lifted on some tropical water trail.

Monk’s superfirer and Ham’s sword set the Africans back for a moment. They went into a huddle. Ham started to slice the loop around him with his sword blade.

But the lawyer did not complete his escape. He gave a shout of warning.

“Drop your pistol, Monk, or we’re done for!”

Ham let his sword blade clatter to the floor. Monk gave one look at the near-by men and his superfirer thudded after the sword.

Two men had stepped forward. They were holding what might have been bean-shooters. The tubes pointed at Ham and Monk.

“We give up!” yelled Ham. “Hold up on that stuff!”

Whether or not the Africans understood, they lowered the short tubes. Ham had instantly recognized the bean-shooters as deadly blowpipes of the African jungle.

The jabbering men lowered Ham and Monk. They enwrapped them with long strips of rattan. Monk gurgled over the chunk of evil-tasting wax thrust into his mouth.

The Africans carried their prisoners up three flights of stairs. They dumped them into a room.

Monk and Ham at first thought it was empty. Neither could speak. There was a shuffling on the floor. A little light came through a dirty window.

Pat Savage lay there blinking at them. She made gurgling noises in her throat.

Ham’s hands were secured behind him. He began thumping with his heels. The thumps were unevenly spaced. Pat Savage’s small heels also thumped. This was an abbreviation of the Morse code devised by Doc Savage.

“Where is Señorita Moncarid?” was Ham’s message.

“Believe she is boss of these men,” thumped Pat.

“Knew it,” tapped Ham. “She trapped us. It is scheme to get Doc. Sent him infernal machine. He has it in safe.”

The Africans appeared to have gone to another part of the building. Ham attempted to cut his rattan bindings with a keen blade which sprang from the inside of a signet ring on his right hand.

But the tough, bark fibre of the jungle could not be severed.

At about the time Ham was telling Pat Savage of the supposed infernal machine in Doc’s safe, the man of bronze was ascending to his headquarters. Count Cardoti exclaimed as Doc Savage’s door opened without being touched.

Inside the door, Doc Savage halted abruptly. From him came the mellow, fantastic trilling. He lifted his hand as a signal for Johnny and Count Cardoti to proceed with caution.

“We have had visitors,” he announced quietly.

The bronze man had glanced at one of the wall panels. This panel contained several dials. A red needle was slowly vibrating.

This informed Doc that one of several secret entrances had been disturbed.

“What do you suppose has happened to Ham and Monk?” questioned Johnny. “They were to stay here.”

Doc Savage whipped through the library into the inner room. Count Cardoti and Johnny followed closely.

Count Cardoti let out a surprised oath.

“I can’t understand what has caused this visit in force to America,” he added. “Good grief, Mr. Savage! They have had a death battle right here in your place!”

Count Cardoti had spoken correctly. Huge glass retorts and scores of small glass containers had been shattered.

Two dead men lay in front of the huge safe. The door of the safe had been deeply gouged with steel instruments. But the invaders had not succeeded in gaining an entrance.

“They’re Masai or Waperri,” said Count Cardoti. “They are of the same tribe that killed Prince Zaban. Their ears are the same.”

The dead men’s ear lobes were loops of deformed flesh.

“Again we seem to have the arrow of the red ostrich,” stated Doc. “That is the war sign of the Masai.”

“That offers a strange contradiction,” stated Johnny. “Unless they have started killing each other.”

Arrows were stuck into the throats of the dead men.

“I imagine,” stated Doc, “these men were not killed by their own tribesmen. Their own arrows were used as murder weapons.”

Count Cardoti bent over two small glasses on the floor beside the bodies. Each was filled with blood. Undoubtedly it had been drawn from the veins of the two dead men.

Count Cardoti’s face was gray and pinched. His black eyes glittered.

“It is strange,” he announced. “Here is evidence there must be a considerable number of Kokonese in New York. Neither the prince nor myself knew of their presence. The glasses of blood tell it.”

“The Kokonese are not blood-drinkers,” stated Doc.

“That’s just it,” replied Count Cardoti. “The Masai and the Waperri do drink the blood of their enemies. So, when they are killed by the Kokonese, the victors often leave a vessel of their own blood. It is a gesture of contempt.”

“These aborigines seem to be very pleasant people,” commented Johnny. “What do you suppose happened to Ham and Monk?”

