Doc Savage: Death's Dark Domain (34 page)

Coming upon it, Doc swept the brocaded hanging aside and found Ham Brooks tied to
a chair. There was a roll-top desk and another chair, both unoccupied.

Entering, Doc cut Ham loose with a blade he took from his belt. He then went to a
corner where a bulky steel box sat unguarded. Doc knelt, threw it open and inspected
the contents. Satisfied, he quickly sealed it again.

In one corner a radio was playing orchestral music, low and softly.

Doc noticed the cumbersome electric typewriter squatting on a plain deal table nearby.
A long roll of paper sat in the platen. It was blank.

Ham yanked off his gag and asked, “Where is Monk?”

“Searching for you. Safe.”

Doc seemed distracted. He found a military radio transceiver in the roll-top desk.
Warming this up, the bronze man began listening to words coming from the speaker grille.

The talk was in the heavy-accented language of Tazan. Doc listened intently.

“Let’s find the others,” he said at last.

As they turned to go, the other radio began playing the nerve-affecting medley. It
began on a glum note, and proceeded to unravel in dismal chords that strained for
the effect of making the listener want to cut his own throat, seemingly.

And on the table, the bulky typewriter began clacking of its own volition. Inked words
started appearing on the paper, forming lines. It was as if a ghost were taking dictation
from the otherworldly music.

Halting, Doc paused to read the paper rolling out of the platen.

What he read caused his weird trilling to issue forth, haunting and ethereal. It mixed
with the discordant melody, battled it briefly.

Hovering nearby, Ham observed that the lines being printed out suddenly became brokenly
spaced, as if words and letters were missing.

“What is this?” he asked, scowling.

“The music coming from Egallah is a kind of a code,” explained Doc. “Beat notes actuate
the printer mechanism, which translates the message into readable words.”

“Rather like a bally teletype machine,” remarked Ham. “Can you make it out, Doc?”

The bronze man nodded. He was fluent in almost all spoken languages. Then he made
his trilling sound again, apparently deliberately. This time, it overpowered the weird
tones emanating from the radio.

Once again, the words coming from the device began to miss, letters spacing apart
in a way that suggested interrupted words.

Ham exclaimed, “Jove! It appears as if your trilling is interfering with the machine’s
ability to decode that deuced melody!”

Curious, the dapper lawyer picked up the device and examined it from several angles.
It appeared to run off storage batteries. There was no sign of a microphone, by which
the mechanism must somehow “hear” and translate the unpleasant melody that actuated
it.

Suddenly, Ham felt Doc’s viselike grip on his arm and he was being pulled along. In
the bronze man’s other arm was the bulky steel box. The dapper lawyer held tight to
the typewriter, which continued clattering until they had put the general’s office
well behind them.

They raced along tunnels remindful of earthy entrails until they found the others.
The reunion was brief and memorable.

“I knew you weren’t dead,” Monk said upon spying Ham.

“How so?” Ham blurted.

Monk grinned. “If you were a goner, you’d have been hauntin’ me already,” explained
the simian chemist.

“Come on,” said Doc, guiding them out.

As they rushed along, Ham made explanations.

“When that damnable Countess Olga took me into a chamber, she attempted to gull me
for information on Doc. When that failed, she claimed to be the Medusa—the mythical
woman whose stare turned men into stone. Removing her turban, she underwent a horrid
transformation.”

“That’s when you screamed, correct?” said Long Tom.

“In all my days, I never beheld anything so shocking,” admitted Ham. “It was horrible—ghastly.”

“You’re just saying that because she flashed her eyes at you and you fell for her,
hook, line and sinker,” snapped Long Tom. “Then she showed you her true colors.”

The dapper lawyer colored angrily. The expression on his aristocratic face told that
he was torn between biting his sharp tongue and divulging the truth. The truth won.

“Yes, she—I mean he—did exactly that,” Ham fumed.

“He!” exploded Monk, eyes widening.

Avoiding Monk Mayfair’s gimlet gaze, Ham turned even redder. “Countess Olga was nothing
more than an alias for Emile Zirn,” he reluctantly admitted.

