Doc Savage: Glare of the Gorgon (The Wild Adventures of Doc Savage Book 19) (10 page)

The proprietor blinked, stammered out, “How can you be so sure?”

Doc Savage did not reply to that. Modestly, he declined to admit that he had memorized virtually every street and thoroughfare in the greater New York area. Beyond that, the big bronze fellow was familiar with streets all over the nation, and in many foreign capitals. He had only to study a printed map for a few minutes to commit the essentials to mind. Once a detail was absorbed, it was never forgotten by his amazingly agile brain.

“Please describe the man,” requested Doc.

The proprietor was not a bad painter of word pictures. He launched into his description, beginning with, “He was better than average height, I would say that he stood five foot eight high. His hair was very black. His eyes had a greenish-gray tint. Maybe you would call them hazel. He dressed like a guy who drove trucks for a living. Brown leather jacket and denim pants. Olive green hat. Paid in cash. Had the truck only two or three hours.”

“Let me examine the vehicle in question,” requested Doc.

“Sure. Glad to oblige.”

The proprietor led them out of the crowded office and into the garage proper, where they stepped around shivering dark pools where oil had dripped out of crankcases.

The truck was several years old and the license plate numbers matched the digits in the photograph.

Climbing into the cab, Doc rooted around, but found very little. The driver had left a pack of cigarettes on top of the dashboard, and Doc took this, taking care to pick it up with a clean handkerchief in order to preserve any fingerprint impressions that might be found on the package.

Stepping out, Doc examined the tires for any telltale residue, but found nothing notworthy.

“We have what we need,” he told the proprietor.

The owner blurted out, “You do? You were in there for hardly a minute.”

“Sometimes a minute,” advised the bronze man, “is sufficient.”

With that, they left the puzzled proprietor rubbing his jaw.

Once they were ensconced in the sedan and back in traffic, Ham asked Doc Savage, “What did you discover?”

“Package of cigarettes.”

Monk inserted, “Bet you five dollars the bird left his fingerprints on the package.”

Doc Savage said, “The package may be more significant than any fingerprints. This is the same brand of cigarettes discovered on the person of Ned Gamble.”

Ham asked, “So? Is it a common brand?”

“It is common to Chicago. It cannot be purchased here in New York.”

Ham said thoughtfully, “That means the assailant hails from Chicago.”

“It may mean a lot more,” commented Doc. “For there is only one cigarette missing from the package.”

Monk murmured, “Funny a guy would bring a package of his favorite smokes all the way from Chicago and leave it behind, after havin’ only one cigarette.”

“If that is in fact what happened,” said Doc. Then the bronze man lapsed into silence.

THE GROUP returned to their headquarters in short order and were soon situated back on the eighty-sixth floor.

Retreating to the great laboratory, Doc Savage gave the cellophane package a thorough dusting with fingerprint powder, then used adhesive tape to lift off the print impressions. These he studied under a compound microscope.

In the normal course of criminal investigations, fingerprint patterns are analyzed mechanically and produce amazing results. Doc did none of this.

Instead, he absorbed the whorls and ridges of the lifted fingerprints, and then went to a chest of drawers similar to the card catalog in a large library.

The bronze giant seemed to know what he was looking for. Opening one drawer, which was labeled “
G
,” he fingered through the closely-packed cards, then lifted out one in particular.

It showed a miniature mug shot of a man, and next to it examples of his fingerprints.

Doc compared the prints to the ones he had just harvested from the cigarette package.

“A match. The man who rented the truck is known as Duke Grogan.”

Ham said slowly, “Duke Grogan. I’ve heard that name somewhere.”

“Duke Grogan is a rising power in the Chicago underworld,” advised Doc.

“The underworld!” squeaked Monk. “That don’t exactly fit what’s been happenin’ around here. Since when does the mob go around puttin’ whammies on people like they hung on Ned Gamble?”

“As much as I hate to agree with this evolutionary mishap, here,” inserted Ham, “it is not like the Chicago underworld to send a hired torpedo in our direction. The consequences of failure undoubtedly would ignite the ire of Doc Savage. Chicago has been quiet since the Savoli outfit was run out of town. Why stir up the kind of trouble we could bring on their heads?”