Doc Savage did not reply. He had produced a small cylinder. A pressure of a button set a generator buzzing. The man of bronze moved with apparent aimlessness across the laboratory.

But when Doc halted, one foot was pressing a spring concealed under the edge of a table. He pointed the gleaming cylinder at the big safe. The tumblers of the lock slid back noiselessly.

The ponderous door swung open.

The block of polished teakwood reposed inside. Count Cardoti had been staring at the opening of the safe. He associated the unlocking with the buzzing cylinder in Doc’s hand.

The cylinder had no connection with the apparent magic. It was a ruse sometimes employed by the bronze man when he desired to open the safe in the presence of visitors.

Doc had already informed Count Cardoti something of the tragedies of the early morning. The police had mentioned them. Not until now had the man of bronze made any reference to his own teakwood package.

“Good grief!” exploded Count Cardoti. “This is like the infernal machines on the street! Where did it come from?”

“It was delivered by a special messenger this morning,” stated Doc.

The count’s pointed face became the color of wax.

“I thought I would keep it and see what happened,” said Doc calmly. “If it is an infernal machine, these men would hardly have been so eager to obtain possession of it.”

Count Cardoti’s face lighted a little. He nodded.

“I had not thought of that,” he admitted. “Still, I think it is dangerous. Have you opened it?”

“Perhaps you might suggest some way it could be done,” stated Doc unexpectedly. “I know now it has come from some of these tribal factions. Have you ever seen anything resembling it?”

“Never,” declared Count Cardoti.

Doc’s bronzed hands slid over the polished surface as if seeking for some hidden spring.

“Please, Mr. Savage, I wouldn’t attempt to open it, if it can be opened,” said Count Cardoti. “I admit since what happened to Prince Zaban my nerves are on edge.”

“Perhaps that is good advice,” said Doc. “We will leave it for the present.”

He returned the teakwood block to the safe.

Without explanation, Doc suddenly glided into the library. When he emerged in the outer room, he carried a square black box. Its lens gave it the appearance of an old-fashioned stereoscope.

No light came from the lens, but when it was pointed at the window of the outside room, glowing words leaped into view.

The beam was the ultra-violet or black light. The words had been written with a substance which fluoresced under this invisible ray. The message had been left by Ham:

PAT POSSIBLY IN TROUBLE. WE HAVE GONE THERE.

Doc whipped instantly to the telephone. His brief conversation with Pat’s establishment brought the only facts they had.

Pat Savage had disappeared with a mysterious dark woman calling herself Señorita Moncarid. There had been an invasion of Africans. Monk and Ham had received a message from the señorita’s hotel. They had gone to find Pat.

Doc immediately called the hotel named. No. There had been no further word from Señorita Moncarid. Only she had left some message for any one seeking Pat Savage.

“Wait a minute,” said the hotel operator. In a few seconds she added, “The message was delivered. The girl who was on the board before me destroyed the address it gave. Now she has gone to Coney Island.”

Doc’s fantastic trilling broke out. He was convinced that Pat was in serious danger.

Señorita Moncarid was a new angle. In what manner could she be connected with the fantastic tribal warfare?

The man of bronze analyzed the whole situation quickly.

King Udu of Kokoland had sought to safeguard Prince Zaban in New York. In some manner, his subjects had failed. There had been the apparent deliberate decoying of enemy Masai warriors to their deaths in the explosion and by the other flaming package.

Then the teakwood block had come to Doc Savage.

Doc whipped back into the laboratory. Picking up the paper wrapping which had been around the package, he studied the address again:

WILLIAM SMITH

4404 Crooked Neck Road, Long Island

Doc got on the telephone. The commissioner of police replied.

“No,” said the commissioner, “we have been unable to get anything definite on Long Island. Some farmers living on Crooked Neck Road in Long Island have reported strange Negro men in the vicinity. But the place is almost a wilderness.”

“I know,” stated Doc. “The region is in upper Suffolk County. For the most part the land there consists of sandy barrens.”

The man of bronze thumbed through a Long Island directory. He put his finger on Crooked Neck Road. There was no definite address of 4404, and there was no name of William Smith.

Despite the evident falseness of the address, Doc announced to the others, “I believe we may discover something of importance on Long Island. We should arrive there shortly after sunset.”