Doc Savage inserted, “It became obvious that the three persons who vanished aboard
the liner
Transylvania
were in fact one individual. Countess Olga alias Emile Zirn, and the unidentified
witness to the apparent demise of the first two. The latter two offering testimony
that one of the others had vanished in black smoke before himself disappearing. In
truth, one clever quick-change disguise artist was concocting lies designed to make
it appear as if the electron-stopping machine had survived.”

Monk piped up. “I get it now! Baron Karl knew that John Sunlight sold the electron-stopper
to Tazan at the same time the Egallans got the eye-paralyzing gimmick. The Tazans
were tryin’ to make it sound as if they still had it. That way the balance of power
would be maintained.”

“You mean the balance of
terror,
don’t you?” inserted Long Tom.

“I was never so mortified in my life,” sputtered Ham. “Fooled by that—that—”

“Spy,” spat Fiana, who had caught up with them. “I have suspected for some time that
Countess Olga was a man. A woman can sense such things,” she added.

“When I was reeling from the shock,” Ham elaborated, “she—I mean he—brained me with
something.”

Monk guffawed loudly. He knew he now had something with which to ride the fastidious
barrister for months to come. Ham was forever ribbing him about his chorus cuties.
Now Monk had a perfect retort.

“Let that be a lesson to you, you skirt-chasing discredit to the ambulance-chasing
profession,” Monk chortled.

Had he possession of his cane, the dapper lawyer would surely have brained the hairy
chemist right then and there.

Their headlong running took them to the body of General Consadinos, his jugular vein
still bubbling, albeit in a less lively manner.

Doc gave a quick glance and saw that life had all but ebbed from the Tazan leader.

“What happened to him?” asked Ham, aghast.

Long Tom cocked his head toward Fiana Drost. “A she-vampire got him.”

No one said anything. They ran on until Doc Savage led them to the escape tunnel that
brought them back to the cellar through which they had escaped what seemed like an
eternity ago. His astonishing memory allowed him to backtrack through the underground
labyrinth without error.

They entered into the night, moving past the dead bodies splayed about until Doc Savage
located a military truck. It refused to run until Doc exposed the engine and did something
to the wiring.

“All set,” he said, slamming down the snow-dusted hood. Doc took the wheel. Monk got
in with him. The others piled in back.

Pressing the gas to the floor, Doc sent the truck careening out of the town of the
dead and through the rapidly accumulating snow.

Here and there they passed patrolling one-eyed Tazan were-men who had become a ludicrous
sight, coated in heavy snow.

“Like snowmen from Hell!” Monk muttered.

They were not molested by the roaming monsters. The latter appeared to be unarmed,
there being no practical method of arming them that did not betray their presence.

Watching the prowling Cyclopes, Monk unlimbered his machine pistol, took aim and began
peppering the lumbering were-men. He had set his weapon to fire single shots.

Mercy bullets struck, knocking snow from the ambulatory hulks, sending the creatures
staggering slightly. But they did not go down. Making raging fists, they attempted
futile pursuit. As they ran, more snow fell off their forms, until only angry eyeballs
chased after them.

“Figures,” grunted the hairy chemist, changing drums on his superfirer.

“What does?” demanded Ham as he watched the monsters fall behind.

“Their hair is so dang thick, the mercy bullets break against the bristles, not the
skin. The chemical dope can’t get into their bloodstreams like it’s supposed to.”

Ham said, “This explains why we failed to fell the multi-eyed group that seized the
first Emile Zirn after he parachuted from our plane.”

“Watch this,” Monk said, aiming his machine pistol at the strange patrol stranded
in the snow, glaring one-eyed fury at them.

A long burst ripped out, sounding like a deep-voiced monster burping. The hairy chemist
hosed his spitting muzzle about.

The results were comical. As if strings were cut, the floating eyeballs began dropping
in bunches. They landed in the snow, winked out.

“What ammo did you use?” wondered Long Tom.

“Anesthetic gas shells,” grinned Monk, holstering his weapon. “One whiff and they’re
out cold.”

AFTER some amazingly skillful driving on Doc’s part, they reached their plane and
Doc Savage rushed them inside. The snow had piled all about the amphibian, covering
the charred ground on which they had landed. The snow cover reminded them of the anthrax
spores of death.

