Читать книгу Meteor Menace: A Doc Savage Adventure - Lester Bernard Dent - Страница 7

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The road mounted numerous hills. From the tops of some of these it was possible to see the far-off hospital. Distance made the crowd there look like varicolored grains of sand.

The throng had not yet dispersed. A few persons had noticed the weird blue glare in the western sky. Even above the mumbling noise of the crowd, some had caught the shrill whistle, faint though distance made it, which accompanied the iridescent display.

“A meteor!” muttered a man.

“But no!” said another. “Whoever saw a meteor of that blue color.”

“Si, si! It is strange for a meteor. The light of it blinds the eye, even at this distance.”

“And did you hear the terrible sound it made?”

One individual, a young woman, was showing no interest in these discussions. She was working her way out of the crowd, casting nervous glances about. Her brown eyes were pools of fear.

Rae Stanley had deemed it safer to remain in the crowd. Accordingly, she had seated herself on a pile of lumber in the middle of the throng and waited.

She had seen her captors, whom Doc had overpowered, regain their senses and flee from the vicinity.

Rae Stanley, nearing the outskirts of the crowd, lifted on tiptoe to look about. For a moment, it seemed as if she would scream. She turned to flee.

But she was too late. A man stepped forward swiftly and grasped her arm.

“Not ’arf glad t’ see me, are you?” he asked. His manner was preoccupied, and he glanced frequently toward the hills where the blue glare had appeared.

“Shrops!” the girl gasped.

“Hi been watchin’ you,” Shrops told her harshly.

Rae Stanley gave him a stare of loathing, and said nothing.

“Bloomin’ well tried t’ warn the bronze bloke, didn’t you?” Shrops asked sarcastically. “You ran when you saw me watchin’ you talk to that gorilla of a mug and the one with the black cane.”

“Yes, I did!” the girl retorted defiantly. “I overheard you making your plans last night.”

“’Ow’d you get out of your room?”

She did not answer.

Shrops eyed the distant hills as if puzzled, then scowled at the girl. “Don’t you recollect what Hi can do by way of payin’ you back fer this little trick? Suppose I send a cable t’ Tibet?”

At the words, the girl whitened visibly. Her lips tightened, and her eyes showed more horror than at any previous time.

“I—thought—of that,” she said, each word seeming a torture.

“Hi oughta keep my promise! But if you don’t pull any more foolishness, Hi may let you off. Come on!”

The Cockney tapped a coat pocket meaningly. A bulge under the cloth hinted strongly at a gun.

The young woman, instead of complying, glanced about as if seeking a policeman.

“Hi’ll blow your pretty ’ead off if you let out a beller!” Shrops warned. “Don’t think Hi’ve got any qualms about shootin’ a bloomin’ woman, ’cause Hi ain’t. You’re comin’ with me!”

The girl made no move to obey. She seemed entirely desperate, ready to risk getting shot rather than accompany the Cockney.

Shrops realized her state of mind. Inside his coat pocket, his gun cocked with a distinct click.

“Don’t be a little fool!” he gritted. “Hi’ll send that cable to Tibet, sure, after shootin’ you! Play my game and you’ll come out ahead.”

The girl seemed to be fighting a terrific battle with herself, debating whether to follow Shrops or not. Her face showed loathing for the Cockney, but also apprehension of some awful vengeance, above the threat to shoot her, which he apparently had power to wreak—a vengeance obviously connected with his repeated threat to send a cable to distant Tibet.

“You—you——” the girl choked hoarsely.

But she accompanied the Cockney.

The Cockney and Rae Stanley turned up some thirty minutes later at a small roadside posada a few miles from the city. The posada was a structure of mud and stone, uninviting to the eye. There was no bar for dispensing drinkables within, and there had never been a shooting, stabbing, or like affray on the premises. Outwardly, this roadside tavern was quite decorous.

Actually, the place was one of the most notorious thief harbors in Chile. But criminals tarrying there conducted themselves with sedateness, and were accordingly free of police notice. The proprietor charged sky-high rates and allowed no rowdyism.

Several Tibetans, loafing about the inn, stuck out their tongues as far as they would go the instant they sighted Shrops.

Shrops and Rae did not seem to consider this tongue-protruding performance anything unusual. These Tibetans came from a tribe near the Mongolian border, a region where the customary greeting is the sticking out of the tongue.

“Did some o’ you tongue-hangin’ blokes ’ave somethin’ to do with that blue meteor appearin’?” Shrops demanded.

“No, Master,” one replied.

Shrops seemed greatly worried at this.

“’Ere’s ’opin’ somebody comes around that does know why it showed itself!” he growled. “The thing wasn’t to appear at all!”

Saturday Loo now stumbled from the posada. There was a purple smear as dark as an ink blot on his jaw, where Doc’s fist had landed. From his manner he did not seem, even yet, to have recovered fully from his ill-favored battle with the bronze giant.

Other Tibetans showed themselves. They were the fellows who, with Saturday Loo, had attempted to seize the girl, and who had fallen victims of Doc Savage’s might.

