Читать книгу The Midas Man: A Doc Savage Adventure - Lester Bernard Dent - Страница 7

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Sylvan Niles was a young woman with horror in her eyes.

She was also a young woman who achieved the unusual combination of being extremely pretty, and still managing to look efficient. She would never have made a movie actress. She was too tall. Movie directors are chary of having heroines taller than heroes.

“Come in,” she repeated. Her voice was queerly hoarse.

The man in the white uniform carried the groceries in, put them on a table in the living room of an apartment which looked as if it had been rented furnished.

The girl held the revolver steady.

“I’ve been reading the newspapers!” she said, hoarsely. “It has come to me what this terrible thing is all about.”

The young man shrugged. “If you know, you know more than I do.”

“Turn around!” ordered Sylvan Niles, grimly.

“What?”

“Turn around. Put your hands over your head and press you palms against the wall. Better still, step back about four feet, and lean forward, resting your weight against the wall. I don’t want you moving quickly.”

The visitor hesitated, then complied. The young woman slapped a hand over his person, obviously searching for a weapon. She found none.

“All right,” she said. “Now we’re going places!”

“What if I don’t choose to go?” the man demanded.

“I don’t know,” said the girl. “I might shoot you.”

“They electrocute people here for that.”

“They wouldn’t electrocute me,” Sylvan Niles said, grimly. “Not if what I suspect is true.”

“What do you mean?”

“You know what I mean,” she retorted. “The world thinks that Jethro Mandebran has absconded, or possibly been kidnaped. There is not the slightest suspicion of what is really behind it. If the truth should come out, right now, and the newspapers publish it—well, it wouldn’t be believed.”

“Why not?”

“Too incredible! Too fantastic!”

“What about Hando Lancaster?” asked the large young man.

This had a remarkable effect on the young woman. She cocked her gun.

“You do know what’s behind this!” she gritted.

The captive shrugged resignedly.

“Raise the window!” Sylvan Niles directed.

This was done. There was a rooftop on a level with the window, but perhaps a dozen feet distant.

“You will find a long plank in the bedroom,” announced the young woman. “Put it across from the window to the roof. We are leaving.”

“So you had your get-away all fixed,” remarked her captive.

“I have not been taking any chances,” she assured him. “Get a move on!”

The plank was rather heavy, but the young man handled it with marked ease, shoving it through the window and planting the end on the roof.

“Go across,” he was directed. “And do not try to run when you get on that other roof.”

He obeyed. The young woman followed. The roof had been tarred and gravel sprinkled on the tar. The gravel crunched under their feet. There were several buildings in a row, all of the same height. They crossed from one rooftop to another.

“We’re far enough away now so that those reporters can’t see us,” said Sylvan Niles. “You’ll find the fire escape at the rear. Go down that.”

The descent was negotiated without incident. The young woman had lowered the hammer on her revolver, but she kept the weapon convenient. When they were in the alley where they might be seen, she dropped the light coat which she had brought along over her arm so that it concealed the gun.

“This way,” she said.

There was a new medium-priced roadster parked in the street. The girl took the wheel, started the engine and pulled away from the curb.

Sylvan Niles passed the outskirts of the city and turned into an abandoned factory of some kind. The main building was of brick. There were a few outbuildings of wooden construction, but these had practically all fallen down. A tall metal fence surrounding the place, however, was in an excellent state of repair; it was nearly a dozen feet in height and surmounted by several strands of ugly barbed wire.

The young woman got out of her car, produced a key from her purse and unlocked the huge padlock which secured the gate. She drove inside, got out and locked the gate again. Then she drove directly to a large door in the side of the brick building.

She tapped the horn button three times in quick succession. The big door opened, disclosing an utterly dark interior. The girl drove inside and shut off the engine. The door closed. An electric bulb flared on.

“Get out!” the girl told her prisoner.

The captive alighted from the machine and glanced about with interest. The building had no windows, and its walls were evidently of immense thickness. Without the light of the electric bulb over the door, it would have been very dark indeed.