“How are we gonna get off in this stuff?” Monk complained, as he slammed and locked
the cabin door.

Getting the engines turning took only seconds. Exhaust stacks coughed smoke and sparks.
Doc advanced the throttles. Props began swirling airborne snow. Then they were trundling
along as the propellers dragged the air wheels forward through treacherous drifts.
A few rods of this and the tires began dragging. Then they squealed briefly, jarred
to a halt—held fast in a high drift, motors straining.

“Tough break,” muttered Long Tom.

“I’ll say,” grumbled Monk. “We’re stuck, but good.”

Doc Savage then did an unexpected thing. He snapped a switch that caused the wheels
to retract into the boat-shaped hull. The big plane settled into the snow crust. They
could hear the drifts creak and grunt under its crushing weight.

“What good will this do?” demanded Fiana sharply.

Doc Savage jazzed the throttles, endeavoring to push the big plane forward. Surprisingly,
the craft responded. It lurched, wallowed a bit, then started gaining momentum, the
way it might on water. Momentum increased. Before they could absorb this, the amphibian
was skimming along, hull drumming beneath them.

Everyone looked to the bronze man in astonishment.

“New hull design,” Doc explained. “The front portion acts as a snowplow. The keel
is flat, waxed thoroughly to double as a long ski runner.”

Monk grinned broadly. He was looking forward to a fight; now he would get one.

Scenery rushed past in a blur. Wing-tip floats had been dropped. These also acted
like skis, keeping the wings from catching in snow banks. The tail picked up, and
they were airborne.

Only then did Monk jerk a thumb at the large container Doc had brought on board. “What’s
in that box?”

“The sight-stealing field generator.”

“You found it, huh?”

Doc nodded. “It is our last hope,” he said gravely.

DOC SAVAGE RAN the leviathan flying boat with both powerful engines pushed to their
performance limits. Often, he batted at the throttles, as if he could wring more might
from the laboring motors. His metal face was grave.

“It stands to reason that the Tazan aircraft carrying the anthrax spores would not
be flying a direct route to their target,” Doc was saying. “Egallan anti-aircraft
guns ring the frontier and every large city. We therefore have a chance of overhauling
them.”

Ham interjected, “Consadinos admitted that they are planning to hit the capital city,
Glezna—a fair distance from here.”

“We never got a good look at the kinda ships that took off back there,” admitted Monk
Mayfair from the co-pilot’s seat. “So what do we search for?”

“Given the distances involved, it stands to reason light bombers would be employed,”
Doc said, golden eyes scanning the skies.

But the night sky ahead was crammed with gyroplanes in the shape of mammoth bats.
They were dimly visible through the grimy windshield, which was still smeared with
the dark substance which consisted of octopus secretions.

Doc made explanations. “The Egallans have perfected an advanced type of gyroplane,
one capable of perfect vertical ascension and hovering in place. They built these
craft to resemble giant bats, the better to prey upon the superstitions of the Tazan
folk.”

“Why?” questioned Ham. He had found his lost sword cane. Possession of it seemed to
settle his frayed nerves. The ordinarily unflappable barrister was still shocked by
his unnerving encounter with the pseudo Countess Olga.

Doc continued, “In the caves south of here, I discovered the underground hangars for
these bat-ships. And in one cave, a substance that could explain much.”

Ham’s dark eyes glowed with interest. “What kind of substance?”

Before the bronze man could reply, three spread-winged bat-ships came wheeling out
of the lunar light to harass them.

Doc executed a flashing chandelle, then a sideslip that put the nimble whirling craft
behind him. With their underpowered pusher-type propellers, the gyroplanes were no
match for the two-motored amphibian.

Ham had brought along the strange combination teletype-typewriter machine. Long Tom
was studying it in his radio cubicle.

The dapper lawyer remarked, “If that is an Egallan apparatus, how did it get into
the hands of General Consadinos?”

“No doubt it was pilfered from Egallan secret agents in New York,” ventured Doc. “Countess
Olga—the first Emile Zirn—was conveying it back to Pristav, where he employed it to
eavesdrop on secret messages passing between Prime Minister Ocel and his operatives.”