“You managed t’ accomplish somethin’, anyway!” Shrops said sarcastically. “You got your bloomin’ selves back out ’ere safely!”

He darkened with rage at the memory of how Doc Savage had vanquished Saturday Loo and nearly a dozen other Tibetans.

“The lowly dog who has never seen a lion is prone to make the mistake of biting one,” Saturday Loo murmured.

“Is that a slam at me for sickin’ you on the bronze bloke?” Shrops snarled.

“A thousand pardons, O Master,” Saturday Loo mumbled hastily. “I meant not to belittle you.”

Shrops growled: “You’d better not get sassy. And if you ’ears why that blue meteor appeared, Hi wants to know about it right off!”

“I hope the blue meteor has turned against you!” snapped Rae Stanley, entering the conversation.

“Hi’ve ’arf a mind to scrag you, my beauty!” Shrops yelled at her, and yanked a revolver from his pocket.

The girl blanched, realizing she had pushed the Cockney a trifle too far. The fellow was almost distraught over the blue glow which he had seen in the sky, and his temper accordingly short.

Saturday Loo wheeled and fled unashamedly.

“You pipe down, or you’ll get it plenty!” Shrops snarled at the girl. “Walk to your bloomin’ room! I wanta see how you got out!”

They made their way to a small, dark chamber in the rear. The single small window of this was crisscrossed with metal bars. Shrops tested the bars and seemed surprised to find them firm. He continued his search, and his attention came finally to the door.

“So you pulled the pins out of the hinges!” he growled. “Well, for that, Hi’ll just post a guard outside!”

Shrops had hardly made certain the girl was a prisoner and returned to the front room, when a car drove up. Springing from the machine, the newcomer raced to Shrops.

“’Ave you got some dope on why the blue meteor showed up?” Shrops demanded.

“No, Master!” shouted the man. “I am he who was sent to destroy the plane of the bronze devil.”

“Don’t Hi know it?” Shrops said sarcastically. “If you can’t explain why the blue meteor appeared, what’s ailin’ you? What’s ’appened?”

“I was almost killed!” the Tibetan yelled.

“Calm, you bloody swine!” Shrops snapped. “Did you destroy the plane?”

“I did,” said the Tibetan. “But a very tall skeleton of a man chased me. He would have caught me, except that I had waiting near by the car which I stole last night.”

“Blimme! But you destroyed the plane?”

“I did, O Master. It was a metal plane, but I punched holes in the fuel tanks so that gasoline ran out. Then I applied a match. The man-made bird was entirely consumed.”

Shrops made a growling noise of satisfaction. “With ’is plane out of commission, Doc Savage will ’ave to start ’ome by boat. The logical tub fer ’im is the Chilean Señorita.”

“The Chilean Señorita?” the Tibetan asked, puzzled. “What boat is that, O Master?”

“The name, ‘Chilean Señorita,’ was painted on ’er bows an’ stern only last night,” Shrops explained dryly.

“This dumb one still does not comprehend.”

“Hi mean that the bloomin’ boat is the same one you came to these shores on!”

“Ah! Now my ignorance disappears. But do you think Doc Savage will now take passage on this newly named Chilean Señorita, O Master?”

“There ain’t nothin’ t’ make the bronze bloke suspicious,” leered Shrops. “It ain’t unusual for the crew of a steamer in the Pacific t’ be Chinese or such. Anyway, the boat ’as got papers showin’ she’s a coastwise tub. She’s a bloomin’ fast scow. That last, more’n anythin’, will persuade this Doc Savage t’ take ’er.”

It was perhaps ten minutes later when another Tibetan arrived at the roadside posada. He was wild-eyed with excitement and breathing rapidly from a long run.

“I bring bad news, O Master!” he gulped.

“Wot?” Shrops demanded. “Is it about the blue meteor?”

“The bronze man!” exclaimed the excited Tibetan. “He concealed himself in a trunk on the rear of the car which carried the two prisoners. In the valley, he leaped from the trunk. It shames me to admit it, but he overpowered those in the car without great labor.”

“Didn’t you try t’ ’elp?” Shrops growled.

“This one was but the lookout stationed on a distant hill, O Master,” the other explained. “I could not reach the scene. But I did the next best thing—I summoned the blue meteor.”

“So that’s why the bloody thing showed itself!”

“The blue meteor took a course down the valley, but the bronze man’s ancestors were watching over him, and he got far enough away to evade its power,” said the Tibetan.

“W’ere’s the bronze bloke now?”

“The last I saw of his unworthy person, he had loaded his two men and my own countrymen into the car and headed toward town.”

Shrops began to curse. He swore in Tibetan until he evidently used up all of the profane words of that tongue that he knew, then launched into Limehouse expletives.

“This bronze bloke is a bloomin’ lot worse customer than Hi thought,” he snarled, when he could speak with a trace of calmness.

The Cockney glowered for a time, thinking. Then, muttering to himself, he went outdoors and called loudly for a car.

“Hi’m gonna go see Doc Savage in person!” he growled. “Hi’ve got a neat plan up my sleeve.”