The man who had opened the door and was now shutting it was worth an inspection. In fact, the poor fellow must have been accustomed to being stared at. He was a freak. His body was more nearly round than it seemed a human torso could be. He was small and his head was tremendously large. Indeed, there were times when it seemed his body and head almost corresponded in size.

He had long, pencil-thin legs. His arms and hands looked remarkably like two long weeds which had been pulled up with the roots attached. His clothing was ill-fitting.

The young woman looked at her prisoner.

“You haven’t forgotten Hando Lancaster have you?” she demanded rigidly.

The prisoner bowed slightly. “Glad to see you, Lancaster.”

“Like hell you are!” yelled Hando Lancaster.

His voice was as brittle as glass breaking, and he threw the words out in an utterly fierce, contemptuous manner.

“Would you be kind enough to explain what this is all about?” requested the prisoner.

“You mean to tell me you don’t know?” screamed Hando Lancaster.

It became apparent that yelling and shrieking was Hando Lancaster’s normal manner of speech.

“He’s lying!” snapped Sylvan Niles.

“He might not be!” corrected Hando Lancaster, screaming. “We’ll darn soon find out!”

The prisoner was ordered to hold his hands out. His wrists were lashed together. He was marched into an adjacent room and up a flight of stairs. At the top of the stairs, Hando Lancaster unlocked a stout door.

This door, it could be noted, was of plate steel, very thick. The room, in fact, was literally a vault.

In the center, on the floor, stood a rectangular box of some dark wood. This box looked very like a coffin.

The prisoner was forced to lie in the casketlike box.

The man in the box now gave every evidence of being profoundly puzzled.

“What’s the meaning of this?” he demanded.

“It’s an old Himalayan custom!” yelled Hando Lancaster.

Hando Lancaster now left the room. He had a rather marked facility for moving silently, like a spider on a web.

It was very quiet in the vaultlike room for a few moments. Hando Lancaster, in departing, had closed the door, making the room a tomb from which, it was quite probable, there was no escape.

“Twenty million is a big haul!” the girl said, suddenly. “With it, operations could be started on a widespread scale.”

“I do not know what you are talking about,” said the man in the box.

The girl became very grim as she stared at him. “You’re lying, of course. You must be the brains of the organization. No telling how many are working with you. Hundreds, perhaps.”

“I wish you’d tell me just what you are talking about,” stated the fellow in the box.

“The infernal scheme must be nipped now,” the girl said, grimly. “Within thirty days, it will be too late. You’ll ruin no telling how many lives!”

“You credit me with great abilities,” said the prisoner.

“With this thing, you’ll upset the whole course of the world!” shrilled the girl, who seemed on the point of losing control of herself. “It’s hideous!”

“It is mysterious, at least,” said the other.

The girl leaned forward.

“How about the Happy Skeleton?” she demanded.

“Skeleton?” The fellow in the box acted vastly surprised. “You amaze me!”

Sylvan Niles gritted, “So you claim to know nothing about the Happy Skeleton? Well, I’ll tell you——”

The heavy metal door heaved open suddenly. Hando Lancaster came flying inside. He looked more than ever like a human spider.

“Don’t talk!” he howled at the girl. “Don’t tell him anything!”

“Why not?” she demanded.

“Wait!” shrieked Hando Lancaster. “Watch him closely! I’ll be back in a minute and show you!”

He scuttled out. His arms had a peculiar habitual movement when he walked, as if he were rolling himself along in a wheel chair.

The strange, round-bodied spider of a man came flying back almost at once. He carried a glass bottle in one hand, a wad of cotton waste in the other. The content of the bottle was alcohol, odor proved. He poured some of it on the waste, then leaned over the coffinlike box and scrubbed briskly at the prisoner’s features. He also scrubbed the prisoner’s hair.

Sylvan Niles leaned down and stared at the features of their prisoner.

“Good night!” she exclaimed.

Hando Lancaster glared at the girl and yelled, “It’s your fault!”

“Don’t squall at me!” she snapped. “Everybody makes mistakes!”

Hando Lancaster leveled an arm at the prisoner in the box.

“You’re not Alex Mandebran!” he screamed. “Who are you?”