Doc stated, “We will let the police commissioner know that Duke Grogan is in town. Perhaps they can pick him up before he leaves.”

“What makes you think he’s leavin’ town?” wondered Monk.

“The booby trap left outside the garage door was not designed to kill us, but to deliver a warning. The warning was to stay out of Chicago. Having delivered that message, Duke Grogan is certain to be on his way home before very long.”

Monk scratched his nubbin skull, muttering, “Sounds screwy to me. We never did anything to Duke or his boys.”

Ham said, “Perhaps Grogan figures it is just a matter of time before Doc got around to him.”

“I don’t buy it,” snorted Monk.

Doc Savage went over to the corner of the great laboratory where the body of Ned Gamble lay. On an adjacent table reposed the late Gamble’s personal effects. Among them was the package of cigarettes found in his pocket.

Doc took this up and shook out the cigarettes, and then did an unusual thing. He began crumpling them up, producing a pile of thin white paper and coarse tobacco. Metallic fingers sifted through the pile, but he seemed to discover nothing of significance.

Then Doc did the same with the package taken from the truck cab. This pile appeared to offer no clues, either.

Lastly, Doc picked up what remained of the cigarette Ned Gamble had been smoking when he succumbed to the strange brain-petrifying influence.

Monk watched this with popping eyes. He was getting an idea of what Doc was seeking.

The bronze man took the half-smoked cigarette, and tore it open, laying the fragments on a clean sheet of paper.

“You’re thinkin’ that cigarette he was smokin’ was doped in some way?” suggested Monk.

Doc nodded. “But it does not appear to be so. All that is discernible is tobacco. Ordinary tobacco.”

Ham’s eyes lit up. “You suspect that Duke Grogan somehow planted a doctored cigarette into Ned Gamble’s package? Is that right?”

Instead of answering directly, Doc Savage said, “Ned Gamble knew he was being followed. Since both men hailed from Chicago, there is some question whether Gamble would recognize Duke Grogan. But it seems likely Grogan contrived to insert a poisoned cigarette into Gamble’s package.”

“Wild, but not impossible,” theorized Ham.

“No, not impossible,” admitted the bronze man in a tone that was faintly puzzled. He was studying the tobacco residue; his eyes shifted over to the other piles.

Unexpectedly, Doc produced two glass slides, and inserted samples of tobacco from the partially burned cigarette and from the package carried by the unfortunate Gamble. They were placed on separate slides.

These he conveyed over to a compound microscope, and inserted one slide after the other, studying both intently.

His trilling filtered out, low and eerie, trailing off slowly, like musical air escaping from an organ pipe.

“What is it, Doc?” pressed Ham.

“The tobacco in the partially smoked cigarette is of a different brand than the two packages from Chicago. Even the grade of paper is dissimilar.”

“What does that mean?” blurted out Monk.

“It means,” said Doc, “that while we were otherwise occupied, an unknown person switched cigarettes. This could not possibly have been the cigarette Ned Gamble was smoking when he was slain.”

“Blazes!” exploded Monk. “Maybe that original cigarette was doped, after all.”

“That remains to be determined,” said Doc. “Before we solve that mystery, we must determine how that unknown individual managed to get to this floor and out again without being detected.”

Doc Savage went to a cabinet and removed from it an atomizer containing a yellowish fluid, along with a lantern notable for its very dark lens. He took these items out through the big rooms and into the corridor.

Walking up and down the hallway, the bronze man began spraying this liberally about the marble floor, which was highly polished, for it was waxed weekly.

The atomizer emitted a fluid which, when applied, reacted to the scuffed patches in the wax coating left by the tread of leather soles, producing a trail of imprints. These became vaguely visible when Doc tripped a switch on the side of the lantern. No light was produced. Not light visible to the naked eye, that is.

But the scuff marks began to glow luminously—an eerie electric blue. Doc went to a wall switch and doused the hallway lights, enabling him to study the glowing prints in greater detail.

Virtually every set of footprints came from the bank of elevators, then paraded to Doc Savage’s plain office door.

One, however, did not. These tracks led to a fire door, leading to a flight of stairs going downward through the building. This door was alarmed. But when Doc pushed it inward, the alarm did not go off.

Examining the door frame, the bronze man discovered the wires to the alarm bell had been severed, leaving frayed copper ends dangling.

The stairway was unwaxed concrete, and so the footprints did not proceed downward. But there was no question that the person who had reached the eighty-sixth floor had managed to find his way to the fire stairs, and disable the alarm on the fire door.

Switching off the ultra-violet lantern, Doc told Monk, “Bring fingerprint powder and tape.”

The hairy chemist made haste, his bandy legs carrying him back in jig time.

Doc Savage brushed the black powder liberally on doorknobs and handrails, and picked up the residue with the sticky tape. Holding the strips up to the light, he studied the fingerprints thus collected.

“Duke Grogan has been here,” he said firmly.

“Peculiar,” commented Ham. “A thug like Grogan would normally send hirelings to do his dirty work. Why would Duke take the risk himself?”

“When we catch up to him,” Doc said firmly, “we will ask Grogan.”

The bronze man’s grim tone left no doubt in the minds of his two aides that that hour was shortly at hand.

Chapter IX

THE PHONIES

LONG TOM ROBERTS returned to conscious awakening with difficulty.

His first reaction was to let out a moan of pain. His skull throbbed. It felt as if every blood vessel winding through his brain was on fire.

Long Tom had walked the trails of danger for a long time. He knew how incapacitating a skull concussion could be, so he took pains not to move until he could ascertain how seriously he was injured.

His low moaning caused a woman’s voice to say thinly, “He’s coming to.”

“That ruffian!” complained a thin, male voice. “What is to be done with him?”

“I have no wish to speak with Doc Savage, or anyone associated with him, until I know more of what happened to poor Ned,” replied the woman.

Long Tom recognized the female voice. It was Janet Falcon speaking. The man’s voice he could not immediately place. The blow on the head had left him groggy.

“Perhaps it would be best if you went into hiding,” suggested the man.

Long Tom’s memory was slowly returning. The image of a face like a gray corpse came back to him. Malcolm McLean.

Janet Falcon was saying, “I think you are right, Mr. McLean. I do not wish to involve the police. Not until I think things through.”

“I know a place where you will not be found,” said McLean. “Get your things, and come with me. You will be perfectly safe. Doc Savage and his associates will not bother you until you’re ready to speak of this tragedy.”

There followed a bustle of activity. Long Tom took stock of his surroundings. He did not open his eyes. But he could tell from the rough textures pressing on his face and hands that he was lying on the carpet.

When he opened one pale eye a crack, the light was almost blinding. He sealed it.

Deep within him, the electrical genius felt a strong urge to jump to his feet and take control of the situation. But every limb felt hollow, like empty milk bottles. His wiry strength was absent. That told Long Tom that if he sprang into action, he would be swiftly overcome. It was aggravating. He wanted to use his fists on someone.

He remembered that corpse-faced Malcolm McLean had brained him with the brass lamp. Long Tom was inclined to return the favor.

As the prone electrical wizard tested his fingers to see if they would respond to his aching brain, Malcolm McLean and Janet Falcon stepped briskly around him and exited the apartment, drawing the door shut with a click.

After that, there was an interval of silence in which Long Tom endeavored to pull himself together.

It was a slow and painful process, but before long his arms and legs were obeying his mental commands. First, the fragile-appearing electrical wizard sat up on the rug. Then he crawled over to the overstuffed horsehair chair and, with agony warping his pallid features, pulled himself up into a seated position.

The perforated cushion was anything but comfortable. That was when Long Tom remembered the peculiar gun he had stashed there. He did not feel up to excavating it now. He merely settled into the cushion, and tested his eyes against the lights.

When at last he opened them, the electrical expert saw only blackness. For a terrible moment, he thought he had lost his eyesight. Concussions can do strange things to a man.

“This is bad,” he muttered to himself. With relief, it dawned on him that the duo had switched off the lights when they left the apartment. That was all.

Long Tom felt around his person, and discovered his compact superfiring machine pistol still snug in its underarm holster.